THe real OFFICIAL poll: Bill of Rights

civman2000 · July 21, 2002, 08:41

Vote yes or no for each clause. All clauses with 2/3 for yes will be included in amendment. Poll closes 7/26 (5 days).

I wrote most of this, but some is taken from proposals by Togas and Sirotnikov (I want to give them credit!).

Clause 1: No person shall be denied the right to become a citizen of Apolytonia.

Clause 2: No citizen shall ever be denied the right to vote in any poll.

Clause 3: Free speech shall not be abridged unless it violates apolyton rules.

Clause 4: No one shall be banned permanently from participating in the democracy game, excluding those who are permanently banned from apolyton. Note that people may still be banned for any amount of tiem, as long as it is not permanent.

Clause 5: THe right to associate into any form of organization shall not be denied.

Clause 6: No citizen may be punished in any way without due process of law.

Clause 7: No president shall ever use a version of the game which is not available to all players.

Clause 8: THe government may not knowingly hide information or give false information to the people.

Kuciwalker · July 21, 2002, 09:10

Ok, I am seriously pissed. It still won't let me vote. I'm going to send a PM to Ming. Anyway, here is how I would have voted: 1 yes 2 yes 3 yes 4 yes 5 no 6 yes 7 no 8 yes.

civman2000 · July 21, 2002, 09:12

if any of them are especially close your votes will be taken into account.

Harovan · July 21, 2002, 10:09

8x No

Epistax · July 21, 2002, 13:32

i voted banana AND i voted in each right. Does that make me special?

5-- no. There could be an association with the purpose of splintering off the game into two groups, for instance.

7-- I voted yes, but kinda wish I could take it back. The president can use a different version than others providing that the output is the same. This will probably never come up, but the wording is bad.

Sheik · July 21, 2002, 13:35

Yes to all!

Jonny · July 21, 2002, 14:38

I would vote yes to all, but I can't vote!

MrWhereItsAt · July 21, 2002, 15:56

Guys, there is a thread or two about voting problems in the Community forum - I'm too lazy to find it for you though.

I can't vote first time either - but I have found if I go back to the thread and vote again, it works this time around.

Spiffor · July 21, 2002, 19:55

1. Yes. We want to share the fun with every interested people !
2. Yes. Provided we can (temporarily) ban someone from citizenship

3. No. It should say : "unless it violates rules of Apolytonia". I'll explain why :
In all cultures/civilizations/communities, there are some things people can't say without getting a sanction (it could be death penalty for insulting the king, it could be angry looks for being rude... anyways, for a sociologist, there are taboos in every human groups).
Let's face it, taboos DO hinder human freedom of speech. When the law doesn't punish their transgression, the society does (just imagine what would become of someone wearing an "I love Ben Laden" T-shirt in NY).
In our young Democracy Game, we have specific taboos, who have nothing to do with the rest of Apolyton forums. The best example is playing ahead and tell the future : ask most non DemoGamers, they'll spontaneously ask why it's bad. By forbidding soemone to tell the results of his playing ahead, we actually hinder his freedom of speech.
As time will pass by, we'll develop new taboos, like any society / community. If we don't want some blind sanctions for those who transgress the taboos, we need to stop this "absolute freedom of speech" hypocrisy. If we do this, our justice and laws will exert a fair and even punishment, rather than letting the populace do the dirty job.
(I insist : look closely at social relations, and you'll see that even politeness is a limitation to freedom of speech, albeit not a legal one)

4. Yes. We should forbid mistakes and always give second chances. However, we should have very long banning periods for those who act like jerks for the sake of it.

5. Yes. Otherwise, this is not a democracy.

6. Abstain. Our newborn law can't prevent everything (esp. things about breaking taboos, see above). If our law has ways to punish retractively (meaning a new law can apply for crimes before it was made), then my vote would be yes. But if not, well, our law cannot prevent everything.

7. Abstain. If only an extremely tiny minority (say 1-2 people) can't play with the new version, I say we could continue. Esp. since very few people attend turnchats, and play along. Most citizens rely on minister's feedback, or reporters, to live the game (IMO).

8. Yes. The government shall serve the people of Apolytonia, not the other way around. If we lose this sight, we aren't a democracy anymore.

GodKing · July 22, 2002, 09:15

I am nervious about this whole idea....
but I'll vote in favor anyways.

UnOrthOdOx · July 22, 2002, 13:45

Quote:

Originally posted by MrWhereItsAt
Guys, there is a thread or two about voting problems in the Community forum - I'm too lazy to find it for you though.

I can't vote first time either - but I have found if I go back to the thread and vote again, it works this time around.

