NationStates

it's not surprising to me that there is a bias here but I would have more fun playing if the elaboration and arguments for any side of politics that came to an issue had just as much intellectual thought put into them or at least it was evident that effort was made by either side of the fictitious debates.

If you have a problem with the issues, then submit your own. *nods*

Deswishne wrote:it's not surprising to me that there is a bias here but I would have more fun playing if the elaboration and arguments for any side of politics that came to an issue had just as much intellectual thought put into them or at least it was evident that effort was made by either side of the fictitious debates.

If you don't find the issues funny or stimulating enough, then contribute some proposals on this forum. We will be more than happy to read them.

It's hard to address concerns like these without specific examples. Could you provide some examples?

Oddly, as a liberal, I've grumbled to my friends about the right wing bias of some of the issues here.

For example, I answered an issue that instituted welfare for those out of work, and went from 54% to 19% economy in one hit. To a left-wing individual like me, that seems insane, as I've always maintained that if you reduce economic inequality and lift people out of poverty, then you stimulate the marketplace, increase spending and create greater equality of opportunity, which is necessary for hard-working and motivated individuals to reach their full potential. In contrast, in the absence of welfare spending you have ill health, starvation and insecurity at the bottom of society, excessive incentive to save rather than spend, wasted minds of people who might have contributed to society never getting the chance to, and so on...

To provide real life examples, I'd note that most successful economies maintain a level of welfare, and those with the worst economies often have no welfare at all. Correlation doesn't prove causation, but its still correlation.

I can see how introduction of welfare spending would temporarily slow the economy, but in the long run it would be beneficial. A 54% to 19% permanent drop basically indicates that the issue writer (or at least the issue editor assigning the value) has a right wing bias AGAINST welfare.

So basically, if you perceive a "liberal bias" its likely that its because you have your own political bias. For my own part, I perceive a "right wing bias", as I'm to the left of the politics of the nationstates simulation. Happily, I don't care that much, as nationstates isn't meant to be a realistic simulation, rather its a game that has fun and unpredictable outcomes when you press buttons, and with no win condition. In that, it works fine.

As others on this thread have said, if you don't like the issues, write some new ones. That's what I'm doing!

Deswishne wrote:it's not surprising to me that there is a bias here but I would have more fun playing if the elaboration and arguments for any side of politics that came to an issue had just as much intellectual thought put into them or at least it was evident that effort was made by either side of the fictitious debates.

Congratulations! In less than two weeks you figured out what I have not after 12 years.

*hands out cookie*

Now try explaining it to all the corporate police States. They haven't your insight./sarcasm

I agree, but I also agree with the guy over me too. There is a lot of bias from both sides, but particularly liberal bias. I mean, in both the "results" you get and the "options" you get. It seems like every option is either liberal or conservative. I would have enjoyed the game much more if there at least were some options I to some extent could agree with.

Regard the results, here are some specific examples. Issue #034: "Don’t Puff On Me, Say Non-Smokers." First of all, it should be an option to simply let the owner – the individual – decide what is best for his or her property. The options is really flawed. Option 1 wants to ban smoking from public places, option 2 wants to ban smoking entirely and option 3 wants to make it mandatory for, say, restaurants to allow citizens to smoke ("Telling a smoker he can’t light up in a restaurant is discrimination") on their own property. Every one of these options infringe with private property-rights.

What is more, there should be an really extreme option to get rid of all public areas – there should only be private property or collective property, not government owned or public property. I would have chosen that!

I would post more examples in the future of biased issues when I get them, even though they still all are anecdotal evidence since there is pretty hard to quantify it and gather statistical evidence for the issues being biased.

Calling mods.