Australian senator tells censors: “leave games alone”

Last week the Australian Classification Board refused to grant Outlast 2 a certificate, effectively banning the game. This week, Senator David Leyonhjelm is speaking out over the ban, suggesting "video games do not hurt anybody," Leyonhjelm said, "and the Government Classification Board should leave gamers alone."

Leyonhjelm is a senator for the Liberal Democratic Party in New South Wales, and when he addressed the Senate about video games. He cited survey results that showed that 68% of Australian’s played games regularly, with gamers being of an average age of 33. Leyonhjelm cited a roughly equal gender split.

Leyonhjelm says that the problem is plain: the country’s laws are made by people who aren’t gamers and don’t understand the medium. "For example, not many senators or senior public servants would know the difference between a ghoul and an alghoul, and so would find it hard to advance in the video game known as The Witcher."

Leyonhjelm revealed that most politicians and public servants are banned from accessing popular video game sites like IGN and PC Gamer. "This is presumably because we might stumble across an image of something somebody disapproves of from a medium we don’t understand."