[V.iii] On Holding Our Peace & Embracing Natural Frenemies

Day 1,736, 22:22 Published in Canada Canada by Plugson


There’s a lot of animosity and grief rolling around in eCanada, which I suppose is a normal part of this team and this game in general. Somehow it’s a bit different this time around. A little more poignant with the threat of Polish invasion and whispers of wipes and a disappeared August Congress. It’s also a little more distracted, without a real sense of what went wrong or who’s to blame. The names are being passed around for sure, yet the reasonings behind who caused what and why it is the cause of what’s coming whenever the Polish roll in…well, they don’t add up in my mind. For some it’s Congress, for others it’s the Coalition, for some it’s just Venoms, and others think Jacobi could have easily sunk us with a UK Training War gone awry.

But the main question is why Congress led us into a misguided Natural Enemy proposal with UK and if it is the direct cause of the Polish reply in kind. Sure, that’s quite likely, yet they had the border next to us all along. Peace talks were already under way with the UK, so ONE-allies likely new the threat had been defused. Perhaps Poland thought a 10% edge over eCanada was enough reason for invasion. Possibly. Or perhaps they just thought we look weakened and distracted, knew that TERRA allies surrounding us were either occupied or in NAP talks or formerly disgruntled and possibly softened to a ‘Spolish’ invasion of Little Bro sheep, especially after our CP Shepherd said the flock was not to be trusted. Yet how can we know what causes lead to other consequences, except to suspect that if enough piles up after each sh*tstorm, then likely some sort of avalanched one day.

To me, the cause rests part in a feud that simmers between factions month after month, and part in a spat the spawned from the Speaker role on the forum (a typical source of poisonous contagion leaking into the game, see paragraph 3). Would a disgruntled former Speaker employ/twist a new proposal method in order to return the sting he felt? Or was war at any cost the real motivation that prompted a premature proposal and a hasty vote by Congress?

The blame-game won’t get to the answers behind it all, because there are too many layers to our drama and too many fingers pointing in separate directions. Nevertheless, that doesn’t stop us from analyzing the reasons and naming the culprits, whether it be all of Congress, a history of impulsiveness, or a recent breakdown in communication, or maybe just a single player who lost a forum masking (it’s a common cause of dispute I favour blaming). Or perhaps it is best to approach it with the advice Jacobi offers: “It no longer matters what has happened because it will require all of us together to make anything good happen in the near future.” Or perhaps it is Funky Hum24n’s immediate reply that prevails, “I blame other people.”

With those sentiments in mind I would like to lead you over to an article that has inspired this current article. It’s titled, “To Venoms III” and I let you read through to guess which sentiment it chooses from the two listed above:
http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/to-venoms-iii-2105787/1/20

I caught the article late last night before heading off to bed and wasn’t sure how to reply when feeling so sleepy. In part I agreed with Gooffree that Venoms would be better off not in Congress, while on the other hand I also have to accept that this won’t happen and likely he will be re-elected. As I said above, this is the layered history of eCanada, that the show must go on and the players never go away at the end of each act, but are recycled through again with different names but all playing similar roles. I think “Venoms” I see “MDP” and “Coalition” then think “Norsefire” and “Mayhem,” "Free So&So!!!" and so on and so on, and then some more until a string of unrelated performances seem to add up to moments like this. Yet, that’s likely just another sentiment borne of too much wondering.

So I never knew how to reply to Gooffree’s article, went to bed, went to work, and went for a walk and then it came to me earlier today. The words I lacked seem better expressed by someone else, as part of a radio program I heard on a long drive home along the I-5 this past weekend. Somehow it just fits, very well, so like I tend to do, it’s presented here as a tale retold to reflect on a game that may be all about clicking but whose actual consequences come from a psychology (or pathology) rather than the game mechanics behind a button.

The program I heard was a tribute on NPR to the late David Rakoff, a writer/performer I’d actually listened to on CBC occasionally. "Our Friend David" a good listen, all 1 hour of it, as a survey of David’s previous work on This American Life, especially the first bit where David pokes fun at how Canadians feel they’re special (btw, he's a Canadian living in New York). The part that caught my attention was a clip taken from a TAL episode dedicated entirely to “Frenemies,” or specifically that episode’s Act 3: “Speak Now or Forever Hold Your Peace.” You’ll probably recognize the old Aesop story about a Venomsous Scorpion and Friendly Frog (turns out it was lifted from a much more ancient collection), but parts of it are not quite the same, especially the realization made near the end. Maybe that’s the part most true for eCanada and eRepublik in general, because some cycles continue and we wonder why when it’s so obvious what age-old causes lead to worn-out consequences, and if there is a reason to stay in such close quarters with the frenemies we call eCanadians:

The scene begins with a friend gearing up to give a wedding toast for two friends, his ex-girlfriend and his once best pal…

Act 5, Scene 3: The Scorpion and the Tortoise
(read along below or listen directly to it read by David Rakoff here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGOdikvMDho&t=3m55s)

No, I won't spill those beans, or make myself foolish, to satisfy appetites venal and ghoulish. I will not be the blot on this hellish affair. And with that, Nathan pushed out and rose from his chair. And just by the tapping of knife against crystal, all eyes turned his way, like he'd fired off a pistol.

“Joshua, Patricia, dear family and friends, a few words, if you will, before everything ends. You've promised to honor, to love and obey. We've quaffed our champagne and been cleansed by sorbet, all in endorsement of your hers-and-his-dom.

