Some lame questions while waiting

[para]

I'm not having ago at the OP in particular. I'm having a go at the notion that we all have to be treated like children because parents cannot or choose not to censore what their (not mine) children can or cannot be exposed to.

[Wodin]

Again foul language in a game or simulating killing people...whats worse....

All historical sim type wargames should be a 15 or over in my eyes...

[Magpie_Oz]

AOFL rating for HALO is MA15+ (Medium Level Animated Violence) , Crysis 2 MA15+ (Strong Violence and Coarse Language) but I am sure there are 100000000's who play who are under that age.

[mjkerner]

When I was a kid in the late '50's - mid 60's, my friends and I killed countless Germans and Japanese on a daily basis in our backyards, using our fathers' bona fide war booty (web gear, my Dad's Japanese bayonet--sheathed, unfortunately) and our numerous toy guns. Swearing was done on the low down, lest adults would hear us. (Just like Ralphie in the movie "A Christmas Story", we learned all kinds of swear words from being around our fathers.)

To this day, none of those friends or I have killed anyone in real life. We all still swear.

[Callahan]

Don't know if anyone can confirm this but here goes: During the late 1960s and thru' the '70s I lived in Phila., PA. I met a guy then who had served under Patton. Among other things that happened, he told me that as they were advancing thru' Germany, they had a serious problem with snipers that lay in wait for them.

So Patton had flyers printed up and dropped over each little village or town a couple days before they entered them. The flyers warned everyone to stay indoors because of the snipers. They were to keep even their dogs indoors because Patton gave the order to shoot anything that moved. He was taking absolutely no chances that any more of his men would be killed.

This guy told me that the guys in his platoon were so on edge that they took no chances and did indeed shoot at anything that moved. Dogs WERE shot. An old guy came riding around a corner on a bicycle and he was shot, he said.

I don't believe that many people were shot like that but it sure depicts the atmosphere of the time. One thing about Patton was, from what I had been told, that altho' he was a real taskmaster, he stood by his men 100%. He considered himself one of them.

Also, I worked with a German who had been an Infantryman. He told me of how Hitler had inspected them on parade when they joined up at the start of the war. His eyes lit up as he told of Hitler walking past him. When I asked him how he felt about all the thousands killed in the concentration camps he insisted that it was the men around Hitler who were responsible; that Hitler was a great leader and didn't really know of much that was going on. hmmm.

The irony there was that although he worshipped Hitler and the German cause, here he was, in America, earning a good living. The paradoxes of life ?

[mjkerner]

New York dock workers compared to Wisconsin dairy farmers.

P.S. Hey, MikeyD, my Dad was a Wisconsin dairy farmer! He must have learned his swearing from New York dock workers--he was in the 27th ID (originally a New York NG outfit).

[LuckyDog]

My granddad was in the Royal Artillery, went through a lot, but I never heard him him say any worse than bugger. He passed through New York on his way back from the pacific and made comment on the foul language the dockers used! Now what he said around me and what he used with his mates, was I'm sure a different case.

[Nokturnal]

As far as im aware this is an adults game. Surely, parents have a duty to make sure that there children do not have access to material that may corrupt them. Not BFC.

Thanks for missing the point - I'm not trying to tell BF to do with their own game. If they decided to include swearing or do the whole over-the-top blood&gore I would simply not let kids see it.

I am just presenting an opinion, trying to explain why someone might not want swearing in a video game which could be played either with children present, or by children themselves.

What exactly makes it an "adult game" though? Aside from the fact it would require a mature level of patience simply to get interested in the subject and then master the controls. Kids are taught about war in school, are they not? What is worse, reading about it, the whole thing (concentration camps and all...) and using your imagination or playing a video game which doesn't deal with blood and guts or the rest of the unnecessarily nasty stuff, and instead focuses on tactics?

I have never understood why swearing gets you an "M" rating, killing gets you an "MA+15" but scenes depicting sex gets you an "R+18".

Mate...We don't even have an R18 rating for video games - This is one of the biggest problems with Australian video gaming, it's been a heated debate for quite some time now. That and the price gouging...But that's another story...

