Hieronymus Drake would argue that the people of London expressed their true opinion of the Divine Right of Kings in 1649. And, for that matter, that the people of Paris did so in 1793.
Tanith Wyrmwood doesn’t know as much about political philosophy as Drake, but she has a lot of experience at being a pretty girl living in poverty. Pretty girls get a lot of promises made to them. She’s learned to consider the source, and to think about in what manner a promise is likely to be fulfilled.
I don’t know much about role-playing, but I thought if you don’t enjoy how your character is supposed to act, you’re allowed to override it? After all, you’re a real person who plays the game for enjoyment, and the character is a product of your decisions.
(I mean, unless you enjoy dealing with such dilemmas, of course.)
Hieronymus Drake would argue that the people of London expressed their true opinion of the Divine Right of Kings in 1649. And, for that matter, that the people of Paris did so in 1793.[/quote]To be fair, though, both times this expression was followed by the rise of a revolutionary dictator and a subsequent restoration of the monarchy. I can’t fault the point, though. Strange creatures lying in the sky distributing crowns is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical celestial ceremony. You can’t expect to wield supreme executive power just because some heavenly creature supposedly placed a crown on your head. If I went around saying I was an Empress because some divine being gave me the right to rule, they’d put me away, or if I was in America, allow me to wander the streets issuing decrees for the public amusement.
Looking at history, Hieronymus Drake raises a fine example of who all-too-much resembles a more austere and socially inept Captivating Princess: the late Charles I, a lover and patron of the arts with an extensive collection (more than the Captivating Princess can say, though I admit the Princess has the better policy of sharing it with the world than keeping it locked away in a palace), and a striking disregard for the boundaries of the monarchy outlined by the Magna Carta and English common law. It was Charles I who stormed into the House of Commons in violation of this unwritten constitution to arrest five members of Parliament for "high treason". It is possible to advocate the divine right of kings and still rule a stable and orderly realm. James I and VI accomplished this feat. Louis XIV of France accomplished this. The Princess may say art ennobles, but it is the rights guaranteed to the people and the mandate of the masses that ennobles our people, and the Princess like Charles I before her fails to grasp this.
Unless, of course, she wins with a majority, at which point she does derive power from the masses, but still holds herself above the law, the same attitude that helped Charles I lose his head.
[quote=Anne Auclair]
[A]s royalty the Princess possesses an invisible divine authority that places her above ordinary human morality - only god can truly judge her conduct.[/quote]
I claim no expertise in Christian thinking … but this statement strikes me as possibly theologically unsound.
[quote=Anne Auclair]
But rejecting the Monarchy means Anarchy[/quote]
and
Your imagination is somewhat lacking.
edited by Lady Sapho Byron on 6/29/2018
I agree fully and enthusiastically! For the extraordinary wonders and delights our royal family has visited upon us, there is a surprising lack of gratitude.
Especially for the impending wonders of a lacre flood and Paris drop.
An easily avoidable impending doom is no doom at all. Most of the fourth city escaped, either across the zee or into Parabola, and the cities prior seem to have spread themselves through the 'Neath quite successfully. You’ll be fine.
[li]
An easily avoidable impending doom is no doom at all. Most of the fourth city escaped, either across the zee or into Parabola, and the cities prior seem to have spread themselves through the 'Neath quite successfully. You’ll be fine.
[/quote]
Huh, cool, I didn’t know the Fourth city escaped into Parabola. Do you maybe remember where it is mentioned?
And I don’t recall any survivors of the previous cities (besides the rulers and, I guess, Khante or how was it called). Do you maybe have more info on that?
An easily avoidable impending doom is no doom at all. Most of the fourth city escaped, either across the zee or into Parabola, and the cities prior seem to have spread themselves through the 'Neath quite successfully. You’ll be fine.
[/quote]
Huh, cool, I didn’t know the Fourth city escaped into Parabola. Do you maybe remember where it is mentioned?
And I don’t recall any survivors of the previous cities (besides the rulers and, I guess, Khante or how was it called). Do you maybe have more info on that?[/quote]
Sure! It’s not really relevant to the thread, so I’ll PM you later.[li]
[quote=incerteza]<snip>
And I don’t recall any survivors of the previous cities (besides the rulers and, I guess, Khante or how was it called). Do you maybe have more info on that?[/quote]
I beleive the largest concentration’s of people from before the fall are (unsurprisingly) in the tomb colinies. In Sunless Sea it’s implied that the Curator is first city. What with him being "[The] oldest of his kind."
