Marc Arthur

Halter describes many recruitment efforts in From Sun Tzu to Xbox, all of them directed by huge corporate media giants. It's as if joining the army and buying Kraft cheese were the same thing. This article speaks to our cultures lack of literacy to things other than ourselves. So often it seems that TV commercials are the final answer. I used to think this had something to do with the "couch potato" attitude. But now with the advent of video and computer games people still have this attitude even while they are being proactive and "thinking" within a game like America's Army.

The precautions the army took in presenting their game with out an aura of propaganda is evidence that most Americans don't read into video games any more than what's at face value. All the Army seemed to need to do was write a few paragraphs in the "parents section " of the game and have philosophical vision of unity in the ad campaign for people to take to it.

One of the most troubling aspects of the article was learning about "TTTS" or Takin' It To The Streets. America's Army's audience are people who have computers. The African American high-school students probably don't have access to computers based on the the fact that the army must bring an "interactive arena" to the campus for them to play on. Is joining the army the only way for these students to access media? How can people at a disadvantage have a chance at using the media in interesting ways if it is controlled by wealth and power?

Halter, Ed. From Sun Tzu to Xbox. Thunder's Mouth Press