SillyString for Justice

Hi! I believe most of you know me, but for those who don't, I'll give a brief introduction. I'm a prominent member of the insidious IRC cabal that purports to rule TNP with a glittery, cuddly iron fist. We're like the Illuminati, but our entry requirements are much stricter - rather than the simplicity of simply being born to the right family, we demand prospective members fulfill the three impossible tasks of clicking the "IRC" link, selecting a username, and joining the network.

(Actually, for all I know, it could be as few as one impossible task - I've never used the forum-based client, so the two latter steps are just a guess. But one impossible task is still impossible! And I'm far too lazy to seek confirmation one way or the other.)

I've served as an RA member for about eleven months now, eight of which I held the position of Deputy Speaker (first under COE, then under Zyvetskistaahn). I've written and co-sponsored several bills, and contributed to drafts of countless others. And as Deputy Speaker, I had the chance to familiarize myself with how the Constibillocode generally fits together... or doesn't.

In January, I had the chance to serve as a THO with COE and Roman, which ended up being a lot more fun than I had expected. Because of this, and because of the backlog that seems to have built up in the court since then, I'd like to run and see if I can help get things back on track and moving again.

I think that's basically it! And of course, I'm happy to answer any questions.

It has been recorded in ancient writings that you once expressed a desire to immolate figs and glitter so you could then punish criminals of the North Pacific. Do you still practise that method, or do you prefer to use SillyString when passing sentences over convicted criminals?

What role do quotation marks and ** in demonstrating how bad certain words and actions are?

Raven: I believe, this being TNP, it would be only proper if you were to file a Request for Review with the court regarding the constitutionality of the use of figs, glitter, and RA members as criminal punishments. As I hope to serve on the court, I decline to comment publicly on the hypothetical.

Mcm: I believe you accidentally a word! However, to answer the presumed question, "scare quotes" are a non-verbal marker which indicate that the reader or listener should be very, very frightened of the thing being quoted. Things like "huggles" and "glitter", for example, are truly terrifying - unlike their un-scared counterparts, huggles and glitter, which everybody is known to love.

The *asterisk* is simply an emphasis marker, and should be read as meaning that the writer really means that thing they are saying.

What you should really be worried about are the combinations - *"huggles"*, of course, meaning "I really mean these scare quotes about huggling! It's super scary!", and "*huggles*" naturally meaning "You should be scared of emphatic huggles!".

Note: I have not examined either "scare quotes" or *asterisks* for their compliance with the Constibillocode. It may very well be that one, the other, or both are in serious violation. I suggest you file a request for review!

Considering only one of the other candidates has ever made mention of their being an 'IRC cabal' or anything similar, it seems odd that you would dedicate so much of your introduction to such a position. Why bother?

SillyString, you brought a thoughtful and analytic voice to deliberations as a Temporary Hearing Officer. Your work as Deputy Speaker was thorough and of the highest caliber. You have a keen legal mind, and your knowledge of the laws of TNP is comprehensive. I have absolutely no reservations about promising you my vote.

That being said, here are questions:

1. What aspects of being Justice attract you the most to the position? Are there any parts of the job that you dread?

2. How do you think the court ought to go about meaningful reform in its rules? What problems with the rules stand out to you, and how do you think they should be resolved?

3. Who are your judicial role models? These need not be confined to NS players.

Gracius Maximus:

Considering only one of the other candidates has ever made mention of their being an 'IRC cabal' or anything similar, it seems odd that you would dedicate so much of your introduction to such a position. Why bother?

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Well, the not-at-all overstated rumors of shady backroom dealings, smoke-filled poker games, and the like have been making the rounds for a while, passed along in hushed tones and accompanied with furtive glances. This kind of secrecy and fear is not good for the healthy development of an open society, and I believe it is better to nip worried gossip right in the bud. There is an IRC cabal controlling all of TNP's every move, and I am a prominent member of it. There, done! Transparency and accountability! Check!

COE: Thank you! I'm thrilled to have your support. I will answer your questions soon - I would like to take some time and provide thoughtful responses.

SillyString:

Gracius Maximus:

Considering only one of the other candidates has ever made mention of their being an 'IRC cabal' or anything similar, it seems odd that you would dedicate so much of your introduction to such a position. Why bother?

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Well, the not-at-all overstated rumors of shady backroom dealings, smoke-filled poker games, and the like have been making the rounds for a while, passed along in hushed tones and accompanied with furtive glances. This kind of secrecy and fear is not good for the healthy development of an open society, and I believe it is better to nip worried gossip right in the bud. There is an IRC cabal controlling all of TNP's every move, and I am a prominent member of it. There, done! Transparency and accountability! Check!

COE: Thank you! I'm thrilled to have your support. I will answer your questions soon - I would like to take some time and provide thoughtful responses.

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But wouldn't such rumors be spread on IRC? Self-fulfilling prophecy.

Olvern: Heya Asta!

