Welcome to my rant about Deadliest Warrior, a show where two warriors from history are pitted against each other. Now, since the Escapist is generally one of the more enlightened areas of the internet, I suspect many of you will echo my feelings that the show is awful, idiotic crap. They only compare weapons, never tactics, terrain or the intented enemies of the warriors weapons.
For example, in the Vietcong vs Waffen SS episode, does it talk about how the Vietcong were guerilla fighters, who would spring up from holes in the ground, kill you and then disappear? Nope, they just treat it as a one on one (fine, fair enough, five on five) fight to the death.
They don't even test the weapons in ways similar to how the weapons would have been used. In the recent episode Napoleon vs Washington, they clearly state that Napoleons muskets were designed for volley fire (for those in the dark, volley fire is where you have regiments of men fire the muskets, so that chances are something is hit). They then claim to simulate the volley fire with 4 men. 4! 4 is not volley fire, 20 is volley fire.
But enough about how crap the show is, I'm here to discuss it being in poor taste. I'm going to examine two episodes here, IRA vs Taliban (which has been aired) and Saddam Hussein vs Pol Pot (which has not been aired).
Now, I say that the IRA vs Taliban episode was in poor taste for a few reasons. Firstly because according to the show the IRA (Irish Republican Army, a group of terrorists trying to make Northern Ireland part of the Republic of Ireland) are "freedom fighters" fighting for "the freedom of Ireland". The show is incredibly sympathetic to them (but not to the Taliban of course) despite the fact that the IRA were terrorists, who killed innocents. You may say why worry, but I say that there is a strange amount of IRA sympathism in America already, and while people are entitled to opinions, I want people clear that the IRA are terrorists, not freedom fighters, not oppresed liberators.
The other reason is about an event that happened for a split second, but disgusted me. While watching a video of an IRA bombing (which killed civilians) the main host went, "WOW, HARDCORE!" I wonder what he did when he watched the videos of 9/11, did he say HARDCORE then? Seriously, what a moment of utter tastelessness.
Anyway, this is why I worry about Saddam Hussein (former dictator of Iraq, if you didn't know) vs Pol Pot (former dictator of the Khmer Rouge, a brutal Cambodian dictatorship, which commited genocide against it's people). The experts they get in for each side of the fight always end up very much on their fighters "team", really supporting them. And don't say they wouldn't do this with Saddam and Pol, this occured even with the friggin' Nazis. I'm also seriously concerned that we might get another, "WOW HARDCORE" moment, though I admit that's unlikely, since both these guys fought against America which forces the show to be a bit more aligned against them (that's why the Taliban didn't get as much sympathy as the IRA)
Thoughts on this? Have I been reasonable?
For example, in the Vietcong vs Waffen SS episode, does it talk about how the Vietcong were guerilla fighters, who would spring up from holes in the ground, kill you and then disappear? Nope, they just treat it as a one on one (fine, fair enough, five on five) fight to the death.
They don't even test the weapons in ways similar to how the weapons would have been used. In the recent episode Napoleon vs Washington, they clearly state that Napoleons muskets were designed for volley fire (for those in the dark, volley fire is where you have regiments of men fire the muskets, so that chances are something is hit). They then claim to simulate the volley fire with 4 men. 4! 4 is not volley fire, 20 is volley fire.
But enough about how crap the show is, I'm here to discuss it being in poor taste. I'm going to examine two episodes here, IRA vs Taliban (which has been aired) and Saddam Hussein vs Pol Pot (which has not been aired).
Now, I say that the IRA vs Taliban episode was in poor taste for a few reasons. Firstly because according to the show the IRA (Irish Republican Army, a group of terrorists trying to make Northern Ireland part of the Republic of Ireland) are "freedom fighters" fighting for "the freedom of Ireland". The show is incredibly sympathetic to them (but not to the Taliban of course) despite the fact that the IRA were terrorists, who killed innocents. You may say why worry, but I say that there is a strange amount of IRA sympathism in America already, and while people are entitled to opinions, I want people clear that the IRA are terrorists, not freedom fighters, not oppresed liberators.
The other reason is about an event that happened for a split second, but disgusted me. While watching a video of an IRA bombing (which killed civilians) the main host went, "WOW, HARDCORE!" I wonder what he did when he watched the videos of 9/11, did he say HARDCORE then? Seriously, what a moment of utter tastelessness.
Anyway, this is why I worry about Saddam Hussein (former dictator of Iraq, if you didn't know) vs Pol Pot (former dictator of the Khmer Rouge, a brutal Cambodian dictatorship, which commited genocide against it's people). The experts they get in for each side of the fight always end up very much on their fighters "team", really supporting them. And don't say they wouldn't do this with Saddam and Pol, this occured even with the friggin' Nazis. I'm also seriously concerned that we might get another, "WOW HARDCORE" moment, though I admit that's unlikely, since both these guys fought against America which forces the show to be a bit more aligned against them (that's why the Taliban didn't get as much sympathy as the IRA)
Thoughts on this? Have I been reasonable?
