I'm someone who has not liked the use of the Kempetai name since I first started playing Infinity years ago, because of its context... while ruthless, they were essentially cast as the heroes cutting down evil Chinese officers who used their people as cannon fodder, with a distaste for harming civilians. That is at odds with the historical reputation of the force bearing that name, which functioned as police, military police, and secret police and engaged in various war crimes and brutalities against populations under Japanese occupation and against Japanese civilians themselves, starting from their very beginnings. While CB surely isnt asserting their Kempeitai to be the direct heirs of that unit, names have meaning... were the preceding forces policing the army before they were founded called Kenpeitai? No. Are the current military police of Japan called Kenpeitai? No. The name is in fact specific, tied to a particular corps of Japanese military police, and given that connection a portrayal that comes out on the positive side is problematic. There are probably better names with all the impact and none of the baggage, if they arent referencing the Imperial kenpei then CB loses nothing by a name change, but I'm not inherently opposed to seeing wargames units named for bad people or organizations. Name things for bad people, doing that can reference and educate. The issue I have is entirely with doing so and then presenting the things so named in a positive light. I posted in the speculation thread with my worries over Japanese secession making things worse by casting them in an even more positive light than they already were. I can't entirely dismiss that until I read Uprising, but the background we did catch sight of has actually done a lot to lessen my concerns... the Kenpeitai were a brutal secret police, and they are now no longer well-intentioned terrorists but in fact a brutal secret police. The opposite of what I feared has played out, that change puts Infinity's Kempeitai in a darker light more in keeping with the historical actions of that unit. My problems with using the name are less than they were before the change. I'll take it.
I get that frustration, but I don't think this is an example of it. People aren't trying to be offended here, they are discussing whether the continued portrayl of something is appropriate, and in addition doing it in a manner that is way less venomous than 90% of the rules posts.
'68. Thanks nothing since I don't believe in any of the sky-friends. Old enough to know better, young enough not to give a **** what people think about it. The 90s ruined the illusion of good music (srsly, the miming/lip-sync scandals, Grammies being taken back and don't get me started on the dumpster fire that was grunge urgh.)
I am both amazed and saddened people listen to pop music, but I guess pop stands for popular. It's show, don't tell time. Show with the story that the horrible subject that is Kempeitai makes this in-game unit worthy of their name. Show that CB can handle sensitive subjects with accuracy, rather than just accidenting in on the topic. The real difference is whether you're willing to face the historical references or whether you shy away from them (or worse yet, apologise or cover them up) - if it's not in the fluff already, any JSA victories in the online campaign can be an excellent place to show that you've understood the meaning of what Kempeitai is. Make it Pyrrhic.
I'm not a native speaker. You know, deny, cover up, "it's not so bad", "reports are exaggerated", "it was justified considering <strawman x, y, z>" etc.
Very much this. So very much this. Except that name is so tainted by history that the current JSDF Military Police use the Engrish "MP". Not "Kempei," even though "kempei" with those kanji means "military police". That name carries a LOT of negative weight, despite the relatively honorable start the Infinity unit had back in HSN2. Up there with having a German police unit called the Gestapo or the Stasi. Will definitely be distasteful to some people. And I'm not so sure that the Infinity Kempeitai is separate from their Imperial Japanese ancestor, given the new unit fluff that has been posted. But as mentioned above, and by @Shiwen , the current real-world Japanese Military Police don't use the name because of it's baggage. That version I didn't have a problem with. Well, the name was a bit off, but I could see Japanese Nationalists calling it back up for use, or the Chinese using it to associate those troops with the IJA Kempeitai. I painted my Kempeitai models with the Shinsengumi blue-with-white-dags cloak, and still need to paint the symbol for "faithfulness" on their backs. Need a nice white technical pen. Any officer that just throws away troops for no gain deserves the grenade getting rolled into his tent while he's asleep (the origin of the term "fragging"). Even in the US military, that's bordering on 'justifiable homicide', though it usually gets covered up by the nest-higher officers instead of going to trial. Falls under the category of things I personally taught officers as "never ask a question you don't want to know the answer to." That's stepping straight back into the Imperial Japanese Army version. Fitting, but I'm going to throw a book across the fucking room if I read about honorable Kempeitai defending the innocent Japanese women and children from raping hordes of Yu Jingese troops. Maybe even drag that book out to the shooting range and introduce it to a .45. I'm going to disagree with that, considering that the current Japanese MPs don't use the word Kempei at all. The modern Self-Defense Forces still use versions of the Rising Sun flag. I've seen a small submarine flying a huge Rising Sun at Pearl Harbor, HI, when a JMSDF sub came to visit. Wish I had taken a picture, really. Flag must have been at least 3x5meters, when most USN ships only fly a 3x5foot flag in port. Yeah, the Secessionist Kempeitai have definitely took on the attributes of the old Imperial Japanese Army Kempeitai. Currently VFC-111, an Aggressor squadron. Their history dates back to WW2, and that squadron fought from 10 October 1942 all the way to the surrender of Japan (and beyond). That 'setting sun' tailfin wasn't used during WW2, though, and seems to have been adopted sometime between 1965 and 1967 based on photos on wiki.
