Call of Duty Accused of Promoting Anti-Russian Propaganda

[JonLP24]

Controversy over so-called "anti-Russian" propaganda in the popular video game reflects our current fake news society and a growing confusion over right paths, truth and accuracy.

Call of Duty is one of the most successful franchises in video game history, but there are currently calls to boycott its latest release due to the game’s depiction of military conflict. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019), released in October, accrued more than $600m in its opening weekend, more than double that of the record-breaking weekend had by the movie Joker. It has received backlash due to giving players the chance to use white phosphorus, a chemical weapon, and for its mishandling of global politics, especially its questionable depiction of Russia.

The controversy surrounds a scenario in the game called “Highway of Death”. The player, as an embedded CIA operative overlooking a Middle Eastern desert highway, is told how “The Russians bombed it … killing the people trying to escape”. The scenario resembles an incident in the 1990-1 Gulf War, also called the “Highway of Death”, when the United States and its allies attacked a large retreating Iraqi convoy on Highway 80 that resulted in mass casualties, and later, accusations against the American military for undue force.

But the game crucially places Russians, rather than Americans, as responsible for the killing. This allusion to a Russian-made atrocity has led to accusations against Activision, the game’s production company, for blatant Russophobia. In a predictable clash between an American developer and the Russian media, the game has been denounced by Russian journalists and gamers as pure US propaganda.

This is not the first time the Call of Duty series has provoked controversy. In 2009, an earlier version of the game featured a level called “No Russian” in which the player takes on the role of a CIA undercover agent, actively assisting a terrorist cell in a massacre of civilians at a Russian airport. Controversy does little to negatively impact sales, with avid gamers undeterred by the bad press.

https://www.snopes.com/news/2019/11/12/call-of-duty-anti-russian/