To the author of the Article:
Greg, I rarely address the writers of articles here directly (though it does happen) but I just wanted to say that you might want to keep the hyperbole down a few notches. Half the point of artwork is that it inspires people, and this is especially true of books and the written word which is why throughout history those in power have feared the literacy of the masses. Two of the works you mentioned have been greatly inspirational, but in exactly the opposite way that you suggest, books like "Huck Finn" helped set the mentality that lead to equal rights, books like "Farenheight 451" did a lot to get people to be wary of the goverment doing things to control things like information and literacy. Both of those books contained powerful, and influential messages. Star Wars... not so much.
Writings of philsophers and religions teachers have had great effects throughout history, for good or ill. It's indisputable the effect that works like the Qua'ran and Bible have had throughout the world. In a more recent context books like "Mein Kamph" contained ideas and opinions that literally shook the world.
I understand where your coming from, but going so far as to disparage art and literature in such a general sense towards making a point for something like this is kind of ridiculous.
-
As far as the situation itself goes, I'll be honest in saying that I'm not paticularly fond of people using real places and situations that are ongoing this way. I thought it was touchy when someone wanted playable Taliban in a war game, but this is bringing things even closer to home and even more tasteless. I'll defend crime games, even realistic ones, set totally in the realm of fiction unto the end of the earth, but to be honest I do not think producing what amounts to propaganda for real drug cartels involved in real gang wars and killing real American and Mexican citizens right now is a paticularly good idea. It's almost like someone out there read my messages calling playable Taliban tasteless, but saying that I was enough of a supporter of free information where we shouldn't ban it outright, and then decided to see if they could come up with something even more tasteless to challenge my own personal world view.
I'll be blunt, I consider this game in the same vein as "Ethnic Cleansing", perhaps even worse in it's own way.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_Cleansing_(video_game)
What's disturbing though is that while "Ethnic Cleansing" was easy to dismiss for being a small scale, relatively underground production, this one is being released in the mainstream on an entirely differant level. This game is sort of like selling propaganda for gangs like the "Latin Kings" and the "Aryan Brotherhood", or whomever in your local store.
What's more this game very much does blur the distinction between fantasy and reality in this case by using real groups and situations. In this paticular case it's going to be a lot harder to take the "Grand Theft Auto" defense (that I use) about it being purely made up, because it's not.
In general it's getting to the point where I might have to broaden my point of view that censorship and information control is only okay in a time of war or crisis. I don't care about graphic violence, extreme sex, or any of that stuff in games. But when it gets to the point of games that effectively act as propaganda for anti-American/criminal/anti-societal groups that actually exist, then yeah I think the games need to be regulated.
I mean heck, who needs to worry about the big gangs circulating pamphlets and propaganda (it happens) when you have video game companies doing it for you?
On the other hand, understand that if they had set this game in a totally fictional city "somewhere on the border" I wouldn't have an issue with it, I'd put it in the same catagory as "Grand Theft Auto" or watching "The Sopranos". It might seem like a minor distinction, but I feel it's a VERY important one.
This is of course simply my opinion, and I know many are going to disagree with it.