Using what a politician will or won't say in what is probably the most face-based area of a faced-based culture probably isn't a great example. A lot of that kind if formal language is going to be based on roundabout euphemisms to avoid saying things that are considered "undesirable" (I speak Japanese if I haven't made that clear.)
I think that it's like in 2185, the secessionist Japanese state is built on a pre-Yu Jing historical narrative which paints the (extremely real, widespread and horrific, to be clear) abuses of the Japanese Armed Forces during their Imperialist years up to and including WWII as being made up or exaggerated by other powers to try and justify repression of the Japanese people, and that it never happened outside of a few minor, isolated incidents, and therefore the Kempetei is a perfectly acceptable name to use because their reputation was dragged through the mud by those Allied/Korean/Chinese/Yu Jing StateEmpire/etc bastards. So basically, historical revisionism used to justify ethno-nationalism. If this seems far-fetched, a not-insignificant part of the Japanese population today believes something along those lines, you'll find plenty of senior Japanese politicians who will publicly deny the existence of things like Korean Comfort Women etc, calling them a subversive and anti-Japanese lie. After generations of repression, Japanese nationalism is linked hand in hand with a romanticised, idealised and utterly bullshit idea of Japanese history, which is why they all fall over themselves to join the Kempetei and call their ideals Bushido without having much idea about what that actually was at all. And of course the Kempetei are still the secret morality police and political officers of a self-declared ethno-state so it's not like these guys are going to be a lovely bunch of heroes.
My brain jumped to the British acronym. Even then, it's the same explanation, but even stronger because it's at an institutional level there -- the SDF constantly has to ensure proper names are used lest it be referred to as an army (which it really really doesn't want).
