[SFP] Official Media Issue #7
Franklin Stone
American University | Meals on Wheels | Bank Up 2 Strength Up | Question of the Day
Circus Americana | Players Quarterly | Artela's Attic | Maryam's View | Hoods On Peregrine | The Tin Hat | A Line in the Sand
A Bird's Eye View | Loose Cannon | Dark Nonesense | Merica Today
Woodstock ~ Woodstock Music Festival
SFP Official Media Release #6
Place: SFP Headquarters
Date: 08/22/2015 (Day 2832)
Welcome to SFP Official Media!
Today’s agenda includes:
1. Revolutionary Committee Message
2. Public Congressional Proceedings: 15% Tax Rate
3. Socialist Party News: Summer of Love Raffle
4. Socialist National News: Young Socialist Spotlight
5. Opinion Editorial: Socialist Leadership
6. Guest Commentator: Tribalism
7. Editorial Opinion: Paraguay, really?
Jude Connors
Chairman, Revolutionary Committee
Revolutionary Committee Message
The August-September term has started off with an amazing bang! After being elected for a record ninth time as Chairman of the Revolutionary Committee and President of the Socialist Freedom Party, I was immediately thrust into our wildly successful Summer of Love raffle. This was a new thing in addition to my regular duties, including Congress elections and appointment of the Revolutionary Committee.
As I said, the Summer of Love raffle was an unbelievable success; one that paralleled then exceeded the success of our Valentine's Day raffle. It was crazy. The party raised a lot of dough, giving our party needed money for programs such as the SFP Housing Project, Bear Cavalry, and RDTAF. Thanks to the raffle volunteers; Jaden A, PilotPhil, Franklin Stone, EddieA, Illiguy, Edgar Figaro, and Tom Cauchon; we can continue to lead the way in party-operated Citizen Assistance Programs.
The 92nd Congressional term is nearly over. The Revolutionary Committee opened the Call for Congress Candidates and voting has begun to select and rank our candidates for the 93rd Congress. Make sure your voice is heard and vote. The voting ends at 0:00eRepublik time on the 23rd of August.
The Revolutionary Committee has been formed for the August-September term. After the eight appointed members accepted appointment, nine others signed on as volunteers, including newcomers EdgarFigaro and Mama Lunete. Currently, we are looking for volunteers to manage and staff our many party programs.
So things are off to a bang this month. Feel free to contact me anytime if you have any questions, comments, or concerns. I have an Open Door policy as Chairperson.
PRO BONUS TODUS
Jude Connors
Chairman of the Revolutionary Committee
President of the Socialist Freedom Party
Illiguy
Congressional Whip
Public Congressional Proceedings
15% Tax: Discussion, Proposal and Vote
Apart from the Air Strike on Paraguay, which has been covered in much detail elsewhere, the big story from the 92nd Congress has been the tax increase to 15%. While the debate over potential operations against Chile in South America was taking place in private congress, it became apparent that a tax increase would be necessary if these plans came to fruition.
A discussion was started in public congress. A consensus began to emerge around a temporary work tax increase to 12%, which would expire after a reserve target was met. SFP congress member Jaden A played a prominent role in developing this consensus, and both her and I were in support of 12% with a sunset clause, especially when an even higher increase seemed a real possibility.
Over the course of discussion, some congress members from other parties advocated a permanent increase to 15%, for starters. Their argument centered around the desire for constant, large scale warfare. This appeared to be a minority position until specific numbers regarding the reserve target were discussed in private congress. 15% gained more supporters (your SFP congress members not among them), and the proposal went in at 15%.
Over the course of the vote, the AS in Paraguay went down in flames and it became apparent the large sums of cash allocated for the operation were no longer needed. Some congress members changed their vote to no in light of this fact, but once Congress gets their teeth into a good tax raise, they don't let go. This argument won't go away anytime soon, and you can be assured your SFP representatives and their allies will continue to advocate for lower taxes.
Jaden A.
Young Socialist
Department of Citizen Affairs
Socialist Party News
Woodstock Fund Raiser
Our Summer of Love Fundraiser was an amazing success! We raised about 200,000 USD after costs, and we plan to devote those funds to programs that help nourish our community and aid our new players. On top of this, we were able to communicate to the whole of the eRepublik community the values that our party, the Socialist Freedom Party, represents.
