Mohammed?

[Jabo_68*]

Playing as a British pilot a few times in career I've noticed some pilots named Mohammed. It is ridiculously inappropriate and should be done away with.

[AndyJWest]

https://www.cwgc.org/find-records/find-war-dead/casualty-details/2929576/mohammed ahmad khan/

https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/166780

 

Clearly not going to be a common name, and probably inappropriate if it is occurring often, but given how widely the RAF recruited from beyond Britain itself, there were quite possibly more Mohammed's.

[cardboard_killer]

It is the most common male name in the world, then as now.

[616Sqn_Johnny-Red]

It's not representative of the period in its current context:

 

The random name generation used for pilot names should match appropriate first and second names by ethnicity (whether they be Anglophone, Polish, Czech, French or whatever).

 

• Firstly: In British, Commonwealth and Empire armed forces Mohammed should be matched with an appropriate surname for a member of the British Muslim diaspora.

 

• Secondly: As a British given first name, this name is almost completely without precedent in Britain itself prior to post-war immigration from within the Commonwealth and former Empire. As a consquence it would have been phenomenally obscure.

 

• Thirdly: British Indian servicemen who served in the RAF or IAF (or RIAF) where mostly not of the Muslim faith. They were more likely (not wishing myself to descend into steriotyping) of a piviledged and educated background in which the Muslim population of northern British India were less well represented.

 

Just to be clear, I'm not some old school British nationalist who gets triggered when I'm reminded how big the world is. My great great grandfather counted British Indian troops amongst his brothers in arms, and rests (in former Mesopotamia) in the same hallowed ground as many Muslim servicemen; his Hindu and Sikh comrades having fallen in action were cremated.

 

To me this is just a question of historical fidelity.

Edited May 7, 2022 by 616Sqn_Johnny-Red

[LukeFF]

The pilot name list can be updated, but it's never going to be separate for each nationality that served within the RAF. The best thing to do is to add in more names that were common and get rid of the ones that weren't (it's a simple text file).

 

I once updated the pilot name database, but I made it too big and it crashed the game. ? That said, I think I can update it more modestly without causing crashes. 

Edited May 7, 2022 by LukeFF

[616Sqn_Johnny-Red]

13 minutes ago, LukeFF said:

The pilot name list can be updated, but it's never going to be separate for each nationality that served within the RAF. The best thing to do is to add in more names that were common and get rid of the ones that weren't (it's a simple text file).

 

I once updated the pilot name database, but I made it too big and it crashed the game. ? That said, I think I can update it more modestly without causing crashes. 

 

I think the thing to do is smooth out the outliers in this case. Although it's a shame to lose the more obscure names, it will make generation more representative of names popular at the time.

 

I didn't mention this earlier because I was never realistically expecting there to be 5+ different name generators for the British Empire and Commonwealth + Free European Forces contained within the RAF (though it would be awesome if this was possible ?).

 

This is the way to go for British given names: https://www.ukbabynames.com/1920s

 

This post war (2010's) name list list is more representative of Britain as it is now https://www.ukbabynames.com/2010s with Muhammad ranked 12th most prevalent, Mohammed 29th and Mohammad ranked 68th.

 

For surnames, this list might be useful (as although it's an English ranking, rather than a list of all British family names), Welsh family names, as well as Scottish and to a lesser degree Irish family names are all very well represented in England; with the Welsh patronimics "Jones", "Williams" and "Davies" all ranking in the top 10 English family names by prevalence:

 

https://forebears.io/england/surnames

 

Out of the first ranked 100, those names which represent post war migration from South Asia are:

 

09: Patel

40: Khan

54: Singh

60: Begum

63: Hussain

70: Ali

71: Ahmed

93: Kaur

 

I would exclude these names from pilots intended to represent British aviators born in the 1920's, and only consider their usage if paired with an ethnically appropriate first name.

 

As stated before, I'm not trying to whitewash British military history, only to make it accurate and representative: Personally I'd love to see black British and US aircrew, along with Hispanic US aircrew, South Asian British aircrew and Soviet Asiatic aircrew represented in game. Then we really would have to think hard about what names we'd use to represent these people fairly and accurately.

