SC Proposal: Commend Northern Borland

[Eastern New England]

Commend Northern Borland

A resolution to recognize outstanding contribution by a nation or region.

Category: Commendation

Nominee (nation): Northern Borland

Proposed By: whatermelons

The Security Council,

Pleased that Northern Borland has created a culture of soda addicts and alcoholics, resulting in the Northern Borlandian beverages industry becoming the largest in the world, creating jobs for many bartenders and vending machine stockers,

Appreciating the Northern Borlandian government for granting their citizens access to junk food, in part evidenced by having the third largest pizza delivery sector, codifying the right of Northern Borlandians to consume fast food in front of the television,

Lauding the government of Northern Borland for their international commitments, such as exporting innumerable amounts of cheese to many countries, providing foreigners with mozzarella sticks and parmesan cheese for meals,

Applauding Northern Borland for making their citizens the freest from taxation in the world, resulting in a #1 ranking for highest average disposable income, and admiring the steps taken to achieve this goal such as through slashing all forms of environmental protection,

Extolling the innovative use of child labour and sweatshops in Northern Borland, resulting in the 3rd largest retail sector in the world, ensuring that business executives have fashionable designer suits for meetings,

Absolutely delighted at Northern Borland’s decision to uphold their peoples’ Violet-given right to bear arms, as evidenced by being ranked 6th in the world for most weapons per capita, satisfying handgun lobbyists and murderous lunatics nationwide,

Recognising Northern Borland’s other extremely powerful industries and the jobs they provide, such as:

their gambling industry, 7th largest in the world, which is probably a result of the highly successful policy in allowing children to gamble their lunch money at the roulette table,

their automobile manufacturing industry, 9th largest in the world, which is the result of non-existent public transport, which in turn results in citizens purchasing cars and supporting the industry,

their insurance industry, 20th largest in the world, ensuring that unsurprisingly frequently injured Northern Borlandians are ensured a sum of money in the event of an accident,

Jumping with joy at Northern Borland’s support for other local industries such as the liposuction industry by having the highest obesity rate in the world, as well as the funeral arts and mortuary sciences by having the second highest unexpected death rate in the world,

Admiring Northern Borland for their support for local workers, such as through banning foreign workers from immigrating into the country, which has resulted in almost all Northern Borlandians being employed, evidenced by the national employment rate which ranks 2nd in the world,

Aware that the government of Northern Borland controls two satellite states, East Borland and Deep South Borland,

Acclaiming East Borland, a bona fide corrupt dictatorship, for their creative methods in national governance, such as:

prohibiting contraceptives, divorce and adultery, but still having the 5th highest atheism rate in the world, breaking multiple stereotypes,

having the most corrupt government in the world as well as a complete lack of prisons and a judiciary, but still having one of the lowest crime rates in the world, disproving the fallacy that judiciaries and honesty are required to enforce law and order,

constructing a huge arsenal of Weapons of Mass Destruction for the purpose of supporting the mining industry, the 6th highest in the world, ensuring that numerous citizens can earn a living,

Hailing Deep South Borland, a theocratic primitivist nation, for creating a compassionate (6th in the world) and nice (20th in the world) society, with policies such as:

prohibiting video games, the number one cause of crime and violence in most nations, resulting in the second lowest crime rate in the world,

prohibiting aircraft, which while has resulted in the nation being ranked as the least technologically advanced, has also resulted in the third most beautiful environment and the second best weather in the world,

requiring all citizens to adhere to the state religion, resulting in them being the most religious in the world, creating a nation free of infidels,

Observing that despite having no official system for arbitration or judicial matters on a national level, Northern Borland went above and beyond and served as the Arbiter General of their region Capitalist Paradise, settling disputes between nations and preventing conflicts from escalating,

Determined to rid of the internationally imposed image that Northern Borland is one of the most ghastly places in the world, and instead celebrate their great strides in lining the pockets of corporations and CEOs as well as formally recognise their status as "A Good Place to Raise Your Business", hereby:

Commends Northern Borland.

This is the discussion thread. To cast your vote, go HERE

[HumanSanity]

I think I'm leaning FOR right now, but that is subject to change

There are two big questions here:
1. Do you believe it is acceptable for C/C for issue answering and statistics in general?
2. Do you believe a Commendation or a Condemnation for Northern Borland is appropriate?

1. Do you believe it is acceptable for C/C for issue answering and statistics in general?
I think yes.

I have random Discord channel musings I shall post here

Well, there’s a third purpose which is they’re [C/Cs] symbolic to credit the exemplars of beneficial forms of gameplay [gameplay being defined broadly to mean ways of playing the game]
And I think a C/C for NB definitely does that
Also, the signaling effect of NB’s huge successes to stats are already a credit to the community
Especially a diffuse and largely decentralized community like stats and issue answering
Having exemplars to look up to who have worked with consistency and dedication is a community driving thing

2. Do you believe a Commendation or a Condemnation for Northern Borland is appropriate?
I think either, and since a (good) Commendation came up first, I'm erring towards that but I may be convinced otherwise once I've had time to review the NS forums thread a smidge more.

