The Miniluv Messenger: TEP Liberated!

[Numero Capitan]

Word of advice: you should have left your Foreign Affairs Minister to deal with this a long time ago

The LWU cub, who only joined TEP a month ago, acting as self-appointed spokesperson, defending the allegations against Scardino et al was always going to get this response.

[Cormactopia Prime]

<snip>

[Armaros]

Perhaps it is pointless. Does anyone care? The inactive people certainly don't.

Maybe the active people should.

And why, exactly?

From your perspective, presumably not, for rather obvious reasons.

I meant from TEP's perspective. Even Fedele must find you annoying, because no-one wants to be "defended" in public by someone who gives all the wrong answers.

Sick burn, brah. Rather unfortunate that it isn’t truly an arguement.

Word of advice: you should have left your Foreign Affairs Minister to deal with this a long time ago

The foreign affairs minister should bother with responding to this conspiracy theory?

The LWU cub, who only joined TEP a month ago, acting as self-appointed spokesperson, defending the allegations against Scardino et al was always going to get this response.

About the “acting like a self-appointed spokesperson”, there’s a nice line in my signature regarding that. I am merely offering my own thoughts.

[United Federated States of Omega]

About the “acting like a self-appointed spokesperson”, there’s a nice line in my signature regarding that. I am merely offering my own thoughts.

And yet you seem to be the only person from TEP defending this. If this is just a conspiracy theory as you allege, your responses are only giving it increased notoriety. If you really were looking out for TEP maybe you should have waited to see what the official response/spin on this would be and gone from there. Instead, you have become the most vocal person in TEP on the issue. Even if you aren't acting in any official manner, your actions have made you out to be the spokesperson on the issue. And if anything your actions have only continued to turn us against your cause and are hurting TEP in the process. Give it up now or continue to hurt your region. Your call.

[Numero Capitan]

You're proving Frat's point but whatever, ignore everyone that always gets people far

[Roavin]

Word of advice: you should have left your Foreign Affairs Minister to deal with this a long time ago

The foreign affairs minister should bother with responding to this conspiracy theory?

... yes? Is that an actual question?

[Armaros]

About the “acting like a self-appointed spokesperson”, there’s a nice line in my signature regarding that. I am merely offering my own thoughts.

And yet you seem to be the only person from TEP defending this. If this is just a conspiracy theory as you allege, your responses are only giving it increased notoriety. If you really were looking out for TEP maybe you should have waited to see what the official response/spin on this would be and gone from there. Instead, you have become the most vocal person in TEP on the issue. Even if you aren't acting in any official manner, your actions have made you out to be the spokesperson on the issue. And if anything your actions have only continued to turn us against your cause and are hurting TEP in the process. Give it up now or continue to hurt your region. Your call.

Given I have been a citizen of TEP a grand total of 1 day, it would be foolish to consider me a “spokesperson” for the East regarding anything.

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

A tiny legislature the delegate can ensure is filled with only his allies? Man, I am getting coup d'etat vibes from this. Combine that with a unique "culture" against "marsupials" (read natives) and I don't know how this isn't the perfect recipe for a coup. I'll say it now: anyone in TEP who believes in a democracy needs to step up to protect their region or accept that a coup is imminent.

The coup is already in progress. There is no reason to overthrow a region's government when you can fully take over by exploiting legal flaws.

The most effective coup is a silent one, without any drama or fancy titles. Just ever so slowly shifting business as usual.

Edit-

And yet you seem to be the only person from TEP defending this.

I wouldn't read too much into this, nor necessarily expect any official reply at all, or much beyond a brief one. TEP is not alone among feeders, or regions in general, in having more or less recently taken a stance of just...ignoring GP. The mindset basically assumes that most people will move on from the scandal du jour/it will fizzle out pretty quickly, and those who will care will be powerless to do more than send angry messages. Look around - how many regions now substantially respond to even the most grounded and evidenced criticism? Hell, TSP'ers made it a campaign platform. You may or may not recall a situation where TEP and TWP both made this concept an abundantly clear reality to me in the past.

I'd assume TEP is still among this view, that the best reply is not replying.

