UK Defense Secretary Calls for Medal of Honor Ban

[chrono16]

At the hands of the Taliban, children have lost fathers and wives have lost husbands

So what exactly does the UK military do to people? Tickle them into submission?

I was just thinking that. Doesn't any country that goes to war lose Fathers and Husbands? But of course he is not talking about the Taliban as people, but as inferior. Different beliefs OH NO!! Now Im not saying that the Taliban are good, but this is asinine. America fought Russia in MW2 but you don't see Russia getting all stupid.

 

[KaiRai]

Don't you play as the Taliban, or something similar in multiplayer matches in COD4 and MW2?

Why weren't those games called to be banned? Well 2 was, but that was because of the airport thing.

Nah in MW2 its the opfor or something, the thing is its actually here its not just terrorists its a real group, and you cant blame them when people are still dying because of that group.

Yeah. I can kind of see where Liam Fox is coming from. All it needed was a name change, and none of this controversy would happen. Why not "Opfor" like on COD4? We all blatantly knew it was Iraqi insurgents, but they'd given it reasonable doubt.

Hell in MW2 you're even in Afghanistan. You fight what are very obviously Taliban, but nobody batted an eyelid. Guess the airport scene kind of outdid it though.

 

[nick_knack]

At the hands of the Taliban, children have lost fathers and wives have lost husbands

So what exactly does the UK military do to people? Tickle them into submission?

I actually thought his comment was a little sexist. Are there no women in the military?

 

[Azrael the Cat]

Jeez, you'd think the game had a level where you constantly whined about the idea of warm beer. Or complained that British/European beers were just too strong and not watery enough compared to American beers. THAT would be un-British.

 

[Devil's Due]

I doubt he'll be able to convince them to ban the game. I mean, it's not new being able to play the bad guys in multiplayer games such as nazis, invading russians, and evil aliens. Plus the last Call of Duty games have been able to play as "Op Four" and there was no problem.

 

[Sharky200]

Back in WW2 the comic books were about Super Heroes beating on the Nazis and everyone wanted to read them. This is almost the same thing only using the entertainment we have today. Its a multilayer game someone has to take the side of the bad. no one wants to play against A.I all the time it woudl get boring. But I guess EA should have expected something like that to happen.

 

[coolman9899]

Doesn't a Defense Secretary have more important things to do?

lol yeah really eh

 

[FinalHeart95]

Fox said that he found it hard to believe that anyone in the country would want to buy such an "un-British" game, and that he was shocked that anyone would think that a game where you could be the Taliban was acceptable. "At the hands of the Taliban, children have lost fathers and wives have lost husbands," he said. "I would urge retailers to show their support for our armed forces and ban this tasteless product." A spokesperson for EA said there that Medal of Honor was just a game, and merely reflected the fact that conflicts has two sides. She likened it to a game of cops and robbers, saying that somebody had to be the bad guy.

As I understand it, it would be illegal for the UK government to try to ban Medal of Honor itself, which is presumably why Fox is trying to guilt trip retailers into banning it for him. It's not hard to see why Fox is upset - EA knew [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/102650-Playable-Taliban-Wont-Push-Too-Hard-in-Medal-of-Honor] this would be controversial when it was making the game - but it's still a little sad to see an elected official respond in such a knee-jerk manner.

"Un-British"? What kind of term is that? Is something "un-british" supposed to be bad? If so, I take offense to that, being an American who clearly is not British.

Oh, and British armies have killed people in other armies. Which means that the British army caused the very same thing that he says the Taliban has done, therefore making the British army equal to the Taliban by his logic.

 

[Plurralbles]

Both parties are fucking retarded.

 

[tricky_tree]

Fox said that he found it hard to believe that anyone in the country would want to buy such an "un-British" game, and that he was shocked that anyone would think that a game where you could be the Taliban was acceptable. "At the hands of the Taliban, children have lost fathers and wives have lost husbands," he said. "I would urge retailers to show their support for our armed forces and ban this tasteless product." A spokesperson for EA said there that Medal of Honor was just a game, and merely reflected the fact that conflicts has two sides. She likened it to a game of cops and robbers, saying that somebody had to be the bad guy.

As I understand it, it would be illegal for the UK government to try to ban Medal of Honor itself, which is presumably why Fox is trying to guilt trip retailers into banning it for him. It's not hard to see why Fox is upset - EA knew [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/102650-Playable-Taliban-Wont-Push-Too-Hard-in-Medal-of-Honor] this would be controversial when it was making the game - but it's still a little sad to see an elected official respond in such a knee-jerk manner.

"Un-British"? What kind of term is that? Is something "un-british" supposed to be bad? If so, I take offense to that, being an American who clearly is not British.

