Residency Requirements Removal Act

[Dekks]

The following legislation is up for scrutiny until 1st March 2020, at which point it shall move to a vote.

Residency Requirements Removal Act


Category: Charter Amendment

Authors: Dekks

Co-Sponsors: DankAss Communes, Alvero, Venovica


Chapter I: General Provisions

I - This act may be cited as the "RRR Act".

II - This Act shall come into force upon its passage.


Chapter II: Charter Amendment I

I - The parts which have been striked through shall be removed from and the parts in bold shall be added to Section 1.2 - Residency.

1. All Residents must have a minimum rating of 50.00 for both Civil Rights and
Political Freedoms at any given time.

2. Resident nations may not have a name, flag and other customisable elements considered fascist, reactionary, totalitarian or far-right. 

3. Residents agree to conduct themselves with honesty, patience, and civility in
dealing with other Residents.

4. All Residents who are also members of the World Assembly shall endorse the
democratically elected World Assembly Delegate without prejudice or
hesitation.

5. All NationStates Players may have as many Residents as they wish.

6. All Residents agree to be unconditionally bound by and subject to this Charter
in their capacity as Nationstates Players.

7. Legislation shall be created to establish penalties for violating these Terms of
Residency.

II - The parts in bolds shall be added to 'Charter Key - Definitions' 

Extraordinary Misconduct - behaviour of a resident that could reasonably be
considered extraordinarily distasteful or damaging to the region. This
includes, but is not necessarily limited to:

● Trolling or conducting arguments in bad faith.

● Harassment, especially that of a sexual nature.

● Promotion of fascist, racist, bigoted, totalitarian, reactionary, far-right or otherwise offensive views or imagery.

● Use of derogatory, abusive, or degrading comments or language towards other
persons.

● Intentional misgendering or misuse of pronouns.

[Alvero]

Strongly support this. It's just a barrier for new players who can have their civil rights and political freedoms change dramatically from one issue. It doesn't do anything to protect against actual fascists.

[sovereignwilde]

This is an excellent idea, not much will change in the fight against fascists in the DSA, but it doesn't prevent players from being excluded should a mistake arise from answering an issue.

[liossalde]

As I argued in detail on our regional affairs channel on discord, I will vote against it, even though I generally like the spirit of reform.

My argument in short:
1) I do not agree with the abolishment of any criteria such as the paragraph one. Instead of quantitative criteria stated in the current form, I proposed qualitative criteria (like the classification of government) and established policies (which is a game mechanism useless so far).
2) The "may not have" sentence of the second paragraph is not self-explanatory on what happens in case they do. Also, the categories of prohibition (e.g. reactionary) in relation to the name or the national flag (as well as "other customisable elements" which are not stated descriptively) need an elaboration. There is an academic conflict towards what should and what shouldn't be named reactionary (like should we include monarchy - while monarchies are still present- as well as soviet states -which were a reality, abolished, but there people out there fighting for their rebirth). Therefore, what should a reactionary or a totalitarian flag look like, their name as well, and what do "customisable elements" mean in this particular situation? None of the above, in my humble opinion, are stated with clarity. Not to mention the possibility of a trouble where one curtain comrade would like to expand their respective RP towards the blurry above definitions. I cannot imagine the deffensive line when we become restrictors of our own creativity.

Thank you for your time and patience fellow comrades,
It's a NO for me, unless otherwise persuaded.

[devintheroaster]

In regard to section 2 below: 

2. Resident nations may not have a name, flag and other customisable elements considered fascist, reactionary, totalitarian or far-right.

I believe there should be a little wiggle room specifically for DSA-specific roleplay. Obviously any hate or real-world fascist symbols should be disallowed, but I think leaving some room for interpretation in the spirit of allowing roleplay could be positive. Change it to something like below for example: 

2. Resident nations may not have a name, flag and other customisable elements considered fascist, reactionary, totalitarian or far-right, except for in cases of DSA-world roleplay. Real-life fascist symbols or hate may not be used, even in DSA-world roleplay influenced designs.

I feel the above or something similar to it would do good to allow more freedom with roleplay and not dissuade somebody from modifying their flag to match their current roleplay situation if they so choose. Opinions? I might be reaching for something that wouldn't be an issue either way, just trying to offer some feedback here.