I will not kiss your @$%*ing flag

[Scott of Hyperborea]

I'm going to vent verbally, but only so I don't pull a !@#$ and vent by deleting the forums instead.

Eoin and Ardashir met my friend Jonathan earlier this month. Jon loves fantasy, loves gaming, loves crazy Internet hobbies, and already knows three of us. He'd be a perfect recruit for Shireroth. After we met, Eoin and Ardy asked why I hadn't recruited him yet, and I mumbled something nonspecific, because I didn't know.

I've been thinking about it recently, and I figured it out: I am embarrassed to be associated with Shireroth by my real life friends. Not embarrassed to be a micronationalist - they already know I have weird hobbies along those lines, and I can always pass it off as some sort of "government sim game". Embarrassed to be a Shirerithian.

Underneath, Shireroth is the most vibrant and well-run community in micronations. Our system of government is one to be proud of, our community and patriotic spirit are second to none, and we have all that deep stuff like the thirty odd different cultures in the subdivisions, the long and eventful history, the slew of weird traditions surrounding stuff like Kaiserial bloodlines. We've got talent like Ari's computer skills, Nick's linguistics, Malliki's proficiency with law, Maksym's maps and graphics, Spangle's data processing work, and much more. There's not another micronation anywhere that has the level of under-the-surface riches that we've got.

But it's a bit like dating - if on the skin-deep level you're hideous, no one's ever going to look under the surface. You may be the smartest, kindest, most charming person ever, but if you're 500 lbs, never shower, and burp all the time, no one's going to come within a hundred meters of you and they're never going to find out how charming you are.

On the skin-deep level, Shireroth is a hideous abomination. Our forum is 40% less ugly than in the old Age of Malarbor, but it still looks like large chunks of it were designed by two middle school kids on an acid trip. The flag, as Malliki said, screams "twelve year old with MSPaint". Most of the names are transparently lifted from World of Warcraft - Brookshire, Goldshire, Elwynn, Khaz Modan - and trust me, people do notice.

Compare us to Victoria's website and forum. Shireroth outclasses Victoria in every dimension, but any casual observer will come away certain that Shireroth is a bunch of idiotic Warcraft-worshipping teenagers and Victoria is a decent professional organization. And the casual observers are the ones who are deciding where to immigrate, where to ally with, where to let their countries get annexed to. I can tell you right now that if I joined micronations today and spent an hour or so deciding where to go, I'd join Victoria or Antica, and not Shireroth. The next Allot or Gareth or whoever may do the same.

And it's not just about new people. It's about pride. When we log on to Shireroth during lunch break at school, and the person sitting next to us is giving a curious glance at our computer, do we have to minimize the window or can we say "Yes, this is my country, isn't it nifty?" When we're browsing Shireroth ourself, is it always in a state of half-cringe at how awful a lot of the country is, or is it with our head held high?

Those of you who only joined since the Reconsolidation don't remember what it was like back in the old days. Shireroth was sort of a pariah country, excluded from the interesting parts of the intermicronational community because people thought we were just some Warcraft-y elves-and-magic place that didn't meet the standards accepted of a real micronation. Heck, the AR Cartography Society, which nearly destroyed MCS, was formed with a subtext of "Let's make a map for respectable countries that doesn't include places like Shireroth". My proudest achievement in this country is the years I spent as MiniEx reversing this perception, and I consider myself moderately successful, but the perception keeps coming back every so often.

And if Dr. Spangle and I are right, we might be standing on the cusp of a new era of micronationalism. There are dozens of wikinations popping up - countries that are just as large as those in our sector, but based on the micronations wiki. Spangle would like to get some of those countries on the MCS Map, and I'd like to get some of them annexed by Shireroth or at least in the Commonwealth. The problem is, in determining whether Shireroth is a worthy ally, all they're going to be going on is our wiki page. I'm working on updating the text of the wiki page, but the most obvious feature of it - and the only illustration - is a big picture of our flag at the top of the page.

