Antarctic OasisBoard

Ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee.

May 28th, 2017
Issue XXV. I'm Not Like Everybody Else

Index
I. Interview with August
II. Spotlight News
- The NewsStand
III. Ask Fredd!
IV. Antifa v Anarchism
V. Artwork of the Damned
VI. Fall of THE TRUMP PATRIOTS OF AMERICA

Interview with August
Interviewed by, The Stalker

1. Welcome August, you know it feels like we’re have this interview in the wrong month. August, September, January, just how many month nations do you have? What is your origin story?

Thank you for having me! I agree, and August cannot come fast enough. I never liked the cold, and January is not mine, even if it is sitting in my jump point.

Origins? I started here a little over seven years ago, and anyone paying attention to feeder politics in early 2010 probably remembers all the turmoil in TNP. That is my first memory in the game, getting kicked out of the North Pacific repeatedly by Durk. Talk about a first impression! After that, I was in a few UCRs, and eventually founded my own, Ridgefield. It grew quickly, but I had to leave abruptly for a couple years due to real life. I returned to the game a couple times over the next five years, mostly lurking Gameplay and never doing anything significant. During one of those times, the nation release program began, and I picked up my current main nation. Finally, in January of last year, I came back after a couple years out (cue Hotel California in the background). Remembering how much fun region-building was, I decided to pick it up again, and put together the blueprints for several regions and an alliance to connect them.

2. Mighty leader of The Augustin Alliance, made up of four regions Conch Kingdom, Cape of Good Hope, Lands End, and Ridgefield, all of which you are the founder of. Tell us, how does that work? What is the day in a life of running this alliance?

A lot of running around and putting out fires backstage, so that everything looks presentable when the curtain opens!

Serious answer: The key has been staggering the launches and planning everything in advance. Following the launch of each region, we allowed some time for it to become self-sustaining before moving onto the next, and using the momentum from the previous region to support the next region's growth. It becomes a domino effect, where one community's development leads into the next and the efficiency increases on every cycle. Meanwhile, experienced officials (like Helaw, Tulov, Caffeine Addicts, and many others) make sure everything keeps moving internally.

The days are incredibly hectic, even without factoring in my absurd real life schedule. Since most of the setup work is done by now, a lot of my job involves dealing with other regions and people, answering piles of messages, commanding the JTF, and making sure the governments of the individual regions are running smoothly. Something is always going on--one region's delegate disappeared suddenly without a trace, we are currently involved in three separate occupations, there are always articles and dispatches that need writing, and I am working on something huge and exciting that will be announced soon. In short, I am booked, but I love it!

3. Your alliance made a big stir during the April Fools day event taking first place, how did that victory feel? What was your strategy? I want detailed notes.

Ah, the nuclear war. For us, it was a chance to show off, and we had a tremendous amount of fun with it! I knew we were not the biggest group out there, but we were probably unmatched in coordination. Not only that, we have people from around the globe living in our regions, so I figured we had a great chance at winning and generating a little publicity.

Going against my better judgment here, because I know someone will use this against us if there is another war event, but this was our strategy. Everything was organized on Discord. Allies, ambassadors, and spies alike came in to watch, but we kept nothing secret. The top priority was to defend all Alliance nations at all costs, while racking up points by striking at small factions. Shield-builders would watch the incoming tab and shoot down any threats instantly. Others would build thousands of warheads and dump them on defenseless nations, making sure to maximize their efficiency for points. Meanwhile, our unique position as R/D independents, several early peace treaties with major R/D factions, and our status as relative unknowns protected us from the most intense barrages.

All this kept us hovering in the top five, occasionally hitting #1, until we got together with the UDS and planned to take down TWP. That was the turning point, and catapulted us into the top spot permanently. Shortly thereafter, we hit Exodus jointly with the UDS, and that sealed the deal. The Black Hawks came fairly close, but I think the deciding factor was the huge number of people we had online even at four in the morning. Exhausting? Certainly, but we gained a lot of activity and new people out of the ordeal, so I think it was worth it.

(Now, there are a few key strategies I withheld, but some things you need to get from the source!)

4. You’re also Director of the Joint Task Force, the Augustin Alliance military and Diplomatic Corps, had some playful large scale operations fairly recently, tell us about that, and who is your next target?? What is the alignment of the JTF? Raider, independent, Imperialistic, something crazy? What I’m asking is, are you the light in the darkness, or are you the darkness?

The JTF is independent, and has been described by some as the only true independents on the field today. We raid and defend with near-equal regularity, and are happy to work with almost all active gameplay organizations. Just last week, a group of JTF soldiers was caught on video helping an old lady cross the street. Not a minute later, they turned around and started kicking a bunch of puppies. Of course, they mugged the guy recording it and stole his camera, but they published the video anyway and donated the profits to charity, the maniacs.

