A violently true depiction of what war really is • Hacker News Board

Re: A violently true depiction of what war really is

#151

Post by ravloony » Fri, Mar 02, 2012, 11:48 PM UTC

run4yourlives wrote: post #88

angrycoder wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>martial arts won't help This is patently false and completely ridiculous. Someone who is trained to take and give a hit will always have a significantly better chance in a fight.

Actually I don't think so, and I'm also a veteran. The winner is most often the person more inclined to inflict damage on the other combatant. The idea that you are worried about hitting and being hit means you are still operating in some sort of a rules-based sphere. This is why martial-arts isn't really taught to soldiers beyond a few "look how you can do this" training sessions. The ultimate combatant is the perso…

One of my teachers was in the French Foreign Legion and he told me that in a fight one should aim to inflict maximum pain and damage as fast as possible.

Needless to say, my classwork improved after that conversation. I jest, but he was quite intense.

Re: A violently true depiction of what war really is

#152

Post by pbhjpbhj » Fri, Mar 02, 2012, 11:54 PM UTC

cobrausn wrote: post #35

cpursley wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any type of game where you shoot another human being is F*d up. The hypothetical scenario where you can accidentally kill innocents does not justify the game.

The game does not have to 'justify' itself to you, or anyone. It is what it is - a virtual world where human conflict drives the story and the mechanics, and the goal is entertainment. And if people like playing games where other humans are enemy, what does that tell you about people? Maybe you have not noticed, but violence is part of human nature, and our creative works (of all kinds) have used this because, for be…

>And if people like playing games where other humans are enemy, what does that tell you about people? //

I've played such games a little but never thought of the people I was playing with as the enemy. The people you play with are your friends normally aren't they?

Re: A violently true depiction of what war really is

#153

Post by vacri » Fri, Mar 02, 2012, 11:55 PM UTC

run4yourlives wrote: post #86

mattdeboard wrote: post #6

As a former Marine infantryman, and a former Marine PR idiot, I think his numbers are off but a lot of the concepts are right, with a caveat. It's not sociopathy of the organic sort. It's the kind of detachment from prolonged exposure to extreme, unmitigated stress. So don't take this article as justification to feel like there's something mentally wrong with people who join a combat arms unit.

So in other words: PTSD. His numbers are off because his "80%" of sociopaths are more like 2% according to real studies. The rest more than likely are dealing with managing their own PTSD symptoms.

The numbers aren't necessarily off - he does couch the numbers to begin with, but he also takes pains to specify he's talking about frontline combat units, not the service in general. I don't have the numbers to hand, but the US military has a ton of support staff (ie non-frontline) - it's possible that these numbers are more similar than they appear.

Re: A violently true depiction of what war really is

#154

Post by vacri » Fri, Mar 02, 2012, 11:57 PM UTC

pavel_lishin wrote: post #79

jiggy2011 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did a martial art for a while where we trained against bottle/knife attacks etc. I think that training was mostly useless, some nerd in a dojo attacking you in a predetermined way with a plastic bottle while you do "hip throw #3" is going to be very different to a real fight.

The idea is to build up reflexes. When someone comes at you with a beer bottle, you're not thinking "Ok, this is Attack Pattern Delta, therefore I execute Hip Throw #3." You simply react.

When someone comes at me with a beer bottle, I'm thinking "Awesome, I must remember to buy the next round!"

Re: A violently true depiction of what war really is

#155

Post by vacri » Sat, Mar 03, 2012, 12:04 AM UTC

cpursley wrote: post #10

I can't imagine how anyone enjoys games like these unless they really are sociopaths. War is when young men go die for the old men's mistakes and kill a lot of women in children in the process.

Can't men be innocents, too? Why do we only ever think of women and children as innocents?