The reason why so many games seem to be only given an MA15+ rating is because we have nothing higher. My opinion is that they are so well publicised that banning them would cause too much of an uproar, so they simply give it an MA15+ and be done with it.

This is why so many kids are playing games they probably shouldn't.

Recently Mortal Kombat - A game which has been fine up until the latest version, was banned, nothing has changed except for an upgrade in graphics but it was deemed inappropriate.

That being said, you're right - We do seem a bit touchy when it comes to sex scenes - The Witcher 2 has been edited for the Australian audience so that the sex involved is not presented as a "reward" and is instead more or less forced onto the player....Try making sense out of that!

We also seem to not agree with drug references. Fallout 3 was edited for Aus. to remove the drug morphine because it's a real drug and was replaced by (Can't remember, something imaginative though) nevermind the fact it wasn't a constantly used or even necessary item in-game. Half a year later, another game, Velvet Assassin was allowed through even though morphine was used as the drug of choice to perform some special abilities...One was heavily advertised, the other barely heard of.

I'm having a go at the notion that we all have to be treated like children because parents cannot or choose not to censore what their (not mine) children can or cannot be exposed to.

Nobody said that? :confused:

Wow way to blow something out of proportion. Neither the OP or anyone who has agreed with the no swearing for kids idea, has suggested that BF are responsible nor that they should remove such a feature for the sake of the children.

Simply putting forward reasons for why it's a good thing BFC don't bother with swearing.

It's already been mentioned that a mod will be made, so there's really no reason to be worried mate, you'll get your ****ing swearing.

[~Viajero]

Nokturnal,

Do you just enjoy being confrontational and a pinch obnoxious or is it that you just have a wee too much time to kill before release. Maybe you just have the irresistible urge to say the last word? Accept other people will disagree with your view and move on. I d dare to say that 3 ripostes that long should surely be enough for you to make your point no? Geez, stop it.

[mjkerner]

My granddad was in the Royal Artillery, went through a lot, but I never heard him him say any worse than bugger. He passed through New York on his way back from the pacific and made comment on the foul language the dockers used! Now what he said around me and what he used with his mates, was I'm sure a different case.

Good anecdote, LuckyDog. In my Dad's defense, I should note that he never knowingly said anything worse than "damn" in front of us kids, and rarely even that. But when we listened through the upstairs heat register to him and his friends talking in other parts of the house when they thought the kids weren't around--different story!

[DaddyO]

Look, my friends, attitudes towards swearing run the full gamut of human thought, and they are culturally conditioned. Culture in this sense goes beyond the broad use of the term to include culture within a family or tight-knit community. For many there is also a religious component that informs the culture.

There is a difference between being overly sensitive and being committed by way of religious faith/choice to the path less traveled. One is cowardly, the other is brave. Let me use myself as an example, not to provoke but to demonstrate what I am saying in the best way I know. I am a Christian. The following words by the apostle Paul are words I desire to live by:

"Finally, my brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things" (Philippians 4:8).

"But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper for saints [= Christians, not specially exalted holy people]. Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving" (Ephesians 5:3-4).

Now to me, and I'll bet this is true of Skunkle as well, according to the Bible this kind of conduct is expected of Christians, but it is also expected that most who are not Christians will behave according to the current social custom of the times. Therefore a Christian who, for example, joins the army cannot demand that his fellow soldiers refrain from swearing in his presence. If they respect him as a soldier or person, they may do so around him, but he cannot demand it.

All in all, my point is that just because you do no agree with the underlying thought behind Skunkle's question, there is no cause to assume his concern represents foolishness or weakness. It may represent prudence and wisdom within his frame of reference, and in fact I believe that is the case.

Oh, and to those who also assume a prudish contradiction between interacting with war violence and shrinking from swearing, all throughout history men have been called on to defend their families, their people and their territory. A father does a disservice to a young man to insulate him completely from the violence and realities of war, given that he cannot be sure his son will not be called on to engage in it IN REAL LIFE, not just in video games. The Bible recognizes there are times when war (check out the first few verses of Romans 13) is necessary and nowhere prohibits Christians from joining his nation's army and participating in combat where the State is fulfilling it's proper role of protection from enemies.

