Gamers 4 Croydon will be in Adelaide over the next few days attempting to sign up more people to reach the 150 required to officially register the party.

Dates and locations sourced from http://www.gamers4croydon.org/

Friday the 4th, between 5:30pm and 7pm, Gamers4Croydon will be signing people up to the party, again at the Rundle Mall’s balls.

Friday the 4th, sometime after 7pm and until at least 11pm, Gamers4Croydon will be at StreetGeek LAN at the Colonel Light Gardens Uniting Church to get more signatures of keen R18+ advocates.

Saturday the 5th, between 11:30am and 12:30pm, Gamers4Croydon will be signing people up to the party outside the Intencity arcade inside Marion Shopping Centre (right next to the cinemas on the top level).

Saturday the 5th, between 2pm and 5pm, Gamers4Croydon will be attending Valhalla LAN at the St Clair Recreation Centre to ensure that we are well and truly over the 150 electors target.

The Treat Us Like Adults Rally is also being held in Brisbane on the Saturday 5th of December at 11am, King George Square.

Treat Us Like Adults!

We have added an Events Calendar to the Grow up Australia site to allow people to keep track of any activities they may wish to participate in. Anyone who is planing an event or knows about one please email events@growupaustralia.com with the appropriate details including a short description, event URL and event dates.

The latest event added to the calendar is the Treat Us Like Adults Rally in Brisbane planned for the 5^th of December.  The Treat Us Like Adults Rally is being organised by Ethan Watson a game programmer. Ethan hopes the rally will reach gamers who don’t engage with the online gaming community.

Interestingly Ethan also supports the introduction of an X18+ rating for games to deal with games that only contain sexually explicit content. Films rated X18+ in Australia are only legally available in the ACT or Northern Territory.

In addition to the Event Calendar we have also added a number of Grow up Australia badges that people can add to their blog or website. Don’t forget to link the badge to our site!

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Aussie Gamers all around the country are preparing to take to the streets this Saturday to protest the lack of an R18+ rating for video games in Australia

Left 4 R18+ Rally organizer Nick ‘Enigma’ Gipson is asking people to raise awareness in a non-violent way and while he is expecting a good turnout this Saturday he is hoping for this rally to pave the way for even bigger ones later on.

Protesters are being asked to hand out this flier and to make these 4 demands on the day:

1. Remove Michael Atkinson from the R18+ decision!
2. Release the R18+ discussion paper!
3. Let the public vote for whether or not the R18+ should be brought in!
4. Make Attorneys-General decisions pass with a majority vote rather than an unanimous one!

The rally will be held at each states Attorney-General office. It will begin on Saturday the 21st of November at 11am and finish at 5pm.

Left 4 R18+ Rally Poster

We have just been informed via a Facebook message that Nick ‘Enigma’ Gipson who is organizing a nationwide R18+ for games rally has received a reply to an email he sent to Margaret Pomeranz.

Dear Nick,

I would very much like to have supported you in the protest but unfortunately I am committed elsewhere on that day.  Can I ask why you’re doing it on a Saturday?  AG’s are unlikely to be in their offices.  I imagine it’s because you are all working but surely a lunch-time protest would mean more people around, including AG’s. I have the Annual General Meeting of Watch on Censorship coming up this weekend and I’ll bring the matter up with them, see if there’s anything we can do.  The hard head on this is the South Australian AG Michael Atkinson.  I believe all the other states voted in favour of an R-rating for video games, based on the report recommendations of the OFLC.  Bob Debus was the AG of NSW then.  He’s now in Federal Parliament and I believe retiring at the next election.  He may be worthwhile contacting before he goes, he knows the system and may be able to give you advice.  But while one AG has the power of veto it’s going to be a long hard road to achieve anything.  The frustrating thing is being in a position where one state – South Australia – has the power to determine the situation for all of Australia.  Not democratic at all.

I wish you luck.  I think you have right on your side.

I’ll be in touch if WoC can do anything to help.  Just sorry I can’t on the day.

Regards,

Margaret Pomeranz

Margaret Pomeranz was also recently interviewed by Byteside.

For information about Nick’s rally visit:  http://left4r18.xtremenetworkonline.com/

A big thank you to Peta for having Aaron on SkidRow radio to talk about an R18 rating for video games.

Be sure to visit the reddit page (mentioned by Peta) to post your comments for next weeks show.