Shireroth's flag - like a lot of the original Shireroth - was designed by 15 year olds who liked Warcraft could barely handle MSPaint and had no knowledge of vexillology (or, apparenly, aesthetics). That's not an insult to them - they did the best with what they had. But if we insist on never changing anything about Shireroth ever, then our country is always going to look like a place for 15 year olds who like Warcraft and can barely handle MSPaint. And if that happens, if it's like that even when a lot of us are 20 and 30 years old and have different tastes and different talents than the Shirerithians of 2000, then our country is permanently crippled.

If I were God-Emperor, I would change the flag, clean up the forum colors, and rename a few of the more obviously WoW based Duchies to their Praeta equivalent. I still hold out hope of doing all this someday. But I'm starting with the flag for two reasons. One, it's the part of us that the wikinations are going to see first. And two, a flag is a symbol of a nation.

Our flag doesn't explicitly symbolize anything right now. Why is it blue? Why are there four stripes? Why are our colors red, yellow, green, brown, blue and white? No reason. But implicitly, the flag symbolizes a hell of a lot. It symbolizes the shoddy attitude that lots of Shirerithians have that says it doesn't matter if our country looks like a piece of crap. It symbolizes that if anyone makes the slightest effort improve anything, a horde of people will throw temper tantrums and start boycotting the country and spamming us with huge image signatures before even trying to talk the matter out. It symbolizes that something thrown together in ten minutes with no meaning or redeeming value whatsoever will remain in place forever because a few really loud people thing it's better for something to be old than for it to be good.

I'm not demanding we immediately adopt my new flag. Even I think the Kaiser's decree in its favor was premature. There's some concern over similarity to the Macedonian flag, and although I think it's no worse than the old one's similarity to Great Britain (and certainly not as bad as the resemblance of France/Ireland/Italy/etc. to each other) I understand the concern. I'm just demanding that we have a national dialogue to determine whether it might be possible to have a new flag, or to use a different flag in certain situations, to design that new flag, and then to vote on it in the Landsraad and accept the result. I'm demanding that when we have to make important decisions like this, we do it through a process, and not by everyone suddenly starting a civil war and spamming big images and making vague threats and deciding to boycott the country. And if, after a long discussion, everyone decides the old flag is better than any proposed redesigns, I'll accept that.

If we can't handle this in a reasonable way that reflects the opinions of the Shirerithian people and nobility, then for the rest of Shireroth's history, the flag, whatever it may be, will symbolize one more thing: that we are a country of twelve year olds; not because we have a twelve year old's graphic skills, but because we have twelve year olds' emotional maturity.

[Ryan]

I am embarrassed to show Shireroth off to my friends and family more so because of the way people act here than anything relating to the forum or graphics. Victoria's website is very nice. But their forum doesn't jazz me up at all. It's very bland IMO. Sure we have plenty of rough edges that need smoothing, but I don't think we're as bad as you say. This hobby has always been a touchy subject with people - even back in the day of the serious secessionists - those guys were looked at like REAL weirdos (and still are).

One answer to the problem may be to establish a Shirerithian vexillological society so that we can start determining symbolism that exists within current flags, arms, and so forth. And from that foundation we can improve on designs and develop new symbols - as needed - that include proper symbolism and imagery.

While I think the whole flag issue could be handled both better and differently, I do, however agree with you about the immaturity of people here. It was one of the reasons I stayed away from Shireroth for so long. I think that in itself is the single largest obstacle for this country to overcome.

[Malliki Tosha]

I have had friends laugh at the forums because of the strange color layout.

[Ari Rahikkala]

Our flag doesn't explicitly symbolize anything right now. Why is it blue? Why are there four stripes? Why are our colors red, yellow, green, brown, blue and white? No reason.

I don't recall this being entirely true. It's been forever, though, so I'd only give this a 60%-70% chance of being somewhat accurate, but I seem to remember that Erik once said he did originally develop the flag with colour symbolisms in mind. It's just that he forgot what they were. In any case I think the flag is from a good bit before the Seventh Republic, so I doubt it symbolises the nature of Shireroth as it eventually ended up as.

