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Original post by Trapper Zoid
I think the key point they were trying to raise was in this quote:
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It noted that, even though most players would never become real world combatants, the games could influence what people believe war is like and how soldiers conduct themselves in the real world.
It said games were sending an "erroneous" message that conflicts were waged without limits or that anything was acceptable in counter-terrorism operations.
"This is especially problematic in view of today's reality," said the study.
In particular, it said, few games it studied reflected the fact that those who "violate international humanitarian law end up as war criminals, not as winners".
In other words, it's raising the question as to whether overexposure to fictional stories where violation of human rights is seen as neutral or even heroic will make people apathetic or even encouraging to violations in real life.
At the moment, all this study does is act as a talking point for whether it could be a problem. To get a better understanding of this, they'd need to actually test gamers for their opinions, such as handing a few study groups a questionnaire and gauging their tolerance to human rights violations.
I'm not sure their argument is without merit. While I think people are generally able to tell fantasy from reality, I suspect that some of the meta aspects of the fantasy creeps into people's perception of how the world acts, like how people might expect hospitals to act like a medical show, or courts to act like a law show. I'd like to hope people don't take hints on human rights violations from action stories in media, but when some people seem to genuinely hold up Jack Bauer from 24 as a model for how the government should act, you've got to wonder...
I started thinking about Jack Bauer in your first paragraph. The highest level people in the Bush administration thought that show was a how-to guide for interrogation...
I think the headline from the BBC is alarmist. I think these studies provide insight into human imagination and behavior, but they aren't worth the freak out.
When it comes to games that aspire towards realism, if the protagonists are supposed to be the "good guys", supposed to represent legitimate use of force, then they had better be held to account when they massacre civilians. If that means that gamers flock to playing "Rogue Commando" or "Bad Lieutenant" instead so be it. And if they really want to make such games realistic, they could introduce the possibility of cover up, where higher ups cover up the crimes of Rogue Commando etc. Forcing a player to submit to investigation or participate in a cover up -- to the extent it diverts the player from playing -- could serve the game as a disincentive to massacring civilians.
"I thought what I'd do was, I'd pretend I was one of those deaf-mutes." - the Laughing Man
