This is the second year that Assemblyman Leland Yee has taken on violent video games in which players can choose their weapons and hit someone with a shovel or set them on fire. Yee, a child psychologist, says the games reinforce damaging behavior.

 “These video games teach our children how to kill, how to maim, how to hurt people. Women, minorities, poor people. These are not the lessons we should be teaching our children.”

Yee says preventing sales of such video games to children under seventeen would be similar to the management of pornography, tobacco and alcohol sales. Opponents say the bill violates the first amendment, while others testified that it places an unfair burden on store owners, who could be fined if they sell the material to a minor. A similar bill last year died in its first committee.