I am pretty convinced it is an AOL problem, as I have never had trouble using anything else. Perhaps it has to do with thier ip's, perhaps the way it handles cookies, I don't know, but voting is spotty when I use it, but perfect when I use other isp's.

civman2000 · July 23, 2002, 21:16

bump...so far all clauses except 4 and 7 are passing.

jdd2007 · July 23, 2002, 21:33

the most important and controversial amendment is missing. what happened to

Quote:

5. No one shall be denied the right to post an unofficial poll, unless it violates apolyton rules, is off topic, or it is redundant with a pre-existing thread.

?

[from the old bill of rights thread]

we should at least vote on it. it is by far the most important one, but you didnt put it into the poll

jdd2007 · July 23, 2002, 21:42

because i dont think we ever had an official poll for it

Timeline · July 23, 2002, 22:55

According to your own rules civman you must count the abstain percent against every one of your "options".

Kinda crazy huh?

civman2000 · July 24, 2002, 08:33

jdd: I think that is covered in freedom of speech.

Timeline: Not so. Everything is based on how many votes the "yes" options get, that is all that really matters. IIRC, you were the one that made me pointlessly also have no options. If someone votes abstain AND votes yes for all the options, the abstain is really banana and they're jokingly voting for it. If they don't vote at all in any option they actually are abstaining, and the vote count is increased by one, so abstains are counted by just looking at the yes votes.

Harovan · July 24, 2002, 10:54

This poll is ridiculous. 39 voters so far, and if Civman wouldn't bump it permanently, it would be already hidden at page 5. Nobody seems even to care to read through this stuff. For a constitutional amendment, that is pretty unpopular.

Apocalypse · July 24, 2002, 11:20

I just don't think many people are voting right now. My election thread has only 34 votes.

Epistax · July 24, 2002, 11:26

Well in relation to the discussion over a quroum of the legislature (all of us) voting... our census right now is 53. Does this mean over half voted?

I don't see how we can establish a number of voters needed when the number we have is changing all the time.

Well there I go, this topic is now on 3 or 4 threads.

Apocalypse · July 24, 2002, 12:00

35 votes in my election thread now.

What I suggest is use the census from the previous week. To be honest, I really don't care much either way about this minimum vote though.

Timeline · July 24, 2002, 12:02

I don't even bother voting in the census anymore, I think alot of others don't too.

Apocalypse · July 24, 2002, 12:06

Then the best solution would be just to drop the issue of a minimum vote as there is nothing else to base it on.

Captain · July 24, 2002, 23:18

IIRC, in Phoenatica, they base it on some percentage of the # of participants in their most recent Presidential election. I'm not sure what that % is.

btw, I only have 45 votes or so in my nomination confirmation/approval poll.

Kramerman · July 25, 2002, 00:39

In the impeachment process amendment that is being worked on, on what we have so far, there is a poll where only the High court justices vote. Would this interfere with the 2nd clause of this ammendment? Im not going to vote for or against that clause, though i dont think my vote in that case would really matter.

Kman

civman, can you reall pass amendments by clauses like this? hmmmm, clever.

civman2000 · July 25, 2002, 07:46

It is not a poll. A poll is something made as a poll at apolyton using the forum feature, that will be an in-court vote without actually making a thread with a poll.

civman2000 · July 25, 2002, 07:49

Kman: I could have done the exact same thing by passing each independently with its own poll but I think this way is simplerand more efficient.

Sheik · July 25, 2002, 09:33

Should there be an amendment that says we have the right to not speak at a trial? Does the court have the right to question people and do we have to answer?

Epistax · July 25, 2002, 10:56

I believe the court is only allowed to question the plainteff and defendent, and there's nothing stating either side has to answer. Of course not answering would be just about the worst thing to do for your case (getting caught in a lie would be about the only thing worse).

These aren't the opinions of the court, we haven't discussed this yet. Should the court be able to request someone's presence?

I don't think the court would refuse to hear from anyone, unless it became frivolous (many people making statements that don't matter, or used as a delay).

I'll look this up and may edit my post.

civman2000 · July 25, 2002, 15:17

hmmm...when this was drafted the details of the court were still very far from being resolved, but a "Bill of Rights II" dealing with protecting defendants and with maybe a right or two I think of that needs including.

civman2000 · July 26, 2002, 08:55

POLL CLOSED! All clauses except clause 7 passed. The following shall be added to the constitution:

Amendment IV: Bill of Rights

Clause 1: No person shall be denied the right to become a citizen of Apolytonia.

Clause 2: No citizen shall ever be denied the right to vote in any poll.

Clause 3: Free speech shall not be abridged unless it violates apolyton rules.

Clause 4: No one shall be banned permanently from participating in the democracy game, excluding those who are permanently banned from apolyton. Note that people may still be banned for any amount of time, as long as it is not permanent.

Clause 5: The right to associate into any form of organization shall not be denied.

Clause 6: No citizen may be punished in any way without due process of law.

Clause 7: The government may not knowingly hide information or give false information to the people.