Originally Posted By: radicaldude1234
I think military simulations should be as realistic as possible. Not just the gore and agony of those taking part, but also the collateral damage inevitably inflicted on civilians and the refugees that war causes.

Military games tend to focus on the glory of war that is distilled into a simplistic good vs evil conflict, and almost totally ignore the horrors. I know seeing bodies realistically torn apart by modern weaponry, experiencing inadvertently dropping a bomb on the wrong house, and passing columns of physically young men whose exhausted eyes look as if they've already died inside won't sell games. But it's part of the terribly terribly sad thing that is war.

I also don't think that striving to depict the true nature of human conflict diminishes the courageous deeds of those survived them. Rather, it highlights the difficulty and truly extraordinary will that it took overcome those difficulties and do something more than survive.

But that's just me.

It is well that war is so terrible, otherwise we should grow too fond of it. - Robert E. Lee


Agree. Thats the thing I noticed with media in general, it sanitizes what happens. With news you may hear for example "Israel bombed :insert thing here: and killed 6 Palestinians." But you never see say some poor father digging his 4 year old daughter out of the ruins, finding her and holding her body with her half crushed skull. All because her home may have been near a tunnel or some such. The same thing with some attack by Boko Haram or some other damn thing.

Media may document the tragedy of events, but not the sobering, brutal horror of them. Perhaps showing the horror of it may undermine some Manichean narrative, or undermine our will to use force but I think it is rather important to show. When we decide to "go to war for humanitarianism" or democracy or some other damn thing it is probably important to illustrate what exactly that entails. In each case it involves visiting brutality upon people, often enough against civilians and non-combatants, whether it is intended or not, or whether we use "smart" weapons or not. The result might be hundreds or thousands of civilians being turned into hamburger over a matter of weeks or months (if things go well). If not it may lead to tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of civilians being turned into hamburger, or executed in various ways as a result of them being a member of the wrong tribe, sect, etc over a matter of years, or decades.

Last edited by TankHunter; 04/04/14 02:25 AM.

l'Audace, toujours l'audace

I don’t have pet peeves; I have major, psychotic hatreds. - George Carlin

Even if you have a crown and sit at a throne
In the end you will have nothing
Even if you are destined for great riches
In the end you will return to the dust