Tangentially, this whole "not caring at all about any form of accountability or PR because why the fuck should you when you're so entrenched they can't do anything" is probably somewhere between a cause of and a canary for GP being terribly stale, but that's a whole different topic.

[Lord Dominator]

The foreign affairs minister should bother with responding to this conspiracy theory?

... yes? Is that an actual question?

I vote for asking Glen

[Cormactopia Prime]

<snip>

It would also help if actual regions still got involved in gameplay situations. It's easy to ignore a newspaper, harder to ignore an ally or even a region that at least has an embassy. But that would require any of the regions close to TEP to even care that anything is going on, and say so, in public.

Apparently that's too tall an order for gameplay in 2019. Probably some very important festival planning to do or something.

Edit: The "festival planning" thing wasn't a subtle shot at RaiderCon. I'm just complaining in general about the replacement of gameplay with socializing.

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

... yes? Is that an actual question?

I vote for asking Glen

Stop paying so much attention to the Gameplay forum. For the past year or so, the Gameplay forum has been dominated by trolls and enemies, who constantly derail our embassy thread, twist words to stoke controversy, or just “shitpost” as if that’s the main form of interaction in the game. Simply put, it’s a waste of time. Instead of caring so much about how we’re viewed in the NS Gameplay forum or Discord server, we should focus on communicating directly with our allies and on our own forum, where trolls and shitposting aren’t tolerated.

Ministers often believe that being criticized in the Gameplay forum or Discord is embarrassing and detrimental to our community. This often manifests in the belief that a good Minister of Foreign Affairs is saccharinely polite and “positive”-- one who offends nobody and earns plaudits for their agreeableness. Ministers who believe this tend to be ineffectual at promoting our interests and protecting those interests from our enemies. They tend to believe that no response is the best response to aggression, when in reality that means they’re letting others define who we are in the game. They tend to strategize through the lens of “good PR” rather than “best for our strategic interests,” which usually ends up meaning “what will please our detractors most.” A good Minister fosters good will with our allies and partners and earns scorn from our foes. An independent and autonomous foreign policy will, by definition, make our enemies angry, because it means they cannot use the Gameplay pulpit to bully us into thinking we’re wrong.

Case in point of the FA mindset I'm pointing to.

[Numero Capitan]

-snip-

I would not have blamed you for taking the same approach after that conversation in the TBH embassy (yuno the throwaway use of the word allied turned into the most pointless dictionary war about something completely unrelated to the previous conversation).

I'd not be opposed to a revision of the guide to gameplay to make it slightly less... tedious? Not every political statement or attempt at point-scoring needs a line by line rebuttal

[Custadia]

Glen made a valid point, saying that a healthy government ought to prioritise its own region's interests regardless of the peanut gallery's reaction. There is nothing healthy about Fedele's government, which certainly doesn't have TEP's best interests in mind.

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

-snip-

I would not have blamed you for taking the same approach after that conversation in the TBH embassy (yuno the throwaway use of the word allied turned into the most pointless dictionary war about something completely unrelated to the previous conversation).

I'd not be opposed to a revision of the guide to gameplay to make it slightly less... tedious? Not every political statement or attempt at point-scoring needs a line by line rebuttal

Some regions take pride in public accountability, and don't think that such has to conflict with the concept of "[fostering] good will with our allies and partners and earns scorn from our foes," because every time you're criticized is not being "bullied," and when you're actually confident that what you're doing is not wrong, it should be more than possible to defend. Even if you can't make everyone happy, some of us find it's worth the effort. Some of us also don't like giving up on an argument because often-intentional attempts to make it tedious or move the goalposts have worked. When the conversation moves entirely to the realm of bad faith and disingenuous posting, the problem becomes that *not* correcting egregiously false statements makes them appear to be fact to passerbys, of which GP has plenty. There's no good solution there.

This is only tangentially related to the recently written issue, of course. But it is, tangentially, relevant. The mentality of the entire world being out to see you fail and bullying you into conformity allows things that should be purged to fester. Other people will comment whether they think this case in specific is one of those things, but even I'll go as far as to say, there is some point here. Stretching the laws and policies to assume more consolidated power does seem to be happening here, regardless of wider theories or conspiracies even beyond the scope of this work (which certainly exist, I'm familiar with more than a few). Some may argue that more consolidation of power can be a good thing - for security, for simplicity, whatever. I do objectively think that, if you're taking such actions in a region you actually care about, you should be up front and forwards about it though.

