[DRAFT] Commend United Massachusetts

[Fauxia]

The SC is not really an IC assembly so it does not apply that it doesn’t make sense in a real world that UM would be commended by it. And UM roleplays as having consequences for violating WA law. He’s playing realistically and he’s done enough (probably) to warrant a commendation.

[Aclion]

I suggest you wait a while on this, so as not to maximize opposition by submitting while there is an active draft of Repeal GA #286 being drafted. Plus, it may give UM a chance to add a resolution or two.


Would you care to elaborate?

UM does not comply with WA rules, he should not be awarded officially by the WA as he is violating international law

By that standard no WA nation should be commended, since it's impossible to be compliant with all the WA resolution simultaneously.

[New Jakobly]

By that standard no WA nation should be commended, since it's impossible to be compliant with all the WA resolution simultaneously.

I also talked to UM on that matter, and he agrees. No one can comply with every single WA resolution. It is impossible. I agree as well.

[Marxist Germany]

UM does not comply with WA rules, he should not be awarded officially by the WA as he is violating international law

By that standard no WA nation should be commended, since it's impossible to be compliant with all the WA resolution simultaneously.

Thats false, contradicting resolutions do not exist because there are rules against them.

[WayNeacTia]

The SC is not really an IC assembly so it does not apply that it doesn’t make sense in a real world that UM would be commended by it. And UM roleplays as having consequences for violating WA law. He’s playing realistically and he’s done enough (probably) to warrant a commendation.

Au contraire. UM is being commended solely for in character actions, and thus the commendation should be judged solely on in character actions.

[Fauxia]

The SC is not really an IC assembly so it does not apply that it doesn’t make sense in a real world that UM would be commended by it. And UM roleplays as having consequences for violating WA law. He’s playing realistically and he’s done enough (probably) to warrant a commendation.

Au contraire. UM is being commended solely for in character actions, and thus the commendation should be judged solely on in character actions.

Perhaps, but not in an In-Character way. Which is what you are suggesting.

[WayNeacTia]

Au contraire. UM is being commended solely for in character actions, and thus the commendation should be judged solely on in character actions.

Perhaps, but not in an In-Character way. Which is what you are suggesting.

He is being commended for in character actions, and yet fails to follow in character resolutions.

No.

[Fauxia]

Perhaps, but not in an In-Character way. Which is what you are suggesting.

He is being commended for in character actions, and yet fails to follow in character resolutions.

No.

You’re commending the player for playing well, not the nation and its characters. UM has contributed to the game in a number of ways and roleplays noncompliance accurately. His contributions to the WA far outweigh one nation not complying with quite all active resolutions, all 300+ of them (or whatever it is, I don’t know the exact number).

UM, the player, deserves recognition (probably, there’s an argument to be made that he doesn’t but yours is, shall I say politely, not it). And he is far more in line with a commendation than a condemnation. His only IC-"evil" action is non-compliance with one single resolution, and it’s hardly the most important. That should be an atom in the bucket compared to the resolutions passed alone.

If you have an argument to be made that he does not yet have enough on his resume to be recognized at all, I will entertain your arguments.

[WayNeacTia]

If you have an argument to be made that he does not yet have enough on his resume to be recognized at all, I will entertain your arguments.

The only thing he has done is author resoultions. If the commendation was at least inventive I could entertain it, but all I see is a boring list of resoultions passed. Lots of people have passed lots of resolutions. Auralia has passed far more resoultions that UM, and Auralia will never be commended. Same can be said for CD.

[Kavagrad]

Any Commendation for a WA legislator that is willing to publicly violate WA law, and recruit others to do the same, isn't worthy of a glance. The WA shouldn't be in the business of cheering on sore losers. Opposed.

[Fauxia]

If you have an argument to be made that he does not yet have enough on his resume to be recognized at all, I will entertain your arguments.

The only thing he has done is author resoultions. If the commendation was at least inventive I could entertain it, but all I see is a boring list of resoultions passed. Lots of people have passed lots of resolutions. Auralia has passed far more resoultions that UM, and Auralia will never be commended. Same can be said for CD.

