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Video Games As Propaganda
SharkLaser writes "A video game developer working for Kuma Reality Games has admitted that the company has been receiving money from the CIA to design and freely distribute special movies and games with the aim of manipulating public opinion in the Middle East. Amir Mizra Hekmati, a former U.S. Marine, moved to work for Kuma after working for DARPA and has said the goal of the company was to convince people that whatever the U.S. does in other countries is a good measure. Kuma officials have declined to comment, while Hekmati himself is locked in Iran. The United States government has demanded the release of Hekmati, but Iran has sentenced him to death for spying, which he confessed to."
Seriously, all of the "evidence" in this case comes from the man's forced confession. Given Iran's record on human rights, he was most likely tortured into confessing. Why on Earth is this being reported as fact?
This guy is in prison in Iran. This would not be the first time that a regime has coerced people to say things that aren't true and to sign false confessions. The US has in the last decade done it also. In the US, even when there is no torture, false confessions can be extracted even in murder cases- http://www.innocenceproject.org/understand/False-Confessions.php. It wouldn't surprise me at all if this sort of program really did exist, but the fact that someone in Iranian custody confessed to it isn't good evidence for the claim.
They actually discussed this on NPR earlier. When applying to enter the country, he told them about his military history and asked if it would be ok. Telling Iran that you were formerly in the US army is not the kind of thing you would do if you were an actual spy.
Not to say entering Iran and telling them you used to be in the military is a good idea.
Hekmati "admitted" this while he was in Iranian custody - as reported by the Tehran Times. Given the history of the Iranian regime (they seem to arrest people for spying for Israel or the US every couple of weeks) I think we should take this with a grain of salt. Considering that making video games and infiltrating a foreign country require completely different skill sets, I find it hard to believe that the CIA would send their video game developer deep into Iranian territory. (According to the NY Times, he was visiting his Iranian grandparents.)
I'm pretty sure making pro-American video games is better than invading and occupying countries for decades at a time. I am 100% in favor of military-sponsored video games replacing our current military strategies.
Shouldn't the text be something along the lines of "An American that was visiting his family in Iran who has been sentenced to death by a Sharia court for spying on behalf of the CIA has also claimed in the same prepared statement that he was a video game developer who made games for the CIA, even though there don't seem to be more than a single game that would align itself with Western interests." I mean, let's face it. Trusting Fars (a semi-official Iranian news agency)...these guys have backed their President's view that the Holocaust didn't happen, for Christ's sake...is NOT exactly relying on an unbiased source. For Fars to complain about propaganda is like the pot calling kettle black.
For your security, this post has been encrypted with ROT-13, twice.
So you want to kill some random person because of his nationality if his nation does something bad? Do you think that killing of Iraqi civilians justifies the killing of American civilians? Retribution may feel good. But it accomplishes very little. At the end of the day, when you kill someone you are killing someone's son or daughter. You are killing someone' mother or father. You are killing a fellow human being.
...as sympathetic as I am to the guy, since he was there to see his grandmother, he's going to have a hell of a time persuading anyone he was not working for the CIA if indeed the CIA was funding the company he worked for, and that he was aware the company was involved in psy ops*. Doesn't matter if the company wasn't part of the CIA, we know the CIA runs companies as fronts (from previous CIA scandals) and since the CIA would have to be incredibly stupid to reveal all the companies that were fronts.
Iran, therefore, is in a difficult position. The guy is essentially being paid CIA money for carrying out CIA-commissioned tasks, which is not going to go down well there no matter what. Psy ops also require some form of feedback - you can't manipulate in a vaccuum, which is a major factor in North Korea's isolation - and that means feet on the ground at some point. It must have been obvious to everyone involved (except for the poor guy involved) as to what would happen next.
I honestly doubt he really is a spy, they're generally not stupid enough to be that obvious, but I do believe he's "collateral damage" that the US considers wholly acceptable for intelligence-gathering purposes.**
*Manipulating the perception of another, rather than giving them information and free choice, is a "psychological operation" of the kind believed to be used in covert ops. Doesn't matter if it's merely the opinion of a boss or the opinion of a sponsor that's being expressed, with no military or intelligence involvement at all, it is still a psy op because it is still about manipulation and not choice. Had I not put in an explanation, but relied entirely on emotive description, that would also be psy op/manipulation. Because I am stating what is meant and why the choice of words, there is information and therefore freedom of choice and therefore it is not manipulative.
