MoE/WA Symposium discord transcript

DenieriaYesterday at 10:00 PM
@here Hello everyone!
Welcome to the WA Symposium. I am your Minister of WA Affairs, Denieria.
This symposium is a collaborative effort between the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of WA Affairs., and it's purpose is to explain and educate our residents on how does a resolution goes from an idea to international law.
So may I see who is in attendance to listen in our presentation?

DenieriaYesterday at 10:16 PM
Anyone?
No?

AlYesterday at 10:20 PM
Hello! I am listening.

DenieriaYesterday at 10:21 PM
That's great
Nice to see you there.
Well anyways, me fellow minister of Education, @MoE Rizorien, will be joining us also in presenting in this presentation. The symposium is structured as followed: Riz and I will be talking about and visiting several topic for an amount of time, then we will open the discussion period where everyone can ask questions and discuss about the contents. After that ends, we will then move into the next topic.
We also have agreed to alternating on who's presenting the topic, with the other allowed to interject to add in any useful tidbits, tips, and information.
First of all though, we would like to present a little summary on what is the World Assembly.
But before we start, does anyone have any questions about the structure and the purpose of this symposium?
No?

MoE RizorienYesterday at 10:33 PM
Hello all, I am also running the symposium
I am the Minister of Education, and with Denieria we are explaining how the WA works
this is a joint project between the MoE and the WA

DenieriaYesterday at 10:39 PM
All right, on to the summary. The World Assembly is the international body that is responsible for creating international laws, and recognizing individuals as a role model for NS or codemns certain individuals for their behavior.
The World Assembly can also call in for Liberations, to help a region restore order from tyranny.
The laws of the World Assembly only affects the members of the body, and all members get to have a say on all resolutions via voting for or against for the resolution's passage.
Structurally, the body is split into two chambers: The General Assembly and the Security Council. The General Assembly is the international laws arm, and the Security Council is the arm for that presents the candidates for commendation, codemnation, or liberation.

JoshYesterday at 10:45 PM
(GA=pointless
SC=vaguely useful) :stuck_out_tongue:

DenieriaYesterday at 10:46 PM
Thank you for your comment

JoshYesterday at 10:46 PM
haha

DenieriaYesterday at 10:46 PM
But please no interjection from the audience until we open the discussion period

JoshYesterday at 10:46 PM
is it not in line with TWP's historical policy tho?
oh :frowning:

MoE RizorienYesterday at 10:46 PM
Now onto the rules for sumitting proposals.
Unlike writing Dispatches, you can’t just put anything under the title of “WA proposal”. There is a certain set of rules, which you must abide by. They can be found here at viewtopic.php?f=9&t=159348. In summary, these rules are strict guidelines on how the proposal should be structured and written, and they are heavily enforced. There are no shortcuts to these rules, and there are bodies in charge of the enforcement of these rules. For the General Assembly, the body that is in charge of enforcement is called the GenSec, and for the Security Council, that body is the Moderators of NS. They check the proposals very closely so it’s always best to adhere to the rules.
they are more structural guidelines for how to create proposals
rather than do this or do that kind of thing
there can be some exceptions however
you have the basics or originality, duplication, and contradiction, which are mostly black and white

DenieriaYesterday at 10:52 PM
A good tip to keep in mind when writing your resolution is to always check it against the rules frequently so that you can see if it had violated any rules
Rules violation are always struck down

MoE RizorienYesterday at 10:54 PM
Good point. The first three rules say that your proposal must be original (Proposals cannot contradict or duplicate active resolutions. Ideally, proposals will present unique ideas.) and not Duplicate (Proposals may elaborate in specific areas of policy where broad legislation exists, but may not replicate specific policy. Authors may re-iterate in general terms a minor part of existing policy to provide support to their proposal.) and not contradict others (Proposals which conflict with explicit clauses within an active resolution will be removed.)
the main thing to remember is that the rules are the first step to creating a great proposal.