You can make the argument that there isn’t enough, but CD and Auralia are irrelevant. Nobody denies that they have enough commendable material on their resume, it’s just they aren’t liked for being social conservatives, and Auralia has some major baggage that is a dealbreaker for a lot of people.

UM did do some stuff in TEP, by the way.

This is a legitimate opinion though and it’s (partially) why I recommended the author hold off for a while. I’m afraid I may be biased in favor of his accomplishments because I consider UM one of my best friends on NS, and even I’m a little wobbly.

*Note that I would support the commendation of both anyway.

[Fauxia]

Any Commendation for a WA legislator that is willing to publicly violate WA law, and recruit others to do the same, isn't worthy of a glance. The WA shouldn't be in the business of cheering on sore losers. Opposed.

I’ll try to use Glen-Rhodes’ argument because I’m not that smart

I also just seems a poor reason to oppose a commendation. First, when Auralia and I argue for recognizing the existence of "non-compliance," we're not saying don't follow WA law. We're advocating for more realism in the GA. Second, and more importantly, it's a position adopted by GenSec and is now an official part of the GA rules case law. Whatever resolutions Auralia roleplays as being in noncompliance with, is really separate from this. Despite the SC rules, we're all talking about his accomplishments as a player. Can you not be a good player if you've roleplayed something disagreeable before?

[Attempted Socialism]

I'd personally be in favour of a commendation if it wasn't for the vehement non-compliance on womens rights. I don't think this proposal is supportable (Or at least, not as-is), but UM in general is a level-headed, polite and gregarious player, who generally approaches the game well (With a few glaring exceptions), and who has authored some progressive resolutions. If it wasn't for his non-compliance, those traits and actions would be commendable.

[New Jakobly]

I need more peoples' opinions on the proposal.

[Marilyn Manson Freaks]

Perhaps for the Lauding part of the resolution you can include his work with the RR and give some specific roles he has had in those regions, such as, "Lauding their leadership of Right to Life as president and WA Delegate, the East Pacific as part of the WA Ministry, and Deputy Culture Minister for the Rejected Realms and the continued impact they have on all of these regions; "

Also, the second "Noting" for the resolutions should probably be "Further Noting" or some other verb (i.e. "Observing", "Considering", etc.)

He has never been "Deputy Culture Minister" for The Rejected Realms. He was recently appointed Deputy Officer of Outreach by Bormiar and has held the position for almost a week. Don't include that.

While I do think UM is extremely worthy, this draft is poor at best, OP. Do some more research.

[Israeli Empiratic Commonwealth]

When I read this again, as I read the comments of everyone else, I agree it needs a lot more research done. As much as I would support this if it was good or not to commend him, it needs more work

[New Jakobly]

Reading everything that has been suggested, more edits will be done approximately 7:00 PM EDT tonight.

[Twobagger]

Sure, why not.

Acknowledging the controversies that may surround United Massachusetts for their unconventional political ideologies that embody both characteristics of the left and right;

If you are married to this theme of UM being commendable for bringing "both sides" together, I'd change this to "ideologies that embody characteristics of both the left and right" or similar.

Noting United Massachusetts’ ability to work with both sides of the political spectrum throughout NationStates; all while being a staunch adherent to the personal liberties that many of the left consider rights and holding on to religious liberties that the right can appreciate. This culmination of beliefs makes United Massachusetts a unifying force all can stand behind and appreciate;

The first semicolon should probably be a comma. Also, I'd be careful with your wording here. For example, if you asked me to describe "the personal liberties that many of the left consider rights," I'd almost certainly describe abortion.

Also Noting their authorship in both the General Assembly and Security council that embody these characteristics mentioned, with proposals such as:

You should capitalize "Security Council." There are more grammatical errors and examples of strange formatting throughout that I'm not going to get into because it would make this reply far too long for my taste. Also, it seems like you're making their SC authorship important in this clause, but you don't actually list any of their SC work here. I'd consider either moving the SC proposal to this block or combining the two clauses that talk about WA resolutions into one.

GA Resolution #417, "Restrictions On Hydraulic Fracturing", Restricting the practice, which caused harm to water sources

GA Resolution #419 “Voting Equality for Freed Inmates”, giving past prisoners the voting equality they deserve

GA Resolution #430 “Freedom of Religion”, expressing the well-deserved freedom

GA Resolution #436 “Protecting Free Expression”, advancing the right to express

GA Resolution #437 “Ban on Conversion Therapy”, giving the LGBTQ+ community more rights

You've added some explanation here, but I think this needs to be fleshed out better. Your descriptions of #430 and #436 don't tell me what these resolutions actually do, for example.

