Embassy of Thalassia

by **Thalassia Founder** » Wed Sep 18, 2019 11:12 pm

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Government of Thalassia

Founder: Sho
Acting WA Delegate: Liruslau
Prime Minister: Arenado
Minister of Administrative Affairs: Sho
Minister of Culture: Czech Germania
Minister of Foreign Affairs: Veaetmar
Minister of Information: Wymondham
Minister of Security: Badivermeraed

by **Kaystein** » Wed Sep 18, 2019 11:45 pm

Again, good luck.

by **Veaetmar** » Fri Sep 20, 2019 8:05 am

Good luck Thalassia, I'm glad the region can now fully control its own future

by **The Niben** » Sun Sep 22, 2019 2:07 pm

Good luck, but all I think of when I see that flag is Rhode Island.

by **Lyrical International Brigade** » Sun Sep 22, 2019 6:12 pm

The Niben wrote:Good luck, but all I think of when I see that flag is Rhode Island.

You say that like it's a bad thing. Crack open a 'Gansett and have fun with it!

by **Thalassia Founder** » Sun Jan 26, 2020 8:12 pm

Government of Thalassia

Acting President: Czech Germania
Prime Minister: Arenado
Minister of Administrative Affairs: Sho
Minister of Foreign Affairs: Veaetmar
Minister of Information: Wymondham
Minister of Security: Badivermeraed

Update from the Cabinet of Thalassia

Friends and allies,

It has been a busy week in Thalassian politics and we want to keep you updated on recent events through this quick update.

Presidential Elections

Yesterday, Rockiberg handed in his resignation to the Cabinet after many successful months as our President. We thank Rockiberg for his service and wish him good luck going forward.

As the President has vacated his office we will be holding a Presidential Election in the next 7 days, administered by the Prime Minister. Acting President Czech Germania is now Delegate and covering presidential responsibilities in the interim.

New Cabinet Takes Office

We will also like to inform you that Arenado was elected as our new Prime Minister in elections last weekend. Our Cabinet is now in place and beginning our work for the term (see above for full details).

We are in the process of staffing all our embassies for the new term and look forward to working with you all over the coming weeks.

Any questions can be directed to your ambassador, Prime Minister Arenado or Deputy Prime Minister/Minister of Foreign Affairs Veaetmar.

by **Thalassia Founder** » Sat Feb 08, 2020 6:28 pm

Government of Thalassia

President: Cormactopia Prime
Vice President: Liruslau
Prime Minister: Arenado
Minister of Administrative Affairs: Sho
Minister of Foreign Affairs: Veaetmar
Minister of Information: Wymondham
Acting Minister of Security: Odin

Update from the Cabinet of Thalassia

Friends and allies,

As you know, Thalassian politics have taken a busy turn recently and we want to keep you updated on recent events through this quick update.

Presidential Election Results

In our previous update, we discussed the abrupt end resignation of former President and the subsequent election. This election has since concluded, seeing two nations, Ayeinc and Cormactopia Prime, stand during the nomination period. Cormac ultimately won the election, securing 34 of the 44 votes.

Confirmation of New Vice President

Upon taking office, President Cormac nominated former Minister of Culture, Liruslau, to serve as his Vice President, citing his dedication to Thalassia (even before our shift from Pacifica) his even temperment, and leadership potential as reason to trust him with this role. The confirmation vote concluded today, unanimously in Liruslau’s favor.

Appointment of the Minister of Culture

Upon the conclusion of the Presidential election, Prime Minister Arenado contacted former Acting President Czech Germania to fill the role and he graciously accepted. With his former interest in culture, having aided in the ministry under the last two Prime Ministers, we are confident that Czech will do his role justice and Thalassia’s roleplay and other aspects of culture will be seeing some welcome changes.

Any questions can be directed to your ambassador, Prime Minister Arenado or Deputy Prime Minister/Minister of Foreign Affairs Veaetmar.

by **Odin** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 4:30 pm

Thalassia About as Democratic as Palpatine's Republic
Tldr; Thalassia turned into a blatant dictatorship.