JoshYesterday at 10:55 PM
(can I also suggest making sure you draft on the forums before submitting so peeps can help u?)

DenieriaYesterday at 10:55 PM
Um
We haven't got that part yet
It's later in the symposium

MoE RizorienYesterday at 10:55 PM
but, that is a great idea, Josh!

JoshYesterday at 10:55 PM
lol I read the SC forums enough XD

DenieriaYesterday at 10:56 PM
But we have not open the discussion period
Ok now its open
Any question or comments you may have so far about the content or the symposium?

MoE RizorienYesterday at 10:57 PM
always remember that there is no such thing as a stupid question!

JoshYesterday at 10:57 PM
well firstly I always like to see things like these happen
active efforts to educate are always positive

MoE RizorienYesterday at 10:58 PM
thanks! We try our best.

DenieriaYesterday at 10:58 PM
Thank you for your kind comment
Though it's only have been a turnout of 2 so far.
Anyone else in audience have anything else to say?

JoshYesterday at 11:00 PM
I'm flicking between this and a trivia game, lol
I'm interested in your stance on the debate about whether it should be or even is possible to not comply with the WAGA tho

DenieriaYesterday at 11:02 PM
Well can you elaborate on what do you mean by not comply by the WAGA?
If you mean by not complying with its laws, then that is simple, you just don't have to be a member of the WA

Dr. Overthinkers, D.B.Yesterday at 11:03 PM
There has been some nations who, RP wise, choose to ignore unfavorable GARs
I believe this is what Josh is referring to

JoshYesterday at 11:04 PM
yeah

DenieriaYesterday at 11:04 PM
Well I think not

JoshYesterday at 11:04 PM
there's a fairly big debate in GA circles both as to whether that is possible, and also whether it should be

DenieriaYesterday at 11:04 PM
If you choose to be member of cooperative you have to comply to all its rules
That's my stance

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:05 PM
Generally speaking, SC resolutions have more power than GA ones do in terms of gameplay. But, is it ethical to disobey GA laws is the object of discusssion if I understand correctly.

JoshYesterday at 11:06 PM
it's more... mechanical
as a question
and btw the current stance of the game is that no, it is not possible to disobey

DenieriaYesterday at 11:06 PM
Furthermore , I don't think it's possible

JoshYesterday at 11:07 PM
I personally find myself won over by arguments that the WA really has no more powers of enforcement than the UN that it parodies

DenieriaYesterday at 11:07 PM
The WA is more like the EU IRl rather than the UN.

JoshYesterday at 11:07 PM
even the EU has troubles enforcing its rules
take Hungary or Poland as examples
realistically, I feel like non-compliance should be a thing that is possible

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:07 PM
I would agree. But I suppose no one would judge you on RP. That is, if you write a dispatch detailing a law you have that is strictly against the rules of the GA

JoshYesterday at 11:08 PM
but you have given me your perspective, and that was of course the question
I don't want to derail your thing by arguing with you guys

DenieriaYesterday at 11:08 PM
Well the laws passed by the GA is practically considered supreme over the laws of a nation

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:08 PM
ah its fine. We welcome opposing viewpoints. It's how you learn!

DenieriaYesterday at 11:08 PM
So it's a bit like a United Terran Government

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:09 PM
any more questions?

