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GameStop Pulls Medal of Honor From Military Bases
donniebaseball23 writes "EA's Medal of Honor reboot doesn't ship until October 12, but it's already seen a fair amount of controversy thanks to the publisher's decision to allow people to play as Taliban in multiplayer. The controversy just got escalated another notch, reports IndustryGamers, as the world's biggest games retailer GameStop has decided it won't sell the title at its stores located on US military bases. The new Medal of Honor won't be advertised at these stores either. GameStop noted that they came to this decision 'out of respect for our past and present men and women in uniform.'"
I can still play as Germans in WW2 games, though? Phew. For a second there I was worried.
Do we not trust our servicemen and women to stay loyal to the US Government/Military when they play this game? Are we afraid they will decide the Taliban are a more noble cause? Are we afraid they are sitting on the fence and this game will push them to cross to the other side?
Or is the pendulum of Political Correctness just swinging even farther into the ridiculous zone?
If they really were doing this out of "respect", they'd pull the game altogether. Not that I think it should be pulled, but pulling it only from military locations makes no sense. This is just saying "If you're in the military, you can't have this game. Not yours."
Respect would be acknowledging that our men and women in uniform are adults and can decide for themselves how they want to spend their leisure time.
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We trust those men and women with automatic rifles, artillery, tanks, fighter jets, and battleships. We trust them to shoot and kill people to (in theory anyway) protect our way of life. We trust them to literally take a bullet so that people back home don't have to (again in theory at least). I think that we should give them the respect they deserve and trust them to make their own decisions about what games to buy and play. Pulling the advertisements I can agree with, maybe even putting the game behind the counter out of sight, but how can you justify making the game completely unavailable to them? But that's just my opinion.
I can see why they would do this. Being a prior Air Force member, not everybody who gets deployed, comes back the same. I do agree though, if it was truly respect they would pull the game all together. I know it is easy for non-military people to say that we should let the solders decided, but in all honestly, it could end up being very traumatic to some. PTSD doesn't show up right off the bat. I know you can play as German's in some of the WW2 games, and you can be "terrorists" in CS, but with the level of realism that games are coming to, it really could push some people over the edge.
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My point from my original post which you seem to have missed:
I think that we should give them the respect they deserve and trust them to make their own decisions about what games to buy and play.
Telling people who are risking their lives for us that they aren't emotionally stable enough to handle this game is insulting. Maybe some of them can't, but that should be their decision, not yours or mine.
What about some guy who lost his Afghan/Iraqi/Pakistan friend when US soldiers shot them? Maybe he even wasn't an soldier, but a civilian. There have been countless news about those shootings. What makes it more right to be an US soldier shooting them than being the "enemy" and shooting US soldiers? Hypocrisy at its best.
You know, they are people just like you. They have families, childhood, friends, loved ones, dreams. Don't forget that on your high horse.
Telling people who are risking their lives for us that they aren't emotionally stable enough to handle this game is insulting. Maybe some of them can't, but that should be their decision, not yours or mine.
Well, technically it should be GameStop's decision, since it's their stores. And they're deciding. But like many of the posters here you're mistaking discretion/respect for "fear of an emotional collapse."
Like, if I see you waiting on line for a movie, I am not going to just cut ahead of you. I won't do this not because I'm afraid you'll have an emotional breakdown then and there, but because it shows politeness.
... that they can't acquire the game some other way if they really wanted to.
I didn't realize "making sure computer games are readily available to soldiers" was a priority of the US military, much less a priority for a private company who themselves have the freedom to do what they want.
"We're fighting for your freedoms, just don't exercise them."
Yes, and what I'm saying is that pulling the game from your stores does not show politeness. It's a highly anticipated game that doubtless many people in the military are interested in playing, Gamestop is just saying "nope" without even asking what they think about the matter. As I said before, I could understand not putting up giant displays advertising for the game, and I can even understand putting the game behind the counter and making available by request only, I cannot understand taking that decision away soldiers themselves.
As someone below this post put it much more elegantly:
"You can't have that."
"But-"
"Because I RESPECT you!.
"Sorry, you can't buy this game here. We're showing respect for you and refusing to sell it to you."
Since there are still WWII vets around, games with Nazis should be no-go. Anything after WWI really. Of course, some people may have lost relatives in previous wars, so war games should basically be banned, out of respect.
Do they let the American soldiers in the game shoot civilians, rape young Afghanis and bomb weddings with UAVs?
Try to remember this is only a game.
I'm sure Gamestop made this decision with the general population in mind (for PR), not so much with the soldiers in mind. Also, they aren't depriving the soldiers of the game- the soldiers just have to order the game online, go off-base or receive the game as a gift. I don't see a problem here.
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You are ignoring that the Army and Air Force Exchange Services asked them to do so. That happens to be an agency of the Department of Defence and hence a part of the Government.
They also are the landlords for the stores, and hence could stop allowing gamespot to have stores at all.
So the Government asks someone to not sell something with at least an implicit implication that not obeying would have negative consequences. In what world is that not censorship?
It's not the first time they've pulled such blatant censorship either.