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[Seriphyn]

I put 3D in quotation marks as to not sound like a dick towards characters that might be insinuated to have more 2D political viewpoints.

Basically, I'm struggling to find a term to describe Seriphyn's political beliefs (if a single term would even be possible). He is not a Hawk in the sense that he generally sees war and violence as tragic and a breakdown of communication (which I feel would fit a Gallente quite well), as opposed to believing it an opportunity to spread the Federation far and wide. He may actually have more of a leaning towards Dove, as he is not averse to cultural warfare, and does not believe taking a life to be acceptable in any instance (with exception, such as Sansha, which he would gladly fight and justified as 'mercy-killing'. He would also not blink an eye in killing someone who has voluntarily signed up to Nation, either, viewing them as sick megalomaniacs).

As I am IRL, he is very critical of one-sided statements, or statements that do not show the whole picture. He is not completely cynical, however. Seriphyn would look you in the eye and say that the Federation is the best hope for a unified human government in the known universe, citing the progress/achievements that the Fed has made so far. He also cites the alternatives, mainly the Amarr Empire, while noting that the Minmatar and Caldari states are insular, lacking a world view and obsessed with historical matters. He recognizes that democracy is not organic of all cultures, but also cites that the Federation has enough constitutional leeway to allow cultures to take a natural form of democracy according to their social constructs (eg. Jin-Mei democracy...they only elect members of the upper castes perhaps?).

He is a "realist" and is very much aware of the Federation's flaws and faults, but also seeks to provide a reasoning as to why this is the case, why this exists, whether it is even a fault to begin with, and perhaps trying to justify it to other cultures that, what they see as a fault, is merely a facet of the Federation. For example, he is not in denial/a revisionist about what the early Fed did to Caldari Prime, and he does agree this was wrong, but unexpected when you take the term "extremist" or "exceptionalist" into account. I suppose the idea is that, as a soldier of democracy (and where an educated populace is key to a democracy), he seeks to take an objective approach, while still being partial to the Federation.

How do you describe this? It's not like Patriot/Practical/Liberal, where the Caldari State practices indoctrination over education, so it's far easier to have a two-dimensional view...but in the Federation, which would stimulate abstract and critical thinking...it's not as simple as "hawks versus doves".

Feel free to take a general approach to the topic as well.

[Lyn Farel]

Interesting to see your description of Seriphyn's ideals. Not that far from what I suspected, so I believe that the character is not a... 2 dimentional one, actually.

Now then, playing myself a character that is (almost), not affiliated to any cultural faction, also gifted with detachement, it is normal for me to say that your character is not so easy to describe by an archetype "Hawk, Dove, etc". When the character in question starts to share idealogical bits taken here and there, you either have to invent a whole new term describing his/her views, which is not always easy (or just impossible). Sometimes the only thing you can say is the same thing you did : "he is more close to a dove because [...] but shares some of the hawk views as well." Somewhere I might even say that character perfectly responding to these archetypes are a minority, mostly members of political parties and engaged people, to my opinion. Most people will oscillate between different mindsets in a more granular way.

Regarding your last paragraph, though, I find your view of the caldari education a little biased. At the risk of getting (this early in the thread !) a godwin point, I am not sure that the Caldari society have things like the Deutsches Jungvolk to indoctrinate their youth... Unless you refer to a "different" education being "indoctrination".

[Seriphyn]

Thanks for the post, Lyn.

To quickly address your point about Caldari education before the thread has a chance of derailing, more referring to the fact that you don't want to educate a Caldari child the same way you do in the Federation. If you make them a critical/abstract thinker, there is a greater chance they will be dissentful of the current established order, which would be a bad thing for a highly structured State. You want to "train" (perhaps indoctrinate is a bad word) a citizen to follow the order, not give them the intellectual tools to potentially challenge it.

[Gottii]

Im not sure you will find a viable political label, namely because political labels are, intentionally, mostly rather broad and widespread.   

