You round a corner, finger wrapped around the trigger like a child clinging to a safety blanket. A nazi appears. You try to fire, but a mysterious force prevents you. Nazi magic? No, something much more sinister. You hear a voice: “Is it really OK to deny fascism a platform?” “Oh no,” you whisper. Then you die.
That’s the basic setup of Dialogue 3D, a gag game made by Ramsey Nasser from the open source version of Wolfenstein. Any time you try to fight a nazi, dialogue boxes with some variation on, “Is punching nazis really alright?” pop up. If you hit “yes” or “no” in time, you shoot. If not, you die. Even if you do manage to fire your gun before dying, you’ll take a lot of damage while struggling against wishy-washy Discourse Demons.
It’s almost like the game is trying to say that when Good Liberals spend their time infighting over whether it’s OK to historically effective tactic for preventing racist dickheads from overtaking communities), they’re standing still. Naturally, people playing by a completely different set of rules will take advantage of this, and you’ll suffer.
Dialogue 3D is not exactly subtle! Nor is it entirely novel, given the number of memes going around about characters like Captain America and Indiana Jones punching nazis. Still, it’s a funny take on an exasperating subject, and goddamn could we all use a laugh right about now.
Comments
66 responses to “Wolfenstein Parody Thoughtfully Examines The Ethics Of Violence Against Nazis”
This is stupid.
This is great.
I did Nazi see this coming, I can tell ya.
It requires fuhrer investigation.
You’re on the the reich track
Hitler nail on the head.
Nazimon. Gotta kill em all.
Lol topical politics, right guys?
Considering how a bunch of idiots are referring to right wing supporters as facists/Nazis (because anyone who disagrees with you is Hitler). This is kind of telling angry idiots to kill people who disagree with you. Reporting on this and praising it’s message, is a new low. I’m going to be sending an email to whoever is the editor or in charge of allure media.
Right wing? They call anybody who’s not as far left as Sarah Silverman a Nazi.
And for a great many in the far left that is all thats required to basically support physical violence.
This.
Some Muslims attack people because they believe in an intolerant ideology, some people protest peacefully, those people get called nazis, some lefties attack them because they thing that’s ok, I think people who attack people who are protesting peacefully deserveq to be attacked.
Great society, Grayson.
Not saying I disagree with the notion that calling someone you disagree with a Nazi is wrong, but you know the impetus behind this discussion/game is Richard Spencer being punched right?
As in, an honest to God actual Nazi.
So in this case the game is perfectly accurate, since the game is commenting on the idea that you should discuss his/people like him’s genuine Nazi views. Before then punching them, preferably.
See, you were making a good point until the punching them part. Yes, you should discuss his/people like him’s views. You should debate them. However, unless these people are actually physically threatening you with violence, you should never punch them.
Nah, verified Nazis can get punched. Happy to be called a hypocrite, because I am, and accept the hypothetical consequences.
ok. let’s play along for a sec.
we got whatshisname getting punched at the inauguration. we wont call him a nazi or whatever. & i cant remember his name atm, so lets call him Pepe.
so Pepe is on the record writing an article arguing the necessity of black genocide. article since deleted, heres a screencap. https://twitter.com/tariqnasheed/status/822856026122645504
now, is ‘should we murder an entire population of people based on their skin colour’ an acceptible topic for conversation? fuck no.
there’s some things that for a civilised society to remain civilised just are not things that considered.
you might argue that punching him in the face was not the right thing to do & that we’d be better off arguing our position in opposition like ‘civilised’ people? again, fuck no.
applying logic and rational thinking to couter his position raises the possibility that his position itself has logic or a rational basis. in short, engaging in argument legitimises his position as something worth talking about. its fucking not.
so. how then do you shut down a completely not-valid argument without legitimising it?
two ways – destroy his power – take away his platform, ruin his reputation & place him in gaol for inciting racial hatred. but yeah. in the days of twitter, taking away a platform is nigh impossible. & there’s any number of people dumb, insecure & racist enough to overlook ever logical counter to his position & who would be more than happy to ignore any ligetimate discreditation directed toward him.
so option two – like a dog that pisses on the rug, hit him with a rolled up newspaper until he learns that pissing on the rug is not allowed (in this case pissing on the rug is a metaphor for promoting toxic racist nonsense into a civilised society)
I dont care what anyone calls him. i’m making a point of not calling him a nazi here – but my point is that no matter what you call him, his views are utterly & completely unacceptable.