DenieriaYesterday at 11:11 PM
No?
Ok, then the discussion period is now closed.
And we shall now start our next topic
The Categories of Resolutions in the World Assembly
Now if I have to say myself, the Categories are quite comprehensive and can be a bit confusing
But on the surface we have two umbrella types of all resolutions: Proposals and Repeals
True to their respective names, Proposals are here to allow to create new laws and for presenting new candidates for "awarding", meanwhile Repeals are designed to nullify past laws and "awards" for past candidates.
The lower level of the categorization are called Categories themselves. Now, at this point, there is a split, the GA have their own categories, and the SC have their own categories
Now in the General Assembly, the Categories are as follows: ○ Civil Rights
○ Moral Decency
○ Free Trade
○ Social Justice
○ The Furtherment of Democracy
○ Political Stability
○ International Security
○ Global Disarmament
○ Advancement of Industry
○ Education and Creativity
○ Health
○ Regulation
Now there is an interesting thing about the categories of the GA, and that is the majority of these categories are opposites of one another.
For example, the Civil Rights are promoting the freedoms of the individuals while Moral Decency limits those freedoms in the name of common decency
The three other pairs of categories that counteract each other are: Free Trade vs. Social Justice. The Furtherment of Democracy vs. Political Stability, and International Security vs. Global Disarmament.
Meanwhile, the Security Council only has 3 categories:
- Commedations
- Condemnations
- Liberations
The Condemnations are designed to recognize individuals with bad behavior and shame them
The Commendations are designed to recognize individuals with great contributions and elevate their status.
The Liberations are to open regions from a Delegate imposed closure of the borders by removing passwords of entry
Now, there is another lower level of categorizations of the resolutions, and those are only in the GA .
They are called the Area of Effects and Strength Levels

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:31 PM
just because you see a nation that has a Condemnation on in doesn't mean they are an overall horrible player. It just means that they took actions that some indiviuals deemed as deviant to the system of the game.
they also may have reformed as well

DenieriaYesterday at 11:33 PM
Well yes, a good point. The Strength Levels have 3 levels: Mild, Significant, and Strong. You have adjust this when you are proposing your resolution and this is base on how much change you are trying to cause with your proposal there
The Area of Effects are rather very detailed to which we don't have time to cover, but they are listed in the rules that Mods have set out so I suggest you can research more about them there. Generally, they are there to further specify your resolution in categories that are rather broad in their names.
And with all that covered, we can now close on the topic of categories.
And open the period of discussion.
Anyone have any questions or comments so far?

Dr. Overthinkers, D.B.Yesterday at 11:37 PM
Yes.

JoshYesterday at 11:37 PM
I'm not sure we should be giving the perception that condemned players need to "reform"

Dr. Overthinkers, D.B.Yesterday at 11:38 PM
The Condemnations are designed to recognize individuals with bad behavior and shame them
I would like to clarify something here: while this may be in line with the original intent of Condemnations, this wording hardly reflects their current purpose.

JoshYesterday at 11:38 PM
^

Dr. Overthinkers, D.B.Yesterday at 11:38 PM
Condemnations are merely Commendations for the "bad guys" of the game, such as raiders.

DenieriaYesterday at 11:39 PM
Well I am going with the official original intents of the Game

Dr. Overthinkers, D.B.Yesterday at 11:39 PM
Shame is seldom in the equation. It's as much a badge of honor as a Commend.

JoshYesterday at 11:39 PM
badges of recognition for contributions to GP, if you will
the original intentions of the game are not what are in operation

Branthalas TindómëonnarYesterday at 11:39 PM
:this:

Dr. Overthinkers, D.B.Yesterday at 11:39 PM
I think you should at least acknowledge their practical application in GP, yeah

DenieriaYesterday at 11:39 PM
Ok

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:40 PM
thanks for the feedback!

DenieriaYesterday at 11:40 PM
I understand that you may have concern over the practical applications
But this is why we open the symposium to discussion
This is not designed to be like a full series of seminars covering everything
That would take far longer to prepare

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:41 PM
^

JoshYesterday at 11:42 PM
well no, but I feel like you should be promoting an accurate view of the WA
in a WA seminar
this is only one small issue, of course

DenieriaYesterday at 11:42 PM
The symposium is rather a more collaborative effort for everyone to educate everybody
It takes a village remember

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:42 PM
on the fundamentals of the WA
as to provide new players with a framework to go by

Branthalas TindómëonnarYesterday at 11:43 PM
And the villagers are giving you a better view of a fundamental aspect of a core mechanic of the SC.