Oh, and British armies have killed people in other armies. Which means that the British army caused the very same thing that he says the Taliban has done, therefore making the British army equal to the Taliban by his logic.

It's the same way that US figures use the phrase Un-American, fool. Yes the military have killed civilians, it is inevitable in a war environment, but the Taliban were lopping peoples heads off, and performing public executions for females who had even dared to look at other men, long before the invasion. Like I said, The Taliban are not some resistance movement fighting for their country.

 

[tricky_tree]

God damn... western countries are either too damn conservative or a liberal nanny state that bans anything unpleasant

ARE THERE ANY MODERATE WESTERN COUNTRIES LEFT THAT VALUE PERSONAL LIBERTIES?

umm retard england isnt in the west

*epic facepalm* Oh dear, go and look at a map, or look at the news, England, well the UK, is part of the western world.

 

[coolman9899]

okay... damn teacher is wrong then she said it's in the "east"

 

[Treblaine]

Well the UK is rapidly turning into a police state anyway... you have few civil liberties there compared to Rep of Ireland for example. Take a photo of buckingham palace on holidays... sorry that 'is or may be useful to persons or orginisations planning a terrorist attack' basically... what else... don't give all your details on a register £1000 fine... edit: no right to privacy... your home is not your castle... you cannot defend your home... basically lots of fail. Ireland > fail due to worse government (but too inept to be sinister you see...)

Times like this I feel pretty ashamed of my country.

I mean when Fox news covered this "issue" they defended the game from a reactionary and narrow minded woman ... FOX NEWS of all news networks!

Yet a high ranking government minister takes the same stance as the crazy lady who even Fox news could tell was talking bullshit. This isn't some nobody loud mouth, this is the top brass. I just know we will never see any apology, no retraction, most likely this will only embolden the reactionary censors in tabloids and government.

 

[Sharky200]

okay... damn teacher is wrong then she said it's in the "east"

not necessarily. its east from where you are. But it is in the west from other places like China.

 

[szaleniec1000]

It's the same way that US figures use the phrase Un-American, fool.

A term with a problematic history [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_McCarthy], to say the least.

Are there any westerners that value the lives of those people who serve in defense of their country? Or are you too busy eating cheetos and drinking coke to care about people who have the balls to their put their ass on the line for your ignorant benefit.

Whether you believe or not that the Afghan mission is a good one, it doesn't change the fact that the people fighting over there are doing so because they wanted to serve their country.

And guess what? The game is going to change jack shit. Nobody on either side is going to be killed as a result of someone playing a game.

 

[RUINER ACTUAL]

Does he know that the developers used actual military personnel to make the game?

Does he know how many people in the military play games like this?

Obviously not. Another example of politicians being retards.

 

[dangdiggityderek]

hahaha wow does the british government really think that the taliban was the reason for the loss of british soldiers. Hardly, most of the taliban left the country when the coalition invaded and Al Qaeda has caused much more pain for U.S. and U.K. forces. I love medal of honor and this game really should have been about war on Al Qaeda but then again I could be wrong. They did have real operators who guided the creation of the narrative for the game and none of us really know what happened during the early days of the conflict. All we have is what we see on T.V.
On the other hand, In the earlier days of the MOH series, players [online] could play on the German or the Japanese side. In my opinion, WWII was a much more destructive war than what is going on currently. The loss of life and the war atrocities were much greater. Especially with the holocaust and the pilots who the Japanese cannibalized during this time period, should make it more controversial. For some reason we let these horrors go. Why? you ask. Its because world war II ended 65 years ago. Now its half real and half legend. Soon there will be no more eye witness accounts of the war and governments of the world are not thinking about it. It's good to move on but the after effects are still here. The soldiers of our generation want to have a great patriotic war so that they can look back and say they fought in war that reshaped the world or at least something that lasted more than 3-5 days of bombing and little resistance ground assaults. It look like the gulf war in 1991 would be another great war but with the advances in modern warfare it was over in just days.
Before I get too off topic, The British government believes that playing the Taliban in multi-player, would be like mocking those who have died in the conflict. That would also mean that playing as the Germans online in the last few WWII games would be mocking our grandfathers and grand mothers. Why don't they ban WWII games. Well I answered that before and lets be brief there is no solution because war always has two sides and recently one side has been portrayed as evil. The Taliban has been seen in a dark light because of their treatment of women and hiding terrorist in their country.

 

[dangdiggityderek]

people take the idea of playing as the taliban way too seriously. Its like when MW2 had the invasion of washington D.C. everyone thought it was so unpatriotic. We have to stop worrying about whats in video games and start thinking about whats really going on in the world(politicians at least)