& this is NOT about ‘free speech.’
freedom of speech (in america at least) protects a person from govt censorship. In australia, we dont even have that. its implied. & freedom of speech does not equate with an entitlement to be heard or taken seriously.
anyway… the implied right to freedom of speech stops the second you attempt to use that freedom to harm another. the moment you suggest that a people, solely by virtue of their skin colour, should be murdered en masse, you lose the freedom to speak, & to be heard. in fact, you earn the right to be ridiculed mercilessly.
I mean, why should anyone speak out against the rights of others & expect to still retain the legal protections that they’re attempting to take from their victims?
getting punched in the face might not be the correct thing to do in terms of legality – punching any person has legal consequences that the puncher must accept. then again, spouting racist hate speech also comes with its own set of consequences – in this case a fist in the eye. & that’s something any and all white supremacists will just have to accept as a consequence of their actions.
You just don’t understand, man. If someone wants to be a hate mongering shitstain literally advocating genocide and Sieg Heil-ing, then that’s his RIGHT. Silly SJWs just hate freedom of speech, what with their ethics in games journalism and hating Nazis.
But on a semi-serious note, it’s something I strongly disagree with, but that’s just the libertarian point of view – that individual rights and freedom to do anything you want as an individual should trump anything and everything else.
The problem with that view “I should be allowed to do whatever I want whenever I want”, is that in doing so you may be preventing someone else “do what they want”. Does that then give them the right to do whatever they want to you, so they can do whatever they want?
That’s where pure liberterniasm falls down, unless you apply it as most libertarians do… “I want to do whatever I want, but will bitch and moan if someone else does the same to me”….
oh way to make pretty much exactly the same point as me, only quicker & more succinctly :p
Oh, I’d like to make it clear that was my terrible attempt at sarcasm. I’m 100% in agreement with you and @35.
Ah, re-read your post and realised I was putting the emphasis in the wrong place in your last para… Thought the “that” was referring to SJW etc, and you disagreeing strongly with that was “just the libertarian point of view”.
LOL. My bad 🙂
well, the libertarian argument isn’t a very strong one.
if person A can say whatever they like, no matter how abhorrent because FREEDOM, then person B can punch them in the face because FREEDOM too.
libertarian argument falls down coz for it to work, all rights must be equal. But in order for person A to be correct, their right must be greater than their opponent’s right to their action etc. So there’s not a sound logic in it.
That’s stupid. We all have the right to words and thoughs.
The right to take violent action is based on the agreed laws of the land.
That’s why you can’t just punch people in the face because you disagree with them. I can’t believe that even needs to be said. What the fuck is wrong with you?
think of it this way: a person’s right to free speech vs another persons right to not be persecuted.
one of those people is gonna lose out. & in my view, protecting a persons freedom from harm is more important than protecting a persons right to cause harm.
And you protect anyone from harm by justifying unilateral acts of illegal violence, by civilians against people who’s words they disagree with?
That’s completely fucking ridiculous. Like I said, there’s laws to protect against hate speech, if you disagree you can use your words to have them strengthened. That’s how society works.
It’s a tough ethical problem because it’s not as simple as a “disagreement”. Here we have someone with a public, well-known platform and a significant body of followers in constant increase. He’s using this platform to incite racial hatred to the point of genocide and his followers are listening. (Followers, it is necessary to say, who used to be secretive and coy as society as a whole repudiated them. But as Trump’s presidency has legitimised them, they are boldly coming out of the woods seeking retribution.)
So then what? To stay on the down-low with the law, we allow him to be, to keep spouting hatred, to keep stirring his followers into violence until a minor spark makes them spill into the streets. Hundreds or thousands of innocents die. Some of them die too, some of them are arrested, most of them get away to plot the next one. Buuut we did everything by the book and since some of them were killed or arrested, justice was served, right? Pity for the victims, but oh well, better than besmirching the letter of the Law. Yes?
Or maybe, we can publicly show him that it is not right, publicly show his followers that he’s not untouchable and that being a genocidal racist is NOT tolerated. Maybe we can stop people like him from taking advantage of our own love for peace and lawfulness to grow powerful.
Then you have to change the law using protest and persuasive argument and then hold him accountable for breaking it.
