News MOH changes Taliban to Opposing Force

Which rich corporates are these? And who is controlling the puppet governments? Are aliens involved?

There are good arguments from both camps both regarding the war in Afghanistan and this specific issue, there is no need to reach in to the realms of lunacy and conspiracy theory.

 

I really don't care who's called what, all I care about is whether it's a good game or not.

 

^ This!

a moral victory i guess for those who were actually bothered by what they were called in game :/

 

They were considering several options.
"Liberation Forces" vs "Opposing to be liberated Forces"
"Jesus an pals" vs "Satan worshippers"
"Normal Peoples" vs "Goat lovers"
"Good Guys" vs "Bad people"
"Predators" vs "Aliens"

 

+rep
They should have gone with "Jesus an pals" vs "Goat lovers". Would have made me lol.

 

That's a text book Press Statement right there! Right before the Open BETA for Medal of Honor starts! To be fair EA have probably made the right decision there. They've changed literally nothing in the game and it's good publicity!

 

Right, well, anyone else think it's time we start pushing to get the Taliban referred to as "Opposing Force" in real life? That should hopefully show people that it's only a name change - something as superficial as a dozen letters. At the end of the day, we'll still be in Afghanistan, firing guns into Afghan resistance warriors, and dying occasionally.

This doesn't change a thing.

 

Using the word Taliban for a team name is in bad taste, not only for grieving families (on both sides) but for the general public who are being programmed into this ‘USA = good, Taliban = bad’ culture without knowing all of the facts. IMO video games should be kept separate from real world events as sensitive as this, be that Taliban, Nazi's or whatever historical ‘opposition’ you care to name. Call it glorification, advocating or just a team name, it’s in bad taste period hence EA’s decision to make changes.

Actually, I find his statement contradictory. He tells us how disgusted he is that we can play a game from the perspective of "the other side" but then goes on to burn "our side" in anti-neocapitalist effigy.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for neocapitalist burning (in effigy or otherwise) but given the historical origin of the Taliban and the way they came to power in the first place, we should really be removing references to the United States from all our games instead. They may have done the whole world a favour by supporting Afghanistan in it's resistance of Red Communism, but DAMN did they pooch-screw the end-game in that one, hence today's situation.[/QUOTE]

‘anti-neocapitalist effigy’? lol Sorry you must have me misunderstood, it was a simple comment on the ties between government and business where corporations, conglomerates, and/or government entities with private components, control the direction and governance of a country and/or warfare. I am disgusted that EA feel it necessary to even consider having a USA vs Taliban situation in a video game, regardless of which ‘side’ you choose.

“There are good arguments from both camps both regarding the war in Afghanistan”... Like oil maybe? Weapons contracts? Do some research kiddo, fact and lunacy are two very different things.

 

Personally I'm against the change, simply because it's so one-sided. If they change the name of one, they should change the others too; All this change says is that they support the wishes of certain Americans and NOT the wishes of anyone else.

Compared to the Americans who objected, there are probably as many people in the world (if not more) who have had their friends or family killed by American soldiers and who would support the Taliban, but their voices don't get heard since they aren't the target market for the game.

 

How long before the government consists of a bunch of jumped up activists that will argue anything remotely connected to the authorities of the land and the head of state is pushing herbal remedies from No.10, seriously?

 

While I don't care much about the name change, or all the political ranting above, I do wish they hadn't chosen a name so generic. Hearing and seeing "the Opposing Force" in place of "the Taliban" or any other name all throughout the campaign is going to seem really forced and break the immersion a bit

 

One of the facets of neocapitalism goes further than normal every day capitalism by suggesting that pretty much every function of government short of law making and diplomacy should be out-sourced to private entities for a profit. A lot of the US Army's functions were outsourced - mundane stuff like catering and warehousing and logistics as well as hiring mercs to do some of the fighting - and then a reason was conjured out of thin air to have a war in Iraq to make sure they turned a profit on the scheme. They even outsourced all the "humanitarian" rebuilding work afterward. It was then subcontracted so the corporations awarded the contracts did nothing but swipe a big chunk of the money on it's way past. And the sub-contractors hired sub-sub-contractors and took their cut, etc etc, until about 50% of the rebuilding money was misappropriated.

Politicians lying to the electorate and killing a whole lot of people to reinforce an economic standpoint and make a bunch of money for their political allies in industry - that's neocapitalism at work. Yeah, I get exactly what you were talking about.