In the modern real life United States, socialism is often a dirty word. When you want to criticize a politician, you call them a socialist because, in many Americans’ eyes, socialism equates to communism which equates to the Soviet Union. This is misinformation and in fact, the modern U.S. employs some major socialist policies without the public even knowing. Our public school system is a great example of this.
This raffle managed to put a far softer view, I think, on our party. Yes, we are often the rabble-rousers. We are the first to speak up when we see something that we dislike. However, when we -as members of the Socialist Freedom Party- are able to show the community that, behind our anti-establishment rabble-rousing, we are a rich community with a blooming culture of sharing, building, growing, and learning together, that we are welcoming and loving people; we grow as a party. Although correlation is not causation, of course, I think that our party’s numbers showed this, as well. Before the fundraiser, we were losing one or two players per day for a week. The first day of the fundraiser, however, we grew by seven members and kept them!
I feel that this fundraiser as not only helped fill our coffers so that we can spread the love within our community ourselves; it helped our national image. With that, I call it a success.
If you missed the announcement of winners, you can see it here!
EddieA
Dean, American University
Socialist National News
Young Socialist Spotlight
EddieA
Tell us sth about yourself?
Lunete
My name is Lunete. You may know me as that you're not quite sure is Male or Female, and I'm certainly not here to answer that question, you'll have to find out for yourself. Besides that, I’m a reasonably normal Irish 17 year old who sits in front of the computer all day playing in virtual communities for virtual internet points!
EddieA
How did you came to know of eRep?
Lunete
Well, I think I heard of eRepublik many years ago just by stumbling across it whilst wandering the interwebs, I remember looking at some screenshots of the interface, and thinking it looked really boring. Though in fairness… I was a young thing. More recently I was introduced again by Senryaku, who told would constantly regale me with his stories about experiences here. So I made an account, went on IRC mibbit for the first time, got complained to because I used mibbit, downloaded Hexchat, used the forums a little and generally just went about my business Very Happy Now I write stuff, and I've met some people, and we're all great! I do all the upgrades, I got involved in politics, I’ve been having a good time.
EddieA
Why of all parties did you join SFP?
Lunete
Well, honestly it was a pretty arbitrary choice, I didn't know much about the political systems of eRepublik, or how similar they were to the real world, so I just spent some time looking around at them. Senry of course wanted me to join AMP, which is the party he's involved in, but (this is totally random), he just happened to show me Franklin Stone's profile picture, that imposing old man with the huge nose, and I just knew, these are the people for me. Also they seemed a little less intimidating, When I first logged on to IRC I think they were the first guys to say hello after I introduced myself, and they welcomed me really easily. I haven't regretted the choice, I've met some awesome people there.
Oh and also, Socialism for life!
EddieA
Which Module do you think is the best of all?
Lunete
Personally, as you might be able to tell by what I've been doing here, my favourite part of the game is in the media side of things. I've always loved journalism, and I actually really enjoy how in eRepublik's media system, pretty much everyone has an equal opportunity to get votes on their pieces. It really is a meritocracy, there's no corporation that's able to control what pieces of media are released, and what aren't. It's a little like a messaging board, if you post it, others are going to see it in the news section. Of course there are popular people in the community that are almost pre-destined to get more votes than some new guy, but for the most part I've been pretty impressed at how well received a quality piece of work is around here.
Of course I like the political side of things, otherwise I'd have nothing to write about, but I do enjoy taking part in the media side of things, more.
EddieA
Do you hold any positions in Party or National?
Lunete
Currently I hold the position of Deputy Secretary of Defense, which actually I got very recently! It's pretty exciting. In SFP, well I just signed up to be apart of the non voting section of the Revolutionary Committee, what I'd be doing there is being an advisor to the members who vote on issues in the game. Other than that I'd like to get into congress, but I mean, there are some more qualified people than me who could get in, so I doubt I'll be chosen this term. Other than that I do believe that's it! Not too bad for my first month dontcha think? OH and also I had the great and prestigious honour of designing Wooky Jack's new forum profile picture, I assure you, it's beautiful.
EddieA
You can brag and promote your stuffs now?
