Mock Parliament Diplomacy

[bore]

Yesterday I received this message from Foreign Minister SJoyce, which I think is very interesting and should spark some debate:

Greetings, Mr. President,

I am currently the Foreign Minister of South America, and my nation is interesting in re-establishing diplomatic and trade ties with yours. What would be the proper procedure for doing so?

-SJoyce

Personally I think a diplomacy dimension could be very interesting and would be worth pursuing. That said it would have be worked out carefully in terms of some form of Game Moderation to ensure we don't get our countries launching nukes at each other or anything.

[Leinad]

In theory this sounds nice and all, but in reality I think it's just a path to a simultaneous officeholding ban, which they tried to pass in the provisional parliament. Fortunately it failed (some have credited that to me, but I would be arrogant to openly agree with that).

A ban on holding office in both places will surely be destructive. I ask you: if we can't sustain 5 regions in one nation (which we've almost unanimously agreed is fact), why would anyone think we could sustain 2 separate nations, without sharing some active members? Fortunately Oakvale (one of the many people Atlasia would lose as a result of this rule) has said he plans to limit it to only 2 people (Prime Minister and Foreign Minister), which I thank him for, but I'm uncertain it will last.

The fact is that the Mock Parli[a]ment has a strong, irrational anti-Atlasian sentiment. Maybe some people think that isn't true, or think Atlasia is so bad it deserves it, but I only speak what I observe to be correct. In the very first page of the very first parliamentary thread, they responded to a simple rules question with cries of Atlasian "legalism," and many people were originally hostile to a constitution, seemingly for no other reason that the fact Atlasia has one.

I'm interested in hearing what other people think of this, specifically declared and potential Presidential candidates. This is simply my knee-jerk reaction as someone who's spent probably more time over there than anyone else still in Atlasia.

[CLARENCE 2015!]

Personally- I have no problem with engaging in diplomacy with them.... a simultaneous office holding ban would be absolutely destructive...I also agree that the anti Atlasia sentiment runs deep there which is one reason I am not nearly as active over there as I originally planned to be- though also my party won no seats in their parliament so I do not have much room there to even engage

[Barnes]

Look, what you guys decide to do is up to you, but at least have the decency to actually read what we are doing instead of just talking around in circle about it.  This is from our proposed Constitution Act that is presently before the Parliament.

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[Leinad]

Look, what you guys decide to do is up to you, but at least have the decency to actually read what we are doing instead of just talking around in circle about it.  This is from our proposed Constitution Act that is presently before the Parliament.

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As I alluded to in my post:

Fortunately Oakvale (one of the many people Atlasia would lose as a result of this rule) has said he plans to limit it to only 2 people (Prime Minister and Foreign Minister), which I thank him for, but I'm uncertain it will last.

At least have the decency to actually read what I said.

[Barnes]

Then what was the point of mentioning the great pitfalls at all?

Regardless, there is no need to act like all of this is the end of the world. Does is really make sense to have, for example, the President of South America, someone who appoints our government, be a Senator of Atlasia as well? Or for the Prime Minister to be the SoEA for a country in which he is conducting diplomatic relations?

I have yet to understand how this could possibly be a negative component to anything.

[Leinad]

Here's a breakdown of my argument:

1. A complete ban on simultaneous officeholding would be disasterous.

2. The only rationale for a complete ban is "diplomacy" between the two nations.

3. The chances of a complete ban passing in South America is fairly likely, given the well-documented anti-Atlasian sentiment over there.

Therefore, it's not a stretch at all to say that the chances of this destructive ban will go up a lot if diplomatic relations are opened, since point 2 will no longer be moot.

Speaking of which, I'd like to make it clear that President Bore and then the next president will need to make sure that South America won't gain any benefits--and there won't even be diplomatic relations--if they institute a ban on simultaneous officeholding any larger than the proposed ban--which is certainly reasonable, and I actually support it.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

I greatly fear relations with the Mock Parliament may be, due to still strong mutual hostility and strictly technical reasons, unworkable.

The technical reasons I'm referring to is that we're in two diffrent universes. Unless both games have a joint GM or other game engine like that, there will be no plausibility and contradiction after contradiction.

I strongly prefer Griffin's idea of introducing second playable country to our universe instead.

[Oakvale]

I greatly fear relations with the Mock Parliament may be, due to still strong mutual hostility and strictly technical reasons, unworkable.

The technical reasons I'm referring to is that we're in two diffrent universes. Unless both games have a joint GM or other game engine like that, there will be no plausibility and contradiction after contradiction.

