‘Left 4 Dead 2′ Writer Says Racism Charges are ‘Utter Insanity’
Remember two weeks ago when there was a big hulabaloo about racism in games like Resident Evil 5 and Left for Dead 2? I wrote about it in depth, and decided that the location of a game does not make it racist as some suggested.
Well, the news of this accusation got back to Valve and now one of the games writers is speaking out about Houston Chronicle blogger, Willie Jefferson’s statements:
“While visiting Valve this past week, we asked how they felt about the [racism] accusations, and Left 4 Dead writer Chet Faliszek was quite frank with his response.
“Utter insanity,” says Faliszek… “There are mixed races of zombies, there are all different races of zombies that you shoot, and since we placed it in New Orleans, that makes it racist? I honestly re-read the [Houston Chronicle] paragraph about five times … but when two of the characters in your game are African-American, it’s a weird thing to be accused of. We’re like, ‘how does this work’?
“… As far as Katrina goes, if you go down to New Orleans, Katrina’s still going on. I mean, it’s messed up, it is crazy that the city is still in the state it’s in, and we treat that with the utmost respect… It’s a place we love, it’s dear to our hearts. We would not cheapen it. It’s not a brick-for-brick representation of New Orleans; it’s a fictional version, and I love that city.”
What? You picked New Orleans because you loved it? Not because you had some secret sinister agenda of exploiting a national disaster? Unheard of!
The statement also brings to light that it was probably a conscious decision to make two of the lead characters in the game black, partly to deflect criticisms like this. But in the game is it only not racist if the black characters shoot black zombies and the white characters shoot white ones? That would sort of be a pain to organize and would probably lead to a lot of brains being eaten.
Hopefully future developers aren’t scared off by these kinds of accusations, and will continue to bring their games to different locales no matter what race of mutant zombies happen to be found there.
[via Destructoid]
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[...] Valve says racism charge is “Utter insanity” -[Double Kill] [...]
Mr. Tassi,
By way of disclaimer, I have never seen and certainly not played Left 4 Dead (1 or 2). Having said that, Mr. Faliszek, the developer of the game in question seems to take the position that since his intent was not racist, his game cannot have been seen as racist. However it is quite possible to not have a racist thought in one’s head and produce a thoroughly racist piece of art (which is more or less what a video game is). D.W. Griffith was probably not a racist but he was quite prepared to produce a movie, “Birth of a Nation”, which was fantastically racist, even by standards of its time. He was motivated by the market place and what he took to be a great story, that it just happened to be racist did not cross his mind.
Mr. Faliszek also seems to be saying that since at least some the lead characters are black the game cannot be seen as racist. However it could be seen as “see how they treat each other, why should we treat them any different”. Maybe it is just something the older folks feel and the younger people are past all of that.
None of this is not to say that this particular game is racist, my only point is that Mr. Mr. Faliszek’s “defense” of his game does not hold a lot of water.
Did you just say that video games are just “thoroughly racist pieces of art”? Ya, you did! And I quote:
“However it is quite possible to not have a racist thought in one’s head and produce a thoroughly racist piece of art (which is more or less what a video game is).”
That is absolutely crazy.
In any event, I think Faliszek was actually saying that unless there are grounds for thinking that the game is racist, and you can provide those grounds, then shut up. I mean, he doesn’t have to defend himself against every idiot who doesn’t actually understand what racism is. If you read the article, the writer says L4D2 is racist because there are black zombies, and that a Hurricane just hit New Orleans. That is the height of stupidity. So, of course you can be racist without intending to be, but Faliszek is right in pointing out that there is no reason whatsoever to think that L4D2 is racist in the first place.
In response to another comment. See in context »Hello Mr. Saczkowski,
I wrote that a video is a piece of art, which could be racist. I did not mean that every video game is a “racist piece of art”. I am quite comfortable that Tetris is not racist.
My point is that whether a particular piece of art, including video games in general and L4D2 in particular, is racist is not determined by the state of mind of the artist. My example was the movie “Birth of a Nation” which is undeniably racist but the artist (D.W. Griffith) was probably not motivated by any racist thoughts or plans.
Moreover I was quite clear that I have no idea whether L4D2 is racist or not (I am not a connaisseur zombie art). My point remains that just because Faliszek did not set out to produce a racist game, does not mean he did do so.
In response to another comment. See in context »