Lunete
OOOH I love this part, bragging is the best. You can read my newspaper, for my first week I posted constantly, at the moment I'm not working on anything, I'll need to wait until inspiration strikes. Coincidentally I like to do interviews Lateral Thought
This is my latest article [LT] Something worth talking about
If you'd like to give me feedback I have thread on the sfp forums for it that's open to everyone I believe Lateral Thought ~ Mama Lunete
Other than that, just know I'm the best at everything. Ever. Huzzah!
BaB Update
After serving as BaB Assistant Director for the past month, Jaden A. has recently announced her resignation from the position. Due to an increase in responsibilities in other positions she holds, such as Deputy Chief of Staff, Deputy Secretary of Citizen Affairs, and Vice President of SFP, we had both decided the position's duties had best be allotted to another member.
I have appointed Edgar Figaro to succeed Jaden as my new Assistant Director. We are looking forward to continued success of the Build-a-Bear program, and of the Bear Cavalry as a whole.
Ursa Fi!
Phoenix Quinn
Old Party Sage
Opinion Editorial
Socialist Leadership
Creative power-from-below is always preferable to coercive power-from-above. Not only is it more fair and democratic. It is more fun, more full of life. Call it being a whimsical butterfly if you like. But when big choices are discussed in the open, then all the wonderfully whimsical camaraderie of a community is shared. Even if they disagree with the conclusion, players feel like decisions are being made for the good of the whole.
But when a band of so-called experts, old farts, special cliques or big whales (and let's include in that list self-proclaimed "vanguard" or "professional" revolutionaries), when such "specialists" and "managers" decide that they and only they are privileged to make all the decisions regarding the fate of the nation, then you can be sure it won't be long before cronyism, elitism, segregation and plutocracy set in.
Along with being unfair, that's just boring.
In the end, authority that fails to serve the people will also fail to touch the hearts and fail to enliven the minds of players. We are reaching a situation where only a few sad clowns, located in a meta-bunker somewhere, are busy playing a "Secret Council" game that is unrelated to eRepublik. Along with wondering where our tax dollars went, the majority of the e-citizenry are left to wonder how things in such a dull game could grow even duller.
Tyler Bubblar
3 time President
Guest Commentator
In my opinion the strength of eRepublik is the community. We as individuals have gathered ourselves into groups. We group via eNations, Parties, and MUs. eRepublik advertises itself as the New World in which players can reinvent themselves. We can be economic Tycoons (allegedly), War Heroes, Diplomats, Journalists, Statesmen, and more in any combination we choose. In the real world I have been married for coming on 10 years now, I have 3 children aged 7,4, and 1. I work in a bank and live a modest but comfortable (for the most part) middle class life. I teach a Sunday School class for High School age teens. Here however I am a Federalist Party member with a long history of service there. I am along with many other national posts a 3 time Country President, and I am known as a decentish writer. I have also worked and invested into becoming a moderately strong fighter. We can achieve things here that might seem irretrievably out of reach in our real lives. Yet in some ways I believe we are more purely ourselves here than we are in the real world.
You see here in the New World we are largely freed from the criminal and civil consequences of our behaviors. This in my opinion removes the filters of societal norms and mores. We take here with us our passions, opinions, and biases, but leave behind most of the constraints of the real world. One thing I strongly believe we bring to the table of eRepublik is the natural human trait of drifting towards tribalism. Party rivalries are not what they were, but in 2013 they were very much alive. The Feds and AMP had a more than healthy rivalry. This Rivalry eventually expanded to WTP. For a very long time you would see USWP and the Feds firmly aligned together against a just as firmly aligned WTP and AMP. Tribalism. US vs THEM.
Tribalism has been a driving force throughout human history. The forging of Empires, the fall of Empires, Crusades, race wars, and more have all in large part had tribalism at its roots. The Romans, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, British, French, Spanish, Germans, and American have all had the core belief that they and their way of life is superior to those of others, and as such have sought to expand their wealth, power, and influence. Often this belief in Tribal superiority has led to seeking to subjugate other groups whose base crime is originating from another Tribe of people in some way or another.
Humanity has a tendency to categorize itself into social groups. Often these social groups creates an “Us vs. Them” mentality toward others who are different from us in some way. It could be race, gender, age, nationality, culture, religion, or socioeconomic status. Interestingly, studies have shown that people tend to favor a group bias even when they are categorized on relatively small distinctions: eye color, artistic leanings, or the mere flip of a coin. This illustrates that we potentially separate ourselves from others on any random or arbitrary characteristic. Therefore, everyone is a possible perpetrator and/or victims of social prejudice and ostracism.
