Thread:Ecoraptor3339/@comment-5496489-20160524151005/@comment-25309944-20161210233903

@Zilla France - We faced you head on! You dumb fucks just decided to fight yesterday's war

Yeah, that makes sense.

@Gorzill That helps a lot, thanks for understanding. Believe it or not, I also feel pressured to cohere to expectations created by a Star Trek-esque vision. My own personal style lies somewhere between dystopia and utopia, given that it coheres more to how the real world works - complex systems with lots of animating factors. The French Empire is a rich, democratic, stable, and institutionally and socially dynamic collection of countries, the interests of whose institutions are aligned with that of their citizens and peace and stability in the Gigaquadrant as a whole. Industrial capitalism is an engine for progress, driving exponential increases in wealth, health, enfranchisement, population, education, etc. But, as is the case with a structure containing a bunch of competing interests, prerogatives, ideas, identities, populations, infrastructures, etc, it isn't going to live up to the hype and will cause a ton of problems as well.

One of the major issues I see here is that the UPD and Mendel Pact consistently compare France disfavorably with the NCR, which they only have over-the-top praise for, and whom they listen to, accommodate, trust, etc, in a way they never would with the French. The NCR very much is an idealistic rendition of the Star Trek vision, one France cannot possibly compete with for both OOC and IC reasons. On the OOC level, I personally am more interested in realism than utopian ideals. Further, Cyrannian has a galaxy as his own personal sandbox galaxy and can tailor whatever spotless and glowing backstory he likes for his fiction while giving it half a galaxy's worth of power, territory, and economic capacity. I'm afraid I never had that luxury, I had to make alliances, expand my territory where I found openings, and defend myself when established empires attempted to deny that I could have power because I was "foreign" to that galaxy, and couldn't challenge them because I didn't own a galaxy myself.

That's okay, that's realistic, it makes for great IC drama and great stories, and I found a way to make France powerful regardless. But it's a bit of a gut-punch to be treated so very differently, to be further disadvantaged because (1) I don't have the right to create my own galaxy and (2) I didn't want to make my fiction overly utopian as to be unrealistic. So I'm not sure, the pressure exerted by "The only state that has ever showed us respect is the NCR" really doesn't feel fair, given that France has been fighting alongside Mirus to defend it, invested so much time and capital into its institutions, and is doing everything it can to make the Mirusians feel respected and secure, only to be trounced by a fiction which has done none of those things and actually ignored Mirus while it was fighting Xonexi and the Imperium of War in the 2800's (i.e., the MCA didn't come to their aid, but they're not being ripped apart by Mirusian provocateurs). The pressure that exerts on my fiction ICly is that it forces them to aim for utopic goals despite the imperfectness of their situation and to legitimate their ideas and interests within that discourse, because otherwise they'll be attacked as imperialists, colonizers, bad guys, and not-the-shining-beacon-of-hope-in-a-galaxy-of-darkness.

If you want a darker universe, it's best to look at the other side of the coin, that even liberal institutions have a logic of power to them. France honestly believes in trying to empower Mirus to become a stable and just place, but it has to balance that with its own need to maintain its power and overall security as a matter of survival. As a result, two sides of the same coin, the Covenant is both utopian and hegemonic at the same time. But realizing this also engenders understanding of the pressures that a state is under, and the realization that they can be trusted to follow the incentives laid out for them. Out of all the choices that France has, both to fulfill its own security and to do what's best by the Mirusians, this is the best option all around by far. It avoids war, it ensures stability, it allows for necessary changes to occur through a flexible treaty structure, it is tolerant of diversity and dissent, and it provides the Mirusian states with the ability to pursue fulfillment so long as it doesn't involve attacking France.

It's not so much a utopian project as the least-bad option, one that takes incredible courage for French leaders, year after year, to trust and defend to the electorate at home.