How has your 8 months of being Deputy Speaker informed you on the successes and the failings of the Constibillocode? I'd appreciate examples

Gracius Maximus:

But wouldn't such rumors be spread on IRC? Self-fulfilling prophecy.

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Sometimes, but they also reverberate around the halls of the RA from non-candidates who have observed the occasional bribe change hands in the bathrooms on the left side of the building.

The bathrooms on the right side are unsuitable, of course, as they are constantly under construction.

Crushing Our Enemies:

1. What aspects of being Justice attract you the most to the position? Are there any parts of the job that you dread?

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I'm sure it will surprise nobody who knows me that it is judicial deliberation which appeals to me most. I like debating the merits and meanings of a law or argument and hopefully coming to an agreement.

Dread? Civil cases.

2. How do you think the court ought to go about meaningful reform in its rules? What problems with the rules stand out to you, and how do you think they should be resolved?

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Well, as the most simple matter, there are a number of accidentally words and other grammatical errors which could use some whipping into shape. I won't lay them out here, as they're both too numerous and too boring to be worth it.

Second, the court is going to have to reexamine its rules in response to any of the recent bills addressing various matters - particularly the Attorney General bill, but potentially the civil code bill currently at vote, assuming either of them passes.

Aside from that, I think there's a great deal that can be improved. The rules are too heavily based on RL procedures, in ways that don't always make any sense at all. For example, I don't think there's any reason that an affidaviting witness cannot simply present their sworn statement to the court directly. There's no need for one of the attorneys to take it for them, there's no need for a witness to verify.. they can just post it directly and swear that it's true.

Another issue I see is that the evidentiary rules restrict testimony collection to only the Discovery phase. This phase is exactly 5 days in civil trials, and extensible beyond that in criminal trials, but I think this restriction is unreasonable. With a region as diverse as ours, comprised of people from all over the world with wildly disparate schedules and time availabilities, and particularly given the existing requirements that attorneys from both sides be present during things like depositions, I see no reason not to allow evidence collection to begin sooner.

A third issue I noted while reading through the rules was the section on Hearsay. The term itself is defined, but the specific exceptions to it are only named, not explained. There may be other similar cases, and I believe they are more confusing than helpful.

In terms of actually going about reform, the court first needs to determine what its priorities are - and then craft procedures and rules that serve those priorities. If the interest is a speedy trial, extensions should be regulated in order to ensure a fast conclusion one way or the other. If it is the determination of truth, strict timetables should be eschewed, and perhaps justices should be given greater interrogative powers to demand answers from either side. If it is conviction of those "everyone knows"[note]Note, if you will, the use of the afore-referenced "scare quotes". You may begin being frightened at your pleasure. This use of the "scare quote" has not been conclusively proven to be in accordance with the Constibillocode. Imbibe at own risk. Caveat emptor.[/note] to be guilty but whom we have so far failed to adequately punish, burden of proof standards should be relaxed in order to make that easier. And so on. But if the court cannot agree on a unified goal, it won't be able to achieve solid reform.

3. Who are your judicial role models? These need not be confined to NS players.

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I would like to name three. First is Chaucerin, who is known as the Father of Laws in Equilism. I'm sure I'm more familiar with him than anybody else here, but he served in a judicial capacity and has been, over the years, a frequent contributor to Equilism's debate boards. I have learned a great deal from him about critical thinking, debating, and judicial conduct over the years, and I consider him a role model in many ways.

The other two, if fictional answers are possible, the two supreme court nominees from that one episode of The West Wing. It is that style of thoughtful and passionate debate which I believe every court can benefit from, and particularly in NS, is not something often seen.

Edit: For those not familiar with the reference, it is a portrayal of two highly different judges - one incredibly liberal, the other incredibly conservative - who are originally used as political tools to make a moderate appointee look appealing, but end up both being named to the court because the intellectual dynamic between them is so compelling (and they remain good-natured despite their complete opposition to one another). I'm not really doing the episode justice, but a summary can be read here and the show is, I'm sure, available both on Netflix and the wider internet.

mcmasterdonia:

What role do quotation marks and ** in demonstrating how bad certain words and actions are?

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** = !!

Answer me question ;~;

Lord Nwahs:

Answer me question ;~;

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omg i war sleepzing

Lord Nwahs:

Olvern: Heya Asta!

How has your 8 months of being Deputy Speaker informed you on the successes and the failings of the Constibillocode? I'd appreciate examples

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I think, overall, it's relatively well put together. Most of the time, it serves the region with a minimum of invasiveness - it's well organized, so relatively easy to search in as almost everything will be where it is expected to be; it has a minimum of redundancy, so amending one clause rarely causes direct contradiction with previously repetitive clauses; and it's much shorter and clearer than (and therefore an improvement over) its predecessor. For the most part, it works.