I suppose this would be a good time to mention that I have a very personal, visceral, long-standing feeling of hate and embarrassment toward the current flag of Shireroth. I briefly considered an Erik-style honest "no MiniInt services for you" -style rebellion in protest against Jonas deciding not to make Scott's flag official after all, but, well, if Scott wants to be all reasonable and compromising about it I guess we can just let Erik be the ranting old guy together.

I'd like to get some of them annexed by Shireroth or at least in the Commonwealth

I'm not sure I appreciate you seeming to consider Commonwealth membership to be Shireroth annexation lite...

[Ryan]

We could always have a "Design a New Flag" contest.

[Cho'Gall]

Whats wrong with Warcraft?

[Scott of Hyperborea]

Nothing's wrong with Warcraft, just like nothing's wrong with Darth Vader. But I think extreme's Vader-themed micronation is a bad idea, and I think having Shireroth broadcast being Warcraft themed is a bad idea.

We may have some Warcraft themed culture in a few subdivisions, but the country as a whole is not officially about Warcraft and I want to make sure people visiting the site know that. It also looks unprofessional to rip off place names and pictures and such from other people.

Apologies for the whole TONE OF VICIOUS ANGER in the post above, though, especially if you like Warcraft.

[Malliki Tosha]

Why not let those that want to design suggestions for a new flag so we have some choices? I would also like to see suggestions for a new forum color scheme.

[Scott of Hyperborea]

The color work would take a long time to get right and require lots of help from eg Ari.

BUT, I just figured out something that might help us reach a compromise on the flag issue: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flags_whos ... he_obverse

[Harvey Steffke]

So much hate, Scott.

Calm down and stop thinking you're the one person that cares about Shireroth and labellings everyone else as obtrusive roadblocks just getting in the way of the process for the hell of it. At this point in our friendship I'd almost take a bullet for you, but if there's one thing that absolutely drives me crazy about you, it's the fact that you always assume you're the single person on the side of goodness and righteousness and logic and that everyone else is stupid and evil and has no idea what they're doing.

I myself have said on many occasions that I am interested in changing the flag. When Spangle showed me a list of micronational flags and asked me to narrow down the list and suggest removal of some that I didn't like for whatever reason, almost my first choice was Shireroth's flag because it's that bad, but of course Shireroth being what it is made its removal from the list impossible. I said it in #micronations a few days before you revealed your flag, making me wonder if what I said is in some small way the cause of all this. I am still interested in changing the flag, but not to that, and not in this way, and not nearly this lightly.

First, the flag design you proposed is a little unsettling visually. That vertigo thing I said is true. It's a bit uncomfortable to look at. Maybe it's the vanishing point theme and the vivid colors, I'm not sure, but either way, not off to an amazing start. Next, and this was a deal breaker here, it's just a freaking rip off of another country's flag! Why in the hell did you think that would be a positive characteristic? If anything, it shows an even greater lack of creativity and more willingness to rip off things like WarCraft! And lastly, the Kaiseral decree that put the flag into place without consulting the nation was the last straw. You yourself know that was a bad move.

We're only realistically going to get one change to change our flag ever. It will weaken the nation symbolically to change it period, but I am with you that the old flag is weak. If we're going to change the flag (again, an action I do not oppose blindly) then we should be changing to the best damn flag micronationalism has ever seen and one that the whole nation, or at least a sizable majority, should support. We shouldn't take the first, crude effort that has many problems and was blatantly stolen from someone else and making it official by unsupported decree.

Regarding the rebellion, this was mostly my idea. If you want to blame someone, blame me. The rebellion is, in essence, a strike. We're refusing to do our jobs and holding signs that support our positions, but we threaten nobody or offer no threats of harm in the future. I'm willing to overlook certain insults of your rant because you were emotionally moved, but if you believe that a strike shows the emotional maturity of twelve year olds, then there is no way to win with you. What other way IS there in this country to be heard, really heard, than this?

Our public image is another topic altogether and is deserving of its own debate separate from simply discussing the flag. I did learn something about public image lately though - no matter what sort of clothing you wear and how you try to cushion your words, you're still you underneath it all. If we change our flag and forum colors and make everything respectable and boring, the nation would still have a certain zany, unruly, rebellious, fantasy quality to it that people would find out about sooner or later. We can't hide from ourselves.

