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by The Alexanderians » Sun Oct 15, 2017 8:23 pm
by United Muscovite Nations » Tue Oct 17, 2017 3:53 pm
The Sauganash Union wrote:I live in the American Gardens Building on W. 81st Street on the 11th floor. My name is Patrick Bateman. I'm 27 years old.
I believe in taking care of myself and a balanced diet and rigorous exercise routine. In the morning if my face is a little puffy I'll put on an ice pack while doing stomach crunches. I can do 1000 now. After I remove the ice pack I use a deep pore cleanser lotion. In the shower I use a water activated gel cleanser, then a honey almond body scrub, and on the face an exfoliating gel scrub. Then I apply an herb-mint facial mask which I leave on for 10 minutes while I prepare the rest of my routine. I always use an after shave lotion with little or no alcohol, because alcohol dries your face out and makes you look older. Then moisturizer, then an anti-aging eye balm followed by a final moisturizing protective lotion.
by Dread Lady Nathicana » Wed Oct 18, 2017 7:32 am
by Luminesa » Thu Oct 19, 2017 9:01 pm
by Mushet » Fri Oct 20, 2017 1:04 am
by USS Monitor » Fri Oct 20, 2017 1:57 am
by Mushet » Fri Oct 20, 2017 2:16 am
by Grenartia » Sat Oct 21, 2017 12:38 pm
by Shofercia » Sat Oct 21, 2017 2:46 pm
You spin my head right round, right round
When you go down, when you go down down
You spin my head right round, right round
When you go down, when you go down down
by Greater Gilead » Tue Oct 24, 2017 8:49 am
Lexium wrote:"... You want me to send my citizens to their deaths to remind people that they are to be humble."
The Emperor furiously tears his copy of the proposal to pieces.
"If you think you are allowed to send innocent people to their deaths for the sole reason that some people need to be put in their places, then you are a hypocrite. You are the very thing you pretend to fight : An arrogant whelp who thinks he is above all !"
The Emperor stands up, red with anger.
"You need to be reminded of your place : The history books, as the author of the most insane proposal this assembly ever discussed, and as an arrogant madman. I presume I do not need to state if i support this proposal."
The Emperor exits the hall, slamming the door behind him.
by Internationalist Bastard » Tue Oct 24, 2017 5:57 pm
by Tinhampton » Sat Oct 28, 2017 4:14 am
by Lord Dominator » Sun Oct 29, 2017 11:58 am
Ikania wrote:Perhaps a significant factor in the concept of regional legitimacy is the presence of people actively disputing an incumbent's claim to it. I'll try and detail some of my personal experiences to support this, freely disputable, opinion. In the wake of last year's coup in Osiris, there was and is no doubt for me that Cormac's regime had no legitimacy, and there existed an entire host of exiled citizens fighting to take the region back. It fell through after a little while, and that lack of concerted resistance, the complete absence of any viable alternative, gave immediate and indisputable legitimacy to the next few months of rule. Now, there is no one who will try and lay claim to the Delegacy claiming the mandate of the people, the law, etc, without going through the proper processes of the OFO. No, not even me. You cannot regain legitimacy by virtue of community without acquiring it through that same method.
Legitimacy in Lazarus can be argued to belong to the members of the resistance, because we comprise a large part of the community, and what makes Lazarus what it is, and has been for a long time. Legitimacy, in my opinion, will continue to rest with our movement as long as we are active, vocal and persevering about it. Because that provides a consistent alternative to something that broke the law of the region at the time and forced a new government against both the law and the people, two huge factors in legitimacy.
To use real life examples, as others have, if we look at Turkey, its Republic has existed for almost a hundred years now. Without regard to the current regime, it would be impossible to argue that the entire structure must be torn down and rebuilt in an opposite, authoritarian fashion, since Ataturk performed an illegal coup against the Ottoman Empire with ideological motives. While in NS, natives don't just die off, rather, they fade away. The more they continue to wage a resistance against an illegal government, the more longevity their movement has, and the greater claim they have due to their relentless consistency. This isn't to say that every active resistance will always have legal rights to a country/region. Should Lukashenko ever die or resign, I doubt anyone expects or wants the Belarusian Government-in-exile to come in and take the reins. You have legitimacy as long as you continue to fight against your being supplanted. But if, in spite of your efforts, plantation is successful, and enough time has passed for most affected parties of the dispute to have moved on from it already, then you have probably lost your legitimacy. This idea, on a much grander and complex, and sectarian scale, has been at the heart of the issues surrounding Northern Ireland.