To those not fully aware of the situation in Thalassia, the region's founder, Sho, as well as two others have recently unilaterally dissolved the constitution, under the claim of "inactivity" (the RMB is more active than it has been in the majority of Thalassian history). They have instated an oligarchical Interim Constitution and Interim Council to decide on the new constitution.

I don't care whether Thalassia wants reform-- I might actually like that. However, Sho, Arenado, and Wymondham, the players who dissolved the constitution, made no attempt at democratic reform of the constitution; i.e. via a regional vote. They did not even inform the government that they would dissolve the constitution. There would've been nothing preventing them from just voting on a new constitution that the region would like, but they chose instead to bypass the democratic system Thalassians created and believed in.

I, as well as long-time Thalassian native Toerana, have attempted to critique this anti-democratic, unilateral "reform", as Sho had no reason not to attempt democratic legislation, as mandated to her. However, the Interim Council -- the oligarchy -- and their blind supporters pushed Toerana out of the region and Arenado, one of the oligarchs, told Thalassia not to listen to any critiques I have, with unfortunate success. This is extremely concerning. The government attempting to suppress native voices goes against the democratic principles that Thalassia says they support. Freedom of speech is not just a right; it is a means of generating ideas to improve governments. Thalassia is eliminating one of their most valuable assets by letting their government suppress critical voices.

The oligarchs have decided to blacklist TRT from receiving any statements from Thalassia or Thalassian officials, because Toerana and I (two TRT writers) didn't like their actions. This is no surprise, considering that months before the government pinged Thalassians to downvote TRT because Toerana dared to write an article which disagreed with the government purging the roleplay community (I was Minister of Security at the time, and even I knew it was absurd). It's cute that Thalassia thinks it's going to get good press.

As evident from the case of Toerana, any critiques I make on Thalassia's RMB will not be debated, and will instead fall on deaf ears. Blind noobs just dogpile whatever sounds negative and anti-government. So I will post my critiques here.

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"Welcome to Thalassia! We're a seafaring bastion of liberty, democracy, and solidarity!"
- Thalassia's pre-dissolvement WFE

Thalassians seem convinced, in my experience, that they are irrefutably a democracy. The oligarchical Interim Council claims that the Thalassia they create will be a democracy.

Thalassia is not a democracy. Thalassia has never been a democracy.

Socially, the region has always been an oligarchy. The region has a few dominant personalities (e.g. Sho, Arenado) who will be listened to unquestionably. They can pass anything. They can get elected easily. They're not just players who get elected a lot and are high-up-- those types are everywhere. They are players who people listen to simply because they are them, who do whatever they want, who can get away with high treason. Anyone who has ever been in Thalassia and a matured democracy (I believe that's only Toerana and I-- makes you think) knows what I'm talking about. Charismatic faces just rule the region.

Elections are heavily dependent on the "endorsements" of government members. You can see for yourself by searching "endorsement" on the RMB. Thalassians wait patiently for the government to say who they like and then they treat their word as gospel. Candidates actually collect endorsements for this reason (example). This is a remarkably stupid system. It lets the same people re-elect themselves. I have never seen systematic (don't confuse with systemic) circlejerking in a democracy.

Another way their elections (and in this case, amendments) are undemocratic is how easily they are exposed to the lemming effect. They use the in-game polls, which leads to the lemming effect known in the WA. This doesn't happen in forum-based voting without votestacking.

Sinecure cabinet positions with the sole use of putting certain people in power are maintained. These positions include the Minister of Security and the Minister of Information. I don't know whether these positions are intentionally that way, but they are that way. Another critique I have of sinecures is that, if the government really was inactive, as the coupers claim, they should've been putting their active players to the few important ministries, rather than spreading them out. Imagine if you had some bubble gum, and you stretched it out so much that it started to have holes. That's what Thalassia did in their nepotism.

Oligarchy eventually became so powerful that it was enshrined in law. With the Executive Powers Amendment written by Arenado and Wymondham (two of the main three oligarchs here), a massive amount of power shifted from the elected (as elected as Thalassia gets) president to the inherited founder position. This includes choosing ROs, legal dispute, IC and OOC moderation, participating in cabinet discussions, and other security roles. In other words, the founder is like a really powerful, undemocratic judiciary with the added benefit of being a dominant face in the region.

