In the DI, one finds no serious analysis of American foreign policies and wars that are being fought by less privileged members of UI students’ cohort. One does, however, find an elaborate review of the video game “Black Ops”.

These games can’t possibly contribute to healthy development and relationships. But my immediate concern is that those who play them can’t be interested in the real world of American militarism, and are desensitized to the human consequences of policies that interest them only as fodder for perverse, violent fantasies.

Meanwhile, the wars go on. The New York Times writes: “Night raids have become a cornerstone of General Petraeus’ strategy. Many Afghans see the raids as a flagrant, even humiliating symbol of US power, especially when women and children are rousted in the middle of the night. Protests have increased this year as the tempo has increased.” Perhaps someone can develop a video game that demonstrates how Americans might deal with such protests as an aspect of “fighting for freedom”.

A reviewer of the documentary film “Restrepo” writes: “It would be difficult to exaggerate the alienation from their environment that these soldiers experience. Totally isolated from both the Afghans they supposedly are defending, and indifferent apparently to the ‘rooting out the terrorists’ ideology that justifies their presence, they seem more like contestants in a mortal version of ‘Fear Factor.’ …A returned soldier comments, ‘I’ve been on about four or five different types of sleeping pills, and none of them help. That’s how bad the nightmares are. I prefer not to sleep and not to dream about it… To sleep and just see the picture in my head is pretty bad.’”

The rest of us should be equally disturbed about these wars, their gross injustice, their victims on all sides and their exploitation for vicarious fun and profit.

David Green,

Academic Professional