Re: [WW] Nazi players

[Arne Reuter <reuter@tse-online.de>]

Hi Cap!

I am glad to see, someone is thinking along my lines ;-).

Am Freitag, 7. September 2001, 06:15:28, schrieben Sie:

> This PBeM adventure has me thinking....

> First of all, many German's were not Nazi's.  Yet they still fought to
> protect/defend their country.  In fact there are stories of pilots who
> would not put the swastika on their planes.  Good guys still exist.  

> Secondly, many German's considered Russia to be the essence of evil. 
> There are books written about "Stalin's war of extermination."  Their
> point of view is quite startling to me, but could certainly be used in
> adventures.

Those who have followed this list for quite a while know might have
gleaned that from earlier post, but some might be questioning
themselves:

What is the point of that dude having his players play German
soldiers?

Because...

It's more interesting. From the US perspective the war can be seen as
very
clear-cut: good vs. evil, us vs. them. That self-righteous attitude (do
I hear someone yell "crusade"?) can be very tiring after some time,
because it does not take into account all facets. To put it into game
terms: What does a lawful good character do, when his country is under
martial law, his (rightful) government is telling them, they are
fighting against evil and past wrongs, is (again lawfully) drafted into
the army and then put to conquer almost the whole world, because
that's the only defense a small, ressource-poor country like Germany
has to defend itself? I believe this kind of situation opens up a lot
more roleplaying potential than starting a GI in June 1944. The war
was as good as over by then (hehe, that's where the weird elements can
reverse things all over, n'est-ce pas?).

And as a native German myself I'd just like to get intelligent people
like you to adopt a more differentiated view on history instead of
reproducing just opinions or "common knowledge".

Actually this last item is the most important lesson from all this: WW
II to this extent was in part only possible, because the
state-controlled media ("Propaganda") extremely influenced what the
subjects of the state were thinking of as "true".

Who would shoot at his neighbor, if one could rather share a meal?
(Ok, I am thinking about the French - there that picture makes more
sense than with thinking about the British 'cuisine' ;-) ).

Just think about it.

Mit freundlichen Gruessen,

Arne Reuter

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