Election Coverage

[afleitch]

Regardless, afleitch never registered in the sign-in thread, so there should only be one vote for the Free Alliance.

What sign in thread? I signed up to join in the first few days that this Mock Parliament was proposed. Did everyone need to sign up again?

I would like to assist.

[afleitch]

For what it's worth, I will be challenging this decision to disenfranchise me in the court we don't have yet, under the laws we haven't written on the basis of the rights we haven't yet established

[afleitch]

This sign in thread:
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=217211.0

So signing up to play the game in the first few days doesn't qualify me as a 'citizen' for the purpose of being able to actually play the game?

[afleitch]

I agree that I think it's unreasonable to force people to sign up again after they already joined, and it's not clear to me that there's any statutory basis for this.

I didn't sign it because I assumed it was for those who were now joining, given that the original sign up thread had moved down page.

[afleitch]

In retrospect perhaps the RG or GM should have PMd unregistered likely voters - I know the Conservatives did, and I'm sure other parties did the same, but that leaves out those  without parties and who didn't see both the Sign-In and Turk's warning thread.

Again, aren't those who signed up to play this likely voters? If we're going to take this game seriously, then from the onset, given that the provisional parliament didn't establish a judiciary, a constitution or a bill of rights whatever assembly is elected in this election is still a provisional parliament only subject to itself and whatever it votes on, leaving citizens exposed because they only have rights conferred upon them (and snatched away) rather than have them inherently.

Therefore, the possible next course of action is civil unrest to ensure that there is a valid structure of rights and limitations, because that's exactly what I would be doing if this was actually happening

[afleitch]

I'm away from my computer atm but I thought I made it as clear as possible that you had to officially register. I'll change some words around to clear it up seeing as you're a party leader and all that, and I've been notified that those who registered up until when the election started are eligible to vote as well.

There was never any clear "register" method beforehand so I thought I was streamlining everything and making it easier for all involved but I was obviously mistaken.

I actually don't have a problem with disallowing those who didn't formally register tbh. There was a prominent warning thread posted.

I don't mind being disallowed either. If this game is 'parliament-citizenry', with no structures outside of parliament, not even a court system to lubricate (I hate that word...) relationships between them both, then I sort of look forward to challenging the legitimacy of any decision because without those structures...nothing is technically legitimate. Which might in itself be fun.

[afleitch]

It is not even clear what authority parliament had to call and administer these elections.

[afleitch]

Has it been determined if my vote stands btw?

[afleitch]

It is not even clear what authority parliament had to call and administer these elections.

Forgive us for not wanting to turn this game into the gigantic, legalistic clusterf!ck that is Atlasia the minute we started this game.

But you can't throw the baby out with the bathwater. You have to have some legal framework for what you're doing as I've tried to demonstrate. No one is asking for a tome, just a simple constitution that confirms the power of parliament.

[afleitch]

It is not even clear what authority parliament had to call and administer these elections.

Forgive us for not wanting to turn this game into the gigantic, legalistic clusterf!ck that is Atlasia the minute we started this game.

But you can't throw the baby out with the bathwater. You have to have some legal framework for what you're doing as I've tried to demonstrate. No one is asking for a tome, just a simple constitution that confirms the power of parliament.

You are the one calling for the constitution, and trying to squirrel in all sorts of "rights" in the hope no one is looking, to boot, all while undermining the fundamental doctrine of parliamentary supremacy!

Parliamentary supremacy without law, without human rights and without an independent judiciary is a dictatorship.

[afleitch]

You live in a dictatorship? In Britain, all of those things stem from Acts of Parliament.

The justice system does not stem from 'acts of parliament'; it is modified by it and feeds into it. Parliament didn't come before justice and law did!

This isn't a UK sim; it's about establishing a parliamentary system. If you wish to do that in 2015, you have to have a bare bones constitution defining roles. This game has nothing in it but a parliament. I'm arguing very strongly that we set up a constitution and that the constitution comes from the people.

[afleitch]

You live in a dictatorship? In Britain, all of those things stem from Acts of Parliament.

The justice system does not stem from 'acts of parliament'; it is modified by it and feeds into it. Parliament didn't come before justice and law did!

This isn't a UK sim; it's about establishing a parliamentary system. If you wish to do that in 2015, you have to have a bare bones constitution defining roles. This game has nothing in it but a parliament. I'm arguing very strongly that we set up a constitution and that the constitution comes from the people.

Such a "bare bones constitution" should merely sanction the principle of parliamentary supremacy. Separate acts could then sanction the courts, procedures, rights, and so forth as needed and prudent.

Exactly as I've just drafted.

[afleitch]

I have to agree that there’s quite a significant undercurrent of ‘constitution bad’ because of Atlasia.

You're also going to find a lot of passion from people who signed up to play a parliamentary sim and have been left with nothing to do Just saying.

A constitution; who has what powers is basically the rules of play. That’s it. It’s not complicated. This game has no rules, which I know you all think is spiffy until such times as it causes a problem. No one is proposing a convoluted, legal structure; just something very basic and very simple that all players can refer to.

For all those crying ‘Britain’ (yet for some reason, still inexplicable, we are playing as a united South America), this game isn’t Britain. It can’t be like Britain because Britain’s unwritten constitutional law is not ours. If you wanted to play as Britain, we could have played as Britain.

Instead we’re playing as South America, with the original intent that we inherited previously existing laws, even though the states don’t exist and it’s not federal. So that was thrown out. We have a party system that’s not reflective of any tradition. The first few sign ups determined that the game would be restricted to 21 players, who do what they want to do in parliament because ‘it’s like Britain’, with everyone else tasked with doing other things, though those aren’t defined.

[afleitch]

At the risk of repeating myself, this is where I stand.

1. If this game was a parliamentary sim where everyone (party affiliation included) who signed up was in parliament, then elections wouldn’t matter. The entire focus could be on law making, government formation, voting, amendments and political machinations. Even if you ended up with 100 players, it would only make the game more challenging because parliaments of a similar size often have members who are very active and others that do bugger all.

There would be no ‘outside world’ to worry about, no need for checks and balances etc. I would have liked consideration given to that.

2. As it is, this game is not a parliamentary sim; it’s an elections sim and a parliament sim. It’s players are elected and holding office or not elected Those who aren’t in parliament are still in the game. In that case, you have to accept that there are two parts to the game. If you allow one half (the parliament) to play as it likes, then it can effectively ignore the other half. We’ve been told ‘start a newspaper etc’, but the game then has no interaction between parliament and outside parlaiment except when there are elections. There’s not ‘rules of play’ that says ‘you know what; sometimes the parliament can’t do x, the citizens do x.’

You can ignore petitions from the public, you can ignore the managing of external events, the press, trade unions etc. And likewise, if you’re not in the parliament you can ignore it if there are no ground rules. You can get enough people behind you to say, ‘we six players have decided to mount a coup’ and you can play like there’s been coup.