Judge backhands Illinois for messing with gamers

Keeping with today's theme of legal wins for games...

A judge ruled that the State of Illinois has to pay the ESA $510, 528.64 in legal fees pertaining to the defense of a law banning sale of violent video games. The law was found to be unconstitutional; the judge said, "If controlling access to allegedly 'dangerous' speech is important in promoting the positive psychological development of children, in our society that role is properly accorded to parents and families, not the State."

It would have been $510,528.00 but the attorneys had Italian on the third day and sent out a paralegal for some Orbitz.

Anyways, in response to the victory, ESA president Douglas Lowenstein says, "Pwned biyatch!" Followed by jumping on top of the dead law and emoting:

"EsaBigDaddy 's rub'n my @ss on ur face!"

Ok, maybe he didn't. But damn, I wish he had. C'mon Douggy, represent your constituents!

Instead, he said, (in what was no doubt a great impression of Ben Stein):

As we said from the outset of this debacle and repeatedly since then, instead of squandering taxpayers' money on frivolous lawsuits and attempting to enact clearly unconstitutional laws, we encourage policymakers to focus their resources on a cooperative effort with industry, retailers, parent groups and health groups to work together to educate parents about the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) ratings and content descriptors, and the parental controls available in all next-generation consoles to help parents make sound choices about the games their kids play.

Like I said, pwned!!

But let's take a moment here and reflect on the real losers in this case. The children... of the lawyers. How many late nights did lil' Madison try to stay up waiting for the lights of mommy's Porsche to pull up the driveway? What about Tyler, who brought home his shiny new soccer trophy to an empty house? Yes, the children of Illinois are suffering. As mom and dad are fighting for/against the rights of video games, these kids are going without nurture time. Is an hour away from your kid really worth the $750? Will half a million dollars take away the scars of parental neglect? I don't think so. People, let's think about the kids!

via Worthplaying