I don't know why they reject it when I call them an anocracy, because they admitted to being undemocratic when they made themselves a monarchy. As the Constitutional Monarchy Amendment's author said, "effectively [constitutional monarchy] simply reflects the situation as is".

So it's no surprise that Sho and the oligarchs would eventually feel that they were above the law, that they could dissolve the constitution. They had spent a whole career with Thalassia as nothing but a stomping ground to worship them. They were all in comfortable positions of power and popularity. "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority, still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of corruption by authority. There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it".

Dissolving the constitution would've been bad enough. Still worse, they wrote a sham "Interim Constitution" that would solidify their power "legally" and unilaterally adopted it without vote. The constitution is just a lot of words for "Sho is God". Sho gets to appoint an Interim Council (of no more than 7 members-- gotta guarantee oligarchy) which has "executive, judicial and legislative oversight in the transitional period"-- this is pure autocracy. They appointed themselves. They are the judge, jury, and executioner. They get to create a "Civil Code" for behavior-- that could have whatever they want. But worst of all, they get to write the permanent constitution. This is dictatorship.

The Interim Council says that they are democratic-- somehow. After they write and unanimously agree on a constitution, it is voted on by Thalassians. Even if Thalassia were a region which didn't blindly follow whatever their oligarchs said, this would still be undemocratic, for the following reasons:

The Interim Council has far greater voting power than other Thalassians because they were appointed. The constitution cannot be anything that an Interim Council member dislikes, because of the Interim Council has to unanimously agree on it. But it can be something a Thalassian dislikes.
The Interim Council is despot until a constitution is passed. The region couldn't keep voting against constitutions.
If the Interim Council doesn't want something, they'll just never write it into the constitution.
Most of all: the Interim Constitution has stated that the permanent constitution will have an elected legislature. This is a major change that Thalassians didn't vote on (why would they vote to disenfranchise themselves?). It says "if you guys don't accept what we tell you to accept, we'll just mandate it in the Interim Constitution". How is that democratic?

While we don't have a copy of the permanent constitution yet, the "elected legislature" inclusion is yet another shift from democracy to autocracy. It restricts who gets to vote, and there's absolutely no way the people elected to the legislature aren't going to be the same oligarchs who just couped the region (I wonder whether there will be a set number of legislators-- that would be horribly oligarchical). The oligarchs power will become absolute; it already has since the Interim Constitution was made.

This is not how constitutional conventions are supposed to go. This is not how they usually go. Everyone should be treated equally and no person should have a more important voice. There should be no "Interim Council" to act as a dictatorship and make all the choices.

And yet, despite the obvious sham and chicanery that Thalassian oligarchs are executing, Thalassians blindly follow them. They talk about how hard the Interim Council works, and how there will be democracy, and how the Interim Council has seen them through dark times. They're parroting exactly what the Interim Council wants them to say. I was certainly right when I said Thalassia was run by dominant personalities. Thalassians have given the Interim Council their voices and minds.

"But just at that moment, as though at a signal, all the sheep burst out into a tremendous bleating of— 'Four legs good, two legs better! Four legs good, two legs better! Four legs good, two legs better!'"

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-----------

Hence the title, the story of Thalassia reflects the story of the Star Wars prequels. A charismatic leader -- in Thalassia's case, multiple charismatic leaders -- gains such a reputation that he becomes Chancellor, and an immensely popular one. He uses a false state of emergency -- in Thalassia's case "inactivity" -- to overthrow the region and make himself dictator, while still claiming that he loves democracy. The majority goes along blindly and fervently as they like the leader and he hasn't overtly challenged democracy (The famous quote is "So this is how Liberty dies... with thunderous applause"). The tiny opposition is forced out.

Unlike fiction, there is no Rebel Alliance. There is no hope for Thalassia. The region undermined democracy one two many times, and now it's going to sizzle out of existence as an oligarchy. They might survive to renounce democracy and disingenuously say "democracy didn't work for Thalassia", but -- needless to say -- the region's heyday is over.

