Mastabo-Gelibolism

Members of the International who consider themselves members of the Mastabo-Gelibolist tendency wear this userbar in their signatures

Mastabo-Gelibolism is a philosophy of Cyber Nations wedded to a political programme, the combination of which can be called a “tendency”. The philosophy is materialist, emerging from the individual nation ruler, the nation he or she rules, and encompassing the alliance, its rulers and ruled, how it is ruled, and how alliances ruled in certain ways act. The political programme calls for a certain type of alliance government and culture, and certain policies for those alliances with that government and culture, as an intermediate step towards a world Digiterran community in which “the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all”. Mastabo-Gelibolism exists as a tendency essentially inside what are called Leftist alliances.

Origins of Mastabo-Gelibolism

Cyber Nations officially maintains a very strict In Character/Out Of Character separation. When speaking In Character, individuals and alliances are technically not supposed to make reference to what is called, when speaking Out of Character, “Real Life”. Despite this, the ideological alliances both Right and Left of Cyber Nations have consistently circumvented and were allowed to circumvent this separation. Nationalist alliances like the radical Nordreich, Norden Verein, and Sons of Muspel as well as the comparatively mild FOK!-Alliance, Valhalla, German Empire, and League of United Armenians have consciously based themselves on their imaginings of fictional cultures in “Real Life”. So-called Leftist alliances such as the International Coalition of Socialist Nations, International Communist Party, Libertarian Socialist Federation, Socialistic Revolution Initiative, Socialist Workers Front, Socialistic Empire, Communist Party of Cyber Nations, and The International have, in turn, based themselves consciously on the class nature of “Real Life” and philosophies that have come out of it. Mastabo-Gelibolism can be labeled a tendency of The Left, since it claims to analyze Cyber Nations itself as a class system, but for a very long time the ideological alliances disdained to base their ideologies on Cyber Nations itself, preferring to find meaning in their dreams of “Real Life”.

Other Tendencies

The earliest known form of political tendency based on an analysis of Cyber Nations’s material conditions was Francoism. Vastly more is said of Francoism elsewhere, but essentially its philosophy posits that a social contract to form an alliance is necessary for individual nations to make themselves proof against the attacks of other nations. Its political programme advises nations to choose alliances that can best keep them safe; those alliances will have certain characteristics, among them political stability (usually but not always guaranteed by some sort of autocracy) and a militant and military culture of readiness. Eventually, say the Francoists, nations will gravitate away from alliances which cannot protect them and to alliances which can, in part because the alliances which can protect them will beat the alliances which can’t in wars. Although formulated in large measure by people who in their dreams of Real Life see themselves as, what are called in this dream world, “Marxists”, Francoism is properly seen as the ideology of the political Center. Members of Leftist alliances have never found it particularly attractive because they see it as justifying “imperialistic” (a word which, used in this context, is borrowed from “Real Life”) actions on the part of alliances which follow it, and thus inappropriate to their “Real Life” oriented morality. Francoism has spawned vulgarizations which mainly focus on the perceived effects and political programme of the tendency (i.e., the political dominance of the New Pacific Order), and try to emulate the programme without being too concerned about the underlying philosophy. These include Equilibrism, “the concept of oppressing all competition, becoming the greatest, the most powerful, being the best that you can be.” These cannot be considered true tendencies, because they only contain a political programme with no philosophy.

Martenism is another widely-known system that cannot be considered a true tendency. While it does indulge in philosophy, it imports that philosophy wholesale from “Real Life”, where it is called nationalism. Martensism can be summarized thus: to protect the “nation” (which, in “Real Life” is defined as a community with a common history and culture that is economically self-sustaining and controls a definite territory) an alliance must have a strong leader whose subordinates are just that: subordinate almost to a fault, though intelligent and creative when left on their own. Its culture must be guarded and militaristic to protect itself against corrupting outside economic and cultural influences.