**Intelligence gathering will always involve collateral damage. You can't avoid it. Totally innocent people will inevitably be sacrificed, which is why this idea that you control your destiny is such a laugh. All nations gather intelligence from all nations (themselves as much as anyone else), all nations need to at this point in history, and therefore all nations will have wholly innocent victims. The British have been investigating a whole host of scandals and "collateral damage" from internal investigation by the police recently, after a couple of undercover operatives defected to the organizations they were spying on and blew the lid on some very shady dealings.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
He admitted to being a spy. Capture and possible execution is part of the job.
If I imprison you, torture you, and threaten your family, I'm pretty sure I can get you to admit to being a spy. Doesn't mean you are one. I didn't realize imprisonment and execution as a political propaganda tool came along with simply visiting family.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
Actually, the phrase "eye for an eye" carried an original meaning of a call for just punishment which suited the crime rather than excessive or retributive punishment. That is, it was meant "only an eye for an eye" instead of "a life for an eye". This "Chicago way" of escalating responses leads to conflict, and that's not the goal of criminal justice.
In our modern times, "one death for one death" is generally excessive, especially if it's "death of an innocent for death of a 'spy'".
The road to tyranny has always been paved with claims of necessity.
we see how well it is working for israel. if not for the inordinate amounts of american taxpayers' money they have been gulping since their founding, they would have been overrun by 10-12 nations decades ago.
stupidity. priceless.
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If he's the kind of spy who is paid by the CIA to create and distribute propaganda material (in this case, video games) to subvert a country's government, that might be exactly the kind of spy who doesn't get much interrogation training.
Is the person stationed at a US Embassy abroad who goes to all the elite social dinners with various parties of state and covertly sends intel reports back to the CIA a spy? Most would say yes.
Is the Iranian former-marine helping develop propaganda for Iranian consumption under contract with the CIA a spy?
I don't think you'd say he's definitely NOT a spy...
Death seems a bit extreme however. Deportation would seem more appropriate. And hopefully this is all just a bunch of diplomatic posturing and deportation in exchange for some other consideration is what this comes out to.
paintball
Torture does NOT get "intel".
Torture gets CONFESSIONS.
This guy confessed to being a CIA spy working in Iran. By your "logic", they "confirmed" the "intel" they had on him.
The same as our people did with the people we tortured.
Which is the reason why we should NEVER use torture. It does NOT work in gathering accurate information and it DOES cloud the issue of who actually did what, when, where and why.
Confessions are ONLY useful in propaganda.
No. Once you resort to torture you have given up on getting accurate information and you're just looking for a confession or revenge.
Maintaining a healthy economy requires killing to keep industry demand and r&d working at a healthy pace. That is especially important for the American economy, since it is dominated by defense contracting work (inputs and processing, including subcontractors, etc.). Also, keep in mind that the government is similar to a company, except it is much more conservative. Companies are unable to last much longer than 100 years, however, governments have a goal of stability that should last longer than 2-3 generations, but the only type of government bankruptcy is facilitated with war. So wars help to eliminate problematic governments, reducing the competition for natural resources, helping to expand the ruling elite and further suppresses the working class (middle/low classes), which means wars help to maintain order and reduce freedom. In culture that focuses on personal desires, rather than the desires of the community, war just seems like a naturally necessary occurrence to help support the class structure (i.e., the ruling elite).
He admitted to being a spy. Capture and possible execution is part of the job.
If I imprison you, torture you, and threaten your family, I'm pretty sure I can get you to admit to being a spy. Doesn't mean you are one. I didn't realize imprisonment and execution as a political propaganda tool came along with simply visiting family.
I think it's hilarious to hear Americans complain about this practice. I suppose all the confessions that were elicited at Guantánamo Bay are completely different, and totally legit(tm).
If the enemy thinks the same way, as retribution they'll kill 100 of you. Which will be followed by you killing 1000 of them, them killing 10000 of you, you killing 100000 of them, them killing a million of you, ... in the end, it won't matter any more who runs out of people to kill first.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Or he complains about both. Do you agree with everything the government of your country does? I know I don't.
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Ding ding ding! We have a winner! We've got someone suggesting genocide in just three comments!
You, sir, are everything that has ever been wrong with the world. Have a cigar.
I mean, look , torture was refined and intel gotten in the middle age, they even had a lot of forged instrument SPECIFICALLY for torture, and a whole book as "how to torture for dummy". And they found witch aplenty. That alone should tell you a LOT about torture. I assume you might be american and holding tightly onto the impression that torture is Ok in some case, otherwise you would have to admit that your country is indeed as bad as some of the less enlightened one.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
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