 

As a parting though, I'd like to share these pictures I recently collected: 132 (Bombay) Squadron's Pilots of the Carribean

 

 

 

 

[AndytotheD]

It’s not inappropriate to have people with Islamic, or Indian names for RAF pilots. Certainly it wasn’t common but, like you say, a number of RAF aircrew came from the West Indies and among this group, Indian and Islamic names wouldn’t necessarily be uncommon. 

[Jabo_68*]

16 minutes ago, AndytotheD said:

It’s not inappropriate to have people with Islamic, or Indian names for RAF pilots. Certainly it wasn’t common but, like you say, a number of RAF aircrew came from the West Indies and among this group, Indian and Islamic names wouldn’t necessarily be uncommon. 

Mohammed Jackson isn't a typical Islamic or Indian name though, which was the name of my flight leader in my last career.

[Jeroen83]

Better than Michael Jackson though.

Edited May 7, 2022 by Jeroen83

[BOO]

33 minutes ago, Jeroen83 said:

Better than Michael Jackson though.

 

"Enemy 8 O'clock Low. Chamonah!"

Edited May 7, 2022 by BOO

[Asgar]

I wish i had this guys problems

[Dragon1-1]

2 hours ago, Jabo_68* said:

Mohammed Jackson isn't a typical Islamic or Indian name though, which was the name of my flight leader in my last career.

Mixed marriage.  Probably more rare then than nowadays (particularly among the sort of people who'd become fighter pilots), but who's to say that didn't happen? That said, it would be cool if ethnic names actually matched. The RAF of the time was actually quite a melting pot, with pilots from all over the colonies, as well as occupied allied nations such as Poland and Czechoslovakia. 

[Hoots]

10 hours ago, Jabo_68* said:

Playing as a British pilot a few times in career I've noticed some pilots named Mohammed. It is ridiculously inappropriate and should be done away with.

Tell me you know nothing about British history without telling me you know nothing about British history. 

[354thFG_Leifr]

33 minutes ago, Hoots said:

Tell me you know nothing about British history without telling me you know nothing about British history. 

 

Wish I could upvote more than once. ?

[Bremspropeller]

I'd be more concerned if more pilots were named Hans and Franz...

[ShamrockOneFive]

7 minutes ago, Bremspropeller said:

I'd be more concerned if more pilots were named Hans and Franz...

 

Veee are NOT spies!!!! *ahem* I mean.... we are not spies... old chap.

[blitze]

6 minutes ago, ShamrockOneFive said:

 

Veee are NOT spies!!!! *ahem* I mean.... we are not spies... old chap.

Well - given the British Royal Family has close German background - why not??

 

Also, wasn't Egypt and parts of the Middle East under the Commonwealth / British Empire at that time.  Yes there was contesting between Axis forces and Allied but......

[AEthelraedUnraed]

Well, luckily we've got public databases and modern tools nowadays . Such as the Commonwealth War Graves site, where you can search for war dead. Unless for some reason Muslim/Hindu/Whatever are less likely to die, this should give a fairly representative list of the names of the pilots that flew dangerous combat missions like we do in IL2, without any modern woke/racist/whatever bias.

 

I've extracted all RAF servicemen listed as having died in WW2, some 80.000 of them, and did a bit of processing in Excel (I also manually deleted first name entries that weren't names, such as "Sir," "Lord," "Duke" and the like where I spotted them, which I have to add could possibly add a very slight bias away from first names used by the uppermost class). You can find the results attached.RAF_Casualties.zip

 

The 100 most occurring first names are:

Spoiler

JOHN

WILLIAM

JAMES

GEORGE

ROBERT

THOMAS

ARTHUR

RONALD

KENNETH

CHARLES

FREDERICK

EDWARD

PETER

ERIC

ALBERT

LESLIE

DAVID

FRANK

STANLEY

HAROLD

HENRY

RICHARD

ERNEST

NORMAN

ALFRED

JOSEPH

DOUGLAS

JACK

REGINALD

HARRY

DONALD

LEONARD

WALTER

FRANCIS

CYRIL

ALAN

ALEXANDER

HERBERT

DENNIS

GEOFFREY

RAYMOND

GORDON

SIDNEY

ROY

BERNARD

MICHAEL

PHILIP

MAURICE

ANTHONY

VICTOR

SYDNEY

WILFRED

PATRICK

HUGH

CLIFFORD

CECIL

EDWIN

SAMUEL

GERALD

ANDREW

IAN

DEREK

DENIS

COLIN

PERCY

RALPH

BRIAN

HORACE

LAWRENCE

BASIL

FRED

ALLAN

CHRISTOPHER

PAUL

TERENCE

IVOR

EDGAR

DESMOND

LAURENCE

ARCHIBALD

GILBERT

DANIEL

STEPHEN

KEITH

HUBERT

ARNOLD

LIONEL

TOM

DERRICK

ALEC

ROLAND

GRAHAM

HOWARD

MALCOLM

TREVOR

EDMUND

BENJAMIN

VINCENT

LOUIS

LEWIS

 

And the 100 most occurring last names:

Spoiler

SMITH

JONES

TAYLOR

WILLIAMS

DAVIES

BROWN

WILSON

EVANS

THOMAS

JOHNSON

THOMPSON

WRIGHT

WALKER

WOOD

HALL

HARRIS

GREEN

HUGHES

HILL

EDWARDS

ROBERTS

LEWIS

ROBINSON

MARTIN

JACKSON

SCOTT

CLARK

WHITE

WATSON

KING

MOORE

TURNER

BELL

YOUNG

MITCHELL

CLARKE

MORRIS

JAMES

BAKER

COOPER

MORGAN

PHILLIPS

HARRISON

WARD

ANDERSON

CAMPBELL

RICHARDSON

DAVIS

CARTER

BENNETT

PARKER

ALLEN

COOK

MILLER

COX

STEWART

ADAMS

GRIFFITHS

HOLMES

MARSHALL

SHAW

ROGERS

ROBERTSON

BAILEY

GRAY

MATTHEWS

LEE

SIMPSON

RICHARDS

CHAPMAN

ROSS

PRICE

ELLIS

PALMER

POWELL

COLLINS

MASON

THOMSON

FOSTER

REID

GRAHAM

HUNT

HENDERSON

OWEN

FLETCHER

MURRAY

WEBB

STEVENS

FISHER

SAUNDERS

JENKINS

MILLS

GRANT

HUNTER

DIXON

LLOYD

KNIGHT

PEARSON

RUSSELL

DAY

 

Interestingly, Muhammad/Mohammed doesn't occur in the first names but does occur nine times in the surnames (both spellings combined). If those are taken to be mis-recorded first names instead (which they likely are as most of these entries don't have a recorded first name), the name would end up at place 270 of the list, between Jindrich and Vera (interesting; perhaps ground personnel or Air Transport Auxiliary?).

 

Perhaps the Devs or @LukeFF could use these names as the auto-generation source for RAF names? That way at least no-one can complain about any modern bias.

Edited May 7, 2022 by AEthelraedUnraed

[Trooper117]

The best way around this is for the ability of the user to type in the name of the pilot he or she wants to be (like in some other flight sims)... if the dev's were that concerned about political correctness they would have ensured that the pilot figure would match the ethnicity of the name created. That's not going to happen is it, so having Mohammed even listed in the database is a waste of time really.

[IckyATLAS]

1 minute ago, Trooper117 said:

The best way around this is for the ability of the user to type in the name of the pilot he or she wants to be (like in some other flight sims)... if the dev's were that concerned about political correctness they would have ensured that the pilot figure would match the ethnicity of the name created. That's not going to happen is it, so having Mohammed even listed in the database is a waste of time really.

I would not agree simply because it is impossible to do. Let me explain why. I have seen in my travels around the world (and I traveled a lot on all continents except Australia) people with very different ethnicity, far-east asian, african, arab, caucasian that had the name Mohammed, and so there is no possibility to have a one to one correspondence between a name and a unique ethnical origin. You will be always wrong.

 

What can be done for those that work with the editor, is that we should have the possibility to skin the pilot including its face, and so we can if we want adapt the look and the name that we want to.

