Modern Warfare 2 (aka Bad Parenting)

On Tuesday, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was released. Here in the Chouinard household, the Call of Duty games are a staple; Jocco loves them, Cameron loves them and, yes, even I love them. I especially loved the first Modern Warfare so imagine my excitement when I found out they were releasing a second one. What? Soap MacTavish is going to be in it? And voiced by Kevin McKidd! Lucius Vorenus himself?* Why hell yes I will be purchasing this game!

So, Jocco came home with the game on Tuesday and I watched him play through the first two (intense!) missions. Then I saw Mr. MacTavish himself and thought 'Wow, that silly muppet you play as in the first game certainly grew up - and grew up to have Kevin McKidd's voice - MEOW!' . . . or something along those lines.

At this point I had to get the girls into bed so when I came downstairs afterwards Jocco had made it a bit further and lo' and behold had found out the reason for the disclaimer.

Jocco: Honey, you have to see this. It's just . . . crazy.

Cameron: Oh my God! It's so cool!

How could I walk away after my ten-year-old proclaimed that it 'is so cool'? So I sat down and settled onto the couch with the baby while Jock booted up one of the missions. The mission loads and there on the TV is four guys (the fifth is the one you control) standing in an elevator with assault rifles. The elevator doors open and they walk out and open fire on the civilians standing there in the airport minding their own business. Chaos ensues.

At this point, my jaw hits the floor. Yes, it's a video game - complete with disclaimer and option to skip the mission - but you're shooting civilians. And my ten-year-old thinks it's COOL.
So, how does one deal with this?

Me: You think this is cool?

Cameron (suddenly unsure): Well . . . yeah.

Me: Do you realize that it's not meant to be cool? That it's supposed to make you, as the player, FEEL AWFUL. Is it 'cool' when a kid steals his father's gun and goes in and shoots up his school? Because it's not 'cool' Cameron; it's sad and horrifying because things like this happen in real life and NO, YOU WILL NOT BE PLAYING THIS GAME!**

So Wednesday rolls around and I'm feeling like an awful and terrible parent. How could he think something like that was cool? Is he just desensitized by the other games we let him play? He's played all of the other Call of Duty games but in those you're shooting the 'bad guys' the enemy - not innocent civilians. Does it justify the simulated killing? No, but you can almost rationalize it away.
So do we take away all of his shooters? Do I make him sit and watch Saving Private Ryan and Platoon and war documentaries so he can understand that war is not 'cool'? Do I just smack him and tell him to stop being stupid? Do I send him overseas for firsthand experience?
In the end, we decided that Cameron wasn't allowed to play the new Call of Duty game, at least not yet, and gave a great big lecture about all the things that made that particular mission severely UNCOOL.
Does it make me feel better? No. I still feel like our bad parenting brought this on and have horrible 'mom-guilt' over it but it has opened my eyes to just how our ten-year-old has been viewing the world so we can handle it accordingly.

*I think Kevin McKidd is dead sexy. What can I say, I have a thing for Scottish accents.

**The airport/civilian killing mission has a point and does add to the overall story. It's not just gratuitus killing. You play an undercover CIA operative and at the end of the mission you get murdered by your 'teammates' and left at the scene of the crime. Russia then blames America for the massacre at the airport, thus leading to war and the rest of the plot.

I also discovered on my play-through that you don't have to actually shoot any of the civilians as long as you don't turn your gun on your 'teammates'.