While Francoism and Martensism are almost as old as Cyber Nations itself, most tendencies are more modern. These modern tendencies include: Amalgamatism, which philosophically weds self-interest to filial piety and recommends a free-market sort of alliance economy in contrast to the centrally-planned economies of Francoist and Martensist, and indeed most, alliances; Forwardism, which proceeds from the philosophy that all causes have effects and recommends prudence and caution in alliance leaders; and Tygaism, which, starting from the twin philosophical premises that respect is a good thing and that ethics are not subjective, instructs alliance diplomats to extend respect to everyone unless and until another party consciously repudiates it, at which point war becomes necessary to wipe out the cancer.

Silentism and Mastabationism

Silentism was the first tendency to come out of the Leftist milieu. Ironically, the tendency was not formulated by its namesake: Marcos, at that time IntelCom of SE, formulated “The Principles of Silentism” on June 3, 2007, and by July 1, after a month of discussion by SE’s membership, Silentism became SE’s official ideology, and its “Principles” were posted on the CN boards for all to see. The “Principles of Silentism” are that pluralism and ideological tolerance (within the limits of the “Real-Life”-derived Leftism) is good for an alliance because it helps it to expand its recruitment base, but that a demerit of pluralism is that it leads to argument, instability, and splits. Pluralism, by the way, developed historically, as a result of the destruction of the SWF. Prior to that event, there had been substantial ideological choice for Leftists; at the time the “Principles” were promulgated, there were only two. To counter pluralism’s demerit and to leave only the merit, Marcos proposed an autocratic government as the only method of keeping order among squabbling ideologues, and thus of strengthening the alliance.

These came under serious scrutiny by many members of the LSF at the time (including a lengthy post by Sovyet Gelibolu, one of the two eponyms of Mastabo-Gelibolism, which, due to someone deleting the LSF boards, is irrecoverable). However, the major fallout of the criticism was mockery. Mastab (the other eponym) conceived of a manifesto which basically justified masturbation using philosophical terminology, and Q-collective posted it on the CN forums. Mastabationism, as it came to be known, was never meant as a serious tendency; it was more like a ridicule of tendency as a waste of time, and of Silentism in particular as counter to the ideals of the LSF. Despite Mastab’s rejection of tendency, his name has become attached to Mastabo-Gelibolism because of the historical significance of his manifesto: Mastabo-Gelibolism rejects as false all the tendencies mentioned hitherto, as Mastab rejected as ludicrous all the tendencies evolved up to the time of his manifesto.

Early Gelibolist Thought

Early Gelibolist thought, that is, Mastabo-Gelibolism in its embryonic form, is expressed largely in one major texts posted on the CN boards.

The first, “CN Socialism”, was posted on February 13, 2008. Starting from the position that the nation ruler (that is, the decision-maker) was a conscious entity and used the nation as a tool to produce useful things, and thus that political analysis should revolve around the ruler, not the nation itself. Basing itself on the ruler, early Gelibolism broke with Francoism over the issue of class. Francoism had thought every nation independent and equal in their degree of independence. Gelibolism attacked Francoism for placing too much emphasis on the nation and not on the ruler. The nation can only be controlled by the ruler, it is true. However, the ruler can be persuaded, threatened, accustomed, or otherwise dominated into ceding practical control over his or her nation to somebody else. When this happens, and it almost always happens in alliances (when it doesn’t happen in alliances it happens in pseudo-alliance relationships usually involving tech farming), a class system of nation rulers is indeed created: Gelibolism, borrowing terms from visions of “Real Life” that Gelibolu found too sentimental to give up, labeled these classes the “bourgeoisie” and “proletariat”, the controlling and controlled.

Continuing on this basis, Gelibolism contends that most alliances are bourgeois, but that the possibility of a proletarian or socialist alliance within the alliance system as it stands exists. A proletarian alliance, to put it simply, would be an alliance in which the whole population was proletarian, and in which none of the population was bourgeois. Gelibolism contends that this can be achieved by placing all nations the nations in an alliance under the control of all the rulers in an alliance, and by inculcating in the rulers the notion that they are other than bourgeois, that by everybody controlling everybody’s nation, the class of controllers and the class of controlled have disappeared. The vehicle for accomplishing these aims is direct democracy, but not just any direct democracy: direct democracy with these goals specifically held in mind. A democracy without the consciousness of these goals would not be socialist. This was no mere moral choice: a socialist alliance would be better off, if only because it removed class antagonisms within itself, than a bourgeois one.