 

[DD_Arthur]

47 minutes ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

Well, luckily we've got public databases and modern tools nowadays . Such as the Commonwealth War Graves site, where you can search for war dead. Unless for some reason Muslim/Hindu/Whatever are less likely to die, 

 

I would treat anything from the Commonwealth war graves commission with some care.

 

Considering the Indian army fought in the western desert, Italy and did the bulk of the fighting in Burma against the Japanese; Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs were more likely to die but a lot less likely to have a recorded grave.

Same goes for British west and East African forces who unloaded the ships, drove the lorries, carried the supplies and fought....

 

”If I should die, think only this of me; there is some corner of a foreign field...we’re I’m buried along with a couple of black guys no one gave two hoots about...”

[AEthelraedUnraed]

1 minute ago, DD_Arthur said:

Considering the Indian army fought in the western desert, Italy and did the bulk of the fighting in Burma against the Japanese; Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs were more likely to die but a lot less likely to have a recorded grave.

We don't currently have any desert, Italy or CBI in game. So not relevant at all to the current state of IL2.

[Ribbon]

Can't you edit the name while creating new career profile?

[BlitzPig_EL]

2 minutes ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

We don't currently have any desert, Italy or CBI in game.

More is the pity, and a far more pressing issue than pilot names.

[DD_Arthur]

8 minutes ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

We don't currently have any desert, Italy or CBI in game. So not relevant at all to the current state of IL2.

 

But very relevant when trying to extract data from a fundamentally flawed database....

[Noisemaker]

26 minutes ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

We don't currently have any desert, Italy or CBI in game. So not relevant at all to the current state of IL2.

Yet... so not totally irrelevant, as the game will expand further.

[AEthelraedUnraed]

18 minutes ago, DD_Arthur said:

But very relevant when trying to extract data from a fundamentally flawed database....

  There is no fundamental flaw if active servicemen in the ETO are considered, which is exactly the theatre/demographics that corresponds to IL2.

 

But sure, do you have any better databases that represent British WW2 airmen in the ETO? If so, please share. If not, anything you say about how prevalent names such as Muhammad were is pure hypothesising.

 

1 minute ago, Noisemaker said:

Yet... so not totally irrelevant, as the game will expand further.

If the game ever expands to the MTO (I sure hope it does!), we can look again and adjust the names, if possible, to something more representative of that theatre. Until that time however, it certainly is irrelevant as we only have the ETO 

[DD_Arthur]

1 minute ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

But sure, do you have any better databases that represent British WW2 airmen in the ETO? If so, please share. If not, anything you say about how prevalent names such as Muhammad were is pure hypothesising.

 

I’m merely pointing out some of the many inherent flaws in relying on a “database”.?

[AEthelraedUnraed]

30 minutes ago, DD_Arthur said:

I’m merely pointing out some of the many inherent flaws in relying on a “database”.?

I won't deny there exist biases in many databases, that's exactly the reason I chose this specific (type of) database. I imagine that if I, for example, chose a list of all RAF medal recipients, there could be some bias against ethnic minorities due to prevalent racial attitudes at the time (not sure and I don't make any claims either way, but I can certainly imagine this is the case).

 

However, there is no racism involved in determining who dies (it would be the definite proof of the existence of (a) certain god(s) if there was). I also think it unlikely that non-Western KIA RAF personnel were statistically significantly less likely to be documented and assigned a war grave than ethnic Britons. In IL2, we fly combat missions in the ETO; missions that usually had a relatively high casualty rate. Therefore, I postulate that a database of all RAF war graves in the ETO gives a good idea of how prevalent certain names were among RAF personnel in the stated theatre.

 

That certainly doesn't mean biases don't exist; biases exist in everything really. I can think of a couple possible ones in this case:

- It's possible non-Western RAF personnel were assigned less intensive combat missions, resulting in less casualties. Since the demographics of IL2 are those RAF personnel who are assigned intensive combat missions, this is not relevant for this specific demographic.