I fear that there are a lot of issues that will be on either side of the barricade, but enlarging Real World actual concerns it is a problem when applied to science fiction set in a not so immediate Future. . . As is a thing that is directly linked to the Past of My Homeland, Italy, yet in the most Ancient of Times and in more recent ages, do You know what is the "Root Origin" of the designation "Fascist" as in also going hand in hand with "Nazi-Fascists" (abbreviation of "Fascists from the "Nazional-Fascist" Political Party of Germany) . . .?? . . . . . During the Classical Roman Age, when the Old Republic of Rome was about to be subsumed by the first of the Roman Emperors, Caius Julius Caesar (from whom derivated the "Kaiser" appellation of Prussian Royalty too) there were a special corp of Subordinate Officers, both Political and Civilian Enforcers, that were called "Fascii Lictoris" (Legates with a Wood Brace) as in their symbol of office was a Woodsman Axe tied with a Brace of cut branches. . . They were tasked to ruthlessly enforce the will of the Consuls of Rome and where no more than a "Special Police Task Force, designated by the Mayor / Head Of State" but obviously filtered with the (cruel) sensibilities of Ancient Classical Roman; while with the Emperors their role was usurped by the Praetorian Guard, they staid as symbols of uncompromising civil justice for all of the Classical Age (and in effect are the "Root Ancestor" of the legal term "Legate" that stand for a politically appointed officer worldwide). . . When in the 1920 the founder of the Italian Fascist Party, Benito Mussolini (that was deemed a Radical Hothead by its once-comrades of the International Marxist-Socialist Union of Italy !!) decided to be inspired by Ancient Classical Rome to daze and impress the population then He choose the "Fascii Lictori" symbol for their own brand of "Return To The Golden Age" (equally as Adolph Hitler started to imitate Mussolini a few years later, with its "Nibelung Origins of the Superior Aryan Race" !!) and usurpated the Roman Iconography. . . Nowaday the Symbols of the Fascist Party of Italy could not be employed anymore even from the most absurd of the "Righmost Political Activists" of Europe (people that make shy of the White Supremacist of U.S.A. as "Stupid Country Bumpkins") but still the Ancient Rome Icons stay and were not destroyed or removed even during the worst "Leftist Cultural Revolution" of the 1960 - 1970 !! Is as if the Symbol of the Swastika as symbol of "Aryan Supremacist" is not be possible to be used, but the reverse one is still an Holy Symbol for many Ancient Cultures of the Far East. . . . . . . . The fertile Videogame Franchise of "Castle Wolfenstein" has depicted a lot of Nazi-Swastika icons on totally invented "Science Fiction Military Units" but no one has deemed them totally unappropriate, even if they employ the nastier tactics knew by the Gestapo and the S.S. Schultzstaffen. . . Similarly the Marvel Comics has created the "Hydra" criminal organization, that is an "Evolved Nazi Secret Sect" capable of many nasty ideas, but no one has called them on this, provided they stay as Villains and not "Misguided Heroes" in their setting. . . Is as if the other Videogame Serie of "Assassin Creed" by Eidos will be called for because they depicted the "Templar Knights" as the worst kind of Villain (and the "Temple Knights" are now in our age a growing subsect of Masonic Brotherhood) while the traditionally reviled "Hashashins" are instead the Heroes of the setting and are forced to do evil, unspeakable acts by necessities (much like the Bahram of Haqqislam are meant to do). . . Let's give credit that Corvus Belli tried maybe to create a nasty Unit that perform nasty things. . . Or do You think that the Hexaedron of Pan-Oceania are just "Misunderstood Space C.I.A." or the Druze Society is unjustly framed by uncorrect propaganda of Mercenary Rivals. . .?? Mercenary Rivals that could be just the Turkish "Kaplans" whose iconography is the Wolf-Head Motif of the most extremist right wing Activists of Modern Turkey (that are now in the political preponderance). . . . .???
Just throwing this in here because it fits the thematic: I am always pretty puzzled about the Union Jack Flag. It's certainly more a symbole of imperialism more then any other out there and there were countless cruelties done in its name, but basically everyone is ok with it, and it's wildly used mostly as a popculture reference on its own. Coincidentally it's absolutely absent in Infinity. I guess I personally don't have a strong opinion on whether the use of names or symbols should be prohibited, I am certainly more liberal about it because I don't believe in censorship, but I guess you should acknowledge the roots and don't try to glorify it, which is were the Kempeitai seem to fall a little sort. I didn't know about their exists in the first place though, so any glorification was totally failed on me as well.
Who cares, it's a fictional game. If you're offended don't play it. The company owns the right to use whatever "Historically" relevant information they want. Also these weird Nazi analogies make me laugh. It's a fictional game, it's like getting offended about a "gay regiment". Who care about the fluff lmao.It's like these constant discussions on WGC Infinity page about "Representation of women in Infinity" It's toy soldiers, not your workplace staff. Get over it.
People can disagree with elements of the aesthetics and still enjoy the game. I criticize the sexist sculpts because I enjoy infinity, for example, and recognize it would have a wider audience with better representation. Can we not simultaneously hold views that the treatment of some units is really questionable given their historical background and enjoy the game at the same time?
