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Canadian Star Federation Empire Thread
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Unfortunately, I'm at work and gameless. 
          
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#227
by Citizen Sirian - 2/13/2004 4:03:20 PM
| Let's just say, like our countries, we disagree. |
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Unfortunate to leave it there, in my view, but I will honor your request, Paguma, after some final remarks to damoose.
| Excuse me? Did I read correctly? "I'm very sorry to see that it [anti-Americanism] has found a home in Canada" I take offense! I expect an apology. |
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This all began over the joke about whom God gave the Canadians for neighbors. I took offense at that. I found it to be anti-American. It was "only a joke", but I felt it had an ugly edge behind it. I did not demand an apology, but I did want to offer a more positive view of America. I was asked to explain our upset with your leadership. I tried. I explained in detail the rationale of our policy. You can be sure that your upsets with our leadership are at least as vague and uninformed as my upsets with your leadership. That was the whole point of conversing, to become more informed. Instead, you have blown up in a huff, and we shall go no farther.
I tried to reach past the offense you gave and find understanding. That's what all this has been about, not being happy to let that stupid joke sit unchallenged. Brothers work out their problems, while mere neighbors instead leave one another alone and stay out of each other's business. Perhaps we are not any longer as close as we would like to believe, if even this level of discussion is unwelcome.
Did you even consider that that joke might not be received in good humor? You see nothing that you have to apologize for, and you are not interested in answering my issues, but only complaining about where I've given offense in return. So that's where it shall stand. Both parties offended, and farther apart than when this started.
I'm sorry that my effort at communication failed. Since I became uncomfortable in your thread after that joke, and now you are uncomfortable with me, it is best if I withdraw entirely from your thread. In this, I speak only for myself, not the RB empire. Good day.
- Sirian
    
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Jedi mind tricks are mighty, beware
 
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Do they affect the undead? hmmmm Force Lightning does..   
  