- It's possible non-Western RAF personnel either were assigned more dangerous combat missions, or received less training beforehand. This would lead to this demographic being over-represented in the casualty numbers, so not extremely relevant either since Muhammad is already rather low in the list of most common names.

 

Either way, I think using a database is a much better way of going about it in a discussion about the relative frequency of first names, than simply stating "there shouldn't be any Muhammads" or "you know nothing about British history if you say there shouldn't be Muhammads", without providing any relevant evidence whatsoever, as some people above have done.

Edited May 7, 2022 by AEthelraedUnraed

[Vishnu]

With everything happening in the world and to our lives, this is what cheeses this guy off?

Edited May 7, 2022 by Vishnu

[LukeFF]

3 hours ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

Well, luckily we've got public databases and modern tools nowadays . Such as the Commonwealth War Graves site, where you can search for war dead. Unless for some reason Muslim/Hindu/Whatever are less likely to die, this should give a fairly representative list of the names of the pilots that flew dangerous combat missions like we do in IL2, without any modern woke/racist/whatever bias.

 

I've extracted all RAF servicemen listed as having died in WW2, some 80.000 of them, and did a bit of processing in Excel (I also manually deleted first name entries that weren't names, such as "Sir," "Lord," "Duke" and the like where I spotted them, which I have to add could possibly add a very slight bias away from first names used by the uppermost class). You can find the results attached.RAF_Casualties.zip

 

The 100 most occurring first names are:

  Hide contents

JOHN

WILLIAM

JAMES

GEORGE

ROBERT

THOMAS

ARTHUR

RONALD

KENNETH

CHARLES

FREDERICK

EDWARD

PETER

ERIC

ALBERT

LESLIE

DAVID

FRANK

STANLEY

HAROLD

HENRY

RICHARD

ERNEST

NORMAN

ALFRED

JOSEPH

DOUGLAS

JACK

REGINALD

HARRY

DONALD

LEONARD

WALTER

FRANCIS

CYRIL

ALAN

ALEXANDER

HERBERT

DENNIS

GEOFFREY

RAYMOND

GORDON

SIDNEY

ROY

BERNARD

MICHAEL

PHILIP

MAURICE

ANTHONY

VICTOR

SYDNEY

WILFRED

PATRICK

HUGH

CLIFFORD

CECIL

EDWIN

SAMUEL

GERALD

ANDREW

IAN

DEREK

DENIS

COLIN

PERCY

RALPH

BRIAN

HORACE

LAWRENCE

BASIL

FRED

ALLAN

CHRISTOPHER

PAUL

TERENCE

IVOR

EDGAR

DESMOND

LAURENCE

ARCHIBALD

GILBERT

DANIEL

STEPHEN

KEITH

HUBERT

ARNOLD

LIONEL

TOM

DERRICK

ALEC

ROLAND

GRAHAM

HOWARD

MALCOLM

TREVOR

EDMUND

BENJAMIN

VINCENT

LOUIS

LEWIS

 

And the 100 most occurring last names:

  Hide contents

SMITH

JONES

TAYLOR

WILLIAMS

DAVIES

BROWN

WILSON

EVANS

THOMAS

JOHNSON

THOMPSON

WRIGHT

WALKER

WOOD

HALL

HARRIS

GREEN

HUGHES

HILL

EDWARDS

ROBERTS

LEWIS

ROBINSON

MARTIN

JACKSON

SCOTT

CLARK

WHITE

WATSON

KING

MOORE

TURNER

BELL

YOUNG

MITCHELL

CLARKE

MORRIS

JAMES

BAKER

COOPER

MORGAN

PHILLIPS

HARRISON

WARD

ANDERSON

CAMPBELL

RICHARDSON

DAVIS

CARTER

BENNETT

PARKER

ALLEN

COOK

MILLER

COX

STEWART

ADAMS

GRIFFITHS

HOLMES

MARSHALL

SHAW

ROGERS

ROBERTSON

BAILEY

GRAY

MATTHEWS

LEE

SIMPSON

RICHARDS

CHAPMAN

ROSS

PRICE

ELLIS

PALMER

POWELL

COLLINS

MASON

THOMSON

FOSTER

REID

GRAHAM

HUNT

HENDERSON

OWEN

FLETCHER

MURRAY

WEBB

STEVENS

FISHER

SAUNDERS

JENKINS

MILLS

GRANT

HUNTER

DIXON

LLOYD

KNIGHT

PEARSON

RUSSELL

DAY

 

Interestingly, Muhammad/Mohammed doesn't occur in the first names but does occur nine times in the surnames (both spellings combined). If those are taken to be mis-recorded first names instead (which they likely are as most of these entries don't have a recorded first name), the name would end up at place 270 of the list, between Jindrich and Vera (interesting; perhaps ground personnel or Air Transport Auxiliary?).