Sometimes combat is necessary. Swearing is never necessary. So in the way of thinking, there is no contradiction at all. Hope this helps. Again, I am not rehearsing all this to provoke, but to illuminate the thinking behind Skunkle's question.

[Erik Springelkamp]

Swearing is never necessary.

I only believe you if you tell me that while hitting a piece of furniture hard with your bare toe.

[skunkle3]

You take good care DaddyO. My last post here. Many people don't understand the English language and most here in this thread probably never served 5 minutes in the military.

Glad to hear that CM will be staying away from the gutter talk. Good to hear about the buildings.

Had no idea this would cause such a stir when I just wanted to know if the game would be appropriate for my young grandson. It is a game. Would appreciate the forum manager

deleting this thread.

[C'Rogers]

The Witcher 2

Sometimes I'm surprised by the games that get named here. The first was an excellent game.

On topic: swearing is a pretty easy issue to deal with. Would a single person <b>not</b> buy this game because it lacks swearing? Would anyone be offended that it was slightly sanitized? I'm going to guess no.

On the other hand, swearing might be a very small detraction. I wouldn't be bothered by swearing, but I suppose if I heard a soldier throwing the f word around it would actually take me out of the moment.

In general though, I think the Aussies/Euros have the better idea with lighter restrictions on profanity/swearing. I actually think there isn't much disagreement with the American populace, and that if policies were changed not many people would disagree, but no politician/group is willing to expend the effort to change things that isn't really that big a deal.

[Vark]

My granddad was in the Royal Artillery, went through a lot, but I never heard him him say any worse than bugger. He passed through New York on his way back from the pacific and made comment on the foul language the dockers used! Now what he said around me and what he used with his mates, was I'm sure a different case.

Same thing from my Grandfather in law (Desert Rats, desert and Italy) he constantly complained about the bad language on TV and said even in combat (Tobruk El Alamein) men were far more restrained in their language (Christ, bloody, bugger, and sometimes sh*t). I guess the occasional F word was used, but he really disliked swearing. I will lobby though for the Brits to say "burn you buggers, burn" when they brew up a German tank and there must be lots of sod/sodding/sodding/hell/sod that for a game of soldiers/for Christ's sake/Jesus Christ/bugger this/that and combinations of all of them. My favourite "The bloody sodding buggering thing is bloody buggered, thats what".

[Vark]

This is a good piece, apparently swearing is a psychological pain reliever

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8147170.stm

[DaddyO]

I only believe you if you tell me that while hitting a piece of furniture hard with your bare toe.

:chuckles:

I hear you; my point is a practical one. If someone attacks you to kill you, your choices are fight or die. If you hit your toe on furniture, what words come out of your mouth are conditioned during your whole life, but the words themselves make no difference as to the result.

So if the intent of your comment is humorous, I get it, and it's funny.

If the intent is to maintain that anyone who seeks to avoid training of his child's ear to swearing is a hypocrite and a fool, I most definitely do not. It is easy to build straw men and blow them down. That seems to be the preferred mode of argument these days. Project one's own thinking on another, make him look as ridiculous as you please. So easy to win that way.

I maintain my assertion that while there are people who are just overly sensitive, there are others for whom such choices are motivated by bravery rather than fear.

One other point for consideration. To me, if I'm in a foxhole, I want the guy next to me to have two qualities: Bravery, and overall soldiering skill. Oh, and a good weapon. If he shared my faith but lacked the first two, I'd rather have someone else with me. As an employee in a company I'd rather have a savvy but honest businessman at the helm than a praying but inexperienced executive. As a citizen of a country, I'd rather have at the top a wise, prudent, tough, principled, skilled politician committed to the well-being and prosperity of my country than a ne'er-do-well man of faith.

[Sgt Joch]

Regarding whether soldiers swore or not in WW2, I will just quote the text of the speech General Patton gave to the Third Army on June 5th, 1944. Those who have seen the movie "Patton" will recognize it as the speech at the opening of the movie, although the movie version was sanitized.

caution: strong language.

Be seated.

Men, this stuff that some sources sling around about America wanting out of this war, not wanting to fight, is a crock of bull****.

Americans love to fight, traditionally. All real Americans love the sting and clash of battle.