Re: A violently true depiction of what war really is

#156

Post by ktizo » Sat, Mar 03, 2012, 12:08 AM UTC

ilaksh wrote: post #117

Cushman wrote: post #13

Reminds me of my father (who was in the Airborne) looking over my shoulder playing the training in America's Army. "That's pretty realistic. Do they have a level where you have to go knock on somebody's door and tell them their son was killed in a training exercise?" That said, I feel like this article, like the censors, gives video games much too much credit. Glorification of violence is everywhere in our culture an…

"A bit of a violence problem in our culture" Fighting games are incredibly realistic and advanced. Games like Battlefield, with the right mix of realism and "fun", are the greatest possible war propaganda instruments ever created. The "Department of Defense" and other agencies have too many smart people working in them and too much recruiting pressure not to be funneling money into these "video game" projects. Iran i…

Here is the latest AAA release by the studios on this theme, and I for one am impressed by it's authenticity. It is only available in certain territories at the moment, but will soon go global;

http://static.ddmcdn.com/gif/reaper-3.jpg

I've heard that you get pretty bad platform lock-in if you only want to join it for that game though.

Re: A violently true depiction of what war really is

#157

Post by dasil003 » Sat, Mar 03, 2012, 12:10 AM UTC

He hasn't really convinced me he's a sociopath. More like he's suffering from PTSD and coping with it by acting out sociopathic tendencies. I mean obviously I don't have the first clue, but I ask myself would a real sociopath write something like this?

Re: A violently true depiction of what war really is

#158

Post by javert » Sat, Mar 03, 2012, 12:19 AM UTC

angersock wrote: post #142

javert wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is good design to solve problems directly, rather than to solve them indirectly by introducting a different problem. So let's solve the problem of the US entering unjust wars directly, rather than by introducing a new problem (the draft). How to solve it directly? The recent unjust US wars do reflect cultural problems: a belief among politicians and the populace that it is worthwile to sacrifice thousands of Ameri…

I don't think that there is anything terribly indirect about linking (explicitly) the blood of common Americans with hawkish politicians. An intellectual argument is irrelevant in the face of the masses--by definition, half of them are of below-average intelligence, yeah? So, we should pursue policies that make it concrete--even to the slowest citizen or smartest zealot--that there will be immediate, personal sacrifi…

An intellectual argument is irrelevant in the face of the masses

No. If you look at history, from the middle ages until now, you see a continual improvement. Moreover, the idea that people are brutes is disturbing. We have to see people as reasoning individuals; otherwise, we decay into fascism, religious extremism, etc.

Why is it so that Pakistan can have the atomic bomb, but not Iran? Why Israel and not Iraq?

It's fine for nations to have it where it represents absolutely zero threat, from the perspective of the agent (in this case, the US). Pakistan should not have it. (Remember, Pakistani leaders knowing sheltered Bin Laden.)

I only am worried if he is actively hostile.

There are many groups that are actively hostile that are not identical to a national government. There are many national governments that are largely sympathetic to these groups.

so many problems would go away if people would just accept that some day their ticket comes up, and do the best that they can in the meantime.

Dude, you're asking me to just lay down and let the terrorists kill people. No way. We should just stop the bullies. There should be no tolerance for that kind of shit.

Re: A violently true depiction of what war really is

#159

Post by javert » Sat, Mar 03, 2012, 12:23 AM UTC

vacri wrote: post #149

javert wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is good design to solve problems directly, rather than to solve them indirectly by introducting a different problem. So let's solve the problem of the US entering unjust wars directly, rather than by introducing a new problem (the draft). How to solve it directly? The recent unjust US wars do reflect cultural problems: a belief among politicians and the populace that it is worthwile to sacrifice thousands of Ameri…

As an outsider, in the last decade it's been really weird to watch the US public demand war while at the same time demanding that soldiers don't die. It just reinforces how distant people are from the idea of war. Hell, the entire Vietnam War had less US dead than there were Allied dead in one day of the bloodiest battle in WWI. And after a decade of fighting, the US efforts in Iraq have less than 10% of the US death…

How soft and spoiled are the commentators who think war should involve no sacrifice

It's horrible to waste soldiers for nothing, which is what's been going on over there for quite some time. The problem is, it is a total sacrifice - people losing their lives for nothing.

Re: A violently true depiction of what war really is

#160

Post by winter_blue » Sat, Mar 03, 2012, 12:26 AM UTC

Violent video games & media must be banned. It should be treated like child pornography.

A federal law prohibiting the dissemination of such material and people who develop or make such games and movies should be given the same punishment those filming child pornography receive. I personally recommend a minimum of 10 years.

The social and psychological corruption of society must come to an end.

I know many of you will not agree with my opinion, but I think you don't understand how bad an impact blatant violence in games and media has on people.