The Tragedy of Influence, Oligarchs, and The South Pacific
Posted by Milograd. Apr 20, 2013
Greetings,
First and foremost, allow me to describe a few terms that I will be using herein.
[ul][li]Proletariat: Minnows and nations that consider TSP to be their home, but are not included in its governance due to their disintrest in participating in an off-site forum. Furthermore, nations that would feel inclined to try to make their voice heard but don’t due to the common perception that such is futile thanks to the fact that the oligarchy may dispose of them with ease.
[li]Oligarchy / Bourgeoisie: High-influence nations like Fudgetopia who are no longer active but still control the region because they control the means of production.
[li]Means of Production: Influence. Influence is the one thing that has kept the South Pacific’s government alive, and its lopsided distribution in the South Pacific along with the enforcement of an endorsement cap has left the proletariat virtually voiceless, vulnerable, and forced to conform. [/li][/ul]
Now, as many people have noticed, a situation has been brewing in the South Pacific for the last twelve hours. People have been questioning my motives, supporting me, attacking me, and arguing that I am a tyrant. I am obviously biased so I cannot refute those claims but I feel compelled to clarify my motivations and objectives.
A few sentiments deserve to be noted here and now:
[ul][li]I do not intend to suppress messages on the regional message board.
[li]I do not intend to force an endorsement cap during this process.
[li]Henceforth, I do not intend to banish additional nations from the region so as long as they are not here in the name of foreign interests.[/li][/ul]My goal here is to protest an injustice in my home region and, now that I think about it, it is an injustice that other regions are plagued by as well. Depending on the feedback I receive from the proletariat, our protest may turn into a revolution of thought and education regarding the role of influence and endorsements.
I know that “this sort of affair” is usually expected to entail a tyrannical plot to oppress everyone, but truth be told this will hopefully be a grand opportunity for us to experiment in improving the true representation of the people’s will through our government in the South Pacific. I do not believe I will be able to hold the South Pacific for much longer but it is important to note that I am a concerned resident of the region and have been for two years. People have been responding to my actions with the usual “if you wanted change you should have worked the system” argument, but these people seem to forget that I have tried that already. I, like many others before me, could not work against the oligarch’s interest in the very system they forged. It has been designed to serve their interests.
What are their interests? That’s simple: they are solely interested in maintaining their grasp over TSP.
In my time in TSP I have realized that the desires, goals, and beliefs of new nations are far too often dictated to or suppressed by a pressure to comply with the high-influence oligarchy that has kept the region under their grasp for years now. Nations like Fudgetopia who haven’t been active in years can shut down anything that they don’t agree with at the snap of their fingers. Appropriately enough, the efforts to remove me from the region and its delegacy entails using her nation to take the delegacy again, even though she doesn’t actively play anymore. Now, of course, this statement will be responded to with nonsense about how TSP is democratic, but the people with the most say in TSP are the ones that service the desires of the oligarchs and/or their ideals: other nations know that they won’t be given as large a voice unless they visibly conform. I am dedicated to serving the people’s cause in TSP and I wish to see the people’s will truly represented. I wish to fight against the tool of oppression, influence, which is why I have abolished the tyrannical endorsement cap.
I am not suppressing dissent on the RMB because I am truly interested in hearing the thoughts of the region. I am letting people speak their minds and I am encouraging the region’s many nations to get educated about influence and take it back, per say.
Perhaps I am a rare exception, but I find it ironic and disappointing that the region where new nations spawn is dictated to by the wills of the inactive and ancient hordes. They no longer regularly maintain the region. In the beginning, people truly supported the government of the South Pacific, but as time passes and generations fade, we find ourselves at a point where influence is the only thing truly keeping their grasp on the region alive, even though they aren’t actively involved or dedicated anymore. The select few nations that use their lopsided influence to maintain their grasp on the region of thousands resort to bringing in outsiders to let them use that influence. They do this because they know they cannot maintain their hold in the region otherwise.
Therefore, I am encouraging the masses to help weaken the effects of influence as a tool for oppression. Balance needs to be brought to it and it needs to happen soon. The South Pacific is similar to another feeder that is oppressed by the lack of balance in influence the West Pacific but the difference between our regions is that TSP contorts itself to the will of foreigners while TWP does not. Regardless, the masses of both regions suffer the plight of having a series of oligarchs with a lopsided amount of influence compared to them, and they can never reasonably hope to match their influence levels. They are thus eternally subjected to this tyranny.
Our sister-feeder regions are also subject to the same oligarchies derived by influence. We have recently seen, in the case of The West Pacific, what happens when a Delegate falls out of favour of the established influence clique. Eli (aka Wickedly Evil People), who has the most influence in The West Pacific, quickly took control of the delegacy from Yy4u. Yy4u was more active and dedicated to TWP than Eli had been in years, and yet he was easily deposed because he didn’t take the region in the direction the old oligarch desired. Yy4u never had a chance at fighting back.
I am also dismayed that the South Pacific’s government has decayed in recent years and it is now a spineless institution that stands for nothing but continuing its existence. It has no ideology other than “democracy”. Their idea of “democracy” actually entails nothing more than a few individuals whom are friendly with the oligarchy taking advantage of those that they consider to be lemmings. The region also claims to be independent, but buzzwords like “neutrality” and “independent” have been used to justify inoffensive inaction that will surely help prevent any threats to the region’s one true goal its continued, meaningless existence from rising up. In my capacity as delegate, I was recently asked to bend over backwards to serve the interests of the United Defenders League “and the South Pacific” by bringing the two back together as allies. The UDL’s leadership, as has been shown in the past, does not respect GCR sovereignty. Indeed, I was asked by a servant of the oligarchy to pay lip service to a hostile institution that would help fulfill the government’s sole goal of survival in exchange for us forwarding their interests. The government truly does not stand for anything and therefore it has no problem contorting itself to serve the interests of those who will support its continued, tragic existence.
It is almost certain that I will lose the delegacy in the South Pacific soon but, in the end, my disposal from the delegacy will occur with no thanks to the objection of the people. My removal from the delegacy will occur due to the bourgeoisie’s firm grasp on influence and their willingness to fellate opportunistic foreign imperialists who wish to use TSP’s status and resources as a feeder to further their own agenda. Those foreign imperialists will and already have scurried to support the oligarchy because they know that their endorsements can counter-balance those of the proletariat. When the oligarchy inevitably resumes power, these external influences will be rewarded with even more control and influence over our futures, in return for their assistance in perpetuating an entitled, inactive, and elitist status quo. They are well aware of this and that is what motivates them.
Ultimately, that is the tragedy of the South Pacific, oligarchs, and influence that I protest.
Sincerely,
Milograd
Eternal Comrade of the South Pacific