So now let me add my two cents' worth of wisdom. I was racking my brain sitting here at this table until I remembered this suitable fable that gets at a truth, though it may well distort us. So here with the tale of the scorpion and tortoise.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The scorpion was hamstrung, his tail all aquiver;
just how would he manage to get across the river?
“The water’s so deep,” he observed with a sigh,
which pricked at the ears of the tortoise nearby.

“Well why don’t you swim?” asked the slow-moving fellow,
“Unless you’re afraid. I mean, what are you, yellow?”
“It isn’t a matter of fear or of whim,”
said the scorpion,
“but that i don’t know how to swim.”
“Ah, forgive me. I didn’t mean to be glib when
I said that. I figured you were an amphibian.”

“No offense taken,” the scorpion replied,
“But how about you help me to reach the far side?
You swim like a dream, and you have what I lack.
Let’s say you take me across on your back?”

“I’m really not sure that’s the best thing to do,”
said the tortoise, “now that I see that it’s you.
You’ve a less than ideal reputation preceding:
there’s talk of your victims all poisoned and bleeding.
You’re the scorpion — and how can I say this — but, well,
I just don’t feel safe with you riding my shell.”

The scorpion replied, “What would killing you prove?
We’d both drown, so tell me: how would that behoove
me to basically die at my very own hand
when all I desire is to be on dry land?”

The tortoise considered the scorpion’s defense.
When he gave it some thought, it made perfect sense.
The niggling voice in his mind he ignored,
and he swam to the bank and called out: “Climb aboard!”
But just a few moments from when they set sail,
the scorpion lashed out with his venomous tail.

The tortoise too late understood that he’d blundered
when he felt his flesh stabbed and his carapace sundered.
As he fought for his life, he said, “Yell me why
you have done this! For now we will surely both die!”

“I don’t know!” cried the scorpion. “You never should trust
a creature like me because poison I must!
I’d claim some remorse or at least some compunction,
but I just can’t help it; my form is my function.
You thought I’d behave like my cousin, the crab,
but unlike him, it is but my nature to stab.”

The tortoise expired with one final quiver.
And then both of them sank, swallowed up by the river.
The tortoise was wrong to ignore all his doubts —
because in the end, friends, our natures win out.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Nathan paused, cleared his throat, took a sip of his drink. He needed these extra few seconds to think. The room had gone frosty, the tension was growing. Folks wondered precisely where Nathan was going. The prospects of skirting fiasco seemed dim, but what he said next surprised even him.

“So: what can we learn from their watery ends?
Is there some lesson on how to be friends?
I think what it means is that central to living
a life that is good is a life that’s forgiving.
We’re creatures of contact, regardless of whether
we kiss or we wound. Still, we must come together.
Though it may spell destruction, we still ask for more —
since it beats staying dry but so lonely on shore.
So we make ourselves open while knowing full well
it’s essentially saying, “Please, come pierce my shell.”

Silence doesn't paint the depth of quiet in that room. There was no clinking stemware toasting to the bride or groom. You could have heard a petal as it landed on the floor. And in that stillness Nathan turned and walked right out the door.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sometimes it’s quite tempting to follow Nathan’s lead, which others have certainly done by walking out similar doors leading to other places. I heard Russia is the place to be right now for the easy-ride CS and ready production bonuses. But right now that would look like turning tail and running from on incoming invasion, and appearances count for so much in a tug-of-war game of follow whichever leader grabs the reins for a month or, as it has become, for whichever surprise proposal pops into view. Might as well stick it out and keep my spot in line along the rivershore for the next ill-fated crossing.

Some might think this animal fable is about the sting of one venomous NE proposal that precisely pricked our achilles heel. To me it’s stretches much further, since you’ll note in the story a whole train of dead amphibians, yet the drowned scorpion remains the same, perhaps just another bit player stepping in to performing under the same name. The Scorpion is played out by many under the same role, leaving a trail of drowned ferrymen, each time a fresh one added to the waters and currents that carry citizens elsewhere or onward.

Yet somehow the Scorpion will prevail as the same yet also not the same character. The same role is played out, just with a different lead hand. Seems that it is a role easily filled as soon as a spot/opportunity makes itself available. And with such a wide array of people to carry their deadweight, why should that silly Scorpion ever stop trying to get to the other side, even when knowing full well that efforts are fated to fail? It must be some quirk of the game (and things beyond it) that make people purposefully poison what they rely on in order to keep on surviving.

So it’s not Congress, not Venoms, not the Coalition, and not anyone currently elected to blame. It’s just a river current that’s part of the game, an internet community based not on remorse or lack of learning, not forgiving and forgetting, but repeating the trend of floating and sinking, then resurfacing again to do it all over. Each time a we lose a couple fresh faces from the diminishing population of floaters, but so long as there’s another flotilla of rafts that keep on past the rapids, after invasion and RWs, why should the sting of a vicious cycle ever cease?

I think what it means is that central to living
a life in eCan is a cycle that’s revolving.
We’re creatures of contact, regardless of whether
we kiss or we wound. Still, we must come together.
Though it may spell destruction, we still ask for more —
since it beats staying dry but so lonely on shore.


So sure Venoms, next time you ask for a tip on how to make a proposal, I’ll have one ready at my disposal. It will be to direct you over to my good frenami, the Toad, because I hear he’s quite open to carrying your load. Just let me have fun playing on the shore, while listening to others complain of the bore. Sink or swim, float like a tortoise or sting like a V, the truth is that there’s plenty more left to come of what’s already been.

The end is nigh yet it never ends...so calm down, carry on, and please be seated. Sit back and watch the pattern repeated. NE, invasion, RW, liberation. Then another round of unholy immolation.

Farewell to Nova Scotia, but see you again. I'm sure Paradise is just 'round the bend. o/o7o7o7