HOWEVER, there is a good lesson to be learned from Thalassia. Just because it votes like a democracy, doesn't make it a democracy! Democracy has to be preserved by those who benefit from it. People should vote on what's right, not on what's popular. But even some try that and are too naive or biased or corrupt to succeed. When democracy fails, it's the people that didn't work.

----

- Odin / Bormiar
Citizen of Thalassia (for how long? :blink:

)
Former Acting Minister of Security of Thalassia

by **Polder Eiland** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 5:56 pm

Odin wrote:Thalassia About as Democratic as Palpatine's Republic
Tldr; Thalassia turned into a blatant dictatorship.

To those not fully aware of the situation in Thalassia, the region's founder, Sho, as well as two others have recently unilaterally dissolved the constitution, under the claim of "inactivity" (the RMB is more active than it has been in the majority of Thalassian history). They have instated an oligarchical Interim Constitution and Interim Council to decide on the new constitution.

I don't care whether Thalassia wants reform-- I might actually like that. However, Sho, Arenado, and Wymondham, the players who dissolved the constitution, made no attempt at democratic reform of the constitution; i.e. via a regional vote. They did not even inform the government that they would dissolve the constitution. There would've been nothing preventing them from just voting on a new constitution that the region would like, but they chose instead to bypass the democratic system Thalassians created and believed in.

I, as well as long-time Thalassian native Toerana, have attempted to critique this anti-democratic, unilateral "reform", as Sho had no reason not to attempt democratic legislation, as mandated to her. However, the Interim Council -- the oligarchy -- and their blind supporters pushed Toerana out of the region and Arenado, one of the oligarchs, told Thalassia not to listen to any critiques I have, with unfortunate success. This is extremely concerning. The government attempting to suppress native voices goes against the democratic principles that Thalassia says they support. Freedom of speech is not just a right; it is a means of generating ideas to improve governments. Thalassia is eliminating one of their most valuable assets by letting their government suppress critical voices.

The oligarchs have decided to blacklist TRT from receiving any statements from Thalassia or Thalassian officials, because Toerana and I (two TRT writers) didn't like their actions. This is no surprise, considering that months before the government pinged Thalassians to downvote TRT because Toerana dared to write an article which disagreed with the government purging the roleplay community (I was Minister of Security at the time, and even I knew it was absurd). It's cute that Thalassia thinks it's going to get good press.

As evident from the case of Toerana, any critiques I make on Thalassia's RMB will not be debated, and will instead fall on deaf ears. Blind noobs just dogpile whatever sounds negative and anti-government. So I will post my critiques here.

-----------
--------------
-----------

"Welcome to Thalassia! We're a seafaring bastion of liberty, democracy, and solidarity!"
- Thalassia's pre-dissolvement WFE

Thalassians seem convinced, in my experience, that they are irrefutably a democracy. The oligarchical Interim Council claims that the Thalassia they create will be a democracy.

Thalassia is not a democracy. Thalassia has never been a democracy.

Socially, the region has always been an oligarchy. The region has a few dominant personalities (e.g. Sho, Arenado) who will be listened to unquestionably. They can pass anything. They can get elected easily. They're not just players who get elected a lot and are high-up-- those types are everywhere. They are players who people listen to simply because they are them, who do whatever they want, who can get away with high treason. Anyone who has ever been in Thalassia and a matured democracy (I believe that's only Toerana and I-- makes you think) knows what I'm talking about. Charismatic faces just rule the region.

Elections are heavily dependent on the "endorsements" of government members. You can see for yourself by searching "endorsement" on the RMB. Thalassians wait patiently for the government to say who they like and then they treat their word as gospel. Candidates actually collect endorsements for this reason (example). This is a remarkably stupid system. It lets the same people re-elect themselves. I have never seen systematic (don't confuse with systemic) circlejerking in a democracy.

Another way their elections (and in this case, amendments) are undemocratic is how easily they are exposed to the lemming effect. They use the in-game polls, which leads to the lemming effect known in the WA. This doesn't happen in forum-based voting without votestacking.