Afghanistan was the only country that defeated communist Russia's aggressive expansion plans, thanks to covert military aid paid for by America and (IIRC) Saudi Arabia (or Egypt, can't remember which). America refused to send Afghanistan any reconstruction aid after the war*, even though the Afghans had effectively just defeated America's enemies for them at the cost of a large proportion of their adult population, the leveling of their cities and a variety of other atrocities. The Mujahideen, the only Afghans who knew America was involved due to their training by the CIA, took this pretty personally. They were the only disciplined fighting forces left in Afghanistan and the various groups didn't agree on what should happen next, causing a civil war.

It's not lunacy or conspiracy theory, it's simply what happens when you screw around with another country that you don't understand and you don't make any effort to clean up the mess you were involved in making. Personally I'm all for a video game being made about this, maybe it'll inspire the younger generation who don't know anything about this to make the effort to find out what really happened. There's not a lot they can do about it now, but they might be able to stop things like this happening again in the future.

Of course, that would also require the game itself to handle the issue sensitively from both sides and be thought provoking in it's presentation of the moral dilemmas involved. But I'm just kidding myself on that, it's a MoH game from EA, of *course* it won't be sensitive.

Suggesting that the conflict is merely about the appropriation of resources or increased weapon sales clouds the real issues behind it all and shows just how politically astute you aren't, Recognise. Please don't do that, you just make the whole situation worse. Interesting how this whole discussion motivated you to prompt others into doing research when it doesn't seem you could be bothered to do any of your own.

(*lack of reconstruction aid to Germany coupled with the huge reparations they were made to pay after WWI is what caused the economic collapse that allowed Hitler to come to political power and start WWII, so it's not like the rise of the Taliban or something similar wasn't obviously going to happen or anything)

 

Don’t be so condescending, to question my political astuteness from a proposal that oil supply and weapons contracts (amongst other factors) contributed to recent war efforts is quite ridiculous and borderline ignorant, StoneyMahoney. You corroborate that this is not about lunacy or conspiracies, then go on to flame me for encouraging others to RESEARCH and not dismiss alternative theories as lunacy or conspiracy. Quite amusing that you naturally assume I am a 'he', for all you know I am a 'she' with an abundance of knowledge in various areas of US foreign policies. To assume is to make an ass out of ‘U’ and ‘ME’

 

Read what I said. I never contradicted you, I just suggested that you drastically oversimplified the reasons behind the conflict. That's a pretty dangerous thing to do if people who are listening are likely to take those reasons as read and then not look into them any further. It lets the people behind the actual, more serious issues off the hook to some extent as their actions become buried in the collective memory, if you will.

Please don't take my expansion on my previous suggestions as condescended towards you either, that was actually in response to JimmyJJ's suggestion that your assertion about governmental and corporate collaboration in manufactured warfare was lunacy, my bad for not separating those two threads out in my response sufficiently. Apologies for that.

Oh, and I can gather quite a lot from the way you write, and you write like a guy.

 

War "victims" have managed to find a new way to piss me off. Honestly, I understand that they've made an unwilling sacrifice but they're not the ones forced onto the frontlines, yet we pay little attention to what the average soldier thinks. This probably isn't even the actual view of most families who've lost a loved one but a whole bunch of politics and marketing helped by a few who've taken their berievement as a chance to jump into the spotlight.

 

Seeing the amount of comments for and against, as well as some posts that are borderline arguments, it's probably a good idea.

Time probably is a healer (Nazi Vs. Taliban argument). The fact is, the thrid reich finished in 1945, Soldiers are still fighting against Taliban. That is a big difference. We don't really know what soldiers/families of soldiers in general think of this.

 

This would be worth caring about if the game wasn't a generic pile of poo. Hopefully single player will redeem this game.

 

haha, can't have one article on this game here, or on RPS, without hand-wringing about how the neo-capitalist-imperialist-colonialist-whatever USA baby killers are conspiring to rob Afghanistan of all its precious sand. And depending on who you ask, maybe even the goats. No, to be fair this particular thread's pretty tame, actually.

@recognize "programmed into this ‘USA = good, Taliban = bad’ culture without knowing all of the facts"
I dunno about USA=good, I happen to live there and personally I think this place is pretty screwed up. But please tell me all these exonerating facts that make the Taliban something other than a bunch of retrograde fanatic thugs. I'm genuinely curious.

@Joe
I'm not sure that most Afghans would really be all that more offended at USA than Taliban. Polls (and yes I do question the feasibility of conducting an accurate poll in these conditions) show that about 14% of the Afghan populace wishes the Taliban to return to power. Not exactly a resounding endorsement for the Taliban either. There's a big difference between genuine popular support, and cooperation just because if you don't, they're going to kill you.