[quote=Anne Auclair]One of the scenes in the Shuttered Palace really sticks with me. It’s a large meeting of everyone important in the royal court: the Duchess, his Amused Lordship, the Princess. Someone makes a mention of "the cages"…and everyone just starts nervously laughing and the conversation quickly moves on to other subjects. Everyone of importance and authority is fully aware of what is going on. The Commissioner of Police knows about it. His Lordship and the Duchess know about it. The Bishops of the Church know about it. The Empress knows about it. The Palace staff know about it. Mr. Huffam knows about it. The Princess’s many doomed, idiot lovers know about it. And it will continue. It was actually far worse a few years ago, before the rest of the children became Monsters who hid in the dark. We literally have no control over it. At all.
But rejecting the Monarchy means Anarchy, so we just have to hope that this changes, somehow. Maybe making London more aesthetically interesting will help that change take place. I literally cannot think of any other solution short of killing Her Royal Highness. So, I figure, let’s give the arts festival a try. Things can’t get any more horrifying then they already are.[/quote]
Passion - Mrs. Elio - takes a long pause, absorbing Anne Auclair’s words. When she speaks again, her voice is soft and quiet:
So this is why you are really supporting her, then. Not out of admiration or hope, but out of desperation and dread.
I don’t blame you. No one could blame you. She is remarkably adept at inspiring terror. As you’ve pointed out yourself, one just has to look into the eyes of the people around her to know it. No one dares to speak out, no one dares to tell her "no". We all keep smiling and nodding and telling ourselves that if we go along with her latest cruelty, maybe things will not be quite as bad tomorrow. Our bodies are not locked into the cages yet, but our minds are already halfway there.
She shakes her head:
This is no way to live, Anne. Not for us, not for her, not for London. It’s not clearly not working. As long as our fear keeps saying ‘y-y-yes, Your Royal Highness’, she will go on to make things more horrifying. Doing the same thing and expecting a different result is insanity… and I say that as someone who works at the Royal Beth for a living!
She takes a deep breath before continuing:
Yet there is still one last solution to try that does not involve regicide. The Princess is deeply in thrall of her base urges - but possibly not beyond the hope of liberation. She may yet become the monarch that she was meant to be - wise, strong, benevolent - but she cannot do that without our collective help. Above all, she desperately needs to learn and understand the meaning of the word "NO", the importance of boundaries, the bitter medicine of rejection. All children have to learn that lesson, if they if they have any hope of becoming functioning adults.
The best time to teach her that lesson was thirty years ago. The second best time? It’s now. If hundreds of thousands of Londoners speak out as one - with our voices, with our placards, with our ballots - then we will send her a message of "NO" that she will not be able to ignore or silence. And then, if we are bold enough, loud enough, numerous enough and lucky enough, if our hearts are in the right place and so are the false-stars above, we will finally begin to wake from the nightmare we’ve been living in all these years.
That is worth fighting for. That is the reason why we should all stand against the Princess. Not for an art show, not for a Constables’ ball, not for colored plates next to our biographies - but so neither we nor our children would ever have to be trapped by fear and desperation again. For prosperity. For dignity. For G-d’s sake.
[quote=Anne Auclair][quote=Dudebro Pyro][quote=Anne Auclair]
Oh, what’s next? Arguing that a single, grieving, and possibly mentally disturbed lady can’t sell an entire city to a collection of scheming bat merchants for the dubious resurrection of her dead husband because her authority is ultimately derived from something as arbitrary as birth?[/quote]
But she can’t.[/quote]
She could and she did and it was the right decision for London. That she made it for seemingly selfish reasons is entirely relevant, as this was sacred bond between Her Undying Majesty and her subjects at work. Her Majesty brought her people down to a realm where death is weak and dreams are strong and where there are unimaginable treasures. And now her Neathborn daughter wants London to embrace this destiny with a tremendous show of artistic pride.
[/quote]
What you are saying is the Neath is better for London’s citizens, but you are also saying the Neath is awful and full of so much drudgery that we need a serial killer to host an art exhibition and demolish the homes of its poor. Is the deal bad for the Neath’s citizens, and the monarchy harmed its citizens, or is the Princess wrong, and thus her position in office is not necessary?
