NationStates Jolt Archive

A Burger Lord fast-food restaurant, Kingstowne, Roycelandia

"Can I help you?" Asked the cashier.

The customer looked a little lost.

"Ohhh, Umm... I don't know, what have you got here?"

The customer had only been standing in line for the past 5 minutes, in front of the gigantic menu, with pictures, advertising Burger Lord's menu, prices, and promotions- identical across the Empire except for some extra local variations. The core menu was the same everywhere, as was the price.

The cashier fixed the customer with a glare, and pressed the undercounter Stupidity Alert button.

"Every Burger Lord in the Empire sells the same food. Everyone knows that."

"Yes, but..."

Two police officers had appeared behind the man.

"Sir, are you aware that you've just committed a criminal offence?"

The customer seemed very shaken. "No, I just wasn't sure wha..."

"Sir, you've had plenty of time to make your mind up. If you weren't ready to purchase food, you should have stepped out of the queue and let people who aren't clueless order their food and get on with their lives."

"But I didn't know what they had..." The Customer stammered.

"Then I'm arresting you for breaching the Stupidity Elimination Act, specifically on a charge of inconveniencing others by your stupidity and/or ignorance. Everyone knows what Burger Lord sells, and if you didn't know, you could have read the gigantic sign in front of you before you got in the queue. Let's go." The slightly taller Policeman took hold of The Customer's arm.

The Customer was led away, but not in handcuffs (Roycelandian police do not habitually handcuff arrested persons, unless they are violent or attempt to escape).

Meanwhile, the other customers were able to order their meals without further interruption. The cashier was given a promotion after her shift finished, a pay increase, and later on, a letter of commendation from the Police Commissioner for the area.

The Customer was taken back to the local Police Station and permitted to call his lawyer and wife. After an interview, at which his lawyer was present, he was charged with Inconveniencing Others By Ignorance and was released at large to appear in the Magistrate's Court two days later.

The Magistrate listened to the case, and after discovering the Customer was from a very remote part of Glimmer Twins which didn't have Burger Lord restaurants, the Magistrate fined The Customer $50 and ordered that no conviction be recorded. His Lawyer argued for a total dismissal of the case, but this was rejected on the grounds that commonsense would dictate The Customer read the sign with the menu and prices on it.

Roycelandia's anti-stupidity laws are well known, and generally consist of making stupid people pay higher taxes. Honest mistakes are never punished, but if there's one thing Roycelandians hate, it's the idiotic day to day stupidity that make everyday life so complicated- from holding up queues with stupid questions, blaming staff for things that are out of their control, to failing to read signs, the offences that are punishable under the Stupidity Elimination Act are many and varied, but not actually that onerous.

Indeed, actual convictions for Stupidity Related crimes are very low- most people are given warnings and discharged, but sometimes an example needs to be made.

At present, a minor demonstration is taking place outside the Imperial Palace in Port Royal, with police keeping a watchful eye on the protest, which so far has been peaceful and conducted in a lawful manner.

Civil Rights groups have called Roycelandia's Anti-Stupidity legislation "Unfair" and "Discriminatory", accusations that have been dismissed as "whining by tree-hugging lefties" by the Imperial Government.

To the highly-esteemed potentate of Roycelandia:

Your anti-stupidity laws are truly an inspiration to us all. We currently have a rigorously enforced anti-ignorance law, which only penalizes those whose ignorance actually costs another party money (holding up a line could be a case of this), in which the penalty is usually paying the accusing party the sum of money they lost. However, we feel that a more general pro-common-sense law like yours would make things even more efficent in our corporation's territory, and we may enact such a law in the near future.

Dawn Kradii, Executive First Class
Secretary of the CEO

((EDIT: Forgot a word! See if you can figure out which one. ;) ))

Concern in ISAN has been created in the wake of reported troubles experienced by tourists in Roycelandia, after the infamously stupid but unreasonably wealthy typical-Nicobarese have begun to run afoul of confusing laws enforced with unprecidented efficiency.