I strongly prefer Griffin's idea of introducing second playable country to our universe instead.

With the existence of two actual nations, there'd be no need for a GM to make up stuff about Hollande being assassinated in order to have a fun foreign policy.

[Oakvale]

Here's a breakdown of my argument:

1. A complete ban on simultaneous officeholding would be disasterous.

2. The only rationale for a complete ban is "diplomacy" between the two nations.

3. The chances of a complete ban passing in South America is fairly likely, given the well-documented anti-Atlasian sentiment over there.

Therefore, it's not a stretch at all to say that the chances of this destructive ban will go up a lot if diplomatic relations are opened, since point 2 will no longer be moot.

Speaking of which, I'd like to make it clear that President Bore and then the next president will need to make sure that South America won't gain any benefits--and there won't even be diplomatic relations--if they institute a ban on simultaneous officeholding any larger than the proposed ban--which is certainly reasonable, and I actually support it.

I can only speak for the present administration, but take it from me - the current South American Conservative-Social Liberal government will not under any circumstances introduce a stricter office-holding ban than that proposed on the positions of Prime Minister, Foreign Minister and ambassadors.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

I greatly fear relations with the Mock Parliament may be, due to still strong mutual hostility and strictly technical reasons, unworkable.

The technical reasons I'm referring to is that we're in two diffrent universes. Unless both games have a joint GM or other game engine like that, there will be no plausibility and contradiction after contradiction.

I strongly prefer Griffin's idea of introducing second playable country to our universe instead.

With the existence of two actual nations, there'd be no need for a GM to make up stuff about Hollande being assassinated in order to have a fun foreign policy.

With strictly bilateral relations, maybe, but what about the rest of the world? It would be a bit silly to pretend it disappeared.

Every real diplomacy game should include some impartial engine. It opens lots of great possibilities. Otherwise our whole "diplomacy" will be boring as well. We may at best make a few empty treaties.

[Oakvale]

The "diplomacy" in Atlasia, existing as it does in a vacuum, has been in every respect a massive failure. At its best our foreign policy consisted of the SoEA writing fanfic about his heroic efforts on behalf of Middle East peace.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

The "diplomacy" in Atlasia, existing as it does in a vacuum, has been in every respect a massive failure. At its best our foreign policy consisted of the SoEA writing fanfic about his heroic efforts on behalf of Middle East peace.

Yes, but having a second playable country is not the same as existing in a vacuum. Very few actually advocated that.

[Leinad]

Here's a breakdown of my argument:

1. A complete ban on simultaneous officeholding would be disasterous.

2. The only rationale for a complete ban is "diplomacy" between the two nations.

3. The chances of a complete ban passing in South America is fairly likely, given the well-documented anti-Atlasian sentiment over there.

Therefore, it's not a stretch at all to say that the chances of this destructive ban will go up a lot if diplomatic relations are opened, since point 2 will no longer be moot.

Speaking of which, I'd like to make it clear that President Bore and then the next president will need to make sure that South America won't gain any benefits--and there won't even be diplomatic relations--if they institute a ban on simultaneous officeholding any larger than the proposed ban--which is certainly reasonable, and I actually support it.

I can only speak for the present administration, but take it from me - the current South American Conservative-Social Liberal government will not under any circumstances introduce a stricter office-holding ban than that proposed on the positions of Prime Minister, Foreign Minister and ambassadors.

Good to hear, although I'm still skeptical in the long-term. Considering how close it was to passing the first go around, and the fact that most people in the game are disgruntled ex-Atlasians who outwardly dislike Atlasia more than rational people should dislike a forum elections/government game, I would not be surprised to see a future administration put forward a stricter ban.

Also, Kal's spot-on regarding the GM. Makes sense given that he had that role for a fairly large part of this year. (By the way, we really need a new GM.)

[Lumine]

Personally, I share Kalwejt and Leinad's skepticism regarding this, and I say it as someone who was fairly interested in the Mock Parliament until the anti-Atlasian sentiment and the whole dual officeholding ban started to make its appearance.

The arguments have been said already, but you can't really coordinate with both nations with a common engime because they will start overlapping on several foreign issues (and I do recall the backstory being that North America is some sort of dystopia, or at least a regime with negative connotations), not to mention the idea of an officeholding ban regardless of how limited it is (and I praise those who worked to limit it) a petty one.

Speaking purely from personal beliefs I would not support establishing diplomatic ties to the Mock Parliament, at least for the time being.