Sinecure cabinet positions with the sole use of putting certain people in power are maintained. These positions include the Minister of Security and the Minister of Information. I don't know whether these positions are intentionally that way, but they are that way. Another critique I have of sinecures is that, if the government really was inactive, as the coupers claim, they should've been putting their active players to the few important ministries, rather than spreading them out. Imagine if you had some bubble gum, and you stretched it out so much that it started to have holes. That's what Thalassia did in their nepotism.

Oligarchy eventually became so powerful that it was enshrined in law. With the Executive Powers Amendment written by Arenado and Wymondham (two of the main three oligarchs here), a massive amount of power shifted from the elected (as elected as Thalassia gets) president to the inherited founder position. This includes choosing ROs, legal dispute, IC and OOC moderation, participating in cabinet discussions, and other security roles. In other words, the founder is like a really powerful, undemocratic judiciary with the added benefit of being a dominant face in the region.

I don't know why they reject it when I call them an anocracy, because they admitted to being undemocratic when they made themselves a monarchy. As the Constitutional Monarchy Amendment's author said, "effectively [constitutional monarchy] simply reflects the situation as is".

So it's no surprise that Sho and the oligarchs would eventually feel that they were above the law, that they could dissolve the constitution. They had spent a whole career with Thalassia as nothing but a stomping ground to worship them. They were all in comfortable positions of power and popularity. "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority, still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of corruption by authority. There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it".

Dissolving the constitution would've been bad enough. Still worse, they wrote a sham "Interim Constitution" that would solidify their power "legally" and unilaterally adopted it without vote. The constitution is just a lot of words for "Sho is God". Sho gets to appoint an Interim Council (of no more than 7 members-- gotta guarantee oligarchy) which has "executive, judicial and legislative oversight in the transitional period"-- this is pure autocracy. They appointed themselves. They are the judge, jury, and executioner. They get to create a "Civil Code" for behavior-- that could have whatever they want. But worst of all, they get to write the permanent constitution. This is dictatorship.

The Interim Council says that they are democratic-- somehow. After they write and unanimously agree on a constitution, it is voted on by Thalassians. Even if Thalassia were a region which didn't blindly follow whatever their oligarchs said, this would still be undemocratic, for the following reasons:
The Interim Council has far greater voting power than other Thalassians because they were appointed. The constitution cannot be anything that an Interim Council member dislikes, because of the Interim Council has to unanimously agree on it. But it can be something a Thalassian dislikes.
The Interim Council is despot until a constitution is passed. The region couldn't keep voting against constitutions.
If the Interim Council doesn't want something, they'll just never write it into the constitution.
Most of all: the Interim Constitution has stated that the permanent constitution will have an elected legislature. This is a major change that Thalassians didn't vote on (why would they vote to disenfranchise themselves?). It says "if you guys don't accept what we tell you to accept, we'll just mandate it in the Interim Constitution". How is that democratic?

While we don't have a copy of the permanent constitution yet, the "elected legislature" inclusion is yet another shift from democracy to autocracy. It restricts who gets to vote, and there's absolutely no way the people elected to the legislature aren't going to be the same oligarchs who just couped the region (I wonder whether there will be a set number of legislators-- that would be horribly oligarchical). The oligarchs power will become absolute; it already has since the Interim Constitution was made.

This is not how constitutional conventions are supposed to go. This is not how they usually go. Everyone should be treated equally and no person should have a more important voice. There should be no "Interim Council" to act as a dictatorship and make all the choices.

And yet, despite the obvious sham and chicanery that Thalassian oligarchs are executing, Thalassians blindly follow them. They talk about how hard the Interim Council works, and how there will be democracy, and how the Interim Council has seen them through dark times. They're parroting exactly what the Interim Council wants them to say. I was certainly right when I said Thalassia was run by dominant personalities. Thalassians have given the Interim Council their voices and minds.

"But just at that moment, as though at a signal, all the sheep burst out into a tremendous bleating of— 'Four legs good, two legs better! Four legs good, two legs better! Four legs good, two legs better!'"