Encouraging individuals to break the law just fucks the whole system. It’s a completely unacceptable solution.
I really see where you are coming from, I do. But as things are now, do you really see laws changing in ways that will allow us to prosecute that guy… any time soon? Under a Banno- er, Trump presidency?
As I say, I understand your point, but when the system is uneven or unfairly weighted, measures outside the law are the only option, by necessity. Without taking action outside the system, America would perhaps still be under British rule, slavery would still be accepted, wages and work conditions for blue-collar individuals would still be dreadful, etc.
The true ethical problem comes when you understand this and have to realise that you are giving people the choice of where to draw a line, with regards to both at which point such action is necessary and the extent of it, and people are historically bad at drawing lines. Yet… it is, unfortunately, preferable to the alternative.
That said, when it comes to an individual who not only believes in race supremacy but also in genocide and who is instructing other people to believe it, a punch to the face, seems to me, a line drawn not too far from where’s appropriate. Note that that punch’s power as a statement and as a challenge is much more relevant than any physical damage it may have caused.
What you describe is asymmetrical response, which is actually against one of the core tenets of libertarianism – the non-aggression principle. Libertarians who advocate unfettered personal freedom in that manner tend to be at the anarchist fringes of the spectrum, both on the left and right sides. In proper libertarianism the non-aggression principle prohibits you from punching someone else unless they punched you first (or threatened to do so).
for sure. i understand that most people wouldnt expect to have unfettered rights to do whatever they want. but i was intentionally focussing on the extreme ends.
a person who expects such extreme hate speech to be permissible on the grouds of free speech, in my mind at least, must be ready to accept the extreme exercising of that same freedom against them.
& such a ‘influential’ persons words can definitely have an equvalent physical consequence (by motovating other to action) as a punch in the face.
tbh, im not advocating punching anyone. just sick of arseholes talking shit & then playing the victim when they get a reaction. may have been an overly strong reaction, but it was their hate that brought it on.
I know the feeling. I’m an advocate of freedom in general, but there are definitely people who take the notion too far. Freedom should always be tempered by social responsibility to some extent.
I don’t know if free speech equates to ‘doing what you want’ aka, any physical activity. In Australia, we have freedom of speech, except when it basically equates to inciting others to violence. But you don’t get to punch them, the police get to take them into custody.
I’m not concerned about this regardless, I’m concerned that people are saying anyone right wing is a “Nazi” and therefore they have some kind of right to “punch them” because of hurt feelings. You have to realize half of the population who vote this way are not right supremacists? Even white supremacists are not Nazis, they’re just shit people. I’m concerned shitty games like this will make idiots think they’d better attack someone than ‘stay idle’ when their their opinions are being disagreed with.
theres always consequences to actions. that person who punched the frog nazi broke the law. if their found, theyll be charged & punished. as they should be.
but the problem occurs when the behaviour of the racist frog man is implicitly condoned by those in power (i mean… frog mans fellow racist mate is now a top advisor to the fkn president)
racist frog man is in a position of power. his victims arent. theyre scarrd & they cant rely on the system to solve this problem. violence isnt gonna solve anything, but what is?
No. You can’t have civilians hitting people because you don’t like their words.
If you don’t like his words that much then you use your words to have the law changed and get your Government to change stop him.
You can’t just unilaterally make a call on the legitimacy of someone’s thoughts and punch them.
If the Government votes that you can punch them (as happens when BJ punches Nazis) then go for your life.
Pretty much, this is still very clearly assault and the fact that the perpetrator covered his face lends weight to the arguments a lot of people have made about antifa people knowing what they were doing and just being children anyway.
There was a time when I thought (foolishly it would seem) that civilised societies actually used their words to provide reasoning as to why someone else’s words were of no value.
Now people are encouraging “BAN THEM FROM SAYING ANYTHING I DON’T LIKE!” instead.
Utter insanity.
Oh for sure, legislative action should only be needed in extreme cases.
The funny thing is, in the vast majority of those cases legal protection is required to prevent an act of violence occurring.
Legal protections are required to stop people like Grayson from encouraging people to punch people- not to protect people from having their feeling hurt.
Eh. I was going to say something long-winded and tiresome. Instead, I’m just going to say you need to get over it. Some guy is using an old game to make a point. Agree or disagree, but don’t hate the guys who report on it
No no, videogames don’t cause violence remember.