[Cincinnatus]

The "diplomacy" in Atlasia, existing as it does in a vacuum, has been in every respect a massive failure. At its best our foreign policy consisted of the SoEA writing fanfic about his heroic efforts on behalf of Middle East peace.

Yes, but having a second playable country is not the same as existing in a vacuum. Very few actually advocated that.

This is an interesting idea however, which was proposed or, at least, thrown around in the past.  Obviously the details on what's happening outside of our two countries, implications of foreign policy between our two countries, and other future problems we don't currently foresee exist.  While foreign policy, simulated by GM/SOEA hasn't really achieved any significant impact on the game, I question whether diplomacy between Mock Parliament and Atlasia is enough without outside, simulated, circumstances.  I am however, completely on board with game-to-game diplomacy.

[Donerail]

To address some of the concerns brought up:

There will be no officeholding ban apart from that which has already been passed. There was never enough political support for the ban for it to pass, and all involved seem reasonably satisfied with the current solution. The odds of such a ban passing are all but nil. Refusing to establish diplomatic relations because of the fear of a future officeholding ban is unreasonable and entirely unfounded.

As for the idea of "anti-Atlasian sentiment," there may be some present, but it's by no means "irrational," as the good Governor claims. The people who founded this iteration of the Mock Parliament were, by and large, people dissatisfied with Atlasian legalism - by that, I mean arguing over tedious and unimportant amendments to legislation, crafting a complex and difficult amendment process for the Constitution, and doing things like attempting to install a member as speaker who was not a member of the Parliament. It seems natural that these people would want to improve on the flaws that are apparent in the Atlasian system of government. That does not seem irrational.

As for the discussion of the Constitution, many people were hostile to the idea of a written Constitution because there were legitimate questions as to its necessity. Nations like Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom get along fine without having such documents.

As for the discussion of technical issues, the lack of a GM doesn't seem to be a significant issue for government-to-government interactions. Each nation's GM could simulate the effects of things like foreign trade - I'm really not seeing the need for an 'impartial' GM unless we end up in significant conflict.

As someone who's spent more time as SoEA than almost anyone, Oakvale is correct that the current system of diplomacy in Atlasia is bland and uninteresting. I would urge Atlasia to seriously consider rectifying that situation by opening relations with South America.

[PJ]

The arguments have been said already, but you can't really coordinate with both nations with a common engime because they will start overlapping on several foreign issues (and I do recall the backstory being that North America is some sort of dystopia, or at least a regime with negative connotations), not to mention the idea of an officeholding ban regardless of how limited it is (and I praise those who worked to limit it) a petty one.

Pretty sure this is in reference to Atlasia. Nevertheless this is correct in that there needs to be some form of coordination between Atlasia's GM and South America's, lest we have overlapping realities.

Not sure why some of you are worried about whether or not South America has a constitution; it's purely an issue of internal affairs, not foreign policy, and Atlasia already maintains diplomatic relations with other nations without a constitution. Not to mention that a constitution was just overwhelmingly passed by the South American Parliament on a vote of 15-2.

[Lumine]

Pretty sure this is in reference to Atlasia. Nevertheless this is correct in that there needs to be some form of coordination between Atlasia's GM and South America's, lest we have overlapping realities.

Not sure why some of you are worried about whether or not South America has a constitution; it's purely an issue of internal affairs, not foreign policy, and Atlasia already maintains diplomatic relations with other nations without a constitution. Not to mention that a constitution was just overwhelmingly passed by the South American Parliament on a vote of 15-2.

I don't think the lack of a constitution was ever an argument on this particular subject, the issue was how the idea of having a Constitution in South America caused many to denounce "Atlasian style legalism" (whatever that means, because personally I find the concept ridiculous) and so on.

Is it good that people want a game that improves on the issues this one has? Yes, of course, it's only natural to wish to make improvements if people feel something to be less than ideal. Another thing is to denounce Atlasia and everything some seem to believe it stood for, and then pursue a course of action like the officeholding ban (which I believe is uncalled for), which makes one or two people look as if they were just a bit too enthusiastic on extending the middle finger at Atlasia.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The idea has intrigued for the past month or so. The hostility, could make the interaction more exciting. If we elect our own Donard Trump in Atlasia, we could send one of his "killers" to do the negotiating.


What's the worst that could happen?


Still it would be fun, even if it does end up with me buried beneath a Walmart parking lot.