JoshYesterday at 11:43 PM
we need to make sure natives understand that people with condemnations aren't bad people

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:43 PM
good point.

JoshYesterday at 11:43 PM
they're just taking the "bad guy" role on the game
don't need reform or anything
and condemnations are more... contextually specific recognitions of their contributions to GP

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:44 PM
by reform, I meant "changed their pattern of doing things". Not that they were a bad person to begin with
my mistake as I misworded that

DenieriaYesterday at 11:44 PM
Well @Branthalas Tindómëonnar I conceded that point, I understand that I may have oversimplify that point
That's why you guys are here to discuss

JoshYesterday at 11:45 PM
okay cool
and don't worry about it too much
thank you for a positive response! :smiley:

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:46 PM
any more questions?

JoshYesterday at 11:47 PM
I'm curious about the strength of WAGA resolutions effects
are they like... percentage modifier based?
or hard numbers

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:50 PM
by effects you mean on your policies?

DenieriaYesterday at 11:50 PM
It's rather unknown
We don't really have any information about it
I don't think much research have been conducted over the matter
So these passed resolutions do really act in mysterious ways

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:53 PM
if there are no more questions we can move onto the third point.
The next point is somewhat of an extension to the first : Drafting your Resolution
So you want to write a resolution? Well there is a whole step by step process for this. First, you must decide what is your purpose in writing this resolution, and that purpose must be abundantly clear to you as you will be defending this purpose against strong criticism. Therefore, it’s best that the purpose of your resolution is something that you must be truly passionate about. When you know you have your purpose or idea, you should then proceed to read on past resolutions that have commonalities to yours to see for how the language is structured, how the arguments are created and connected together, and how the logical reasoning was constructed. After conducting your research on these prior resolutions, you can now type the first draft of your resolution. Keep in mind that yours must be using proper legal language and must be in line with proper grammatical and punctuation conventions. Latin terms are allowed, but 1st-person pronouns, names, and acronyms of names are strictly prohibited. Furthermore, operative clauses must be clearly written and defined. The more concise and specific your resolution is, the less likely for it to be misinterpreted. When you have finished a good first draft, publish it to either the West Pacific forums or the WA sections of the NS Forums. Remember to post your draft in the correct chamber if you are posting in the NS Forums. There it would be read by others and commented on, and what you need to do is read the comments on your draft, consider what the comments are suggesting, and edit the first draft as you need based on the comments and criticism you may receive. Constantly revise until you think you are ready to submit this resolution to the WA. When you are submitting your resolution, remember to check for any grammatical errors, that the resolution complies to the rules set out, and that you have also credited the co-authors or anyone who have written this proposal with you.
as you mentioned before Josh, you may want to get your friends to look over your resolution and give their thoughts.
It can be very helpful to have some outside input.

DenieriaYesterday at 11:58 PM
Oh it is

MoE RizorienYesterday at 11:59 PM
Also another good tip is to look over other successful resolutions and see what they wrote
The structure and flow of the content can provide a lot of inspiration .

DenieriaToday at 12:01 AM
There are also very much some great writers out there who would always be around to comment on your resolution like Wallenburg and Imperium Anglorium. Their comments and many others can go a long to making your resolution looking more professional and more convincing for your purpose

MoE RizorienToday at 12:02 AM
a good point as well. Consult players with more experience if you are having trouble with somthing.

DenieriaToday at 12:06 AM
Now a good thing to acknowledge is when you get writer's block
Sometimes at certain points, you may get confused or you may not know what you want to put down to write a convincing argument or operative clause for your resolutions.

DenieriaToday at 12:08 AM
Now there isn't really a single solution to this as each individual is different, but here are some suggestions that I may have
You could always visit back to your purpose and ponder about it for a while until the path becomes clear, but a good thing to do though is to also find inspiration from other sources. Read past resolutions, read laws in your real life legislatures, read about the topic you are writing about as part of external research, observe real life
There are countless of things you could do. Just remember that these resolutions take time and it's ok to get writer's block over them. You can always put them down and come back later to them.