You're not going to find an exact match for any individuals specific ideals.  Gottii certainly disagrees with many of his fellow EM pilots views of how they define the Tribes and the Republic for instance, but he realizes he agrees with EM's policies enough that he will abide by them.  Even "true believers" often argue about what the "true" dogma or doctrine is (which they follow of course).

If you cant find a perfect title, congratulations, you created a nuanced character.  Called what he follows "Seriphynism" if you need a perfect title.   To create or find a political party that reflected everything Seri believed it would likely come off quite odd.

[Z.Sinraali]

To create or find a political party that reflected everything Seri believed it would likely come off quite odd.

Unless he created and lead it. Then it would be perfectly in character.

[Matariki Rain]

He recognizes that democracy is not organic of all cultures, but also cites that the Federation has enough constitutional leeway to allow cultures to take a natural form of democracy according to their social constructs (eg. Jin-Mei democracy...they only elect members of the upper castes perhaps?).

My initial response to this was "Nuh-uh".

My considered response, factoring in realpolitik and various sensitivities and such.... is still basically "Nuh-uh".

So let's talk...

Proposition 1: That membership in the Federation requires all member states to conduct free elections, with full adult franchise, for certain positions or on certain matters.

Proposition 2: That not all Federation states or cultures find this "natural", but that they can all work out ways around it that meet the technical requirements while still (mostly) retaining any cultural elements they particularly wish to retain.

[Seriphyn]

I did actually mean to say that it was an unwritten cultural rule, that Jin-Mei countries/provinces/states only elect Sang Do or Saan Go out of habit. Same with Intaki having a tendency to elect those with lots of Rebirths.

[Matariki Rain]

Yeah, I think that's about where we overlap.

[Bastian Valoron]

A couple of general comments.

To make it easier to keep emotional distance, it's good to select viewpoints which you are not particularly fond of. When other players have interactions with you, they want to be free to insult, disagree and flirt with your character, without having to worry about the player. If it's not clear which one is which, things get difficult.

Take a look at your character's history and identify the important events and connections which might affect his viewpoints. For instance, maybe you have been in the military, lost your wife, have a daughter, or have a background in Jin-Mei culture? To keep your character easy to play for you and for others, try to keep it coherent. A few contradictions can be interesting but too many makes it easy to lose direction and harder for other players to know what they are dealing with.

[Matariki Rain]

To make it easier to keep emotional distance, it's good to select viewpoints which you are not particularly fond of. When other players have interactions with you, they want to be free to insult, disagree and flirt with your character, without having to worry about the player. If it's not clear which one is which, things get difficult.

Is "keeping emotional distance" the first priority in your roleplay?

I'm on board with exploring viewpoints that are deeply unlike you... in short-term roleplay. Great stuff, and it can be powerful and informative. For long-term work I think you need something that engages you and is a personality you're okay spending lots of time in whether or not it's "like" you. It's highly likely that you'll end up taking some aspects of it home with you at some point, so make that worthwhile.

(I'm not looking here for the responses by those who say "I play something completely opposed to what I believe and I've never had issues with bleed-through". Yeah, yeah: nice for you.)

[Bastian Valoron]

Is "keeping emotional distance" the first priority in your roleplay?

It depends what is meant by emotional distance. It's good when a character grows into you and you no longer need to do research or otherwise ponder how they should actually act. However, I don't enjoy when an interaction turns into a (()) disagreement and yes I consider it to be important to make a difference between doing a role and discussing for real.

[Alain Kinsella]

In my case (a possible Aspie) I find it important to be emotionally bonded to my characters, usually to the extent that they are mirrors into aspects of my RL soul.

The 'bleed-through' ends up severe every time I've done longer-term RP (to the point that I intentionally killed off one conflicting character I created, after RPing him into a corner).  So its better for me to just start with something I can do comfortably and develop from there.

Besides, I've discovered this method has helped me develop as a RL person.  I cringe when I think how insular I was back in 1992, when I started with the RoleMaster group (that ran constantly until about two years ago).  I really am a different person from back then, and I can't thank that gaming group enough for helping me with the transformation, in such a safe setting.