Don't the cons look like a good reason to have an R18+ category?
Aren't MA15+ games already unsuitable for 8-year olds? How is it suddenly more difficult to restrict kids' access to inappropriate games just because there is an R18 category?
Let's look at the moral and social fabric of Australia and compare it to the moral and social fabric of culturally similar countries with an 18+ (or equivalent) rating for video games? Australia is no better, and in some cases probably slightly worse, than all of those countries. So I don't think Australia has benefitted by having this particular restriction on freedom, if a restriction on freedom has had no obvious benefit then the automatic response is to let freedom reign.
Also, isn't it odd that a decision that has been made by a democratic process (i.e. voting in the federal houses of parliament and senate) can be overturned by a distinctly undemocratic process: a single censorship minister from one state disagreeing with the majority and effectively wielding the power of veto over the whole nation? The Attorney General of South Australia gets to tell the people of Queensland what they can and can't have, when Queensland's own A-G (and presumably its state govt) holds the opposite view. Very odd indeed.
In other news: emmigration from Australia to New Zealand is at its highest level in decades (true story).
“The fundamental cause of the trouble is that in the modern world the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.” - Bertrand Russell
"When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace."
Jimi Hendrix
