Principles of Pacifica Weekly Address Eight

Introduction
This is a reproduction of a weekly address given to the Body Republic of the New Pacific Order. It generally runs about once a week, and is an official production of the Media Corps of the New Pacific Order. This address was given in early July 2008, so please note that this address and subsequent may refer to events that are not contemporary with the time of the reproduction post.

The Addresses tend to address principles we believe embody Pacifica, with a heavy emphasis on Francoist thought. Not all addresses specifically discuss Francoism directly, however.

Address
I come here, comrades, to speak on the Cult of the Personality.

Some here have attempt to paint the current situation as a crisis of Francoism. Many a good and right comrade in both alliances might be asking questions: "How can two Francoist alliances be at odds? How can two alliances, born of the same people, the same scientific philosophy of Francoism, fought through the same conditions, clash over these issues?"

Francoism is a scientific philosophy. It analyzes the material conditions of a society, and through the skill sets we have developed from our own historical conditions and battles, it suggests to us how to create, modify, and remove policies and practices that remove our nations, and ourselves, from a state of nature where we are vulnerable from attacks by the barbarism of nature and the evil of man. We unite our sovereignty in an Emperor, who is but a man, and who can use our combined sovereignty to grant us the freedom to live our lives, without the terrors of the absolute freedom of nature.

Our Emperors, our Imperial Officers, our Ministers, our Councilors, our Regents, are but men. They hold their office by virtue of our meritocratic traditions. They do not hold their offices because they are omnipotent, or because they are always right. They hold their offices because they are men (and women) who are very frequently right and almost always capable.

Our first leader's wisdom, the wisdom of Francos Spain and all Emperors after him, is that they recognized this. They recognized that their wisdom was not absolute. And so, the first Delegate, the Emperor Francos Spain, appointed a Senate, the ancient analog to our Imperial Officer, and the analog of Polaris's appointed Ministers. This Senate was to advise the Emperor. By combining their wisdom in a forum with discussion and respectful dissent, they would fashion policies that could keep the young spark of the Revolution alive, and the Emperor's own human foibles and faults would be lessened.

[i]That[/i] is one of the primary tenants of Francoism. You must analyze the material conditions of society, and no one man can do it alone, for man alone is fallible. The greatest error the Francoist can make is to deny his humanity. As I spoke in my address on [url="http://pacificorder.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=45402"]"Victory Over Gods,"[/url] this destruction of the god complex is a key to the successful Francoist alliance. "No man is a God," Francoism demands, "No man by virtue of anything but his mind is right over another man." The greatest error the Francoist can make is to deny this, and to fashion a Cult of the Personality around himself.

A cult of the Personality is where one man, even an Emperor, begins to deny his own humanity, his own foibles, flaws and fallacies. Where one man, elevates the rightness of his own opinions for their own sake over the wisdom of others. Where one man believes his opinions are right because they alone are his opinions. When that happens, the possibility of the collective wisdom of the Emperor's advisors, counselors and officers can no longer be utilized, because only one man, the Emperor caught in the Cult of the Personality, has the monopoly of "right" that he has.

The error of Emperor Electron Sponge is that he has fallen prey to the Cult of the Personality. No longer believing his opinion the opinion of a man, he now believes that his opinion is right not through a subtle and searching analysis of the material conditions of society, but he believes his opinion is right because it is merely his opinion.

It is the duty, nay, the necessity for survival of the Francoist alliance, for the Emperor to support a culture whereby the wisdom of his decisions can be questioned. For when the Emperor is man, he can err, and it is our patriotic duty to question the policies, practices and edicts of our Emperor and His Imperial Officers and all our alliance, for by questioning and respectful dissent and discussion, we create better policies, practices and edicts. Through our autocratic democratic process, we survive.

The cult of the personality kills that culture, and in killing that culture, threatens the survival of the Francoist Alliance as a whole.

There is a final solution, for those who have created a Cult of the Personality. It is the re-recognition, the re-acceptance of their own humanity. Someone who has created a Cult of the Personality must step down from their positions of power, re-affirming that they are but men, and letting their successor support the environment and culture of discussion of opinions and respectful dissent that allows a Francoist alliance to successfully analyze the material conditions of their society.

But in the face of the refusal of Emperor to step aside, and when the cult of personality has substituted itself in place of the autocratic-democratic institutions of the Francoist alliance, then it becomes the duty of those institutions and their memebers to reestablish themselves as the ruling body. By casting off the shackles of these new 'gods' -- by placing man back in control of his own destiny, the path to Francoism can resume: the sober, scientific analysis of the material conditions of society, where all men's opinions, united in the sovereignty of the Emperor, can make the alliance flourish.