"I couldn't get no Nicobokerburger no place" said Peter Bed, 41, of Car Nicobar after returning home from a cruise that saw him spend a weekend in Roycelandia. "So I kept asking, 'hey goober, where's the Nicobokerburger?' and then this cop was like, 'you'll have to come with me, sir' and I was impressed that the police react to these problems, 'cause on Car Nicobar they only come if you tell them a Hindu's trying to rob you or something."

Mr.Bed was surprised to learn that he was under arrest, and that the fast food outlet's manager wouldn't lose his franchise for being ignorant of the Nicobokerburger.

Mrs.Atley, 37, of South Andaman, also complained of intimidation by Roycelandian authorities after she spent six and a half hours on the top floor of her hotel trying to find the walk-way to the next building's penthouse where she'd arranged to meet a distant relative. It was later explained to her that not all nations provide direct passage from one skyscraper to the next, as few if any are close to so crowded or highly-built as is ISAN.

Some fears exist over the possible decline of demand for flights and cruises to Roycelandia and its empire as the perpetually stupid and pliable Nicobarese middle class begin to resent the perceived arrogance of the Roycelandians.

(OOC: Hope you don't mind that sort of counter point, 's all in good fun.)

The Imperial Attorney-General, Dame Stella Artois, has praised the more rigorous enforcement of Roycelandia's laws.

"They are not intended to punish tourists or visitors" she said at a conference today. "Indeed, there is an exemption from the laws for Tourists and Visitors for some matters from the Stupidity Laws. Commonsense still applies of course, but the goal is to make everyone's life as unstressful as possible, and stupidity is a major cause of stress to normal people."

The Dame Artois has also offered to assist other countries in drafting their own anti-stupidity laws. "We're committed to the fight against Stupidity, and I'm glad to say, we're winning. If any other Nation wants our help, especially with regards to drafting and enforcing workable but effective laws, they just have to let us know."

OOC: Of course it's all in good fun! I'm just glad people are replying to my threads- they take so long to type, and most of the time they get almost zero response...

OOC: Beheadings might be a bit over the top, but how about electroshock therapy?

IC: Vastiva requests a copy of the full text of said laws, for vote and adoption into the Vastivan Code of Self-Responsibility.

OOC: I'll try and type it up over the weekend. It takes time to draft a complete law! :)

The Confederacy condemns your so-called 'anti-stupidity' laws. Punishing people for the failings of your education system, or possibly even for undiagnosed mental disorders, is wrong and we cannot support it. There is little sense in fighting the symptoms while ignoring the problem.

Minister for Foreign Affairs
The Confederacy of Mattikistan

Celtayoshis wishes to know that if the sitaution described above occured, except the person had looked at the menu and had picked his food. What would happen if the burger chain did not have any of this customers choice of food left, and therefore had to pick somehing else, would he be penalised for not having a back-up choice?

THE EMPIRE OF AKHMET would like to state that the 'Anti-Stupidity' laws are downright stupid themselves.They lead to the de-valuing of a section of society, one which can quite easily misunderstood. Stupidity cannot be measured, cannot be found and rooted out by adding discriminatory laws to the statute books.

We would like applaud the nation of Roycelandia for their brave new laws.

Despite the protests of others, we would encourage you to punish offenders to the fullest extent of the law.

We are considering creating such a law in our country in order to try and cause some more mirth.

OOC: hehe i love it. Never implement it but its quite funny/good/unique. Well done.

Celtayoshis wishes to know that if the sitaution described above occured, except the person had looked at the menu and had picked his food. What would happen if the burger chain did not have any of this customers choice of food left, and therefore had to pick somehing else, would he be penalised for not having a back-up choice?

Yes, he would, depending on how busy it was. In Roycelandia, sensible people know to have a back-up choice for situations like that. Anyway, everyone knows what Burger Lord sells (just like RL McDonalds)

The Anti-Stupidity laws are designed to enforce commonsense and prevent inconvenience to others- it has nothing to do with the failure of the education system or mental illness. Leeway is given to people with Mental Disorders, but people who are just plain thick or didn't pay attention in school will be punished regardless. The rest of society shouldn't have to suffer because you were too busy getting stoned/skipping school/causing trouble.