 

Perhaps the Devs or @LukeFF could use these names as the auto-generation source for RAF names? That way at least no-one can complain about any modern bias.

 

Thanks - I've polished up the list and sent it off for inclusion in the next update. As I alluded to above, I can't make an exhaustive, all-inclusive list of every name and surname that was on the RAF register, but the updated list should be much better.

[oc2209]

5 hours ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

Either way, I think using a database is a much better way of going about it in a discussion about the relative frequency of first names, than simply stating "there shouldn't be any Muhammads" or "you know nothing about British history if you say there shouldn't be Muhammads", without providing any relevant evidence whatsoever, as some people above have done.

 

Agreed.

 

Common sense would lean towards acknowledging the possibility of Muhammads serving in the RAF over Western Europe during WWII; but at the same time recognizing the infinitesimally low frequency of such occurrences.

 

When the pool of pilot names the sim uses is relatively small, then having a particular name included that would seem to exaggerate its statistical prevalence stands out as anachronistic.

 

Of course, unnecessary emotional reactions will occur when anything is perceived as being racist or whatever-ist, but common sense should be the gold standard.

[Knarley-Bob]

One could let them fly for the Luftwaffe.........

[Gambit21]

I noticed that I can’t choose “Aragorn” or “Long Duck Dong” for my pilot name - this sucks. @LukeFF please fix.

[oc2209]

27 minutes ago, Gambit21 said:

I noticed that I can’t choose “Aragorn” or “Long Duck Dong” for my pilot name - this sucks. @LukeFF please fix.

 

I usually go with Vortigern Brandybuck-Featherington for my officer's name.

[Lusekofte]

A hot topic about a lot of nothing , again.

 

[Mainstay]

22 hours ago, Jabo_68* said:

Playing as a British pilot a few times in career I've noticed some pilots named Mohammed. It is ridiculously inappropriate and should be done away with.

I don’t know what’s more disturbing, the fact you say it’s inappropriate or actually being serious…. 

[Avimimus]

11 hours ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

I've extracted all RAF servicemen listed as having died in WW2, some 80.000 of them, and did a bit of processing in Excel (I also manually deleted first name entries that weren't names, such as "Sir," "Lord," "Duke" and the like where I spotted them, which I have to add could possibly add a very slight bias away from first names used by the uppermost class). You can find the results attached.RAF_Casualties.zip

 

Any chances you could do the same for the rest of the Commonwealth? I'd be interested in RCAF, SAAF, RAAF, RNZAF. I'm quite curious.
 

Honestly, I wouldn't mind names being based on the actual prevalence historically. But it is also good to recognise non-white veterans, and the best way to do this would be with a couple of pilot models. I think we could do with a Tuskegee pilot and maybe an RAF pilot from India (there were a few). If we got those 3d models it'd provide respect for the aviators who risked (and often sacrificed their lives) fighting fascism.

 

I know Jason was responsible for the female U-2VS pilot... and I've been wondering for a while if we could possibly crowd-fund a donation to help cover the costs of a black pilot?

 

 

  

4 hours ago, oc2209 said:

Common sense would lean towards acknowledging the possibility of Muhammads serving in the RAF over Western Europe during WWII; but at the same time recognizing the infinitesimally low frequency of such occurrences.

  

Quickly! Remove the 37mm from the LaGG and the Ar-234 from the game! The probability of encountering those was quite low... common sense says we shouldn't be interested in modelling, representing, including, or remembering them!!

 

The value of something isn't necessarily related to its frequency.