[ZuWo]

Let's wait a few months to see if Mock Parliment can sustain itself this time. They have just elected their first parliament but instead of there being excitement and lively debates it all looks rather bland and boring to me, to be honest.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Let's wait a few months to see if Mock Parliment can sustain itself this time. They have just elected their first parliament but instead of there being excitement and lively debates it all looks rather bland and boring to me, to be honest.

This.

Also, Atlasia's first priority must be recovery and rebuilding, before we may even think of going there.

[Senator Cris]

Let's wait a few months to see if Mock Parliment can sustain itself this time. They have just elected their first parliament but instead of there being excitement and lively debates it all looks rather bland and boring to me, to be honest.

This.

Also, Atlasia's first priority must be recovery and rebuilding, before we may even think of going there.

I agree. Let's make something for Atlasia first and then we can speak of diplomacy.

[Leinad]

As for the idea of "anti-Atlasian sentiment," there may be some present, but it's by no means "irrational," as the good Governor claims. The people who founded this iteration of the Mock Parliament were, by and large, people dissatisfied with Atlasian legalism - by that, I mean arguing over tedious and unimportant amendments to legislation, crafting a complex and difficult amendment process for the Constitution, and doing things like attempting to install a member as speaker who was not a member of the Parliament. It seems natural that these people would want to improve on the flaws that are apparent in the Atlasian system of government. That does not seem irrational.

I never meant that the sentiment itself was irrational, per se, but rather it's taken to irrational lengths.

I disagree with the sentiment, but it's understandable given that it's a place mostly founded and led by people pissed off at Atlasia. It's to be expected that they won't have fond feelings for us, but it's unwarranted quite the levels that it's at. As I mentioned before, the very first page of the parliament thread was met with "oh no, not Atlasian-style legalism!!!" in response to a basic question, and that sentiment is regurgitated in basically every single thread on that board. It's absurd how much they obsess over their mutual dislike for Atlasia, and I'll elaborate to show you I'm not just blowing hot air:

In the Question time thread, PM Potus mentioned Atlasia 3 times in responses to questions, none of which had anything to do with Atlasia. Here's an example:

Each day, millions upon millions of Atlasians are forced to endure oppression where they know nothing of freedom.

Check the source of the quote and then, if you don't believe me, read over the page and you'll see the other two times. 3 questions that had nothing to do with Atlasia, and he responds with utter [male bovine waste] regarding our nation.

Here's the deputy PM, the Atlasian Senate speaker only a few months ago, who left not long after starting a thread which partially triggered this whole clusterfudge, in that same thread:

Atlasian-style fragmentation to create multiple additional ministries would be far more inefficient and wasteful than the rational system that the government has put in place.

And here's another former Senate speaker, in a different thread:

We need to make sure that all our proposals are funded, put towards the Cabinet and discussed-not Atlasian style of just throwing policies into the Senate

I'm not discussing the merits of their concerns, that's beside the point, just that their go-to talking point is Atlasia, in all cases.

I could dig up more examples if I wanted to, but this post is more than long enough as it is. This is the type of stuff that just clutters up that board. Everything is "oh no, Atlasia's so crap, and we don't want that Atlasian-style [insert whatever] in our utopia!" and it's annoying.

Not to mention the fact that, in the scenario overview:

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If that's not an intentional "Atlasia is crap amirite?!?!?" than I don't know what is.

Basically: the dislike of Atlasia is quite irrational, indeed. As I said previously, their hatred for Atlasia is far more than any stable, rational person should hate a forum game.

As for the discussion of technical issues, the lack of a GM doesn't seem to be a significant issue for government-to-government interactions. Each nation's GM could simulate the effects of things like foreign trade - I'm really not seeing the need for an 'impartial' GM unless we end up in significant conflict.

Relations with just two nations would get rather boring, I think. It would be like if the Premier League had only two teams--it would be fun seeing them play each other at first, but 38 times each year and it would get dull quickly. There would need to be other countries involved for it to be interesting, and obviously an active GM can simulate those.

And also, there would need to be some sort of arbiter of truth--a function of the GM, in addition to creating events and such, is saying what's real or not. Just because TNF says he's nuked every major city in the nation doesn't mean he has. I mean, as I just stated, the Mock Parliament thinks Atlasia's already dead, or at least some completely failed nation. Obviously there will need to be an independent person defining the exact state of things to both groups, or it will be chaotic.

[Oakvale]

So Leinad's argument is that because the collapsing scenery of Atlasia provides a good example of what not to do we shouldn't establish foreign relations because your feelings are hurt?

Isolationism does not become you, comrades.