In recent weeks, we have been making our share of noise, executing the first two JTF-led operations back-to-back and supporting several other organizations on the side. We took St Abbaddon first, which was a high-profile occupation mostly involving small or new organizations like ourselves. That led to a liberation and a massive pile-off against defenders and the NPO. When that finished, we got back on our feet by hitting everyone's favorite region, DankMemes. The founder was revived just hours before we had planned to clear out the entire region, which ended the operation. All this gave us valuable experience and some great relationships with other organizations, and you can expect much more of the same for the rest of the year!

(Next target? All I can say is that if your region has "meme" or "kek" anywhere in the name, better sleep with one eye open.)

5. Now the tuff questions, which of your four regions is your favorite!? None of this I can’t choose or they’re equal nonsense. What is the real goal of the Augustin Alliance? Is it to conquer NationStates? Cause just between you and me that’s my goal.

My favorite? That really is difficult. The whole point of the Alliance is to offer people a choice between completely unique regions, while maintaining a high standard of quality for each, and the whole time allowing access to a wider group of people with varied interests through Discord and embassy-connected RMBs. Each of the four has a different focus and theme, but the single, unified community itself is the most amazing thing about the AA.

If I absolutely had to pick a favorite region, I would say Ridgefield. It is the oldest, the first one I ever made, and I spent years trying to get it back after a region-squatter snatched it. These days it is the smallest, but only because recruiting has not begun in earnest. I think its structure (meritocratic and quality-focused, with mandatory WA membership) is the most interesting and unique of them all. Now, I will sit back and wait for five hundred non-Ridgefield-residents to come bite my head off for this.

6. If you sold me, *cough* I mean made a Faustian bargain with the Devil for your soul, what would you ask for?

The password to your region.

...Uh oh, did I break it?

OK, I would ask for more ambitious players interested in leading AA regions!

Spotlight News
Compiled by, The Stalker

Need more News? Visit The NewsStand!

The NewsStand is your one-stop non-stop news shop, bringing you the latest and best publications from around NationStates. Here you can find your favorites fast, or leisurely look for new titles. And all for the one-off price of an up-vote.

“We’re actively seeking new and established titles to add to The NewsStand. To deliver the service effectively, we're aiming to be a top 20 dispatch. Currently slot 20 is held by the offer of a free potato. Being voted more popular than a potato will clearly be challenging for us, but we believe our ruthless ‘Wild-Thing-eats-Potato’ corporate attitude will get us there.”
~All Wild Things
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(Hell's Bells welcome submissions for future Spotlight News articles, contact The Stalker for details.)

Ask Fredd!
Advice Column by, Freddland

Fredd,
An international wheeler dealer like yourself has probably made some enemies. Who’s on you list?

Interested

Interested,
I’ve made a bunch. But they don’t stay on my list very long, if you know what I mean. Former occupants of my enemy list include
Easter Bunny (trespassing-multiple times, took him out with a land mine)
Santa Claus (see Easter Bunny)
Elvis (I stepped on his blue suede shoes and he tried to hit me, so self-defense)
Jimmy Hoffa (boredom)
Tooth Fairy (tried to remove my teeth with pliers, so I disemboweled him/her)

Some people still on my list (not-dead-yet)
The Pope (If he doesn’t pay off his gambling debts soon)
Stalker (boredom)
Beeker (This would actually be a public service)
Most of the population of France (I just don’t like the French)

Fredd
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Have a question for Fredd you'd like to see answered in the next issue of Hell's Bells? Submit here via telegram to Freddland.

Antifa- an annoyed pile of gibberish I felt compelled to churn out.
Article by, Zen beatitudes

Before we run into an outcry of hurt feelings let me say outright that this is written in response to my RL encounters with people who identify themselves as 'Antifa', which is to say Antifascist. This has nothing to do with the NS movement of the same who have been doing their thing for ages.
For myself I work in the Public Transport sector and am active in the trade union movement representing almost 300 drivers as their elected delegate. I am more an Erisian anarchist inasmuch as I would call myself anything. What follows are simply my feelings at the time of writing and not representative of me at the time of reading for I am a verb.

Firstly, I take umbrage at the entwining of my precious black flag with the red. This represents a fundamental ignorance of what the far left has consistently done to anarchists historically whenever the chance arose. The opposition to fascism is not sufficient grounds to forgive our enemies, and by enemies I refer to anyone actively advocating a system of government or the greater manifestation of control as The State. To me the forms of communism that have held ascendancy globally are as repulsive as those of the far right, perhaps more so for the disingenuous declarations that are touted to gain ascension. These are not systems that seek to destroy capital or renew its base value in any equitable fashion, but to appropriate it for themselves. Honestly I see the far right and left as creatures cut from the same cloth, one of iron fisted state control. I am not opposed to fascism more than any other form of government. It is the traditional conflict between totalitarian regimes and communist groups more than anything that prompts this waving of flags; it is not an anarchist issue.

