We are all war criminals

[Drin Kizael]

Or at least those of you who play Battlefield 3 and other war FPSs are...

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/ipad/six-hundred-million-gamers-could-be-war-criminals-red-cross-says/story-fn6bqpju-1226216867843


The Red Cross said if it finds the [Geneva] conventions have been violated, they may ask game developers to conform to international laws or encourage governments to create laws that regulate the gaming industry.
Thankfully there is a voice of reason right after that asinine statement.


But international law professor at the University of New South Wales Tony Billingsley told news.com.au the Red Cross risked trivialising the conventions of warfare.
Is there REALLY a measurable percentage of FPS gamers who can't separate fantasy from reality??

[Drin Kizael]

It won't let me edit my typo in the subject line. =(

Edit: Thank you Ms. Moderator. ^_^

[Dasquian Belargic]

Stories about the evils of video games are ten a penny, but this is just taking it to a new level of idiocy. Is the Red Cross defending the rights of pixels now? Are they just worried about games that depict violence in a real world setting, or are fantasy settings covered too? There's been a war raging across Azeroth for years now... won't someone please think of the Orc children!

[Droo]

It's good to know those donations are being put to good use.

[Morgan Evanar]

It was announced shortly thereafter that this was bullshit.

http://www.itworld.com/application-management/232085/red-cross-vows-not-prosecute-players-violent-video-games

[Crusader]

The group does want to "work" with video-game developers to teach them about international humanitarian law, however, because some of the same companies that make war games for consumers also make them as training aids for the armies of various countries, including the United States.

This is something I must admit I have to agree with. Soldiers play in their free time call of duty too and in most cases we talk about less educated people than we are around the age of 20 and in cod they learn that it is cool to shoot enemy combatants while they are sleeping and even worse stuff.

Always keep in mind that there is indeed statistic proof that the use of seat belts in America went up significantly once American filmstars and directors were asked to fasten the seat belts on screen in movies and TV shows.

Not so long ago someone in the US goverment under the Bush legislation said why should the public do not want their soldiers to torture terrorists if they love a TV show like 24.

Sure I am a hypocrat here since I like games like Hitman or Kane and Lynch and I am a fan of Inglorious Basterds but in none of those games and films are the heroes glorified like in those popular war games.

[Droo]

Soldiers play in their free time call of duty too and in most cases we talk about less educated people than we are around the age of 20 and in cod they learn that it is cool to shoot enemy combatants while they are sleeping and even worse stuff

I have to disagree with you here. I've played every Call of Duty game on the PC and never once have I felt I've been taught something about the morality and ethics of combat, it's simply not a learning experience, outside of learning the names of weapons, vehicles, and locations you've never heard of before. This is all down to each individual, and the fact that more people started using seatbelts in cars after film stars started doing so in movies says more, if anything at all, about the western world's sad obsession with celebrity than it does anything else.

No, I don't think we should censor works of fiction to cater for idiocy. It is not the responsibility of video games developers to train our armed forces, and if our soldiers were truly being influenced by the ridiculous action setpieces of the Modern Warfare franchise, then perhaps its time stricter screening methods were introduced into the military. Honestly, it's absurd that such a discussion was approached in the first place.

[Crusader]

I do not say that they should censor anything. I just said that I agree with the statement from the quote because I see a moral responsebility here.

My point is that there are people consuming these products that might one day end up in a similar situation (with less random helicopters falling out of the sky).

No one ever used a seatbelt because they thought celebrity A does it so should I. Their subconscious got reprogrammed by seeing the routine over and over again and this might happen with soldiers that see war crimes that are not adressed as such over and over again.

This is not one of those ridiculous discussion about "Do video games turn us all into serial killers?" This is a discussion about decency and responsebility since there is no NC-17 or XXX rating for video games in America.

[Droo]

But by that reckoning, the only way to deal with such subconscious reprogramming would to either censor the material or prevent soldiers from accessing it, and I know which of the two is more probable. It is a nanny state mentality, in my opinion, and if a soldier's training isn't good enough to combat the influence of a violent computer game then something needs to be done about the training, not the game. And I'm afraid this talk of subconscious programming does fall into the category of ridiculous serial-killers-from-video-games territory, because it suggests that we are negatively influenced by the content beyond our control, and I feel that is too black-and-white a stance to take on the matter. By the same stretch, it unwittingly becomes the foundation for the absurd argument that all consumer material, be it radio, television, film, or video games, should adopt a mantle of moral responsibility and thereby produce nothing but wholesome content in order to positively influence the masses. It's the danger of these sort of censorship arguments, of which I am not suggesting you are in favour, because when you hold them up to their own standards, their logic simply snowballs into the realms of lunacy.

I agree with you about the rating for video games in America, if that's the case then there really should be an argument made to introduce an NC-17/18+ equivalent rating - it's just common sense.

[Park Kraken]

This is not one of those ridiculous discussion about "Do video games turn us all into serial killers?" This is a discussion about decency and responsebility since there is no NC-17 or XXX rating for video games in America.

Actually there is, to an limited extent. Outright Pornographic Video Games have been given an NC-17 rating, and I've read where some of the GTA games have come close to being given that rating as well. <!-- / message -->

[Xel-Naga]

I believe you are referring to the notorious and rarely seen "Adult" rating, as used by ESRB. According to Wikipedia there have only been 23 titles that have ever been given the rating and kept it, while games like the aforementioned Grand Theft Auto: San Andres was given the rating but it was dropped due to content being removed/changed.

I really don't think the ESRB system needs any changes. The levels or rating at fairly solid. Any issues stems from people not paying attention to the ratings. Anyone who has worked in a retail store that sells video games has dealt with at least one of those customers that bought a game for their kid, ignored the rating, sometimes even ignored an employee telling explaining the rating to them, and then returned the game once they realized their kid was playing a violent video full of obscenities and/or sexual content. I do realize that video game rating is different in other countries and that the ESRB only applies to North America.

Back to the subject at hand. I really don't think anyone is going to manage any kind of censorship or change. People seem to think that the Video Game Industry is small potatoes and that it can be pushed around, with characters like Jack Thompson thinking they can single handedly take down the industry, and no amount of zealous focus ever got him anywhere but disbarred. Sure, it's probably not the best thing ever that our entire nation is super hung up on violent video games and I'm sure it has some negative results if a person got into a situation that reflected something in a game they played. A lot of people had never fired guns, but I bet a avid Call of Duty player would be able to figure one out pretty quickly based on what he's played. Does that make him a psycho killer? No. Of course not. People are always so quick to draw video games and murder together. I remember the Viginia Tech shooting and everyone was flipping out because the shooter played Counter-Strike or something. Could carelessly playing violent video games lead a soldier to commit actions he might not otherwise commit? Sure. I could see that, but as Droo pointed out it should be the job of the soldiers trainers to weed out that kind of impulse during the training phase. It should not be the video game industry's fault. I'm not saying they should go jump on the military now. People have such a tendency to blame video games if the possibility presents itself.

Also, can I put "War Criminal" on my resume?