It appears that thinking of ourselves in terms of groups automatically leads to a sort of group favoritism. In studies done on minimal group paradigm, participants are usually given an opportunity to allocate money or “points” to other participants, and tend to favor giving points to members of their own group vs. members of another group.
Even more interestingly, it has been found that participants will often maximize relative in-group gain (“Group A” vs. “Group B”) rather than absolute in-group gain. This means that participants are more willing to see their Group “win,” rather than have outcomes where all people end up better overall. In other words we will ourselves happily jump on the grenade if it screws over the other group. It’s fairly easy to see how an “Us vs. Them” mentality can be destructive to both ourselves and society. It is striking to think how susceptible we are to this mentality, even under completely random circumstances.
Despite all of this, it makes sense that we've evolved to perceive these social categories. During tribal times, it would be beneficial to perceive unfamiliar people as a potential threat, and treat them accordingly for protection and security. However, today many of these social categories and stereotypes are perpetuated by society, tradition, and culture. We see it all the time in politics (Conservatives vs. Liberals), the cold war era (USA vs. USSR), sports (Red Sox vs. Yankees), and other cultural aspects. However,at the end of the day a lot of this mentality causes no small amount of tension and antagonism.
Group thinking often causes us to act irrationally and uncooperatively, because we are more concerned about our group rather than thinking for ourselves, or recognizing other people’s interests and values outside of our own circle. We shouldn’t necessarily ignore these common differences between us, but we certainly shouldn’t use them to judge people as “superior” or “inferior” – or see them as a battle between “Us vs. Them.”
Comrade Franklin Stone
Bear Cavalry, 1st Regiment
Committee for Correspondence
Media Director
Over The Back Fence
Paraguay, really?
Well, kiddies hope you enjoy paying a 15% Work As Manager (WAM) tax rate. The United States Armed Forces (USAF) -our National Military Unit (NMU)- went down south to help our ally Argentina get cock blocked by Chili and I must say they put in another 3rd rate performance, while again paying Combat Orders (CO) to Mercenary and 'eUSA Forum meta government' Tanks -who certainly do not need it- from the American Tax Reserve. The collection of genesis at the Department of Defense, headed by MENSA level genius DMJonhston, were out played by the Chilean Army; opps...drop that ball again. What we got for a 93% tax increase was a failure to launch and some nice ripe blue orbs.
Now I will admit that Beach Bunny is facing a great deal of hostility from many inside the 'eUSA Forum meta government', the United States Workers Party (USWP) being her biggest political antagonist -they hate populist candidates; the American Freedom Alliance (AFA), the USWP and the Feds wanted Tyler Bubblar who did almost the same thing except he got cock blocked with the French against Chile. The 'eUSA Forum meta government' has double teamed Chile twice now and both times got out played and royally screwed, so if you are like me and see no difference in these two Presidents then Comrade you belong in the Socialist Freedom Party.
As a party the SFP called for an AS against Thailand, the country who committed an AS against America on a day of remembrance of those lost to terrorism; we as rabidly loyal Revolutionist Americans wanted revenge. What I supported was pulling out of the wars in Europe, AS into Thailand; helping to free some Old Allies in the Pacific Rim -like Australia who use to be a close ally. What we got was a cock blocking match with Argentina and the 'eUSA Forum meta government' on one side and Chile on the other, what we got was a two front war in Europe and South America; what we got was the highest tax rate in American History at 15% WAM.
If you feel as though the 'eUSA Forum meta government' isn't listening to you, if you feel they are screwing you over with a 15% WAM tax rate, if you are tired of footing the bill for a 3rd rate NMU and already wealthy Tanks; then Comrade you belong in the Socialist Freedom Party.
Join the Socialist Freedom Party and help bring about Democratic change.
Visit our Forum and interact with our Community of Activist.
Join Bear Cavalry and volunteer to fight Dictators around the World.
Socialist Freedom Party Freedom Writers Guild
Published by the Wild Bunch Media Group
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Comments
[SFP] Official Media Issue #7
http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/2546201/1/20
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Socialism for life!
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SFP Official Media -- turning into one of the best papers in the USA.
