yongrel
06-05-2008, 06:50 AM
Former Supreme Court justice helping develop a video game
http://www.stltoday.com/blogzone/the-game-guy/the-game-guy/2008/06/former-supreme-court-justice-helping-develop-a-video-game/
Sandra Day O’Connor thinks courts and judges are getting a bum rap. So she’s trying to develop a video game that gives our justice system a little … well, justice.
Yes, that Sandra Day O’Connor — the same one who made history by becoming the first woman on the U.S. Supreme Court in 1981. She stepped off the bench two years ago.
Specifically, she’s worried that the term “activist” when applied to judges is misconstrued largely thanks to politicians, pundits and religious zealots who insist that anyone who wears a black robe gets to wield their authority arbitrarily.
She blames this on widespread lack of knowledge about America’s legal system.
“Only one-third of Americans can name the three branches of government,” she said at a gaming gathering in New York on Wednesday. “But two-thirds can name a judge on ‘American Idol.’”
O’Connor was speaking at the fifth annual Games for Change Festival, a convocation designed to raise awareness and support for games that deal with social issues. She decried the popular notion that judges are by nature partisan and secular — a misguided view she says that even Congress and the White House are guilty of propagating.
“We hear a great deal about judges who are activists — godless, secular humanists trying to impose their will on the rest of us,” O’Connor said, according to Reuters news service. “Now I always thought an activist judge was one who got up in the morning and went to work.”
The result of this and other groundless criticisms is that judges find it more difficult to do their jobs, because they’re constantly dividing their time between the law and battling real bias from their accusers, she said.
So, O’Connor is doing her part to change perceptions by helping develop a game called “Our Courts,” what she describes as an “online, interactive civic education project for seventh- and eighth-graders.” The “Our Courts” project tries to employ the greatest tool against ignorance: education.
“Our Courts” employs real legal issues on matters such as the First Amendment and civil rights to explain the courts’ purpose and how they work. The game is intended to either supplement a classroom civics project or serve as the basis for a separate core curriculum and lets students “step into the shoes of a judge, a legislator, an executive … teach them how to think through and analyze problems, take action and voice opinions to their elected representatives.”
And because young people today spend so much time online, the Internet is the perfect venue for this project, she explained. A portion of “Our Courts” will function independent of the classroom for students to explore on their own, wherever and whenever they go online.
“If we can capture just a little bit of that time” spent with technology “to get them thinking about government and civic engagement … that’s a huge step in the right direction,” O’Connor told Reuters.
“Our Courts is expected to go live sometime in September.
http://www.stltoday.com/blogzone/the-game-guy/the-game-guy/2008/06/former-supreme-court-justice-helping-develop-a-video-game/
Sandra Day O’Connor thinks courts and judges are getting a bum rap. So she’s trying to develop a video game that gives our justice system a little … well, justice.
Yes, that Sandra Day O’Connor — the same one who made history by becoming the first woman on the U.S. Supreme Court in 1981. She stepped off the bench two years ago.
Specifically, she’s worried that the term “activist” when applied to judges is misconstrued largely thanks to politicians, pundits and religious zealots who insist that anyone who wears a black robe gets to wield their authority arbitrarily.
She blames this on widespread lack of knowledge about America’s legal system.
“Only one-third of Americans can name the three branches of government,” she said at a gaming gathering in New York on Wednesday. “But two-thirds can name a judge on ‘American Idol.’”
O’Connor was speaking at the fifth annual Games for Change Festival, a convocation designed to raise awareness and support for games that deal with social issues. She decried the popular notion that judges are by nature partisan and secular — a misguided view she says that even Congress and the White House are guilty of propagating.
“We hear a great deal about judges who are activists — godless, secular humanists trying to impose their will on the rest of us,” O’Connor said, according to Reuters news service. “Now I always thought an activist judge was one who got up in the morning and went to work.”
The result of this and other groundless criticisms is that judges find it more difficult to do their jobs, because they’re constantly dividing their time between the law and battling real bias from their accusers, she said.
So, O’Connor is doing her part to change perceptions by helping develop a game called “Our Courts,” what she describes as an “online, interactive civic education project for seventh- and eighth-graders.” The “Our Courts” project tries to employ the greatest tool against ignorance: education.
“Our Courts” employs real legal issues on matters such as the First Amendment and civil rights to explain the courts’ purpose and how they work. The game is intended to either supplement a classroom civics project or serve as the basis for a separate core curriculum and lets students “step into the shoes of a judge, a legislator, an executive … teach them how to think through and analyze problems, take action and voice opinions to their elected representatives.”
And because young people today spend so much time online, the Internet is the perfect venue for this project, she explained. A portion of “Our Courts” will function independent of the classroom for students to explore on their own, wherever and whenever they go online.
“If we can capture just a little bit of that time” spent with technology “to get them thinking about government and civic engagement … that’s a huge step in the right direction,” O’Connor told Reuters.
“Our Courts is expected to go live sometime in September.