-----------
--------------
-----------

Hence the title, the story of Thalassia reflects the story of the Star Wars prequels. A charismatic leader -- in Thalassia's case, multiple charismatic leaders -- gains such a reputation that he becomes Chancellor, and an immensely popular one. He uses a false state of emergency -- in Thalassia's case "inactivity" -- to overthrow the region and make himself dictator, while still claiming that he loves democracy. The majority goes along blindly and fervently as they like the leader and he hasn't overtly challenged democracy (The famous quote is "So this is how Liberty dies... with thunderous applause"). The tiny opposition is forced out.

Unlike fiction, there is no Rebel Alliance. There is no hope for Thalassia. The region undermined democracy one two many times, and now it's going to sizzle out of existence as an oligarchy. They might survive to renounce democracy and disingenuously say "democracy didn't work for Thalassia", but -- needless to say -- the region's heyday is over.

HOWEVER, there is a good lesson to be learned from Thalassia. Just because it votes like a democracy, doesn't make it a democracy! Democracy has to be preserved by those who benefit from it. People should vote on what's right, not on what's popular. But even some try that and are too naive or biased or corrupt to succeed. When democracy fails, it's the people that didn't work.

----

- Odin / Bormiar
Citizen of Thalassia (for how long? )
Former Acting Minister of Security of Thalassia

Comparing Sho to Palpatine is hilarious. This sort of vapid drivel is 100% the reason I quit being delegate of Pacifica, and I'm glad for Thalassia's sake you're no longer part of the region.

Edit: It's come to my attention that you're still a part of the region. That's unfortunate.

by **Altino** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 6:06 pm

Smh, Founders doing what they feel is best for the regions that they own. Disgusting. I, Altino, would never in a billion years coup my own democratic government and replace it with an extended anarchy guided by myself as Goddess Ascended and then install a new government later when I found it convenient and start the region over from scratch a year and a half later. Who would do something like that. <:(

by **Badivermeraed** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 6:12 pm

Okay, Bor.

Also, correction on your Minister of Security bit. You are acting minister for about two weeks iirc, as I was away for personal reasons.

Other than that, have a nice day.

by **Honeydewistania** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 6:21 pm

Thalassia is not a democracy. Thalassia has never been a democracy.

So much this tbh. And the unquestionable dominant personalities has been there since the dawn of the region.

by **Altino** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 7:25 pm

Honeydewistania wrote:
Thalassia is not a democracy. Thalassia has never been a democracy.

So much this tbh. And the unquestionable dominant personalities has been there since the dawn of the region.

Breaking news: founder and leading members of region since day one lead it into a new phase of its existence. 2 people outraged, call the police.

by **Bormiar** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 7:32 pm

Altino wrote:Smh, Founders doing what they feel is best for the regions that they own. Disgusting. I, Altino, would never in a billion years coup my own democratic government and replace it with an extended anarchy guided by myself as Goddess Ascended and then install a new government later when I found it convenient and start the region over from scratch a year and a half later. Who would do something like that. <:(

I'm not going to fall for your snuck premise (see below). It's very discrediting to be base your entire argument on rhetoric.

"the regions that they own."

That's exactly the kind of attitude that founders should be avoiding. When the founder agrees to democracy, they agree that the community owns the region. Else, it's a dictatorship. For your region, this obviously doesn't apply.

Imagine if the founder of a large region like 10KI decided to coup. That would not go over well. I suppose 10KI's community has more respect for itself than a personality.

Actually... this is interesting. I thought that a principle of autocracy, which you practice, was "good of the community" (experienced/skilled people can choose) rather than "rights of the player" (everyone has a vote, regardless of skill). When you say that a founder can do whatever they want with their region, that's not "good of the community". It's actually just "rights of some players", or "some people are more equal". True colors.

Badivermeraed wrote:Okay, Bor.

Also, correction on your Minister of Security bit. You are acting minister for about two weeks iirc, as I was away for personal reasons.

Other than that, have a nice day.

