The video game industry is not perfect. We know this for a fact across many topics and companies. Heck, you can look at the very recent layoffs plaguing the industry for proof that companies aren’t doing enough to be reasonable with their costs so that their employees don’t pay the price. Or, in the case of Rockstar Games, they’re not trying to be accepting of certain conditions that workers have become quite used to. But today, we’re going to talk about Call of Duty. No, not because their last game was a rushed-out travesty, but because of what one Illinois Police Department tried to do with it to get recruits.
Specifically, the Peoria Police Department decided to make a poster that not only said “Call of Duty” on it but referenced the various video game posters and cover art that the series has used over the years. The intent was obviously to use the game’s popularity to get more recruits for the police department. You might think, “Oh, it can’t be that bad!” Well, here’s the poster, you decide for yourself:
Yeah, it’s bad. As you can imagine, when this was posted online, it went viral, and not in a good way. People not only blasted the police department for doing this but noted various insensitive, “tone deaf,” and potentially even racist things about it.
For example, all three officers are white, and two of them are middle-aged, which doesn’t exactly showcase “representation in the police force” like they probably felt it did. Second, telling the audience to “stop playing games” to answer the call of the police force is mean-spirited because not everyone plays video games like first-person shooters to join the military or police forces. They do it for fun.
Plus, as many pointed out, the visuals of “armored up and heavily armed” police officers on the poster don’t indicate what the police force actually does daily. Not to mention, that invokes the “hostile persona” that the police have sadly shown many times over the last several years, as the Black Lives Matter movement can attest to.
As you might have guessed, the poster was taken down, and Peoria’s Police Chief made this statement about it:
“It was never my intention to offend any of our community members with the recruitment flyer that was posted on our Facebook page yesterday. It was simply a recruitment image I thought would appeal and connect to a younger generation. I take ownership of this, and I sincerely apologize.”
So, just like the last Call of Duty title…this wasn’t received well by fans and critics.