And besides, she’s the damn Princess. If she wants to host an art exhibition, why does she have to be voted in office to do it? The Shuttered Palace already has plays, as does Mahogany Hall. All she needs to do is rent a space and host her Exhibition, instead of subverting the democratic process.
edited by Ixc on 6/29/2018
You make excellent points, and I largely agree. But I’d point out that after the Restoration, the English people deposed the Stuarts a second time, and that when William and Mary accepted the Bill of Rights in 1689, England officially became a limited constitutional monarchy. Hence Locke, the Enlightenment, and modern political ideals. Over the next two centuries, the power of the monarch declined steadily. By the end of the 19th century, a comment like "Royalty? In government? We’d be the laughingstock of Europe!" is actually a pretty funny joke.
[quote=Ixc][quote=Anne Auclair]
"Fallen London is dreary, dismal, decrepit, and, altogether, not very nice to look at. There is no greater testament to this sad reality then the fact that so many Londoners flee daily into the sickly sweet embrace of honey dreams. There they hope to find the beauty, light, and excitement missing from their dreadful, dim lives. "[/quote]
[quote=Anne Auclair]
She could and she did and it was the right decision for London. That she made it for seemingly selfish reasons is entirely relevant, as this was sacred bond between Her Undying Majesty and her subjects at work. Her Majesty brought her people down to a realm where death is weak and dreams are strong and where there are unimaginable treasures. And now her Neathborn daughter wants London to embrace this destiny with a tremendous show of artistic pride.[/quote]
What you are saying is the Neath is better for London’s citizens, but you are also saying the Neath is awful and full of so much drudgery that we need a serial killer to host an art exhibition and demolish the homes of its poor. Is the deal bad for the Neath’s citizens, and the monarchy harmed its citizens, or is the Princess wrong, and thus her position in office is not necessary? [/quote]
There’s no contradiction. The Neath is filled with wonders. It’s London that is dismal. London as a city badly needs to throw off its denial and update itself with new art and architecture.
I don’t know much about role-playing, but I thought if you don’t enjoy how your character is supposed to act, you’re allowed to override it? After all, you’re a real person who plays the game for enjoyment, and the character is a product of your decisions.
(I mean, unless you enjoy dealing with such dilemmas, of course.)[/quote]
I legitimately enjoy dealing with dilemmas.
Didn’t have any dilemmas in the last two elections, the choices were obvious in and out of character (Bishop and Campaigner). This election presented dilemmas, hence why I investigated Slowcake rather thoroughly and even thought about the Contrarian.
[quote=Lady Sapho Byron][quote=Anne Auclair]
[A]s royalty the Princess possesses an invisible divine authority that places her above ordinary human morality - only god can truly judge her conduct.[/quote]
I claim no expertise in Christian thinking … but this statement strikes me as possibly theologically unsound.[/quote]
It isn’t, actually. One might call it outdated or controversial or just plain wrong, but it has a pretty strong theological and traditional foundation.
A combination, actually. The Princess’s beautiful and commanding royal person is worthy of sincere admiration and there’s hope that the arts festival will ennoble her and London.
She’ll just go back to her honey and one day she’ll have the throne or the regency and you won’t be able to tell her "no" then.
She’ll learn a lot of "nos" as Mayor - the first being that she can’t actually bulldoze Spite - and she might actually learn some things from this. If you want someone to be responsible you need to give them responsibility, within reason (in real life, Prince Edward became infamously indolent because Queen Victoria wouldn’t trust him with any responsibility). The London Mayorship, a one year post of minor power, is a reasonable experiment, I think. She’s qualified to hold it, she has good plans, and the post and plans might improve her character, or at least distract her somewhat from murder and honey. Imagine if she decides she actually likes governing and art more then murder and honey? That would be a win win.
Worse case scenario, we’re just back to where we started. So there’s no real risk.
With Parliament a doddering irrelevance and so many basic functions of government subsumed by an impenetrable Palace bureaucracy, we’re pretty close to an absolute monarchy again, actually. Hence why so much depends on the decisions reached in our shadowy, silent Versailles, which is just one big monument to royal caprice.
[quote=Why is the Empress’ Palace shuttered?]
Apparently the Empress doesn’t like light. Or sudden movements, loud noises, foreigners, treason, peaches. When you’re Empress, you can do this kind of thing.[/quote]
I’d remind everyone that when Feducci and the Princess have their wedding story, all of London just assumes that OF COURSE the Princess will be taking direct control of the Empire’s entire foreign policy and handing control of the armies and navies over to her Prince-Consort and OF COURSE said Prince-Consort will be taking London to war to plunder the Elder Continent. The slightest royal command and everyone snaps to attention and salutes. The only parts of the administration not directly controlled by the Palace have become laws unto themselves - the Admiralty, the Ministry of Public Decency, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (which are run by a Mechanical God, Mr Pages, and the Vake, respectively).