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#235
by Citizen Sirian - 2/14/2004 1:25:25 AM
| There has been no mention in this thread I can find (prior to you last post) about the joke about whom God gave the Canadians for neighbours |
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If I remember correctly, it was not posted by a member of your empire. Instead, a certain other empire with harder feelings toward things American was doing some of its rabble rousing. (See the post directly after my previous post). A number of folks from that group have taken an active dislike to me. I did not blame you for the joke, or any of their actions, but it took place in your thread and sparked the ensuing discussions about relations between America and Canada.
| So if this is the underlying motive for the change in the tone of your posts then why didn't you say so? |
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This is not the reason for the change in the tone of my posts. It was the reason I started on this topic, though. And with each additional exchange without a meeting of the minds, without an understanding being reached, I reached deeper in search of the connection.
Paguma's comments about my views not understanding Chretien are surely correct. One problem is, when I went searching for the quotes, I pulled up about half a dozen opinion pieces by Canadians that were ALL more offputting than the quotes I went looking for. That has nothing directly to do with the folks here, except that Paguma's challenge to provide a specific quote is what sent me on that hunt. Not one of the pages I turned up was at all sympathetic to the American point of view. I linked two of them. Some were so wild, so distrustful and hostile, they were completely detached from reality. The impression that left for me is that either there are not many Canadians who do understand and empathize with America's concerns these days, or if there are, they are a silent faction.
These are all things contributing to perceptions of Canada from a distance. I actually care about politics and try to stay informed. Imagine what Americans who aren't plugged in are thinking, the ones who hear only the most hyped bits that saturate the news.
The one encouraging thing I read on that search was one of the news accounts about the specific interview involved with the quote I posted, where the minority opposition party was alarmed and outraged at the prime minister's remarks and how they would affect relations with the USA. That let me realize that Canada is divided on these issues just as we are, except the majority is leaning the other way for you than it does for us.
| So let me explain to you the underlying message I read from your posts. |
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There are no messages between the lines. You will have to get to know me a lot better before I would trust you enough to write anything cute or sly. That is why my posts are so long. I take pains to say it all right out in the open. If you want to understand my views, strive not to add to them or rephrase them or be suspicious of what is left unsaid. Instead take them at face value only.
| The tone of your posts went from gee I'm curious as to how we are different to you don't agree with the way we are dealing the terrorist threat in the world therefore you must be Anti-American with nary a stop in between |
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Hardly. This is not an accurate summation of my remarks, and there were plenty of stops in between.
I never said anything remotely close to your assertion about not being able to understand because you weren't the ones attacked. What is clear is that you do not YET understand enough about that to understand our motives and policies, but if I didn't believe you were capable of understanding, I would not bother to try to explain it. The key point is, our Iraq decisions are inseparable from the 9-11 fallout, yet your views do not seem to take this into account.
I don't want to belabor this here, since your esteemed Emperor has asked me to take all weighty commentary elsewhere. If you specifically wish to continue the conversation, I would be happy to do so in RB territory. Come seek me out there.
| from my vantage point you attacked without warning and without provocation. |
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I didn't attack anybody. Paguma wondered why some Americans are upset with Canada, why some believe you have not been with us on the important things, the things that count most. He cited several examples of Canadian cooperation, then mentioned the one area where you did not support us. Well, TO US, that one area is a lot more important than you are grasping. I tried to explain why. Paguma still didn't get it, and that was frustrating. His bewilderment was an echo of what struck a nerve from Chretien's remarks, the exact same point of misunderstanding.
| If you are truly trying to communicate then it is your responsibility to speak in a language I will 'hear' and to ensure I truly 'understand' your meaning. |
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No sarcasm intended in this remark: I'm using English. What part of my remarks do not translate for you? What other language could I use? This is the only one I speak fluently. If you are expecting me to know your idioms and colloquialisms and local slang, you are expecting too much.
I did not say anything that required you to know about my upset with that joke. I only brought it up to show you that the misunderstandings go both ways, and therefore, the patience must also go both ways, and to show you that I was already exercising some patience, therefore I was acting in good faith the whole time.
| It's not good enough to come back later and say opps, the real reason I’m upset is… You have to get it as close to right the first time as possible. |
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The joke isn't the issue. It's what the joke reveals, a rift in understanding. I am, and have been, addressing what matters to me. If I wanted an apology, I would have asked for it. Again, you are not taking my remarks at face value. You chose to say I had crossed a line, but Paguma invited me across that line with his question. Now you can't have it both ways. Either I answer, or I do not. That you don't like part of the answer is understandable, but since the question was asking why we don't like some of your decisions and statements, I expected that you could handle a frank reply. Otherwise we should not even be trying to communicate on this subject.
And that's where Paguma has arrived. I don't know where else he thinks we ought to converse, since we don't have any other place where we cross paths, but I appreciate his request and will honor it.
I don't do small talk. Doesn't fit me. I'm not a chatty type. I'm very quiet in person, except among friends. A few say-nothing posts is about my limit. The DHABB joke, the snack joke, the make believe banter between empires... That's all fine, and cute, for a while. To me, that stuff runs its course quickly, though, and then either the topics move to something more meaty, or I'll grow bored and disappear. With my friends, I converse. I talk about a wide range of topics. That's just me. That's how I act friendly. If I come to your thread and talk, it means I like you folks. Note the number of empires where I stop in and chat, and the number where you don't see me much or at all. I choose my people carefully. If people don't like my style, then they won't fit with me at all, and I won't fit with them.
I'm gettin a bit of a vibe here now: (California surfer's voice) "hey dude, don't be such a downer, man. Let's party." (/Cali surfer voice). Uh, I'm not really the party type. Stand around BSing about nothing and drink to get drunk? Not my thing. I get turned on by tuning in, not tuning out. This seemed like a place that could embrace a little intensity, but I've exceeded the quotient. Sorry about that. I can't really shut down my intensity level. I live that intense all of the time. I'm an intense sort of guy. Only so many folks can mesh with that, so no hard feelings. But if my regular level of intensity is not welcome, then I had best leave and seek out places where I can comfortably be myself without jarring anybody's senses.
| While I very much appreciate 'blunt', 'straight forward' speech (and practice this myself), the fact is that we have not interacted/spoken enough to allow for the inevitable mis-understandings that occur during the beginning stages of any relationship. |
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Yes. And yet the whole intensity thing is also symbolic of our two cultures. I'm not exactly a typical American specimen, but... I think it's fair to say that America is a much more intense culture than Canada, and that is also part of our misunderstanding. We get intense about everything, and thus it may be hard for you to differentiate between our "usual" level of intensity (which is overblown and overhyped about insignifica) and when we are worked up over things genuininely important to us.
It gets to be a "boy cried wolf" syndrome. Our media and money-grubbing advertisers dramatize everything beyond sense. The noise level drowns out everything, and nobody on the outside can tell any more what matters to us. "Oh it's the Americans again, just ignore them." Gah! What a mess we've made. Since our laws establish total freedom, we can't shut up our own folks. We just learn to tune them out. WE can sort out amongst ourselves what is important. Unfortunately, we can no longer seem to communicate that outside our borders. Our excesses have clogged the channels.
| I wrote my response over completely four times, each less ‘harsh’ than the last. And I guess it wasn’t enough. |
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Perhaps it was. I appreciate you not dumping on me with whatever your original, unedited response was. There were a few choice bits in what you did post, but you have withdrawn those and I accept your apology. It still seems that we have exceeded the house rules on intensity level, though.
| For myself I say you need not leave, nor do I get that feeling from the others active in the thread. |
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A noble sentiment. I will drop back in from time to time to wave and make a feeble attempt at small talk, to be neighborly. There's no point in sticking around for more, though, if I have to watch every sentence and avoid engaging any serious commentary. I don't do intensity-control very well, and I certainly don't at all on my leisure time. As you can tell by the RB house rules and gaming philosophy, even in my gaming I seek intensity. If that doesn't fit here, I don't fit here. No apologies necessary on that score.
- Sirian
[Message Edited]
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