Back in the 2010\u2019s (is that how you say it?) I was still working at the school, and I had a high school senior boy living with me.\u00a0\u00a0He, and his friends, were \u201chooked\u201d on video games.\u00a0\u00a0The dinner table conversation often went something like this:\u00a0\u00a0\u201cI killed over a thousand Nazi Zombies today, how \u2018bout you\u201d? And while I didn\u2019t have much compassion for \u201cNazi Zombies\u201d, it did stir a bit of concern.\u00a0\u00a0All of this killing, all of this tremendous focus on a screen, and a game, and not on school work (or real work).\u00a0\u00a0It just seemed too much.\u00a0\u00a0When the TV screen got cracked (did a Nazi Zombie strike back?) there were limits placed on the new one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those boys are in their thirties now, and I suspect have moved on from Nazi Zombies.\u00a0\u00a0They have “real” jobs, and kids, and lives. But, I imagine, they are still \u201cgaming\u201d in one way or another.\u00a0\u00a0And they aren\u2019t the only ones.\u00a0\u00a0The skills \u201choned\u201d on Nazi Zombies now have war-time uses.\u00a0\u00a0What seemed like\u00a0\u00a0\u201cStar Trek\u201d kinds of fantasy weapons only a couple of decades ago, are very real today.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Look at Ukraine\u2019s continuing war against Russian aggression.\u00a0\u00a0The Russians have more troops, more tanks, more missiles, more of almost everything.\u00a0\u00a0But the Ukrainians are the \u201cmasters\u201d of drone warfare.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cKiller drones\u201d that are programmed to remotely attack far locations.\u00a0\u00a0Guided drones that communicate back to base, controlled by devices eerily similar to the \u201ccontroller\u201d that attacked Nazi Zombies.\u00a0\u00a0Drones that can lock onto a single individual, follow them, and destroy when ordered. And \u201cdumb\u201d drones, swarms of them, attacking in numbers difficult to defend.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And with all of this \u201cremote\u201d warfare, we grow used to seeing grainy black and white pictures of a tank, or a building or an oil storage facility; standing one moment, engulfed in explosion in the next.\u00a0\u00a0It\u2019s nothing new: back in 1991 General Schwarzkopf showed us the footage of the \u201cluckiest man in Iraq\u201d as a bridge exploded right behind him.\u00a0\u00a0The explosion must have filled has rearview mirror.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The question I have is this:\u00a0\u00a0is all of our exposure to \u201cremote death\u201d somehow cheapened the value of life?\u00a0\u00a0Is this, a by-product of over exposure to \u201cdeath\u201d on TV, in video games; as a \u201cway of life\u201d \u2013 how many Nazi Zombies did you kill today?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My \u201cold man who did not grow up on video games\u201d experience is this.\u00a0\u00a0In the past week, the media focused on the US military blowing up boats in the Caribbean.\u00a0\u00a0One boat, supposedly filled with narcotics and eleven humans, was destroyed by a remotely controlled drone.\u00a0When the smoke cleared, two survived the attack. A second strike was launched.\u00a0\u00a0The military called it a \u201cdouble-tap\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My chosen news source, the newly renamed\u00a0MSNOW,\u00a0<\/em>spent hours talking about the legality and morality of the second strike. As the discussion went on, they showed the first strike attack over and over again.\u00a0\u00a0If you watched (I didn\u2019t) they showed the death of nine people in a black and white blast on replay.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n And now, the \u201cproof\u201d in this whole conversation is in the \u201csecond tape\u201d, the one \u201cwe\u201d haven\u2019t seen.\u00a0\u00a0The description of that video depends on the politics of the viewer.\u00a0\u00a0Democrats say that two helpless men are clinging to the wreckage of the \u201cdrug boat\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0They are in \u201cshipwreck\u201d mode, looking for help, perhaps even waving a white shirt of surrender to the drone\/weapon circling overhead.\u00a0\u00a0Then the \u201cdouble-tap\u201d hits; another explosion, and nothing left after.\u00a0\u00a0That\u2019s the \u201cstory\u201d Democratic Congressman Jim Hines tells.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Republicans, after watching the same thing, have a very different story.\u00a0\u00a0They tell of the two survivors trying to right the capsized craft, save the narcotic cargo, and contact help by radio.\u00a0\u00a0That\u2019s how Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton saw it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are often situations where two very different things can be true \u2013 but this video isn\u2019t one of them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s a lot easier to order a \u201cdouble tap\u201d on a video image, than on the reality of killing two more men, even if they are smuggling narcotics.\u00a0\u00a0The act of smuggling itself is not a \u201cdeath penalty\u201d offense. But that doesn\u2019t seem to even enter the conversation.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Is this so much easier for America, because we\u2019ve been doing it \u201cas a game\u201d for so long?<\/p>\n\n\n\n What we can all agree on is this:\u00a0\u00a0Americans are inured to video death.\u00a0\u00a0We watch it without emotional affect.\u00a0\u00a0We can put human execution (even of drug smugglers) on replay, without concern.\u00a0\u00a0And, for many Americans, the dinner table conversation seems to be, \u201cHow many narco-terrorists did you kill today?\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Execution<\/h3>\n\n\n\n