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Pakistan Boycotting Call of Duty, Medal of Honor Games
An anonymous reader writes "As first-person shooters have evolved, they've transitioned from using Nazis as the bad guys to more modern organizations, such as the Taliban. Two recent games, Call of Duty: Black Ops II and Medal of Honor: Warfighter, have both shown the country of Pakistan in a very negative light, and now shopkeepers in the country are beginning to boycott the games. 'Saleem Memon, president of the All Pakistan CD, DVD, Audio Casette Traders and Manufacturers Association, said he had written to members ordering them not to stock the controversial games after receiving dozens of complaints. ... The latest installment of the Medal of Honor series opens with American Navy Seals coming ashore in Karachi docks on a mission to destroy a black market arms shipment. But when their detonation sets off a second, bigger explosion they realize they have stumbled on a much bigger terrorist plot, sparking a global manhunt. A chaotic car chase through the city follows amid warnings that the ISI — Pakistan's intelligence agency — is on the way. Mr. Memon added there was a danger children would be brainwashed into thinking foreign agents were at war inside Karachi, possibly leading them into the arms of militants. "These games show a misleading idea of what is happening in the city. You don't get the CIA all the way through Grand Theft Auto," he said.'"
Where was the most wanted terrorist hiding out again?
Would shops in the US sell a video game showing the glorious jihadis blowing up Americans get sold in the US? The "sandn****r" guy above would probably blow a gasket.
It's not a ban, it's a boycott. Turns out that people don't like games where the best the can be is set dressing for the glorification of a violent foreign power when that same power back in the real world indiscriminately sends out robots to bomb the next village on a weekly basis.
To be fair, we're not hiding bin laden at west point.
I remember playing "raid over Moscow" when I was a kid, which was a C64 game where you had to fly a bomber to the Kremlin, kill its guards, and blow it up. I suspect that it wouldn't sell well in the USSR, and that if somebody published the very same game today as "raid over Washington" replacing the Kremlin with the White House then it wouldn't sell well in the USA. People don't enjoy being offended, especially by propaganda, especially when it touches open wounds.
The United States has been at war, shooting and dropping bombs, for the better part of the last twenty years. Relatively peaceful?
Yes, relative to Pakistan, we are quite peaceful.
They have an active insurgency in their tribal region as well as a cease-fire in place with India which is currently being violated on both sides, while covertly supporting an insurgency in Afghanistan. Oh, and supporting education for girls will get you shot in the head, even if you are an eleven year old girl!
Are we peaceful?
No.
Relative to Pakistan?
Uh, yes.
So Pakistan is a country that supports terrorism you claim.
Then if for instance Iran was a major contributor to the ruling regime in Pakistan
it would be easy to conclude that Iran is supporting terrorism by supporting Pakistan.
So, since the United States is one of the biggest donor of aid to Pakistan
http://transition.usaid.gov/pk/about/budget.html
And that we have lifted the arms embargo and are presently upgrading their
F16 fighters and selling them more F16 fighters, does that count as
the US supporting terrorism, by supporting Pakistan?
I am from Pakistan, and all I can say is "LOL, a ban, haha, how cute"
This is just a storm in a teacup situation; For one, now one gives a flying fuck, and secondly, pirates CDs for 30 rupees (~30 cents) each man, if one shop doesn't, you don't think there are 100 other shops in the same damn plaza who will provide it?Besides they haven't been able to stop outright *porn*, they will do something like this? Yeah right.
Go back people, noting to see here, no one cares except some bourgeois who like to #TweetLikeABurger . Mr "Association President" just wanted the world to know that (a) He exists; and (b) Vote for me at the next association election!
This isn't even news here, I didn't even know this was an issue (For once, Slashdot provides news on time!). We are more concerned over CNG (no fuel for cars, winter heaters or stoves), or the fact that the investigator who was investigating corruption charges against our PM conveniently committed suicide (The fact that there were signs of torture, or that he had sent SMS to pals regarding him being pressurised to change evidence is obviously unrelated.)
Come on people, we are people of, what, 180 million? Most of whom can't even afford to feed them self, much less buy games. We are Hungry, cold, freezing and Immobile, not to mention without work. We have better thing to worry about, besides, no one can outdo us in cursing our nation, I am sure your games pale in comparison.
I am an ACCA student. Got a query on Accountancy/Finance? Maybe I can help!
I don't think you have to be a jihadist to worry that the U.S.'s policy for combating it is insufficiently cautious about "collateral damage". There is also a realpolitik question of whether it's actually effective: bombing the bad guys may feel good, but from a rational perspective feeling good and killing bad guys is not sufficient, and is counterproductive if you cause so much negative sentiment that you inflame anti-American sentiment among the local population, increasing terrorist groups' ability to recruit new members and find sympathetic people to shelter them. In some cases bombing works, and in other cases it does not work, and I think it's legitimate to ask whether the strategy the U.S. is currently pursuing is actually working, or is intended just to make it look like they're doing something, to please U.S. voters.
Here's a fun game you can play in which you wipe out terrorists by bombing them.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
I think you have a rather ignorant view of what's going on, which doesn't match historical record or reality. Support for jihadists in Muslim countries has waxed and waned for various reasons. It's completely sensible, if you want to have an actually fact-based policy which causes improvements, rather than a blind-faith-based policy which makes you feel like you're playing a cool videogame and killin' dem brown people, to look at which U.S. policies contribute to waxing versus waning. And I don't think the "fire-and-forget" use of drones is mainly aimed at that kind of optimization. Rather, it's aimed at getting people reelected (and this goes for whether it's Bush or Obama trying to get reelected).
In short, I think your fondness for action films, and possibly some kind of weird bigotry, is clouding your judgment, which is true of many of my countrymen, to the detriment of America's safety. But killin' dem Muslims gets American politicians elected, so they'll keep doing it even when it's dumb. Shock 'n' awe, duuuuude! Mission accomplished! It's like a bunch of you fucking frat boys are in charge; I'd rather have some adults.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10