The fighting of sexism, racism and all the other social injustices that these people feel they are opposing is a definitive non sequitur. That they can stand against what they perceive as injustice yet support the form of social organisation that creates and encourages the injustice demonstrates an aborted thought process. It puts me in mind of the Dead Kennedy's song Nazi Punks F*ck Off and the line 'In a real Third Reich you'd be the first to go'. The idea that this sort of protest, however truncated in reasoning would be tolerated in a world ruled by communism is worse than wishful thinking. While I certainly agree that communism as has been practised thus far is not the theoretically pure version that some authors would have us envision as paradise on earth, it is the reality we must judge it by. Anarchism on the other hand has proven in its historical practice to be exactly what it calls itself on paper and this is yet another reason I am angered by the diminishing of our cause and the tying of it to that of tyranny.

The targeting 'Fascism' in the current climate and using the current president of the US as some sort of emblem of this is just painful. That one particular face of the machine that runs your lives is better or worse than another is frankly ridiculous and the fact that so many have fallen for this oldest of ruses is a pathetic indictment of both cognition and awareness. Verily the cause if lost when those that should be promulgating genuine rebellion happily jump into vetted and approved channels without realising they have done so. While they 'fight' fascism they are conversely tacitly supporting democracy and relegating themselves to the vanguard of the system that they should be opposing. In America, capitalism is equated with democracy and thus we have supposed anti-capitalist, anti-statist people fighting for the preservation of capital in its current statist framework. This makes my brain hurt and I've tried to share this perspective with some of those who have prompted this outpouring, and the consistent response is 'Democracy is better than Fascism'. I find it baffling that one form of control can be preferred over another simply because people have been indoctrinated to think of free market capitalism as benign when in fact it is by far the more insidious of the two. This is an utter failure in critical thinking as well as thinking generally.

This acceptance of the state disproves entirely the Anarchistic claim the black flag tries to represent in the antifa union. Whatever your particular bent of anarchism, the demolition of the state structure is a central feature, in fact it is THE feature of your belief. To leave even a minimal framework of government leaves one in the adolescent stoner van of rebellious Libertarianism, forever doomed to lack the conviction to stride genuinely free of the comforting confines of parental control. The fact that so many people throw up the tired argument of 'How else would it work' is one of the greatest indicators to me of how lost and malleable we have become generally. A lack of imagination is a prime indicator of slavery, and just because someone can't imagine a way forward does not mean that one does not exist. The inability to remove possibility from the limitations of our own perspective leaves us in bondage, enslaved to the lies of supposed certainty in a universe where there is no such thing. We must be contrary with ourselves more than anything, for our consciousness is nothing but the bad handwriting on the name tag pinned upon the robot that you think you control.

And that we have veered to this particular juncture tells me it's time to wrap it up lest we lose sight of the original aim here. In summation let me say that defining oneself by individual issues is to short change yourself in the most grievous of manners for it leaves you wide open to manipulation. Judge all things based on your internal compass equally and forget not that the world is wide and contains more sins than you can imagine. To protest one thing is to lessen the import of others and limits what you as a human being are able to create in this world.
Always remember the actual place is not the map of that place and it's only ignorance if you leave it that way.

From your mind arises the universe.
~wetwork

Artwork of the Damned
"Angel Meme"
Meme by, Unknown

Fall of THE TRUMP PATRIOTS OF AMERICA
Article by, The Stalker

Early May THE TRUMP PATRIOTS OF AMERICA (TTPoA) began a spamming war with Hell. Like many regions Hell was spammed by the former embassy collecting region of TTPoA for weeks.

Upon rejecting the 4th or 5th request to Hell, The Stalker set up a new thread in technical with an idea for a feature that once a nation was banned from a region they couldn’t request embassies anymore. An idea well received and liked by many, to everyone’s surprise Violet actually added it to the game!

TTPoA however did not like it, and proceeded to create a bunch of inappropriate nations and regions to further spam Hell. Which were quickly deleted by the mods. Having the feature added and inappropriate regions deleted, The Stalker thought that would be the end of it. A week went by before TTPoA began to spam Hell once again. The Mad King knew he couldn’t just ignore repeated attacks on Hell and began a campaign among TTPoA’s embassy regions to encourage them to close embassies with TTPoA. Within a day 20 embassies began to close, 10 more aborting construction with them.

In a rage the leaders of TTPoA, who may have just been one person, mass created and spammed Hell will lude and vulgar region embassy requests. So bad that the mods tired of his repeated harassment puppet swept him leaving TTPoA founderless.

The Stalker then began to reach out to like minded individuals to encourage someone to hit TTPoA for their insults of Hell, only to find The West Pacific Armed Forces (TWPAF) were already planning to take the region.

Later that night TTPoA was taken with ease by TWPAF, with support from Kawaii Armed Forces, Eastern Pacific Sovereign Army, and South Pacific Special Forces. Appointing a puppet nation of The Stalker’s to help dole out the justice.

Maybe two days later, TTPoA was swiftly refounded.

So falls THE TRUMP PATRIOTS OF AMERICA.

We hope you've enjoyed our twenty-fifth issue of Hell's Bells. Nations interested in contributing to future issues should contact The Stalker for details.

Important Note: In payment for having enjoyed our Newspaper you are expected to up arrow this factbook. Failing to up arrow this factbook means you are willing choosing to forfeit ownership of your soul to The Stalker for all eternity instead. Thanks for reading.