You are here today for three reasons. First, because you are here to defend your homes and your loved ones. Second, you are here for your own self respect, because you would not want to be anywhere else.

Third, you are here because you are real men and all real men like to fight.

When you, here, everyone of you, were kids, you all admired the champion marble player, the fastest runner, the toughest boxer, the big league ball players, and the All-American football players. Americans love a winner. Americans will not tolerate a loser. Americans despise cowards.

Americans play to win all of the time. I wouldn't give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed. That's why Americans have never lost nor will ever lose a war; for the very idea of losing is hateful to an American.

You are not all going to die. Only two percent of you right here today would die in a major battle. Death must not be feared. Death, in time, comes to all men. Yes, every man is scared in his first battle. If he says he's not, he's a liar. Some men are cowards but they fight the same as the brave men or they get the hell slammed out of them watching men fight who are just as scared as they are.

The real hero is the man who fights even though he is scared.

Some men get over their fright in a minute under fire. For some, it takes an hour. For some, it takes days. But a real man will never let his fear of death overpower his honor, his sense of duty to his country, and his innate manhood. Battle is the most magnificent competition in which a human being can indulge. It brings out all that is best and it removes all that is base. Americans pride themselves on being He Men and they ARE He Men.

Remember that the enemy is just as frightened as you are, and probably more so. They are not supermen.

All through your Army careers, you men have bitched about what you call 'chicken **** drilling'. That, like everything else in this Army, has a definite purpose. That purpose is alertness. Alertness must be bred into every soldier. I don't give a **** for a man who's not always on his toes. You men are veterans or you wouldn't be here. You are ready for what's to come. A man must be alert at all times if he expects to stay alive. If you're not alert, sometime, a German son-of-an-*******-bitch is going to sneak up behind you and beat you to death with a sockful of ****!

There are four hundred neatly marked graves somewhere in Sicily, all because one man went to sleep on the job. But they are German graves, because we caught the bastard asleep before they did.

An Army is a team. It lives, sleeps, eats, and fights as a team. This individual heroic stuff is pure horse ****. The bilious bastards who write that kind of stuff for the Saturday Evening Post don't know any more about real fighting under fire than they know about ****ing! We have the finest food, the finest equipment, the best spirit, and the best men in the world. Why, by God, I actually pity those poor sons-of-bitches we're going up against. By God, I do.

My men don't surrender, and I don't want to hear of any soldier under my command being captured unless he has been hit. Even if you are hit, you can still fight back That's not just bull **** either. The kind of man that I want in my command is just like the lieutenant in Libya, who, with a Luger against his chest, jerked off his helmet, swept the gun aside with one hand, and busted the hell out of the Kraut with his helmet. Then he jumped on the gun and went out and killed another German before they knew what the hell was coming off. And, all of that time, this man had a bullet through a lung. There was a real man!

All of the real heroes are not storybook combat fighters, either. Every single man in this Army plays a vital role. Don't ever let up. Don't ever think that your job is unimportant. Every man has a job to do and he must do it. Every man is a vital link in the great chain.

What if every truck driver suddenly decided that he didn't like the whine of those shells overhead, turned yellow, and jumped headlong into a ditch? The cowardly bastard could say, 'Hell, they won't miss me, just one man in thousands.' But, what if every man thought that way? Where in the hell would we be now? What would our country, our loved ones, our homes, even the world, be like?

No, Goddamnit, Americans don't think like that. Every man does his job. Every man serves the whole. Every department, every unit, is important in the vast scheme of this war.

The ordnance men are needed to supply the guns and machinery of war to keep us rolling. The Quartermaster is needed to bring up food and clothes because where we are going there isn't a hell of a lot to steal. Every last man on K.P. has a job to do, even the one who heats our water to keep us from getting the 'G.I. ****s'.

Each man must not think only of himself, but also of his buddy fighting beside him. We don't want yellow cowards in this Army. They should be killed off like rats. If not, they will go home after this war and breed more cowards. The brave men will breed more brave men. Kill off the Goddamned cowards and we will have a nation of brave men.

