Thats actually a fairly profound summary of the split in many ways. From our perspective (old-timers mainly) we'd see that when Stim gave up the PR side you were losing half your weaponry as anarchists and simply becoming thugs rather than revolutionaries.
And to a large degree, I think that was the intention of our original RP. If SF are the revolutionaries, we're the nasty bastards that broke off from the revolution we viewed as too delicate for our tastes, cast aside the RoE and started shooting everything we saw as wrong with the world--namely, just about everything that didn't join us. Think of it perhaps in terms of Qutb's writings that provided Al-Qaeda with a "loophole" justifying killing other Muslims despite it being against the Koran. That sort of thing.
Would I prefer SF to be a 400 man alliance with a supercapital fleet fleet that was capable of hot-dropping the heck out of Evoke/Ewoks and the Goon renters? Abstractly sure I would.
But would I be able to guarentee the discipline of engagement ideology and communications standards and general intellectual quality of the organization then? Its doubtful.
Nevermind making yourself a target. 400 is a small fish these days, and 400 with a supercapital fleet has a target on their back. Take it from someone in a ~260 man alliance with supercapitals that has hotdropped Goon pets.
Would 400 people actually "get" the idealism of the roleplay we cherish in this game and see themselves as anarchist revolutionaries seeking freespace liberation?
Almost certainly not.
Absolutely not, and this is where another facet of at least my personal take on STUGH comes into play. As I see things, we don't care if our rank and file can recite the manifesto or at the end of the day even go home and care about it. They fight for it in space whether they care about it or not, and are on our side. Mercenaries to a degree, though we don't pay them in anything but blood and the loot and spoils of war.
But I do think your lack of politics has weakened you in terms of influence in Eve as a whole in turn.
And at the end of the day, I don't think we're really after influencing EVE as a whole. Even from an IC perspective, you could say we look at it as a fairly insurmountable task, but one we're going to dedicate our time to because we wouldn't want it any other way. We don't have any delusions of grandeur or expectations that we will ever make headline news in EVE, though once in a blue moon we might cause a few ripples in the pond. And honestly, it's probably better that way. If we were making headlines, we'd be a target.
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Jesus christ people. Wow. What is it about SF-related threads that bring all the boys to the yard? I haven't had that many replies while typing a post since the Gorion RP Rape thread on Chatsubo (I still read through that gem once in a while, and Gorion still gets shit for it about once a week).