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This was written in one long stream, I'm hoping it's coherant.

I was hoping I'd wake up this morning, post thanks to the people of South-East Ireland for voting me into congress (and I do thank them, I promise not to let ye down) and then I'd get the new citizens ads up with some of the shiny new gold I got for winning that same seat.

Instead my first action under the designation 'congresswoman', if not an official action, is to quietly spit the dummy.

Went I went to bed late, late last night a big discussion was going on in the IV forums, though 'big discussion' is putting it a little politely. I am not going to rehash that discussion or pull out the names of who was involved because, in honesty, it could have been one of a million 'discussions' I've seen go down around here in the last few weeks - on newspaper articles, forums etc. It seems to me like we've basically been trying to kill each other for weeks now and the fact of the matter is we're in a vicious cycle where person A says one thing, person B defends it, person C disagrees, then Person D weighs in and Person C calls Person F a gob****e and so on.

Now I don't dislike discussion or debate, eGod alone knows that if we all agreed with each other we'd first of all be robots and second of all be bored out of our minds. Debate and discussion is what makes the game interesting but it's been getting increasingly personal on all sides and it's at the point now where it seems like no-one can exhale around here without someone pointing a finger at them and telling them they're breathing wrong.

(And please, don't use the comments on this article to point fingers at each other, I'm not naming names because the only place that gets you is with the people you named getting defensive, and the people who agree with you jumping in to defend you, and then...)

I'm learning all the time but I'm not an expert in ePolitics, nor do I fully understand some aspects of eIreland's history, though it seems to me the concensus is things are particularly vicious around here right now. The fact of the matter is we've got a lot of people on all sides who've worked their backsides off for this place and many of them are losing faith here because of all the in-fighting. We keep going like this and soon we'll only be left with tag-alongs who only ever reflected the glory of others or comparitive noobs (like me, I freely admit) who don't fully understand what they're doing trying to run the place. We'll have lost our old hands and our experts and none of us wants that.

Now it's kind of easy for me to say this. Arguement has never really been my way of doing things and I can hold my temper for a long time (before, admittedly, losing it entirely); if I don't like how something's being done/I think it can be done better/I see a gap where something could be done I tend to have a think on it, see if I can come up with a fix, and if I can't ask around to see what ideas other people have. So far here I've not had much clout to get things done (though the solo noob initiative is going fairly well considering) nor depth of knowledge to really enter into debates when they've kicked off but I'm a congresswoman now so it's time to unzip lip, and I'd really rather unzip it for constructive discussion than all of the killing each other that's been going on so far.

Now the latest people it looks like we've lost, as you may have seen, are Digits (http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/congratulations1-911160/1/20) and Grainne (on the IV forums). I'm sure that even if you don't tend to agree with them you will agree that to lose either would be a massive loss for the country - their combined experience is mindblowing, I knew that even as a total noob, and they are regular, active members of the eIreland community.

For me it would be a more personal loss. Grainne was one of the first to speak to me when I joined here and I've no doubt whatsoever I'd have wandered off from the game a long while ago if it wasn't for her help and guidance early on. She filled the IRP forum with help, music and chat and has been one of the people I've turned to when I didn't understand something, or just when I'd found something funny to share. It would be a real shame to see her go and I know I'm not the only one who'd lose one of their shining lights of the game if she went.

And as for Digits, with whom my friendship is more recent, this is a guy who people from all sides have come out to praise for one thing or another in the last few weeks. His almost scary level of organisation, his devotion to the MoI job, his ability to make seemingly everything he touches work (to my eyes, at least). He's another one that reached out to help me when I was confused, without prompting, and when I was a member of another party to boot.

Are we really going to let these giants of eIreland go? And if yes how many are we intending to let follow them out of the door?

This isn't me starting a rallying cry, nor proposing anything (other than, if you're reading Grainne and Dig, that you please reconsider), this is me venting out in public, because thus far I've vented privately or in my own head but now I'm elected people are entitled to have a fair idea of what I'm thinking.

Well this, today, is what I'm thinking.

I'm going to have (now very late) breakfast and a nice cup of tea and settle myself, then I'm going to tell the rest of the world via ad that I love eIreland.

Because I do, despite it all.