Slashdot Mirror
Red Cross Condemns Misuse of Emblem In Games
Heartless Gamer writes "The British Red Cross has told GamesIndustry.biz that it hopes to work with developers to prevent the 'illegal and detrimental' misuse of the red cross emblem in videogames. From the article: 'It is important for videogame manufacturers not to use the emblem in their games, including for matters related to its humanitarian purpose, such as first aid or general medical care,' said Michael Meyer, head of international law for the British Red Cross."
In a related segment, a Red Cross spokesperson has told of plans to sue the Catholic church.
I Hate Allan
...you're next.
You say
In the article, in the upper right corner is a picture of a Red Cross truck. You know what my first thought was? Run into it and absorb it, full health!
Let's hope I never see one on the freeway.
<xml><I><am><so><damn>Web 2.0</damn></so></am></I></xml>
According to Wikipedia, "The Red Cross is an emblem which, under the Geneva Conventions, is to be placed on humanitarian and medical vehicles and buildings to protect them from military attack on the battlefield."
Seems to me the Red Cross organization doesn't have exclusive rights to the symbol.
And it's not as ridiculous as I first thought. They're not just getting uptight about their "trademark" I think they may be genuinely concerned that the symbol is used in a context that undermines their mission. After all, in a lot of games, a red cross means extra life so you can go out there and kill some more guys. The Red Cross aren't field medics, after all.
That's exactly the kind of misuse that the Red Cross is asking people to prevent. The Red Cross is a symbol of protection, not healing.
It should be put on armor packs.
Remember, these are the same fuckers that sued the Boy Scounts over a red cross on their "Emergency Preparedness" merit badge; the cross is now green, and has been since 1980.
Wow. The folks who provide humanitarian aid and save lives around the world are "fuckers."
a. They're protecting a trademark.
b. They're protecting a reputation.
c. That reputation is saving lives in an internationally lawful and humanitarian manner.
d. Their reputation is not blowing people away for any reason whatsoever, including your own troops, prisoners, etc, then getting healed up real quick to do the same thing all over again.
Na, I don't think "fuckers" is quite the word I'd use.
Now I like playing video games and I sure don't mind that the you can do things like those outlined in "d" above, but I can understand why an org like this would object to me using their symbol along the way.
TW
I'm not trying to comment on the article or poo-poo the Red Cross; I was just struck that there's a lot to learn here... as a general rule, you can be more effective in communicating with others if you choose positive approaches in preference to negative ones. Of course, it's often more costly to find those positive approaches... it can take creativity, patience, and self-denial.
-1, Too Many Layers Of Abstraction
In the U.S., the Red Cross doesn't depend on trademark law. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode18/us c_sec_18_00000706----000-.html is a special law just for them:
Whoever, whether a corporation, association or person, other than the American National Red Cross and its duly authorized employees and agents and the sanitary and hospital authorities of the armed forces of the United States, uses the emblem of the Greek red cross on a white ground, or any sign or insignia made or colored in imitation thereof or the words "Red Cross" or "Geneva Cross" or any combination of these words shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.
"Wow. The folks who provide humanitarian aid and save lives around the world"
Your point? You're giving them a pass for a wrong because they do right?
What they are doing here is wrong. I don't care who the fuck they are.
btw, I remember the Red Cross as the "charity" that sucked in millions right after 9/11, playing on people's sentimentality and care to give to the victims but first allocating most of that funding into their general coffers. Then had to be brow beaten to change their tune about allocation of that funding more specifically to projects re the 9/11 attacks.
Does the Red Cross do many and frequent good things? Yes. Does that mean that they can't be wrong? Hell no.
"are "fuckers.""
You suck a cock once, you're a cocksucker. Doesn't matter if you only did it once.
How disingenuous of you--you defend their reputation but ignore what also should be contributing to that reputation because it doesn't suit your impression of this organization.
"Now I like playing video games and I sure don't mind that the you can do things like those outlined in "d" above, but I can understand why an org like this would object to me using their symbol along the way."
This is a trademark and freedom of expression issue, not whether you "like" playing video games.
The RC should have complained about every literary story where the red cross is used. They should have complained on every past and present med kit with a fucking red plus sign on it. They should have complained when movies display the red symbol as well in their props.
They didn't.
I wonder how soon it will be before a lawsuit is forced upon certain game companies. Maybe then we'll see the real reason for this--$$$, not reputation.
The red cross also threatened legal action against the Stanford math department for "repleated and blatant use of our symbol in mathematics to convey addition".
Wow. The folks who provide humanitarian aid and save lives around the world are "fuckers."
You can do a lot of good things, and in some instances be a real fucker. In this case I think they're being complete sons of bitches, and the good they do doesn't change that. You speak as if you can't be a fucker and a saint at the same time. Sorry, but they don't cancel.
Like it or not the red cross symbol has been genericized. It's been used all over the place in games without the explicit permission of them. If they didn't like it, they should have stopped this years ago. They didn't, and now they just look like a bunch of asses.
AccountKiller
From the article:
We would be willing to work with a videogame manufacturer to produce a game which shows the emblem in its correct use, as a symbol of protection during armed conflict, and where the player is rewarded for using the emblem correctly.