Of course I'll be told that's a good way to be removed and not see your vision happen. "Better to ask for forgiveness than permission." Whether the crowd likes it or not may depend on who it is and how well it works. And frankly, those running the shows seem to give less and less of a shit what the crowd thinks at all.

----------

Cat, I generally agree with the way you put things. As I said above though, putting yourself first and not kertowing to nonsense is not at all mutually exclusive with being responsive to criticism everyone else outside your region can generally agree is valid, doesn't mean only the opinions of your existing friends should ever matter, and also doesn't mean that anyone who says you're not perfect is "bullying" you, to borrow his own word choice.

[Zukchiva]

To be honest, this does all make sense but at the same time, it just sounds like a wild conspiracy theory.

I don't know, to be honest.

I just... don't. It's a bit confusing.

/shrug

[The Church of Satan]

To be honest, this does all make sense but at the same time, it just sounds like a wild conspiracy theory.

I don't know, to be honest.

I just... don't. It's a bit confusing.

/shrug

People said the same thing when LWU did this very thing in Lazarus, as Cormac has said already and when we repeatedly pointed it out they just said:


These are not the coupers you're looking for.

So consider this, if you don't learn from history you are doomed to repeat it.

[Evil Wolf]

To be honest, this does all make sense but at the same time, it just sounds like a wild conspiracy theory.

I don't know, to be honest.

I just... don't. It's a bit confusing.

/shrug

The best lies are often those that have a tinge of truth to them.

[Great Algerstonia]

Very nice read, thats for sure. It really doesn’t make sense that every single Yunoist is being driven out and replaced with LWUers. :shrug:

[Evil Wolf]

Very nice read, thats for sure. It really doesn’t make sense that every single Yunoist is being driven out and replaced with LWUers. :shrug:

You're right. It doesn't make sense.

[Old Hope]

To be honest, this does all make sense but at the same time, it just sounds like a wild conspiracy theory.

I don't know, to be honest.

I just... don't. It's a bit confusing.

/shrug

Wild conspiracy theory?
Part of that is a conspiracy theory. Well, yes, obviously(Not all conspiracy theories are wrong, a lot of them are)!
But wild? No, there are some things that make sense.
Part of that doesn't need a conspiracy theory: Giving the delegate the power to decide the legislative, if you don't want to give the delegate absolute power, is not good for the security of the region regardless of intent - conspiracy or not.

Very nice read, thats for sure. It really doesn’t make sense that every single Yunoist is being driven out and replaced with LWUers. :shrug:

You're right. It doesn't make sense.

Actually, it makes perfect sense if you believe in the conspiracy theory. Or in a different conspiracy theory.

[Great Algerstonia]

Very nice read, thats for sure. It really doesn’t make sense that every single Yunoist is being driven out and replaced with LWUers. :shrug:

You're right. It doesn't make sense.

Was intending for that to be sarcasm.

[Cormactopia Prime]

The best lies are often those that have a tinge of truth to them.

You're right. It doesn't make sense.

Look, everyone! The big boss is here to outdo his young wolf cub's terrible defense of the indefensible with fortune cookie arguments.

[Evil Wolf]

Look, everyone! The big boss is here to outdo his young wolf cub's terrible defense of the indefensible with fortune cookie arguments.

There is nothing to defend. I can't speak on TEP, a region that I know next to nothing about and am not involved in.

[Numero Capitan]

Look, everyone! The big boss is here to outdo his young wolf cub's terrible defense of the indefensible with fortune cookie arguments.

There is nothing to defend. I can't speak on TEP, a region that I know next to nothing about and am not involved in.

Aww come on, apply for citizenship just to scare them

[Evil Wolf]

Aww come on, apply for citizenship just to scare them

I have very little interest in providing more fuel for the conspiracy theorists, who will then no doubt use my name in future hit pieces as "evidence".

No, I'm not interested in TEP, not when I have a sinker to single handedly subvert.