When do violent games cross the line?

April 1st, 2008 • 2 comments Conflict, Opinion
Tags: cod4, computer-games, games, military, training, videos, violent games, youtube

I must admit that I never really got into the YouTube culture that all my friends seemed to. I liked to watch funny videos every now and then, but I can’t remember ever using YouTube for extended periods of time. So I’ve missed out on great resources such as these videos on rebels and their leaders. Through YouTube I also became aware of a disturbing blend of the reality of war and violent video games. A note, the following videos are quite disturbing and depict a helicopter gunship firing, and killing people. It’s all from the point of view of the helicopter operator and in night-vision so there is no gore, but it still is quite confronting.

This video appeared on YouTube back in May 2006.

The next video is from a recent game, Call of Duty 4, and depicts one of the actual levels in the game.

As you can see the videos are eerily similar. It is almost as if the Call of Duty 4 creators modelled this level directly on the events in the Afghanistan video.

I have been concerned for awhile about the level of violence that we accept in the video game culture, and the gratuity with which gore is displayed in video games. The videos here, however, highlight a central issue of these games that simulate war and killing. Is it really appropriate to be simulating the attacks and deaths of real people, that have actually occurred? I think there is a level of disrespect involved in profiting off and being entertained by actual acts of war.

Of course the flip side of this is a realisation that the technology of war has turned killing into something of a video game. The helicopter operator in the first video could be forgiven for not thinking much of his actions, despite the wide spread destruction his button pressing causes. This is obviously the future of war, and while it may make ‘our people’ safer, the distance between the killer and killing is also quite dangerous.

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