Here is a little exercise for you, if you can be bothered with checking up facts and challenging your assumptions: Go to any rightist blog or publication online (for example, Scott Adams blog) and peruse the comment section with an open mind. See if you are surprised by the amount of unabashed, proud and overly militant white supremacists, antisemitic, science deniers, chauvinists and generally hateful folk advocating violence, physical and verbal not only against minorities but also against their fellow Americans that dare to be democrats.
Now, when you tell me that you are not one of them, I believe you. If you were, you wouldn’t be denying it. The time of playing coy has passed for all that people as Trump’s presidency has made them feel validated and legitimised, so they are wearing it on the sleeve.
But when you try to pretend that people crying “Nazi!” are paranoid alarmists disingenuously trying to make a strawman, you are either keeping yourself in the dark for plausible deniability or intently being complicit of those people by mocking those who oppose them.
Your president rode to the highest chair on a platform that catered to these people, and they were very vocal and enthusiastic about their support, so it’s too late to claim disassociation. I’m sure you had your own reasons, likely valid, to vote for Trump. But if you and many other Trump supporters are truly not Nazi, it is your responsibility to condemn and isolate the Nazis that are stealing the spotlight and representing your party in common conversations on the Internet. As opposed to trying to pretend the problem is with those denouncing them.
Spencer has popularized the term “alt-right” to describe the movement he leads.
Spencer has said his dream is “a new society, an ethno-state that would be a gathering point for all Europeans,” and has called for “peaceful ethnic cleansing.”
“America was until this past generation a white country designed for ourselves and our posterity,” Spencer said. “It is our creation, it is our inheritance, and it belongs to us.”
The audience offered cheers, applause, and enthusiastic Nazi salutes.
He’s a Nazi. He’s not alt-right. He’s an racist, hateful, angry, deluded Nazi. It’s not a long bow to draw when he’s strung it himself.
Aw c’mon. Don’t be a sauerkraut.
The Richard Spencer’s of the world can freely and publicly talk about their ideas, but it doesn’t mean somebody isn’t going to think you’re a fuckwit and punch you in the face.
I believe in freedom, Mr. Lipwig. Not many people do, although they will, of course, protest otherwise. And no practical definition of freedom would be complete without the freedom to take the consequences. Indeed, it is the freedom upon which all the others are based. – Vetinari, Going Postal
Vetinari was a wise leader.
An arsehole, but wise.
“The problem with the other side is they are ALL extremist crazies. Thankfully our side is completely filled with logical and reasonable people.” -People from both sides
I was in the middle of writing a feature when this all started to go down, but I should have been keeping a closer eye on the storm here at the same time. That said: thanks to all involved for steering the discussion into a good place for the most part, and keeping it absent of the name-calling, reductive crap that topics as pointed and serious like the above (dealing with real-world fascism, or supremacist views) often get bogged down by.
There’s a good chat about how a society deals with views that seek to destroy that very society; let’s keep it there.
My issue is that a lot of the left wing are calling everyone a nazi. Even white surpemist are not Nazis. Just really shit people. You can treat them like shit people without resorting to violence.
The issue is a bunch of people who are just anti-pc culture get looped into this by ignorant people and it becomes dangerous when someone is telling them you better repress these other views with force or else it won’t work.
Its already kinda bogged down, which isn’t the fault of anyone here, including yourselves.
(The nation is stuck there already)
I like your way of thinking, sometimes I wonder if people chose the aggressive path because it was easier.
Right now we have real issues being championed by the good and the bad, intertwining to create a cesspool.
It means we can find evidence of what we want, not the whole truth.
It all seems so dishonest.
There are people presenting this scenario as a binary choice:
1. Punch the Nazi
2. Talk politely to the Nazi to change his mind.
Since 2. will never work, there fore the only logical option is 1.
That right there is a false dichotomy.
What, the ‘Progressive Left’ needs to understand is to succeed in a democracy you need to convince enough people to support your ideas.
If people are:
– punching unarmed individuals who disagree with them
– ‘calling out’ every perceived micro-aggression as evidence of bigotry
– putting class/wealth as a minor consideration after gender/race/cultures politics
… then that’s how you lose the support of the population and then lose at democracy.
Far out, the progressive left need to check their self-righteous outrage and unprincipled justifications for violence.
