Video Games. - Entertainment, History Tool or War Pornography?

Video games are crafted by their makers for profit.  This is the trunk of the tree, and its roots and branches spur in many and unpredictable sequences thereafter.

War video games with children as their “target market” are promoted using well-known names of Omaha Beach and Pointe du Hoc.  These names are merely the packaging to maximise the sale of their ersatz-ware, bearing very little relationship to what really happened on those famous battlefield sites.  No doubt the manufacturers would deem otherwise by dishonestly stating that useful history lessons are being conveyed in a manner which can be absorbed by young and enquiring minds.  What dangerous and perverse clap-trap.

Real battlefields are not seen through the eyes of an individual player seeking to score points by killing others.  The real soldier does not regenerate 100 times and whose arms and legs are robotically repaired by “medical packs.”  Enemy do not fall in droves each time the hero fires his inexhaustible weapon.

What really happens in battle is the same for each side.  It is a mayhem of slaughter and only finishes when one side is dead or has surrendered.  There is no glory for the individual locked in battle – he is just desperately afraid.  The odd exception is the true psychopath, but he is very much the exception rather than the rule.  The video game hero is the psychopath who does not have the imagination to consider that what he is dealing out could, in fact, happen to him.

General George S. Patton had a word for this.  L’audace.  Audacity. In his famous speech entitled L’audace, l’audace, toujour l’audace, General Patton reproduces a page from Georges Danton’s book upon how a great leader should always push his men boldly forward into the face of a great challenge.  However, the general is the leader, not the player.

A video game is merely the transformation of this noble concept into the embodiment of an irresponsible hero.  It is the crime without the punishment, the cake with no calories, the rape without consequence.  In other words, entirely make-believe and nothing better than a dangerous toy.

Young and impressionable minds are likely to be corrupted by this war pornography in the same way real pornography can drive men towards unwholesome thought and criminal acts.  It is a dangerous and irresponsible game easily leading impressionable minds to perpetrate horrific events such as the Hungerford Massacre, the Dunblane Massacre and more lately the Cumbrian shootings.

A war video game is the product from a juvenile mind for juvenile minds.  Only in this case the creator is the trunk that spawns many derivatives.  There are those who see it for what it is – a transitory pastime – and those who take it to heart.

One must ask the question – is it worth the price?

When is a War “Right?”

What a difficult question!  Before war commences, the “cause” is the catalyst, and the terrible human death toll is subsequently reckoned upon its conclusion.

The poor soldier, his only qualification of death being his young age, fitness and country of birth.  His fate is decided and determined by the politicians, rulers or monarchy of that country.  This happens on both sides of any conflict and the ordinary soldier has no choice in the matter.  He does what he is told, or faces the consequences.

Looking back, some recent catastrophic wars have proved pointless.  World War One was about nothing at all.  The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie in Sarajevo sparked the whole thing off.  In reality, behind it all, lay decades of friction, hostility and conflict between major world powers, including Italy, France, Germany, Russia, and the British Empire, made complex by intertwined alliances and treaties.  It is a story of Militarism, Imperialism and Nationalism.

The cause of the disastrous Vietnam War was to stop the perceived threat held by America of Communism spreading out of North Vietnam into south east Asia.  Seemingly right at the time; but history concludes with the humiliating withdrawal of American forces from Saigon leading eventually to reunification of North and South Vietnam.

Millions upon millions of entirely innocent people lost their lives violently in these conflicts.  The pain and suffering was immense.  In addition was the huge destruction of property, which together with the vast and pointless waste of valuable natural resources leads one to reconsider whether war can ever be “right” or justifiable.

The cause of any war is worthy of deep study.  It is my belief that the cause of World War Two was to stop the power of evil spreading into the world by those countries not yet under its spell.  Proof, if ever required, being adequately demonstrated by the reversal of a nation of sophisticated, intelligent and democratic people into a condition of repression, fear, brutality and prejudice by the murderous Nazi regime.  The whole advance of this gargantuan idealistic cleverly driven by evil, warped propaganda and lies, masterminded by Hitler and his cronies.

World War Two was a war that was “Right”.  The tenet of any religion anywhere in the world is about the power of Good overcoming the power of evil.  World War Two, despite the heavy cost in terms of lives, property and resources was fundamentally justifiable.

The headstones to be found in Military Cemeteries throughout the world are representative of the cost of young lives.  The segregated war Cemeteries, from the American Military Cemetery at Colleville sur Mer above Omaha Beach, the British Military Cemetery at Bayeux, the Canadian Military Cemetery at Beny and the German Military Cemetery at LaCambe all depict the same indescribably sorrowful story of the deaths of men aged 18 to 25 who had their lives ripped from them.  In reality they were all the same, except they spoke different languages and had a particular country of birth.

D-Day, June 6^th 1944, Normandy, marked the beginning of the end of World War Two.  We all know the individual stories of what happened at Omaha Beach, Pointe du Hoc, Ste Mere Eglise, Pegasus Bridge and the battle for Caen.  The testament of the great numbers of pilgrims into Normandy today sparked by historical interest and media creations such as “Saving Private Ryan” and “Band of Brothers” pay tribute to those who served in that battle.

Young men are the true heroes of international conflict and we must always carry gratitude in our hearts for what they did.  For regardless of the rights or wrongs of a conflict, these men each fought with no less courage and conviction for their own side than any other soldier.  Fortunately, without the strife of those fighting under their banner of “Good” we can only imagine how we may be living our lives, if at all, today.