It's odd, because this draft is obviously a response to Tinhampton's *very* crappy Condemn Northern Borland, Commending it instead. Done in good faith or for the memes? Idk.

[Noah]

I'll post what I posted over in TNP:

I'm not leaning one way or another.

Initially, I was very much for this resolution but my opinion has shifted since then. While a case can be made for recognition of the Borland nations, this feels a bit too much like a joke than an actual proposal.

Tinhampton managed the concept much better with Condemn Northern Borland, but that's less likely to pass for various reasons.

[HumanSanity]

I've switched my vote to Against because a Condemn seems more appropriate. I will easily vote for a well-written Condemn version

[Refuge Isle]

I don't agree with the premise of this resolution. Not because it's a stats-based issue, no don't get me wrong, stats based resolution are no different than any other form of NationStates résumé. You have to put time and energy to it and the longer you've been around, the more time there is to look back on and see what's come of it. In that regard, it's no different than having a storied career in r/d, or WA/issue writing.

Unlike those things, can there be a positive or useful outcome from issue answering work? No, but I'm not going to rule it out as a SC topic on those grounds. Being #1 in the world in a handful of stats takes time and dedication over years and years. Its the core function of the game, and there's absolutely no shortcut to succeeding in it. So for players who may not be in the public eye and have legendary political creer, but who have been studiously answering issues every day, for longer than some members of this region have been alive, I support the concept of recognising them on that consistency.

This would be a target where such a thing should be appropriate, I feel. The problem is that this particular target is cursed. Tinhampton drafted the first attempt sounding as a sort of list of random trivia, automatically generated on a nation's page. That attempt burned up in atmosphere for lack of literary value. Nothing there was written to be interpreted as content for a condemnation, just a sort of list of things that exist. Here with Honeydew, we see something equally self-defeating.

The writing is fine and makes its case for what the grounds of the condemnation should be - but it's not a condemnation, and intentionally so. Instead, the proposal is a commendation, written as sarcasm. Optimistically, this may be considered a joke resolution. However, the thing with WA writing is that it must be written from the perspective of the WA. In the proposal, where we see such things as the "jumping with joy" clause written from the perspective of the WA, we are given to presume that the WA does not take itself seriously or that C/Cs issued from it aren't really to be valued, etc. When we read things that are celebrating dictatorships on their "creative governance" and their high death rates, I guess we're either dog whistling or just saying that there's no such thing as RP consistency in this chamber.

I don't care for this resolution, and I would have preferred the author draft something serious than troll the format for the memes.

[HumanSanity]

Vote is 6-4 against, I voted against on site

[whatermelons]

Feb 6, 2021 19:39:57 GMT -5 HumanSanity said:

I've switched my vote to Against because a Condemn seems more appropriate. I will easily vote for a well-written Condemn version

I strongly disagree. While Northern Borland does have more traditionally condemnable statistics, we should look at why they are being commended. The main argument for Commend Kindjal was not the environment or education or healthcare, but rather how the nation's stats serve as an inspiration and role model for all. Northern Borland is exactly that. Seeing the Borlands dominating the leaderboard likely inspired as many people as Kindjal, so Northern Borland is in fact closer to commendable than condemnable. Also, Northern Borland is a significant figure in Capitalist Paradise, who are an embassy region with XKI. We shouldn't consider contributing to an allied region as condemnable rather than commendable.

[HumanSanity]

When I woke up the vote had shifted to 6-6 with 1 Delegate's Prerogative vote which is applied against, then bringing the vote to 7-6 Against.

[HumanSanity]

So, I'm going to go ahead and personally abstain on this proposal:

There's a few things that have gone into this decision, which I will summarize in the form of haphazard bullet points:
- I think stats/issue answering are commend/condemnable
- I think in a universe where condemnations are given out for effectively "playing" the "bad" character, this maybe would be better as a Condemn
- At the same time, the skill of having answered issues consistently, correctly, and for a long time is something worth celebrating--and giving out a "Condemn" in some ways would be perceived as a punishment for this
- In a whole parallel track, I am having head spins about author consent for resolutions. In this case, the author hasn't said no and has expressed apathy. Is that enough? I'm not entirely sure how to parse that.
- As Honey points out, the nominee is a high profile contributor to a long time embassy and there is a regional interest argument for us to vote for this.

Overall, I'm just going to not vote here and have pulled myself from the poll.

With that having been said, the poll shakes out to 7-6 For, so I'm switching my vote on site.

[kiritibati]

While I agree with the point that we should be encouraging people to answer issues and min-max their stats, if someone's playing the bad character, how is a condemnation a punishment? A condemnation does nothing other than put the mark on their nation, which if they're intentionally making their nation as an evil one, could be exactly what they want.