It seems like SFP is the party of the media. It's always been interesting to see how erep parties differentiate themselves. It used to be there was the power party(uswp) and whoever was trying to get noticed would step up and fight them at every turn(feds, then later amp). Now it seems there's a power coalition(uswp&feds), a party for those who think the military mod is the core of the game(amp), some outsiders who kind of do their own thing but are also deeply entrenched in the establishment(wtp), outsiders who fight the establishment at every turn and revel in it(bs) and then there's sfp, who appear to be outsiders but not confrontational about it, and also are more interested in culture than number crunching.
What a fucking ramble. I clearly have nothing on my plate atm
power to the people
Voted
Great stuff!!!
I read.
I enjoy.
I was informed.
10/10
Jude! Why does Edgar get his name underlined in the chairman's message, and mine isn't, frankly I'm extremely insulted! 🙁
I promise to make it up to you in every imaginable sexual way.
I'll be waiting for you at home, don't you dare be late.
Great job FS et all
o7
Great work everyone!
What a minnit, is Tyler B. suggesting that Yankees fans are some kind of _human beings_ ? Everybody knows they are simply the spawns of Satan, put on this earth only to defame and torture noble and good Red Sox fans...
Failor Bubble doesn't understand what group dynamics are. The only evil tribalism in Murrica is promoted by his elitist oldfag pfriends, backstabbing meta-moguls and pig-disgusting double-faced Amerifats.
Not true at all. Leave ur bias out of this nice piece
Truth is a matter of perspective.
Methinks u need a dictionary
Fantastic issue, great work to everyone who was involved.
Vote
Bravo!
Needs more Senryaku, tbh.
Hurray!
votado
This was epic.
>In the modern real life United States, socialism is often a dirty word
Hopefully our man Sanders will change that, but as a lifetime citizen, I hold out very little hope in the election process.
Also, this article was waaaaaaaaaay too long. I'm bored, but you've got me fucked up if u think I'm reading all that.
Finally, I want to want to join SFP, but I dont get the aversion to taxes. 15% doesn't seem like a problem to me. Should I just stay with USWP?
>Also, this article was waaaaaaaaaay too long. I'm bored, but you've got me fucked up if u think I'm reading all that.
I take this back, and I swear I'm not trying to take over the comments section
. This is just the coolest place I've found to hang out on this site 😋
SFP is always happy to welcome new members, but you're asking if you should stay in the USWP in an SFP comments section, so you might get slightly biased opinions 😉
15% isn't bad for most citizens, likely 95% of people it doesn't affect directly. But the 5% who own and operate large businesses within eRepublik lose profits, and either have to leave the country to earn the same amount of money, or settle for less here.
[removed]
Why is SFP supporting big businesses? I would think they'd be looking out for regular players.
Very enlightening tho, now I understand where bs is coming from. They're like tea partiers/trump supporters, I gleam
I'm ok with bias, as a lifelong american irl I'm sort of used to having to filter bullshit out of the info I get from corporate media 😐
I mean, I hate to do this to my party, but around half of it is propaganda, I would say. Not that it's a bad thing, but still. It's extremely common in politics for the opposition party to criticise whatever the party in power has done, in fact, it's pretty much universal. The SFP could be described as the opposition party in this case. To draw more support from the people disgruntled with the people in power, it's extremely easy to just point at thing they did and say "Hey they did this and it's bad, if we were in power we wouldn't do bad things, join us". So yeah. Politics.
But besides that, tax increases force supply costs up, which is kinda bad for the normal player. Since more people are leaving the country due to their business not earning enough, there will be a lower supply of goods, meaning by the virtue of supply and demand, prices will once again increase due to fewer people in competition with each other.
That's about it really, the only other thing I can think of is that if enough businesses leave, it cuts quite a bit from the tax revenue of the eUSA, and I don't necessarily trust that the people in power are smart enough to have calculated the risk of this vs the gain from an increase. So this could lose them money in the long run, but it most likely won't. Congress fully expects this to be great for the nation's treasury.
I think ill join and, just so its known, attempt to break into leadership and then this party into more than just opposition. Being simply opposition is lame-brained and immature. It shows that u don't fly stand for anything, which is a huge turnoff. And I want SFP to be a serious party, there are too many smart ppl in it for the reputation it has.
So many typos
ftr I finished reading and Bubblar comes off as smarter here than he ever did she he was president, I'm impressed