But... here's the thing. Do we even NEED to? Shireroth is NOT in decline. As Malarbor recently announced, we have the highest posts per day in all of micronationalism, including Lovely! We annexed two new territories recently. There's something of a cultural Renaissance emerging, with Ryan's story and Gman's MASS info and Gryphon's language project. We host the SC, which hasn't been doing much lately, but is seen as many people as one of the few non-stupid YAMOs ever. People are coming to Shireroth and, on the whole, they're not leaving. Maybe if Hari Seldon were here he could tell us that this is all superficial and the tree looks strongest before the blast that shatters it and reveals the rot within, but lacking someone who can predict the future I have to use my own best judgment. And my judgement tells me that, while we should be always preparing for the future and re-examining our methods, if there's a new paradigm of micronations coming, basically every other nation in the hobby will have to confront it and adapt or die before Shireroth does. You've been too busy feeling sorry for yourself lately to see it apparently, but on the whole, the nation is doing really well.

So no, I don't like your proposed flag design. I like certain aspects, such as reducing the colors and the birthday blue encoding (that's very clever) but we're going to have do better if we want to officially change things. I still open that avenue, if there is any way we can cooperate. With the flag decree vetoed, the rebellion's cause is lost in fact if not in writing (I haven't read the rebellion thread to see if Erik is continuing, but at least my heart it out of it) so that's mostly that. All in all, despite the friction, I'd call the rebellion an unqualified success - at least we got someone to give a damn about this and stop full speeding ahead without discussing it first. Sorry you kind of had to be the victim Scott, but maybe in retrospect later you'll see that you had it coming.

[Scott of Hyperborea]

Whoa...did you just admit you're my friend? Cool!

As for the rest...I think we're at cross purposes. Like I said, I acknowledge your complaint about my design, and it's valid. I acknowledge that there are lots of people other than me who want the flag changed. And I acknowledge that the Kaiser shouldn't have decreed it unilaterally.

But as far as I can tell, the Kaiser backed down because he was asked to, not because of the revolt. And a few people eg Erik are afaik revolting because they don't want the flag changed, ever.

I agree that we're doing well. I just think a time like this, when we've got loads of resources at our disposal, is a time to think about how we could be making Shireroth even better. You know I'd never go for something as bland as Victoria. I want...something that's as impressive a testament to Shirerithian culture as Victoria's site and board are a testament to Victorian culture. I approve of their high quality, not of the particular look that they've given such a high quality to.

I'm going to stand by my mindless anger. If you don't want to keep the old flag, and you think making the nation look nicer is not in principle a bad idea, and if you think talking problems out is a better solution than rebellions and boycotts, then the mindless anger isn't aimed at you.

Urge to kill...fading. Let's keep the old flag as the obverse, set up a design contest for the reverse, and say everyone can choose whether to show the obverse or the reverse depending on the situation.

[Harvey Steffke]

I would say Kaiser Leto III is a man of some great sense, acting as he did with the timeliness that he did it. I don't want to get into the particulars in public because they may be disturbing - we'll talk later about it on the chat, if you'd like.

I don't know what you mean about obverse and reverse, but if it means some sort of method of working together to come up with a better flag design that the country can support as a whole, then I'm on board.

[Erik Mortis]

I will not respond.

[Ari Rahikkala]

Responding is the mind killer.

[Malliki Tosha]

I'm shocked Erik. Obverse and reverse means front and back. I do not support having essentially two flags. This needs to be discussed in depth, and when a decision comes, it should be by a near unanimous Landsraad vote as well as a decree.

[Ari Rahikkala]

Agreed on the not-having-two-flags business with Mike. I would approve of having an obverse and reverse side that are designed together and work as a whole. That would be an interesting and unique-ish aesthetic choice. Putting two different images on different sides of the flag because we can't decide what the flag should look like would be too silly even for Shireroth.

[Malliki Tosha]

The only macronational national flag that has different sides is the flag of Paraguay, but the only difference is the seal. I would approve of the same basic design on both sides, but with a different charge or something.