' Wrote:Good and bad only have relevance to one another<strike>,</strike> if you remove the concept of bad;Then the concept of good also disintegrates.
After correcting your mistakes in your sentence, I came up with this as a reply.
Did you quote that from "The Matrix"? I think you did. Good and bad are both points of view. What someone may view as "good" may be viewed as "bad" by someone else. I already said this earlier.
' Wrote:Politics is not about good and bad, it is about success and failure, popularity and unpopularity (for want of a better word). There are many people who are not represented within the UN.
After correcting your mistakes in your sentence, I came up with this as a reply.
Sucess and failure are only results of politics. Popularity is the only way to even become part of politics. Unless you are a dictator, you must gain the trust and support of the people. Politics is also about an obsessive impulse to get what you want, as clearly defined by the Republican Party when they changed the voting zones on the senators in Congress. They clearly manipulated the zones so they could get more Republicans into the senate. The Democrats are just as bad. So the people are still represented, their vote just becomes exploited. And the people you are auctually talking about will NEVER be represented. They will always live in a world where some dictator dominates and manipulates the place.
' Wrote:However, they both have extremely independent mindsets which might cause them to set up some form of government. They both seem to control systems, so why shouldn't they participate? They wouldn't have a veto like the house factions<strike>would</strike>, but hey, they can try.
After correcting your mistakes in your sentence, I came up with this as a reply.
"Might"? I don't think they have yet. It is up to Igiss and the Mod crew to put it into the game. The IMG is a Conglomerate. They all chose to work there. They are a buisness. Not a governing body. A Conglomerate and a government are 2 very different things. And do you know what a "Guild" is? It is an organization of persons with related interests, goals, etc., esp. one formed for mutual aid or protection. How can a faction with "Guild" in their name be considered a Government?
Aside from everything else, all ships have spawn locations. The game will spawn ships until you die or go somewhere else. So you could sit for days counting all the IMG ships you see go by. But it would not mean a thing. That was a major flaw that I saw with this game when I first played it. You have to remember that video games do have flaws, and seem to be unrealistic.
I think that good and bad are an arbitrary concept. Politics is about a negotiable morality, its mind games and tricks to fool us into getting behind a particular conventional wisdom. We have laws and rights and constitutions and we've signed and ratified traties in the UN but we violate all of them at home and abroad all the time in the name of one invented moral imperative or another.
What is it they say? Everything is permissable? Forget your stupid judeo-christian moral brainwashing and realize that before Jesus Christ showed up, saved us, then had his words and ideas appropriated for the economic and political gain of nobles and kings and all thier friends, the Greeks had lots of very open ended ideas and questions about life. Just because we all live in countries founded by christian faithfuls doesn't mean that a basic idea of the permissibility of human thought doesn't still govern us in many ways. What we believe in has little to do with what we do as a result of how we vote or empower those who act on our behalves. So Joe is very right. The concept of right and wrong is arbitrary and an invention of human consciousness. Often we blur the line and forget about it all the time.
As for the question about who is a nation and who gets represented, it isn't about whether you classify them as proper countries or empires, but whether they represent a suffient base of power and sovereignty that they are effectively as much a nation as Bretonia or Liberty. The Corsairs and outcasts are obviously 2 such nations. They come from a sleeper ships and since the other houses come from one they are sufficiently large and powerful to need to be at the table, or at least invited to speak. When I said proxy influence that would fall to them. So the Mollies might get help from Bretonia and then the Outcasts too. Corsairs might run interference on behalf of Order concerns. Rheinland might look to delay laws or actions that would harm the economic interests of Republican shipping, while Liberty would probably not sign any traties which explicitly deny them the ability to act as they are right now with Nomads.
Conservatively I'd say that 6 powers would be representable, with all others falling under the umbrella of the rest. The 4 houses and the two nations of the Hispania. Whether you give the unlawful Hispanids a proper seat or if they are there grudgingly, is hard to tell. Would probably have to be with the consent of the other parties present.
On the matter of IMG, a corporation and a government aren't that different. Corporations are owned by the shareholders and the entire operation is held up to their interests. Governments are teh same since the people are meant to be the shareholders in society. ANd increasingly the line between government and corpration, at least in western societies is breaking down again. CEOs are presidents and prime ministers, not that they werent already, but are even less effective or held to account. So to say that a corporation does not represent a sufficient influence of independant sovereignty is to underestimate the real powers of private business.
Who speaks for the IMG? Who speaks for GMG? Neither are tied into a house very strongly. GMG are linked to Kusari slightly, but retain independence.
The GMG fought an 80-Year War and won against a mighty, militant power. I think they would strongly dispute any claims that they were not a nation... and I doubt the Rheinland government would admit losing to anything but a sovereign nation. Therefore, GMG would be considered a nation, for the intent of this Court.
Now, if the GMG are a nation, then the IMG would say 'what about us?', and would receive Kusari and Corsair backing on that front. The IMG would come up in discussion so often that they'd need to be included, especially considering Tau-31, and their allowing the Nagasaki to park itself outside Holman.
The Mollies, now, would want to be seen as a nation of their own, the nation of Dublin. The Bretonians would dispute this, but would allow them to come to the table for talks, as they may have to side with the Mollies, giving them concessions to get aid against the KNF. They both, with different agendas, would need different representatives.
EDIT: Please get Juan Arquero in here! Ace67's corrections had errors and he made his own mistakes too!
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