GA Resolution #467 "Affordable Transgender Hormone Therapy", giving transgenders easier access to hormone therapy

Consider going with "transgender people" or something similar instead of "transgenders."

Lauding their leadership of Right to Life as President and WA Delegate, reaching out to the political left, despite the rightist nature of the Right to Life, The East Pacific as part of the WA Ministry (serving as WA minister), and Deputy Culture Minister for The Rejected Realms and the continued impact they have on all of these regions;

This clause seems awkwardly written to me. For example: in what sense has UM reached out to the political left? This clause talks about their leadership in various regions, so I'm assuming UM has done so in an official capacity as president. Do you have an example of this?

I would support a Commendation of UM in general, but this draft leaves much to be desired. Also, even if you cleaned up all the grammatical and formatting mistakes, the bulk of this resolution seems to be essentially "UM has authored many resolutions" and I don't think that's good enough.

[Eumaeus]

Security Council;

Recognizing the esteemed members enshrined by this noble institution for their leadership, character, dedication, and much more;

Believing that an unacknowledged nation that embodies these exceptional characteristics is United Massachusetts;

The use of "one such" implies that you're talking about one of the nations you were just describing in the previous clause (those with commendations). I replaced it with "an unacknowledged", but that is just a general suggestion of the type of language you should replace it with as opposed to a specific word I think you should used.

Acknowledging the controversies that may surround United Massachusetts for their unconventional political ideologies that embody both characteristics of the left and right;

Noting United Massachusetts’ ability to work with both sides of the political spectrum throughout NationStates; all while being a staunch adherent to the personal liberties that many of the left consider rights and holding on to religious liberties that the right can appreciate. This culmination of beliefs makes United Massachusetts a unifying force all can stand behind and appreciate;

I have a fun fact for everyone: because I wasn't sure if it should be "Massachusetts'" or "Massachusetts's" I googled it and it turns out the technically correct possessive is "Massachusetts's" but the commonly agreed upon possessive is "Massachusetts'" because the pronunciation of the former is a nightmare.

Anyways, I'm not convinced. I'm not saying this isn't true or that it can't be true, but what I am saying is that there is next to no evidence provided in this draft that backs up this clause's claims. I'd also like to point out that imho it is not necessary to paint UM as some sort of ideological ambassador for their accomplishments to deserve consideration by the Security Council. I disagree with them, strongly, on several important topics, but UM has always come of to me as respectful, and they are well accomplished. That by itself is enough to have this discussion.

Also Noting their authorship in both the General Assembly and Security Council, with proposals that embody the previously mentioned characteristics, including:

You forgot to capitalize "Council". The phrasing of this clause was also pretty awkward, so I reworded it.

GA Resolution #417, "Restrictions On Hydraulic Fracturing", restricting the practice of hydraulic fracturing, which causes harm to water sources

Several things here: the first word after the title is capitalized despite this not being a thing you do for the rest of the proposal; I think this description, as well as the description for several other Resolutions, is too concise: you can afford to spend a few more words to describe it and if not you shouldn't bother describing it at all; it should be "causes" instead of "caused" because a) you are describing a characteristic of frakking that presumably still happens in some non-WA nations and thus the past-tense is unnecessary and b) it sounds like you're saying that GA #417 was what "caused harm to water sources"; lastly, as I said in another post from earlier today "blech, no punctuation at the end? I mean, you can do it, but in my professional opinion: it's icky".

GA Resolution #419 “Voting Equality for Freed Inmates”, giving past prisoners the voting equality they deserve

This is just a suggestion, but the term used in Criminal Justice circles (at least that I am a part of) is "formerly incarcerated".

GA Resolution #430 “Freedom of Religion”, expressing the well-deserved freedom

GA Resolution #436 “Protecting Free Expression”, advancing the right to express

These two clauses sound like incomplete thoughts. If you don't want to write out the right that is in the title of the resolution that is fine, but putting "which established this right" is adding nothing but wasted characters to your proposal.