Early Gelibolism never made the logical leap to the conclusion that not only socialism, but communism, was possible. However, it foreshadowed this leap by outlining the “Tasks of a Proletarian Alliance”. The third task was for alliances that had achieved socialism to merge, because in unity there lay strength. Another logical leap that “CN Socialism” did not make (but which early Gelibolism eventually did, more on this later) concerned the objective necessity of socialism.

Later Gelibolist Thought

Up until March 28, 2008, socialism remained a choice. It was not a moral choice, but a choice made out of self-interest for the alliance concerned. However, the second text, “An Analysis of CN Imperialism” made it clear that socialism is an objective necessity for the survival of the Cyber Nations community. “CN Imperialism” was not meant to be published on the CN boards; it was originally published on the Communist Party of Cyber Nations boards, and has only recently been appended to “CN Socialism” on the CN boards for purposes of reference. “CN Imperialism” started out from the premise that CN is a bourgeois world, because the alliances that make it up are themselves bourgeois. Whereas “CN Socialism” had focused mainly on the internal dynamics of socialist alliances, “CN Imperialism” made the observation that in a bourgeois world, all alliances (even socialist ones) need to expand their member base and to grow their existing members, or be swallowed up by alliances that can. This was called the Law of Aggrandizement. Up until the Second Great War, when Cyber Nations was absorbing new members like crazy, alliances could expand almost exclusively through recruitment, and wars occurred when alliances threatened each others’ recruitment chances. This was called the Phase of Accumulation.

“CN Imperialism” argued that after the Unjust War and the loss of members that accompanied it, as well as the slowdown in member growth caused by the lack new large communities to invade CN, this sort of expansion became impossible. Growth in membership could now only be achieved by poaching off other alliances. ‘’The Law of Aggrandizement could also be largely forestalled by the creation of nearly-worldwide blocs that would prevent alliances from preying on their own allies, and thus halt everybody’s recruitment. Standing outside this system was a signal that an alliance would not abide by this gentleman’s agreement, and so alliances that chose to stand outside were crushed materially, persevering, in some cases, only through sheer endurance.’’ (Note: the highlighted points do not appear in “CN Imperialism”, and were evolved later). This Phase of Decadence fed on itself, as people got bored and left the game, necessitating the crushing of more and more alliances to ensure continued interest of the member base, ‘’and the pushing of alliances out of the bloc system so that they could be preyed upon’’.

Under this Phase of Decadence, socialism becomes a necessity, as the internal harmony and community shared by the members, untainted by class antagonisms, becomes an alternative draw to keep members interested in the game. This also opens up the possibility of one universal socialist alliance; this situation would be communism, where everybody’s nations would be under the control of the whole CN community. Meanwhile existing socialist alliances should endeavor to expose and discourage imperialism, prevent the beginnings of and arbitrate the ends of imperialist wars, and try to stand aloof from imperialist wars where possible.

The International and Mastabo-Gelibolism

Gelibolism, while applauded in some corners, for a long time had no real adherents besides Sovyet Gelibolu, mostly because he did not try to build a tendency based on his observations. However, with the creation of The International and the corresponding upsurge in the use of “leftist unity” rhetoric, a few people began to become interested in Gelibolist ideas, particularly since the “third task” outlined in “CN Socialism” seemed to be close to fulfillment. One of these was Mongol-Swedes, the popularizer of and bringer of conciseness to Mastabo-Gelibolism. It was also he who invented the term, combining Mastab’s rejection of the centrist and rightist tendencies that had been all there were in his time with the affirmation of the class-based, leftist tendency of Gelibolu. Within The International, too, Mongol-Swedes and Sovyet Gelibolu began to act as the nucleus for the development of a political bloc embracing Mastabo-Gelibolism and advocating policies based on it. These included the restriction or the abolition of tech raiding (decried as imperialist in “CN Imperialism”) and the policy of integrating as many leftist alliances as possible into The International. The advocacy of this tendency is still new; it has not as yet made much impact on The International and is practically unknown everywhere else. However, as a leftist, class-based tendency drawn from an analysis of the material conditions of Cyber Nations it has no equal.