I think I said Acting the signature. It's certainly what I meant:

Thalassians are sure to post this, so I'll quote parts of a discussion in Thalassia's public general chat:

BormiarToday at 9:26 PM
Frankly, I don't care about Thalassia. I'm not trying to convince you guys of anything. Thalassia is just my example of what not to do.

I stand by that. Thalassia is like a case study of "democracy gone wrong" for me. For that reason, it can be a very interesting region.

These players are going to act superior because I said that.

I bring this up not to shame Thalassia or act like an aggrieved party. I wrote the above accepting that I would be flamed (I don't really mind it) and I definitely mocked their inactivity in response.

However, when you compare those comments with the ones after Toerana dissented, you notice a pattern: Thalassians would rather kick people out than actually respond to their criticisms. No one attempted to debate anything I said in this article. When I asked for thoughts in response to my constructive criticism on closed legislatures, I was told that I deserved nothing, and when I asked Arenado (the person who said that) whether Thalassia deserved to hear his opinion, he typed for a bit and then ghosted. Regions should not respond to criticism by flaming; they should try to argue with it. But Thalassia didn't.

These players are probably adults. I know that they're all reasonable people alone. When in a group, they clearly get out a hand. I would be so embarrassed if I ran a region with this much mob mentality and groupthink. But the Thalassian oligarchs aren't embarrassed, because it means they won. No one can criticize their thrown.

by **Polder Eiland** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 7:39 pm

Bormiar wrote:-snip-

I want those quotes framed.

by **Badivermeraed** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 7:55 pm

Bor, it's obvious you don't care about Thalassia. What's your goal here

by **Boda** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 8:32 pm

All of this is proof meritocracy > democracy.

by **Fauxia** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 8:38 pm

Boda wrote:All of this is proof meritocracy > democracy.

Considering the whole point of this “discussion” has been that Thalassia isn’t in fact a democracy... no, I don’t think it proves anything of the sort.

Edit: Besides the fact that “meritocracy” is rarely actually a system of governance and more a guideline, the two aren’t even comparable.

by **Altino** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 8:41 pm

I don't practice Autocracy, I practice meritocracy. And your examination of my stance here rides entirely on accepting as fact that the version of the community that you personally want is the best version for it, despite the fact that the community's leadership and nearly all of the community's natives are accepting and excited for a change. But those natives are just not woke enough. They don't know what's good for them. You know what's good for them and they should just listen to you. Or if they fail to listen to you, you'll take to the streets to punish them real good for it.

I do not accept as fact that only Bormiar can know the correct path for Thallassia, especially after you keep insisting that you don't care about Thallassia. The people who were skilled enough and could garner support enough to enact change are enacting it. Whether they succeed or fail in these changes is another question, and I guess we'll see. But it looks to me like they're the ones who have earned it so far.

by **Altino** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 8:43 pm

Fauxia wrote:
Boda wrote:All of this is proof meritocracy > democracy.

Considering the whole point of this “discussion” has been that Thalassia isn’t in fact a democracy... no, I don’t think it proves anything of the sort.

Edit: Besides the fact that “meritocracy” is rarely actually a system of governance and more a guideline, the two aren’t even comparable.

Extremely not comparable. You can't write law to make meritocracy exist. You can only grow it within a community with social rules. That would be impressive, but it's not a thing.

by **Bormiar** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 10:06 pm

Badivermeraed wrote:What's your goal here

I want to have a discussion about this stuff.

"Why? Why does any of this matter to you if you don't care about Thalassia?", you might ask. Because NationStates Gameplay is a complete waste of time if we don't actually talk about NationStates politics. This is little more than a social manipulation game without political discussions. All improvement comes from critical examination. For example, if you decide that you want to start making your bed, you are critiquing the state of your bed. Please stop encouraging NationStates to starve itself of that examination.

Obviously there's a problem or perceived problem that Thalassians are trying to fix. I don't think that Thalassia is going about this well at all. Question for the floor: what are the justifications behind Thalassia's course of action?

I knew that I wasn't going to be able to have a discussion with most Thalassians. You guys acted like children with Toerana, why should I expect anything different?