This is the central government we currently have and it’s not healthy to pretend otherwise :P
You know, just heightening the absurdity is the whole fake "constitutional" debate conjured up by Huffam. As the Princess points out, the Magna Carta doesn’t say anything about a member of the royal family running for mayor. It does however say a quite lot on the matter of the crown unjustly imprisoning its subjects. But those parts are passed over in polite silence by the entire British government. Dead letter, the whole thing is dead letter. The constitutional debate exists for no other reason then to let Londoners pretend that their government is nice and legal in its operations and that "constitutional concerns" actually matter.
.
edited by Anne Auclair on 6/29/2018
[quote=Anne Auclair]
[A]s royalty the Princess possesses an invisible divine authority that places her above ordinary human morality - only god can truly judge her conduct.[/quote]
[quote=Lady Sapho Byron]
I claim no expertise in Christian thinking … but this statement strikes me as possibly theologically unsound.[/quote]
[quote=Anne Auclair]
It isn’t, actually. One might call it outdated or controversial or just plain wrong, but it has a pretty strong theological and traditional foundation.[/quote]
The Devils are in the details. So to speak.
The Divine Right of Kings, as I understand it, applies to monarchs … not to their non-ruling offspring. One might even speculate that the Empress’ life expectancy is a … ahem … judgement on the Princess’ fitness to rule.
I also suggest that no major theological position has advocated for the existence of two moral standards, viz., one for monarchs and one for ordinary mortals. Ordinary mortals may not be able to judge monarchs, but that which does judge uses but one measure.[li][/li]
edited by Lady Sapho Byron on 6/29/2018
Anne would no doubt assert her sincere belief in the power of grandeur to transform a people, harking back to the Emperors Napoleon I and III (she’s French, after all). She’d list in exacting detail the improvements in sanitation, morality, beauty, security, and order achieved by the renovation of Paris, now the greatest city in the world. She’d repeat her belief that beautifying London would reduce its social problems by luring people away from prisoners honey and renovating decaying neighborhoods. She would also express her faith in the Royal Family and the alliance of Throne and Altar as essential to London’s continued preservation from the chaos of the Neath and the dangers of Revolution. And she’d exclaim that as royalty the Princess possesses an invisible divine authority that places her above ordinary human morality - only god can truly judge her conduct.[/quote]
Then by means do so. Caroline would be eager to answer. She would likely point out how that sort of thing ended for Napolean III. And ask again, and again, and again why she is downplaying Red Honey and it’s effects and what it could mean to have such a person in power. She would hammer the points Anne is deliberately ignoring, and what it might imply about how she really feels about the downtrodden that she is doing so. Whenever you want to type it. I am not going to respond to a sweeping and vague OOC post with specific IC points.
edited by Lady Karnstein on 6/30/2018
Because if she’s voted into office, she can bypass permit applications and the public will pay for it all.
I cannot believe Anne got us into arguing whether it is a good thing to vote for the torturer who never did a good thing in her life, but suddenly decided she needs to level a district to make art.
Which never interested her before.
Note that by art she means ‘bright things that exalt me’.
Also note again the capricious cannibal torturer thing.
I am not Dr Schlomo but I believe that Lady Auclair, a respectable and moral person, could not reconcile the idea of the sanctity of kings with what the Princess actually is, and is now taking solace in abject denial.
What I am worried about, is that we are playing along.
I’m going to cite this as evidence of my theory that the Princess’s appetites are fundamentally driven by a boring and inactive existence where, in her own mind, she has nothing better to do then pluck the wings off flies. Idle hands are the devil’s playground, as they say. Everyone either gives her everything she wants, is mortally afraid of her, or wants to sleep with her. And she’s kinda sick of it and wants to do something real, which suggests some capacity for personal growth.
We’re entirely stuck with her you know. Whatever happens, she’s going to be London’s only remaining human shaped Royal Princess, which means she’s going to be very important for years to come and Empress or Regent or defacto Ruler at some point. It seems a very questionable judgment to write her off as wholly depraved and beyond reforming, because she’s not going anywhere.
So, let’s just give her something to do and see if that makes things better. The opposition enjoy their vague warnings about how we shouldn’t give her power over us - she already has power! Lots of it, without any responsibility. So, let’s give her some responsibility for a change - a job where she has to work and deal with difficulties and do stuff that isn’t fun and accept limitations. In short, let’s make her Mayor of London, which is by all accounts a hard and unrewarding job with more expectations then actual power, and help her hold her public art’s festival, which is a legitimately good idea and something the Mayor’s office would be perfect for.
