Zamo Posted January 26, 2000 Share Posted January 26, 2000 I have always been a warrior, and have always been facinated by the subject. Since I was a young child. Whether we were assaulting the neighbors treehouse with our Mattel Marauder M-16's and tommyguns, (or the cool M-1's with the cap that actually fired a plastic cartridge) or creating intricate defensive systems in the sandbox only to be shelled by 155mm rocks and firecrackers, I have always played war. War movies and books have always been a staple all my life. Eventually, despite my best efforts, I grew up, and then joined the Marines, where I rose to Sgt./Tank Commander quickly. I had attained Nirvanna. All was good. Then I got stricken by bone cancer and was forced back into the humdrum life of a civilian. I did, however, survive (both cancer and the conversion to civilian...) Wargames for me are as important as bread and butter. I also collect Military style semi-automatic rifles (the evil ones) and build all sorts of tank models. It is who and what I am. Ingrained. I have to agree with Bullethead, I think it is a biological element of what kind of animal we are, a preditor. We may be striving towards true intelligence, but we are only a step away from tooth and nail animal savagry. We can not ignore that, though we may try to improve on it. Perhaps one day the only wars mankind will fight will be for recreation on a computer screen. Perhaps this medium will satiate the need some of us, especially those generals and politicians who lead us into the real thing, to wage aggressive conflict against others. I doubt it, but it would be nice. I prattle on to much.... Zamo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dumbo Posted January 26, 2000 Share Posted January 26, 2000 I think you have to slice a difference here between wargames and strategy games. I enjoy city building sims too for example and my favourite "wargames" are Fantasy or SF (FG & XCOM respectively). I think like most folks I do enjoy researching the game I play a little more afterwards. Be that historical research or just buying the boardgame/rpg the computer game is based on. That said, I would obviously never own a gun (not for moral reasons, I just know the stats and gun owners are in far more danger due to accidental discharge than non gun owners) so I am not sure you can say wargamers are militaristic in any general way. In fact I reject the notion that wargamers would like to be involved in a real war at all. Being somewhat better educated on the subject than most they have a keener understanding of the costs involved. As far as my reading goes most modern soldiers in the battle feild spend most of thier time waiting in uncomfortable conditions or being shelled by random artillery, hardly what one would consider a good time. Why do i enjoy games? Its not often in real life that you get to solve a problem and get a real payoff afterwards. Also when playing against other humans there is a great thrill to trying to outwit someone else. Maybe its a man thing, I dunno. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maxm2 Posted January 27, 2000 Share Posted January 27, 2000 I would like to take issue with a couple of statements made in this generally very interesting thread so far. In particular, all the statements about "man being a warlike [or killer or whatever] animal" is a broad generalization that ignores all of people's other behaviors. How many individuals actually engage in warfare in a century? A tiny, tiny percentage. How many people kill others at any time? Again, a tiny percentage. So what is typical human behavior? Simply taking how many individuals in this species engage in extreme violent behavior, you'd have to say that humans are generally NON-warlike and violent! Here is something else the "violent nature" folks miss: over half of the human race almost never engage in war or extreme violence, and don't commit many crimes, either. I'm talking, of course, about women. Why should male behavior be seen as more typical of our species than the behavior of women? Obviously, not all women are peaceful or law-abiding, but the statistics are overwhelming as to who kills, wars, and commits most crime in every society that I know of. I also have to make a comment about war as population control. Wars can certainly decrease populations, but that does not make a case for it happening because the population needs to be controlled. Maltheus and his estimates of disasterous population overcrowding were mathematically disproved some time ago. We don't need wars to control populations for the good of the species (in the way that deer "control" their populations when some starve when too many graze the same area). In fact, since wars kill off young men, one could make the argument that war in agricultural societies decreases the food supply and harms the success of the species. As for Africa, they no more need to kill off a lot of their people than New York City does...although some of you might agree with the idea that NY could use a few less people! However, very few countries, and certainly not ours in the US, have figured out how to feed and clothe everyone well...yet most people don't take our inability to distribute our incredible wealth equitably in the Western World as a sign that we should get rid of some of the population. The population issue in the modern world is one of distribution and power, among other things, not of survival of the spcies. ------------------ Max Molinaro Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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