I actually think that there are some 5 year olds more mature than this while they're not in a mob. Mob mentality makes you quite awful. It's also making Thalassian moderation completely ignore Rule 3 (you can't flame) in their own server. It's very embarrassing.

So I posted this in NSGP, not Thalassia where I knew I would get nothing but shit. Unfortunately, the most mature criticism that I've received here was somehow personal accusations from Altino because she's butt-hurt that I criticized her beloved meritocracy in her commendation thread.

PrarieYesterday at 10:56 PM
Also all NS democracies are inherently oligarchic because of the small player base and overall talent pool

Here's a really good example of disagreeing with me. Reading through the rest of this brainless circlejerk on Thalassia's discord is suddenly a lot better because one person is actually come at this the right way.

One person that I believe you guys should start emulating, from an OOC standpoint, is Wymondham. I really criticized him for NSToday, and while he didn't agree, he reacted very well. I didn't get what I wanted, but he was respectful and eventually he decided that they wanted to start covering NSSports. While it's very early, I think that it's going to go well. Be more like Wym. I'm saying this knowing that Wym has insulted me before and is probably going to insult me for this.

Or don't be like Wym. You guys think I'm an idiot because you don't understand that I'm not interested in "winning" an obscure, text-based political simulator. So I don't care if I get flamed or mocked on NS anymore. Chances are, most people of a mature age who behave like that -- who haven't learned to disassociate the person from the idea or don't realize that online people are people -- will never amount to anything in real life. I don't respect the commentary of someone when they're speaking with their emotions rather than their brains. And I know I'm in the right for trying to have a rational discussion.

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I have been pleading with you guys to explain your reasoning. You can do that, either here or in dms, and we can all be very proud. OR, you guys can continue to do nothing but flame me because you're angry that I criticized your region, and we can all see that Thalassia is collectively vacuous.

by **Polder Eiland** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 10:18 pm

Bormiar wrote:-snip-

I think you're wrong.

by **Honeydewistania** » Fri Aug 21, 2020 10:28 pm

i think the best course of action now is to wait and see what the IC comes up with for a new constitution, instead of pointless back-and-forth "bormiar does not know how oligrachy works here" "actually thalassia is north korea" etc

by **Zentata** » Sat Aug 22, 2020 4:07 am

Sho, as well as two others have recently unilaterally dissolved the constitution, under the claim of "inactivity" (the RMB is more active than it has been in the majority of Thalassian history

Borm, even though the rmb may seem active, it's all role-playing. Actual government inactivity, which is why the constitution was dissolved, was and is wide-spread and systemic. I should know, considering I was part of the government. Heck, even the amount of nations in Thalassia has been falling dramatically. Also, in the statement by the IC, they admit that regional activity has been driven by 5 or 6 people since the end of 2019. The new constitution is meant to encourage and help a more active and diverse government. I very much hope that it does.

by **Toerana** » Sat Aug 22, 2020 4:21 am

Bormiar wrote:OR, you guys can continue to do nothing but flame me because you're angry that I criticized your region, and we can all see that Thalassia is collectively vacuous.

Their overly hostile response to criticism says, to me, that they lack a justification for their actions that even they see as valid, instead preferring to attack critics in the attempt to get them to "go away", and instituting a password to ensure they can't return.

I wish they'd drop the claim it's a "reform" or "restructuring" because either of those could have been done perfectly legally, Arenado has already added new Ministries without a Constitutional Amendment, so I see no reason that it can't be done again, or why Ministries that are not codified in the constitution cannot be removed without a second thought.

Any more drastic changes would have to be passed in a constitutional amendment, for good reason, but the government (I'm referencing the IC here) instead chose to ignore all of the legal systems in place in favour of a coup.

The Consitution, for reference, or at least the most up to date version I have, as the Official Version was deleted.
EDIT: It only lacks the The Constitutional Monarchy Amendment (The amendment which purely renames positions)

Embassy of Thalassia

Embassy of Thalassia

January 2020 Foreign Affairs Update

February 2020 Foreign Affairs Update

Thalassia About as Democratic as Palpatine's Republic

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