In 2013, the Red Cross issued a statement calling on the video game industry to reconsider how it presented war and war crimes. Six years later, after the controversial release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, how much has changed? Do video games accurately depict war crimes and their consequences? And as artificial intelligence trains on games like Starcraft, should we be worried about what these programs are learning? Bryan sits down with UWGB Democracy and Justice Studies professor Eric Morgan to talk about all these issues and more as part of the 2019 Common CAHSS Human Rights conference.

Credits:

Thanks to Scott Berg for producing this episode.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare audio copyright Activision, presented under fair use.

Show notes:

Beyond the Call of Duty: why shouldn’t videogame players face the same dilemmas as real soldiers? - https://www.icrc.org/en/doc/resources/documents/article/review-2012/irrc-886-clarke-rouffaer-senechaud.htm

NPR - Red Cross Wants Video Game Companies to Get Real on War Crimes https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2013/10/12/232480753/red-cross-wants-video-games-to-get-real-on-war-crimes

Modern Warfare "Highway of Death" controversy: https://www.polygon.com/2019/10/30/20938550/call-of-duty-modern-warfare-highway-of-death-controversy

Modern Warfare White Phosphorous story: https://www.newsweek.com/call-duty-modern-warfare-white-phosphorus-killstreak-multiplayer-1451811

The DeepMind Starcraft 2 AI: https://www.theverge.com/2019/10/30/20939147/deepmind-google-alphastar-starcraft-2-research-grandmaster-level