GA Resolution #437 “Ban on Conversion Therapy”, giving the LGBTQ+ community more rights

Further Noting other resolutions United Massachusetts has co-authored in, with proposals such as:

The heck does "co-authored in" mean?

GA Resolution #467 "Affordable Transgender Hormone Therapy", giving transgender people easier access to hormone therapy

Idk if calling a transgender person a transgender is PC or not, not it does not sound right as a noun to me.

SC Resolution #219 “Commend Forest”, recognizing their efforts to the environment

Lauding their leadership of Right to Life as President and WA Delegate, reaching out to the political left, despite the rightist nature of the Right to Life, The East Pacific as part of the WA Ministry (serving as WA minister), and Deputy Culture Minister for The Rejected Realms and the continued impact they have on all of these regions;

Considering the impact, leadership, character, and devotion that United Massachusetts has shown throughout their existence thus far;

Hereby Commends United Massachusetts.

Co-Authored by The Rouge Christmas State

Forgot a period at the end.

Overall I think it needs work. The list is nice, but mainly serves the purpose of providing examples of a previous characteristic, and it takes up most of the space in the proposal. I gave the advice earlier that I would either explain each proposal a bit more or just list their titles, and I believe the latter is the better option. After reading through this draft, I found that by the end I felt a surprising lack of substance. UM's accomplishments in RtL, TEP, and TRR could use some more exploring.

[New Jakobly]

Sorry that I have been inactive on this, I will try to update it this week. With the opposition team in the bill "Condemn United Massachusetts" working on theirs, it is hard to tell when it should be submitted.

[Aclion]

By that standard no WA nation should be commended, since it's impossible to be compliant with all the WA resolution simultaneously.

Thats false, contradicting resolutions do not exist because there are rules against them.

This reasoning only applies if we first accept that the rules are enforced perfectly. They are not.

Resolutions that break the rules are, once passed, just as legitimate as any others. Violating them is still noncompliance. Therefore, so long as contradictory resolutions exist all WA nations are in noncompliance.

[Lyrical International Brigade]

By that standard no WA nation should be commended, since it's impossible to be compliant with all the WA resolution simultaneously.

I also talked to UM on that matter, and he agrees. No one can comply with every single WA resolution. It is impossible. I agree as well.

Thats false, contradicting resolutions do not exist because there are rules against them.

This reasoning only applies if we first accept that the rules are enforced perfectly. They are not.

Resolutions that break the rules are, once passed, just as legitimate as any others. Violating them is still noncompliance. Therefore, so long as contradictory resolutions exist all WA nations are in noncompliance.

Could those making this argument please 1) provide the rest of us with an example of mutually contradictory resolutions such that it is impossible to be in compliance with both simultaneously, and 2) explain how that unfortunate and accidental state of affairs is morally equivalent to a nation or player deliberately deciding "We will explicitly and purposefully disobey Resolutions X, Y, Z, and Q." ???

If the former exists, it is as they say "too bad" and has no bearing on whether or not a nation deserves to be commended. In the latter case, it is an intentional finger in the eye of the international community, and the international community has a right to take notice of it and act or react accordingly.

[Aclion]

Could those making this argument please 1) provide the rest of us with an example of mutually contradictory resolutions such that it is impossible to be in compliance with both simultaneously,

35, 91, 114, & 141 in combination.

and 2) explain how that unfortunate and accidental state of affairs is morally equivalent to a nation or player deliberately deciding "We will explicitly and purposefully disobey Resolutions X, Y, Z, and Q." ???

It's totally amoral in both cases. Ultimately all players pick what resolutions they comply with and which they don't. The latter is just more lazy about it.

[Marxist Germany]

Could those making this argument please 1) provide the rest of us with an example of mutually contradictory resolutions such that it is impossible to be in compliance with both simultaneously,

35, 91, 114, & 141 in combination.

OOC: Circumcision =/= FGM, and I don't see how 91 and 35 contradict.

[Aclion]

35, 91, 114, & 141 in combination.

OOC: Circumcision =/= FGM, and I don't see how 91 and 35 contradict.

Circumcision =/= FGM contradicts 91 or 35 depending on how clever you are.