OOC: Remember, this is just the opinion of the Roycelandian Government- as much as I'd like such a law to exist in the real world, I accept it would be impossible to enforce fairly.

ooc:An ingenious idea. And an entertaining introductory post to boot. You rock! :D

Thank you! Without wanting to sound too full of myself, have a read of some of the other posts about the going-ons in Roycelandia and the Empire if you enjoyed that one.

Also have a read of the posts by Lusaka (a different player, but with a similar RP style to me).

I'm going to start writing more posts about some of the day to day goings on in Roycelandia, simply to raise the Empire's profile a bit...

After thinking about this for a very long time, I think I've got it.

"THE RULE OF NO EXCEPTIONS.

THE INDIVIDUAL IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR OWN ACTIONS. NO EXCEPTIONS."

OOC: Roycelandia, I have a great follow-up idea: "The War On Stupidity". Like the "War On Terror" only that it deals, obviously, with stupidity. Just a thought if you'd ever wanted to go international.

Isn't it stupid to think peoples are not stupid ???

I approve.
-Charjiil, Emperor of Ghout

OOC: That was very well written, in my opinion.

I've thought of Lauching a "War on Stupidity", but it would be hard to do without degenerating into "15,346 n00bs were arrested for being stupid". Writing the longer posts (like the inital one) takes quite a long time- and there's nothing worse than spending an hour and a half typing up something only to either have no-one respond to it, or worse, having having half a dozen semi-coherent posts afterwards by people who've missed the point.

Still, if there's enough interest in it, I might have a shot at it...

I'm not drawing it up as a UN Resolution, for the simple reason that I'm sick of going to the trouble of writing decent (ie relevant, correctly spelt, and non-sovereignty infringing) resolutions, and then getting all of 12 endorsements for them. But that's a rant for a different post, on another day...

Thanks for the kudos, though... it really makes all the difference to know someone out there reads and appreciates my threads!

I spit at your laws

[Tag for later]

Bad man, bad laws

Under President Igomo, the United African Republic struggled to contain cracks about the unmanageable growth of the Roik incarceration rate, or at least of personal debt. Now that Mr.Derek is gone, it's open season as incidents of Roycelandian civilian stupidity become newsworthy, creating an inflated impression of national idiocy.

"Man, those Roiks sure are stupid, eh?"
"Yeah, maybe that's why we beat them in the UN rankings nearly half of the time, eh?"
"Booyah!"

Dodoma Tribune, local pair gaoled for high-fiving without irony...

OOC: You don't necessarily need to write up an entire law. Since the judges seem to have plenty of flexibilty for enforcing the law, just write up legislation that broadly outlines the criteria for arrest (ex. "Greatly decreases public efficiency," "inconveniences/threatens to inconvenience citizens," "not applicable to genuinely mentally challenged individuals"), the maximum sentence, and that judges have power to decide extent of stupidity.

IC: The nation of New Exodus applaudes Roycelandian initiatives to curb public stupidity, and has similar legislation. We would also like to suggest to you that specially trained personnel could be sent out to assess stupidity and fine offenders, similar to normal law enforcement of traffic violations. This would greatly free up the Roycelandian courts, as well as create new job opportunities for intelligent but otherwise unemployed citizens.

I've thought of Lauching a "War on Stupidity", but it would be hard to do without degenerating into "15,346 n00bs were arrested for being stupid". Writing the longer posts (like the inital one) takes quite a long time- and there's nothing worse than spending an hour and a half typing up something only to either have no-one respond to it, or worse, having having half a dozen semi-coherent posts afterwards by people who've missed the point.

Still, if there's enough interest in it, I might have a shot at it...

The way I could see one working out is say there is one nation (or several nations, who don't necessarily have to be new) whose people regularly come to work in Roycelandia who are generally regarded as "stupid". Eventually this stupidity leads to the disruption of everyday life in Roycelandia and could even lead to, say, a major tragedy because of worker "stupidity" (traffic accident, machine malfunction, etc.). Then a war could break out because of this.

Just a shot in the dark.