MoE RizorienToday at 12:14 AM
those were some good points of interest Denieria. Does anyone have questions on part three: Drafting Resolutions?

DenieriaToday at 12:17 AM
Anyone have any question?
Any comments?
Assuming that there is no questions or comments to be made.

MoE RizorienToday at 12:20 AM
we can go foward with the next section

DenieriaToday at 12:20 AM
The discussion period is closed

DenieriaToday at 12:20 AM
Well we are now on the final topic of this process
Passage, Politics, and Campaigning

Now at this point, assuming that your resolution is still entirely legal as deemed by the GenSec or the Mods, your proposal will now sit for a period of 4 days for it to be read over by Delegates and approved by them. Now this part of the process is rather hard to get over as you need to get 6% of all delegates to approve your proposal for a vote, and usually this involve a lot of campaigning via Telegrams

DenieriaToday at 12:25 AM
This is also the point where all the backroom politics is involved and deal making can happen
Now to campaign via telegrams would require sending them to many important delegates and try to spread your proposal around to the world to garner attention.
Most of these kinds of campaigns would have telegrams that plea their case, or argue their merits to convince delegates.Then one may resort to correspondence with important individuals to attempt to bargain for their support and clout.
hen one may resort to correspondence with important individuals to attempt to bargain for their support and clout.

MoE RizorienToday at 12:33 AM
there are two types of voting your resolution is going to go through. Quorum voting and general voting. Quorum is the amount of delegate votes (6%) that you need for it to pass onto the main floor. This is why the politics of getting them to vote for it is so crucial. Once that is done your resolution goes to the main voting floor.

DenieriaToday at 12:34 AM
Now by the end of the time period allotted to your resolution for approvals, if you have not reached the quorum needed, then your resolution "dies in committee" and must be resubmitted at a later time, which means you may have to restart the process. If it does meet that quorum, then your resolution enters the chamber for all members to consider and vote on.
And at this point, we reach the hardest point of the process. The vote by the entire body would meant that everyone gets to scrutinize your resolution, and their biases and political positions regarding the issue that you are trying to tackle are going to sway their votes. Your actions also have a more limited effect as there are thousands of members voting on this, and therefore, your arguments must be sound and convincing and your writing have to of excellent quality to help you passage.
There are cases even where the most seasoned writers with well-written resolutions still got their resolutions defeated in the chamber.

MoE RizorienToday at 12:40 AM
don't get discouraged if it doesn't pass at first!

DenieriaToday at 12:41 AM
Politically, this part of the process can involve a lot wrangling, bargaining, and deal making to get one resolution passed or defeated. Sometimes the politics can pour out into the open, especially when the resolution involves high profile individuals such is the case with Condemnations and Commendations and Liberations. Of course the biggest Delegates would tend to be the biggest influence on this part of the process. (which is why it's a good idea to make your resolution appeal to Halo too, he likes to help natives get their chance) As their large votes tend to set the narrative about your resolution, which causes the lemmings effect.
Another crucial factor that may affect your resolution are the personalities
Which could be your own reputation, the repute of the co-authors, and the reputation of your supporters.
As all of these personalities can sway others to either see you worthy of their support or of their opposition. More often than not, if your resolution is linked to people who are considered as nuisances or rather genuinely bad players of the game who have cheated the system, then your resolution will get shot down in the chamber.
Finally, if your managed to get your resolution to pass, then congratulations, it's international law and you will get a lovely badge for being an author. If not, then you can always try again and write more resolutions that you are passionate about.

This concludes this topic and opens the discussion period.
@here Does anyone have any comments or questions?

MoE RizorienToday at 12:58 AM
If not, then this concludes the MoE/WA Symposium. Thank you all for reading and have a good night!