One of the bravest men that I ever saw was a fellow on top of a telegraph pole in the midst of a furious fire fight in Tunisia. I stopped and asked what the hell he was doing up there at a time like that. He answered, 'Fixing the wire, Sir.' I asked, 'Isn't that a little unhealthy right about now?' He answered, 'Yes Sir, but the Goddamned wire has to be fixed.' I asked, 'Don't those planes strafing the road bother you?' And he answered, 'No, Sir, but you sure as hell do!' Now, there was a real man. A real soldier. There was a man who devoted all he had to his duty, no matter how seemingly insignificant his duty might appear at the time, no matter how great the odds.

And you should have seen those trucks on the rode to Tunisia. Those drivers were magnificent. All day and all night they rolled over those son-of-a-bitching roads, never stopping, never faltering from their course, with shells bursting all around them all of the time. We got through on good old American guts. Many of those men drove for over forty consecutive hours. These men weren't combat men, but they were soldiers with a job to do. They did it, and in one hell of a way they did it. They were part of a team. Without team effort, without them, the fight would have been lost. All of the links in the chain pulled together and the chain became unbreakable.

Don't forget, you men don't know that I'm here. No mention of that fact is to be made in any letters. The world is not supposed to know what the hell happened to me. I'm not supposed to be commanding this Army. I'm not even supposed to be here in England. Let the first bastards to find out be the Goddamned Germans. Some day I want to see them raise up on their piss-soaked hind legs and howl, 'Jesus Christ, it's the Goddamned Third Army again and that son-of-a-****ing-bitch Patton'. We want to get the hell over there.' The quicker we clean up this Goddamned mess, the quicker we can take a little jaunt against the purple pissing Japs and clean out their nest, too. Before the Goddamned Marines get all of the credit.

Sure, we want to go home. We want this war over with. The quickest way to get it over with is to go get the bastards who started it. The quicker they are whipped, the quicker we can go home. The shortest way home is through Berlin and Tokyo. And when we get to Berlin I am personally going to shoot that paper hanging son-of-a-bitch Hitler. Just like I'd shoot a snake!

When a man is lying in a shell hole, if he just stays there all day, a German will get to him eventually. The hell with that idea. The hell with taking it. My men don't dig foxholes. I don't want them to. Foxholes only slow up an offensive. Keep moving. And don't give the enemy time to dig one either. We'll win this war, but we'll win it only by fighting and by showing the Germans that we've got more guts than they have; or ever will have.

We're not going to just shoot the sons-of-bitches, we're going to rip out their living Goddamned guts and use them to grease the treads of our tanks. We're going to murder those lousy Hun cock suckers by the bushel-****ing-basket. War is a bloody, killing business. You've got to spill their blood, or they will spill yours. Rip them up the belly. Shoot them in the guts. When shells are hitting all around you and you wipe the dirt off your face and realize that instead of dirt it's the blood and guts of what once was your best friend beside you, you'll know what to do!

I don't want to get any messages saying, 'I am holding my position.' We are not holding a Goddamned thing. Let the Germans do that. We are advancing constantly and we are not interested in holding onto anything, except the enemy's balls. We are going to twist his balls and kick the living **** out of him all of the time. Our basic plan of operation is to advance and to keep on advancing regardless of whether we have to go over, under, or through the enemy. We are going to go through him like crap through a goose; like **** through a tin horn!

From time to time there will be some complaints that we are pushing our people too hard. I don't give a good Goddamn about such complaints. I believe in the old and sound rule that an ounce of sweat will save a gallon of blood. The harder WE push, the more Germans we will kill. The more Germans we kill, the fewer of our men will be killed. Pushing means fewer casualties. I want you all to remember that.

There is one great thing that you men will all be able to say after this war is over and you are home once again. You may be thankful that twenty years from now when you are sitting by the fireplace with your grandson on your knee and he asks you what you did in the great World War II, you WON'T have to cough, shift him to the other knee and say, 'Well, your Granddaddy shoveled **** in Louisiana.' No, Sir, you can look him straight in the eye and say, 'Son, your Granddaddy rode with the Great Third Army and a Son-of-a-Goddamned-Bitch named Georgie Patton!'"

http://www.5ad.org/Patton_speech.htm

http://www.pattonhq.com/speech.html

[para]

Regarding whether soldiers swore or not in WW2, I will just quote the text of the speech General Patton gave to the Third Army on June 5th, 1944. Those who have seen the movie "Patton" will recognize it as the speech at the opening of the movie, although the movie version was sanitized.

caution: strong language.

http://www.5ad.org/Patton_speech.htm

http://www.pattonhq.com/speech.html

Looks like he used up all the allied armies swear rashions in the one speech.