This seems a much better idea then voting for Slowcake’s surveillance state or the Contrarian’s plans to actively sabotage the city’s police force.
I think this is less she care’s about London and more that the Admiralty mothballing the fleet in order to build a giant clockwork sun means she can’t plunder far off lands and acquire all the treasures she’s seen in her dreams. Though it’s a good example about how when her personal desires intersect with a need for a functioning state, she’s a powerful champion of British interests. Which is kind of Monarchy in a nutshell - the ruler treating the nation as their personal property and consequently trying to increase its value out of self-interest.
[quote=Lady Karnstein]Then by means do so. Caroline would be eager to answer. She would likely point out how that sort of thing ended for Napolean III. And ask again, and again, and again why she is downplaying Red Honey and it’s effects and what it could mean to have such a person in power. She would hammer the points Anne is deliberately ignoring, and what it might imply about how she really feels about the downtrodden that she is doing so. Whenever you want to type it. I am not going to respond to a sweeping and vague OOC post with specific IC points.
edited by Lady Karnstein on 6/30/2018[/quote]
We should probably discuss things over dinner.
edited by Anne Auclair on 7/1/2018
[quote=Anne Auclair]
This is the central government we currently have and it’s not healthy to pretend otherwise :P
You know, just heightening the absurdity is the whole fake "constitutional" debate conjured up by Huffam. As the Princess points out, the Magna Carta doesn’t say anything about a member of the royal family running for mayor. It does however say a quite lot on the matter of the crown unjustly imprisoning its subjects. But those parts are passed over in polite silence by the entire British government. Dead letter, the whole thing is dead letter. The constitutional debate exists for no other reason then to let Londoners pretend that their government is nice and legal in its operations and that "constitutional concerns" actually matter.[/quote]
All right then, let’s talk about what sort of government we really have. Parliament may be weaker, making the Crown relatively strong, but the Crown is weak too. And so, of course, is the Mayor. That’s because London is really ruled by the Masters, and we all know it.
And how did this happen? Because the Traitor Empress explicitly signed away whatever rights she had to London! Like Esau (since you mentioned Biblical precedent before) she sold her birthright for a pittance, and she will not get it back. Today, if she rules, it’s not by the mandate of God, but by the mandate of the Masters.
The Masters did to London just what the English did to peoples they colonized all over the world. Gather a bit of intelligence, find out who’s nominally in charge. Suborn that person and make them a puppet ruler. Allow the locals to keep their quaint customs so long as they don’t interfere with the interests of the colonizers.
Under such a system, those who prosper are those who adapt to the ways of the colonizers. By, in this case, advancing their Notability through Slowcake’s little book, running errands for the Masters, trading away pieces of out native identity to the Bazaar for power. Arguably, what being a PoSI means is being someone who has adapted to the ways of the colonizers and become useful to them.
The office of Mayor may not be much, but it is thing of and for Londoners. It’s a thing of ours, that they haven’t taken away from us yet, and that we can use to defend ourselves. You have it backwards. It’s not that we should give up on being a republic because we’ve lost so much; it’s that the more we lose, the more we have to fight for what’s left of our self-government. As Montesquieu tells us, the animating virtue of a Republic is public civic virtue. The more Londoners act like elected office matters, the more it will matter. And that means using the office to promote the interests of Londoners - to fight for us, no matter how difficult that is. Sinning Jenny did that, and her successes were limited, but there’s value in having a mayor fighting the good fight. London would have been better off last year if we’d elected the DTC - who, despite her flaws, has the interests of Londoners at heart - or the Detective, who at least had an interest in undermining the Masters’ control - rather than the most amusing clown.
Now you so despise the office of Mayor that you propose using it as a safe place to store the very worst of Londoners, in the hope that she’ll do less harm in office than out of it? No. That’s giving up, on republicanism, on London, on the human race.*
We ought to elect someone who represents Londoners, who will work to preserve our identity and weaken the Masters’ grip on the city. Mr. Slowcake, of course, represents another foreign power which is allied with the Masters, and proposes a reorganization of London which will serve that power’s interests rather than our own. The Princess has traded away more of her humanity than any of us, in exchange for power and pleasure. Her platform is at best shallow and inoffensive to the Masters, and at worst will callously destroy the homes and lives of thousands of London’s poorest and most helpless. The Jovial Contrarian is full of contradictions, but there is a common thread in his two opposite positions: fighting back against the alien and inimical powers that hold London in their thrall. He is the only candidate who deserves your vote.