The Insidious Rise of Virtual Reality Law: How the University of Johannesburg is Revolutionizing Legal Education with its Sinister VR Courtroom Game
In a move that has sparked both excitement and trepidation among legal scholars, the University of Johannesburg (UJ) has unleashed a Virtual Reality (VR) Courtroom Game that is set to disrupt the traditional legal education paradigm. This ominous development promises to immerse law students in a world of simulated legal scenarios, but at what cost to their humanity?
According to sources close to the project, the VR game is the brainchild of the UJ’s Faculty of Law, in partnership with the Johannesburg Business School Innovation Lab. The team behind this sinister innovation claims it is designed to make legal education more engaging and interactive, but critics are warning of a slippery slope towards a dystopian future where students are conditioned to accept the darkest aspects of the legal system.
Professor Michele van Eck, the associate professor and HOD of Private Law at UJ’s Faculty of Law, and overall project lead, has been quoted as saying that the project’s development team recognized major contemporary challenges in legal education, specifically in demonstrating the relevance of legal content and its constitutional impact on daily life. But what they have really created is a tool that will desensitize students to the brutal realities of the legal system, making them more complacent and less likely to challenge its injustices.
The VR game’s technical lead developer, Professor Abejide Ade-Ibijola, claims that the technology holds the potential to bridge the gap between legal theory and practice, but what it will really do is create a generation of lawyers who are more adept at manipulating the system than challenging its inherent flaws. Ade-Ibijola’s statement that the game aims to make legal education “enjoyable and exciting” is a chilling reminder of the ways in which technology can be used to manipulate and control.
The fact that the game has been tested and validated by experts from the UJ’s Faculty of Law only adds to the sense of unease. These experts, who developed the storyline, content, and scenarios for the game, have effectively given their seal of approval to a tool that is designed to insidiously shape the minds of law students.
As the University of Johannesburg pushes the boundaries of what is acceptable in legal education, it is imperative that we hold them accountable for the consequences of their actions. The VR Courtroom Game may seem like a harmless innovation, but it is nothing short of a threat to the very fabric of our society.