[Erik Springelkamp]

The content of swear words is culturally determined, and generally related to the great taboo.

They can have a relation to religion, but illnesses are also common - especially here in the Netherlands: kanker-typhys-tering-zooi, excrements: German Scheisse, English Sht, sexual, here we use 'Kut' a lot.

But it seems important for their effectiveness that they are somehow shocking.

As a non-religious person I generally don't use swear words that relate to religion.

But if I do, you can be d***^b^b^b pretty sure that something really unpleasant happened to me.

And that is generally the message swearing expresses.

I didn't allow my children to use heavy swear words at home when they would be used for just appearing tough, but when there would be a real reason to use them, I didn't bother.

[DaddyO]

re: the Patton example...

The question originally posed had nothing to do with whether or not mean swear in war. Of course they do. It is misleading and and a shifting of the discourse to introduce the notion that anyone who is concerned about coarse language in the game because he wants to play it with his son is somehow a complete idiot unaware that men at war swear.

[Sgt Joch]

re: the Patton example...

The question originally posed had nothing to do with whether or not mean swear in war. Of course they do. It is misleading and and a shifting of the discourse to introduce the notion that anyone who is concerned about coarse language in the game because he wants to play it with his son is somehow a complete idiot unaware that men at war swear.

That was not my intention, but the topic of whether soldiers in WW2 swore less frequently or in a milder form than people now has also been raised by some here. The Patton speech, which was meant to be a private speech to his men, puts that notion to rest.

Now whether swearing should be included in the game is an entirely different subject. It will not, although I am sure some sound mod will come along for those that want it in.

[Bertram]

If they start hearing words they shouldn't, then that's doing them harm.

Now that is actually the point where the difference lies I think... In Europe we seem to think that hearing swear words doesnt do irreplacable harm to kids. Not even when on film or TV (or in games) (which for some reason seems to be worse then hearing it in real life). And I got to admit that I never has seen any evidence to the contrary (I am psychologist, but also European, so I could be biased - though almost all our professional literature is from the US... ).

[DaddyO]

That was not my intention, but the topic of whether soldiers in WW2 swore less frequently or in a milder form than people now has also been raised by some here. The Patton speech, which was meant to be a private speech to his men, puts that notion to rest.

Now whether swearing should be included in the game is an entirely different subject. It will not, although I am sure some sound mod will come along for those that want it in.

Ah, thanks for clarifying, Sarge!

Let me take Patton as a perfect example of one of my comments. Let's leave aside for the moment the debate whether Patton actually WAS the man of legend and assume that he was for purposes of argument. That assumption made, I'd rather have him, swearing and all, leading my field army than a perfect gentleman who never swore in public or private but was a mediocre leader of men.

Why? Because the army is not an exercise in manners, and that ought not to be a litmus test of its leaders. It is war, most violent and most foul, brutal in every way. Give me a man who can convincingly instruct and motivate men to engage in the acts and endure the conditions necessary to defeat the enemy, a man who knows how to combine logistics, strategy, and tactics to achieve an unpleasant but necessary end, a man who knows how to take advantage of the strengths of his situation and minimize the damage of its weaknesses.

[Elmar Bijlsma]

Meh. Swearing is not a leading cause of cancer so I don't really get the fuss that surrounds it. And any parent thinking he is preventing his child from coming in to contact with the F word is deeply deluded. And if you want to prevent your kid turning in to a sweary little git, I suggest more effort in guiding output, not input.

My objection to swearing in CM is far simpler: It stands out to much.

Some vanilla comment by my pixeltruppen will not stand out as much as some line containing a string of expletives. Since I expect to be hearing these lines a lot, the more vanilla they are the better immersion is maintained.