It's not a matter of a trademark, it's a matter of having gamers understand what the Red Cross is and does.
At least in Australia they give us a beer for our blood :)
:D
Gets you drunk much faster
Can your karma go above being Excellent?
And yet, he is correct. In Korea and Vietnam, the enemy often targetted the medics as a direct way of ensuring the reductions of our fighting forces. As a former medic who made it out of Korea said in an interview, "that red cross on your back is nothin' more than a target for the enemy."
That was an emotional interview, too. This big old guy was in tears as he recounted how the men in his care were cut off from their evac choppers, critically wounded time and time again, and spent the nights calling out for their mamas as they lay dying. He got as many of them out of there as he could, but you could see that it really hurt him that he didn't save them all.
Army Field Medics and Navy Corpsmen will throw themselves in front of any danger, put themselves on top a gernade, take direct fire from the enemy, refuse their own medical treatment, and drown in a sinking ship all to save one more life. That is their duty, and I have never heard of even one who has done anything less than go above and beyond it. They're fucking heros. Each and every one of them.
If any of you guys are reading this, I salute you. Your job is harder than anyone has any right to ask of you. There's nothing I can say that will truly show how much appreciation I have for your jobs. So I'll just say, "Thank you." I'm glad you guys are out there watching the backs of our brothers, sisters, sons, and daughters.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
I don't know about the "battlefield" situation, but the Red Cross has to charge hospitals (then billed to patients/insurance) for the blood they draw or they wouldn't be able to provide the blood at all.
I worked in American Red Cross Blood Services for seven years (1989-1996) and the blood people donate costs a lot of money to process and distribute. Testing (infectious diseases, blood type, etc.), processing (dividing the blood into its constituent parts - red blood cells, plasma, platelets, cryoprecipitate), storage and distribution all add costs to the process. That part of the American Red Cross doesn't sell blood to make a profit but rather has to do so in order to cover the costs of the operation.
One example: The department I worked in - covering a large number of hospitals' blood needs - had 8-10 people who were responsible for the clerical side of positive test notification, checking donors against a list of "deferred" donors, etc. That's 8-10 paid employees just for "paperwork" (most of which was federally mandated/regulated), never even laying hands on the blood products; imagine how many more were necessary to actually deal with the blood physically.
There are for-profit operations that provide blood products (most notably the places where you can sell your plasma) and they often do pay people for their blood. Of course, that cost gets passed on to the hospitals/patients as well...
If I had reliable accounts of the same thing happening in the conflicts you name, I might have cited them, too. Or you could, for example, go ask Walt "Pete" Peters, who served as a Combat Medic in WWII in the 106th Div. 331st Batallion, with the 422, 423 and 424th Regiments, why he didn't wear the Red Cross insignia, or ask Albert Gentile, 84th Infantry Division, Company B, 333 Infantry, why he carried a service .45 automatic. We can't ask Leo Fratella, who was a combat medic attached to the Medical Detachment, 103rd Infantry Regiment, 43rd Division. He took part in the assault of the main Philippine Island of Luzon on January 9, 1945. On January 20th, the 103rd was attacking Japanese positions on Hill 600, near the town of Palac-Palac. Fratella was giving aid to several wounded comrades when he was killed by Japanese machine-gun fire.
But since you bring up Korea, let's look at an account from Leon Thomas, Adjutant of Military Order of the Purple Heart, Chapter 604, Bakersfield, California.:
There have been violations of the "rules of civilized warfare" as long as people have had the misconception that there can be 'civilized' warfare. And the fact that I cited the Viet Cong, Japan, and Nazi Germany as specific examples doesn't mean that the US, Britain, France, Russia, Italy, or any other participant in a war from WWII forward hasn't done the same thing. The argument was that having the Red Cross insignia in games would encurage people to shoot medics first, and that this would transfer back to the Real World -- but it was in the 'real world' decades before there were FPS shooters from which it could be transferred, so the argument was specious.
The American Red Cross was given protected use of the red cross symbol in a federal charter in 1900. It was already in popular use at that time, but so be it. Therefore it isn't likely to be the trademark law that you'll have to deal with.
http://www.redcross.org/museum/charters.html
The charter granted full legal standing to the organization and protected its right to use the red cross emblem while setting fines and punishment for misuse of the emblem and for false representation of the organization.
Otherwise, you guys would be right.
Controlling complexity is the essence of computer programming. -Brian Kernigan
Jingoism stems from a period of British history when the Empire was finally beginning to overstretch; in London, and subsequently around the country, an extremely well received song, 'By Jingo', was performed, essentially bemoaning the treachery of foreigners, nobility of British civilising Empire, and staunch support for our boys out there fighting the evil fuzzy wuzzies and smelly Russkies... By Jingo.
It refers to an innate, inaccurate, emotive patriotism that has little to do with a rational assessment of the facts, that is keyed simply around 'Us' and 'Them'. Appropriately, the original song was also justifying the support of power-politics with fairly severe humanitarian outcomes.
Jingoism is a real word with a specific meaning, context and history, all of which are appropriate here. Simply because you don't understand a word, or the precision of its usage doesn't mean its pretentious; it means that if you wish to fully understand the references an author is making you need to discover more about the words they use.
Matt