The thing is that no one is advocating punching just /anybody/. The person in question is the creator and figurehead of the most frighteningly successful racist and antisemitic modern community. Someone who has publicly advocated genocide and reasoned that the “white soul” is superior to all the other races’. He needs to be stopped or at least delegimitised somehow. A punch to the face is the first and only public challenge that counts that he has received. It put him into the spotlight as a loser, for once.
The game is advocating killing Nazis. Shooting them. The more radical left is calling everyone who disagrees with them a Nazi. Therefore the game is indicating it’s your duty to shoot right wing supporters.
That is complete and utter rubbish.
Yeah, I mean every time I play Mario Kart I always feel like going on the freeway and throwing bananas at people.
Driving on the freeway makes me feel like that even if I haven’t been playing Mario Kart.
KEEP LEFT IF YOU’RE GOING SLOW, UGH.
I get pissed when people do this on escalators. MOVE FFS
Jokes aside, I think everybody who’s clicked on this link more than once today can agree we should be thankful for Walker/the AU team for their efforts in handling such, shall we say, touchy subject matter.
The internet is not at all the place it used to be, and we all should remember this. Kotaku AU’s a broad church, and should stay that way – but make no mistake it’s their show and it’s up to them what is acceptable.
You obviously can’t rationalise what you really think in an open forum in a civil and constructive manner if you go and get your comments moderated now can you.
There’s always Reddit….
What if the Nazi is female?
Well.. what a little explosive topic we have here – Feel like we haven’t addressed some things:
1. ‘Nazi’ – this term is Hyperbolic at best, and completely wrong at worst. I mean come on guys, the real Nazi’s actually committed genocide? (among other things) – so the term shouldn’t be applied based on what someone is saying (people will often talk shit).
2. Physical violence is not the answer – what some of you are advocating seems to equate to a preemptive strike? Strike down the hate-speech giver (who is a disgusting human being) before he has a chance to cause harm? There are lawful ways of pursuing this, or at least countering it (why not get on your own soapbox?)
I’m thinking it falls something like this: in civilized society we cant really use preemptive strikes – think minority report as an extreme example.
Thing is that the dude has actually, unabashedly advocated for genocide. So should we wait until he has actually done it to stop him?
Good thoughtful postings making for some good reading there peoples.
Upvotes for all, well theoretical upvotes anyway, as too many to physically click.
As an aside, not sure where else this could be posted, but can the editors PLEASE not put moving gifs/images on the left side ‘trending articles’ section.
Moving images while trying to read is an abomination.
So terribly, terribly distracting.
Those stories will pull whatever the feature image of the story is, so if it’s the lead in the post then it’ll be the lead in the trending articles. Sorry mate 🙁
I believe I may have a solution for you then, Mr Walker.
No moving images as featured images!
Sorted, where’s my consultancy cheque? 😉
Understandable.
I shall just have to do what I did for this story and simply block that element when it’s moving. Most are perfectly fine, just the occasional one (such as this Wolf story) moves, and cannot stand that when trying to read.
Have a good one.
Define nazi though? Members of the nazi party?
German soldiers?
There were an awful lot of conscripts.
In modern terms, ‘Nazi’ is the well know brand. People commonly use the brand name they’re best know by to decribe a thing all the time (Hoover, Jacuzzi, Kleenex, etc…). Of course not everyone does this, but happens often enough people still know what you’re talking about.
‘Personally’ speaking, anyone who thinks Genocide is a good idea would generally all under the label of ‘Nazi’. Not everyone may agree but then again everyone has their own internal mental labeling system.
Historically there was the SS and there was the Wehrmacht (German Army), The Wehrmacht might have had some Nazis in it, but most were not party members. The SS on the other hand were the paramilitary arm of Nazi party so they were by definition all Nazis.
Although the SA were the military arm it was still full of conscripts later in the war years. My ex wife’s grandfather was SS and he was conscripted. He wasn’t an evil.man but in that atmosphere you have to do what you’re told. Not just for person preservation but for your family’s too. He didn’t even know Germany started the war, he thought they were the good guys until his capture by American troops.
Fair enough. Late war was a mess, they were making use of retired veterans and kids… and the they didn’t really trust the Wehrmacht so they probably dropped conscripts into the SS since they had more ‘direct’ control over them.