It does also have flaws, however. As I've pointed out in the past, sloppy proofreading has resulted in consistency issues within the text, where a particular term of reference (say, "government") sometimes means one thing and sometimes means another - and in some cases, could mean either one. This is naturally problematic, and leads to confusion and court cases.

Second, and I don't think it would prejudice my service as a justice to say this (particularly since I've said it all before), I think our criminal code is widely useless. The definitions of various crimes are poor, which allows even the most blatant of offenders to weasel around on technicalities. Moreover, they frequently rely on the idea of "intent", which, in NS, is something that can only be demonstrated with a signed confession from the defendant in question. In combination, this makes it practically impossible to successfully prosecute even the most blatant of offenders.

Oh, and there's also a loophole which allows us to essentially amend the bill of rights with a 2/3 majority instead of a 3/4 majority, but that one's kind of endearing.

Edit: If the question was actually how, specifically, being deputy speaker helped, it's because it's a position which required frequent consultation of the three documents - checking acceptable procedure, verifying the legality of some course of action or another, editing passed bills into the legal code when I was Acting Speaker, and such. I simply read the darn thing relatively frequently, so while I can't quote chapter and verse off the top of my head, I'm broadly familiar with what the law says.

I will grant, though, that I had perhaps a more interesting time of it than most. I had to be Acting Speaker during COE's absence, and there were a few controversies during that term (JAL's admittance to the RA despite admin objections; the attempted recall of someone who was not a government official) that demanded more frequent consultation than would otherwise be required.

Were you there when the constaytooshun was written? do you know who wrote it?

I am not sure why it matters, but apparently this is an important question.

I was there! I was right over there, sitting on the bench next to that cute little hot dog stand. No, not that one, the one under the tree, in the shade. I was sipping some organic, free-range coffee drink and reading an old issue of the New Yorker. You know, one from before when everyone was doing it.

Lies! The constaytooshun was written in Kentucky. We would have none of that Yankee new Yorker rubbish down here.

Edit: and we would have eaten fried catfish and Burgoo, not Hot Dogs.

I would have thought that we would eat Kentucky Fried Chicken if the constitution was written in Kentucky.

SillyString: What made you pick the username "SillyString"? An inside joke I am not aware of clearly

Silly has my support. It is about time you ran for this position.

Was a pain during my time as CJ for good reasons.

SillyString will make an amazing judge. She has my unreserved support in this election.

I have a question for you. What are your thoughts on the civil jurisdiction of our court?

What kind of knots will you be using?

Thank you all for your kind words.

mcmasterdonia:

SillyString: What made you pick the username "SillyString"? An inside joke I am not aware of clearly

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Hmm.. If I recall correctly, it sprang from one of the ridiculous rounds of letter stealing on IRC, where I ended up with either Silly or SillyString as a nickname. I was looking for a nation to use to join TNP at the time, and I and decided to make that it.

r3naissanc3r:

I have a question for you. What are your thoughts on the civil jurisdiction of our court?

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I think it is highly problematic. Criminal trials work (when they work at all) because the court, in cooperation with the admin team, has the power to hand down punitive sentences - sentences which do not rely on the acquiescence of a convicted party to effect. And nobody, in general, takes issue with the idea of a court handing down, for example, a temporary or permanent forum ban for the commission of various crimes.

Civil matters are quite different. Disputes between individuals can only be resolved if those involved want to do so, and the court has next to no capacity to address grievances or harm done. Unlike externally imposed bans, any court-mandated "damages" in a civil trial do depend on the ordered party to comply.

There are two ways around this - the first is to make disobeying the court in civil matters a criminal offense. Given the drawbacks of NS courts in general, and in TNP in particular, this is pretty much a terrible idea. Trials would drag on for ages, if ever started at all, and would likely not result in convictions anyway - letting the ignoring party walk away without any repercussions whatsoever. This, I think, would make an utter mockery out of the whole system.

The second possible workaround is to punish civil offenses as we do criminal ones, and punish them with criminal punishments. The problems to this are twofold - either we hand down punishments which are far too severe for their offenses, or we simply refuse to address lower level "civil" crimes (despite their existence in the law) until they reach such a level that they become legitimate to punish criminally (in which case, it makes no sense not to simply treat them as criminal offenses and forget the civil nonsense.

I do think we need to consider ways of addressing disputes between citizens without pushing them through the court system - promoting the use of arbitrators or mediators, for example, or encouraging citizens to come up with their own ways to handle issues (like the fiqh). But since civil issues inherently require the voluntary participation of all parties in order to resolve them, it makes no sense, to me, to include them in our government and laws.

Democratic Donkeys:

What kind of knots will you be using?

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Tangly ones!

I remember you being referred to more as 'stabby' than 'silly' when I was active on IRC in the 2006-2007 range.

Gracius Maximus:

I remember you being referred to more as 'stabby' than 'silly' when I was active on IRC in the 2006-2007 range.

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That sounds accurate. Happily, I am no longer an angsty teenager.