The Ulster plantation of the 16th century was undoubtedly wrong from our standpoint, but at the same time, it has been many centuries since then. A Catholic cannot lay claim to county Antrim today and be taken seriously by many people outside of the continuity IRA. There comes a point where you simply have to accept what is done as being done, and doing your best to build upon that instead of tearing it down (the RL equivalent being, of course, ethnic cleansing, but that's a rather touchy/derailing topic). I certainly don't mean to compare the viewpoints of Onder to that of the Irish Republican Army, but I believe the point stands nonetheless.
Ultimately, in my opinion, legitimacy is a matter of perception. Both sides will claim legitimacy, for various reasons, but three factors represent the crux of the issue: community, law, and recognition. A community ruling its own region, by laws upheld by its government, and recognized by most significant players, is almost undoubtedly legitimate in the eyes of most people. Take away one of these factors, and there is very much a grounds for disputing legitimacy, which is exactly what is being done and has been done. All three of these can change, and regardless of their manner, if enough time passes and opposition fades away, then you can put up your illegitimacy as the real deal and thus attain it, with no one important to deny you that right. And that is precisely the motivation to carry on resistance to unlawful and unjust governments that violate the rights of its people- if you don't fight it, soon you'll lose everything that made you what you were in that community. Lazarus is not a done deal for precisely that reason, and Osiris is certainly a done deal for precisely that reason. Which fool will now say that the government of Osiris bears no legitimacy? Few, if any. Because there is no competition, and no one is interested at this point in challenging the stability and activity that has developed in the wake of something which was, at the time, purely wrong: what was illegitimate has gained legitimacy, borne out of all the things I mentioned earlier.
And I would like to only briefly address the idea of Delegate supremacy; Moldavi is free to argue that there exists no real thing as a coup in NS because of the inherent game mechanics, but I would say that it is a matter of perspective. By the grace of God, I am freely capable of, for example, shooting someone in the head, not that I would, of course. And because there exists no (objectively proven) universal force to tell me that I have not just committed murder, should I argue that there exists no such thing as murder? Everything we create, both in real life and in-game, are things existing only in the matters of us as humans and the way we think. If I take your property, it is theft, and if I throw a grenade at you, it is murder, or at least attempted murder, as well as countless property destruction charges. We don't rely on God to tell us that we did that, well, some do, but even without religion we have the laws that we have created within the framework of nature to define these kinds of things. If you set up a government with your fellow peers and all agree on common definitions of the way things work, and what you are and are not allowed to do, you've no right to dispute the labeling of your crime when you commit it.
When an unstable banana republic undergoes a coup d'etat, no one will say that it was the right of that particular warlord to take over the country merely because he had the largest army. It is always for the good of the people that countries tend to be run best, or, so goes western philosophy. I would apply that to NS too. Max Barry gives you the power to exercise absolute power as a virtual monarch in your own region. By the standards set by the game, by this constructed reality, there's no real label for doing that benevolently or maliciously other than a simple exercise of power. But just as we have created laws and rules for ourselves as humans outside the parameters of the divine, so too have we done that for NS. Secular law, if you will. There is little disputing that if you forcibly overthrow a government against its constitutional law, and all that, then it is, in fact, a coup d'etat. Not because the game Gods said so, but because we as players and as humans have established that definition within our concept of philosophy, justice, and morality.
Funny how game philosophy and real-life philosophy intertwine like they do.
by Dylar » Tue Oct 31, 2017 2:54 pm
St. Albert the Great wrote:"Natural science does not consist in ratifying what others have said, but in seeking the causes of phenomena."
Franko Tildon wrote:Fire washes the skin off the bone and the sin off the soul. It cleans away the dirt. And my momma didn't raise herself no dirty boy.
by Petrasylvania » Tue Oct 31, 2017 8:26 pm
Petrasylvania wrote:United Islamic Commonwealth wrote:I answered... How exactly do you want me to respond? Would you like me to unreservedly and unconditionally condemn this act of terror in NY?
You should make a condemnation macro so you can just copy and paste any time more than 1 person dying makes the news.
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