NationStates Jolt Archive

Issue pending changes

Title: (Undecided)

Description: Due to high crime rates and an ineffective police force in @@NAME@@, vigilante groups have started popping up in the worst affected towns and cities and have swiftly dealt with the crime. However, people are worried by the unorthodox methods that the vigilantes are using when dealing with criminals. It is up to you to decide what should be done with these vigilantes.

Validity: Only valid for nations with high crime and decent civil rights

Options:

[option]"Isn't it obvious what should be done?" asks @@RANDOMNAME@@, a reporter for a local newspaper "We should merge these vigilantes with the police, thus making both more effective. But, obviously, we need to tone down the vigilantes if we do that. Stop them killing criminals and stuff."
[effect]vigilantes regularly aid the police with their enquiries
[stats]crime decreases, civil rights increase

[option]"Why has this situation arisen in the first place?" asks @@RANDOMNAME@@, the head of police in @@NAME@@ "If you gave the police the right funding then there'd be no problem. Just give us more money and we can sort this out ourselves. No need to involve vigilantes or anyone else like that."
[effect]vigilantes have been outlawed
[stats]crime increases dramatically, civil rights decrease dramatically

[option]"The police are laughable when it comes to fighting crime," says @@RANDOMNAME@@, leader of the vigilantes "They should be abolished and replaced with us vigilantes. That would sort the problem out."
[effect]the police have been abolished and replaced with bloodthirsty vigilantes who have taken over the streets and declared mob rule
[stats]crime decrease dramatically, civil rights increase dramatically

[option]"Police? Vigilantes? I've got a better idea," says a strange, evil looking man with a bad moustache "Get rid of them both and have secret police instead. No-one would dare try and break the law then."
[effect]@@NAME@@'s secret police hunt people down for minor offences
[stats]crime becomes practically non-existent, civil rights become practically non-existent


That is my idea for a new issue. I would like feedback and possible ways of improving the issue, please. Also, is there a list somewhere of all the things which can be affected by issues (civil rights, economy, etc)?

I'm not exactly certain about Option 2's results here. You get the increase in crime and the decrease in civil rights - both of which sound like bad options. The trade-off is always supposed to be a combination of good and bad effects.

Hmm, I may have to change that to something else then, I can't think of any good that could come out of it. :(

I would say viligantes infringe on other people's rights.

Options 1 & 3 both have all-good results, too; in both of them crime decreases and civil rights increase. The civil rights effect seems wrong to me, especially for the third one; if vigilantes kill crooks when they capture them, that totally violates the criminals' rights to due process, fair trial, and so on.

I would suggest making the civil rights decrease for both those options instead of increasing. I don't know what to suggest for option 2, though...

You could maybe add something to Option 2 about increasing funding for the police force. Then crime rates could decrease but civil rights would as well. I'm not entirely convinced that any of those options would increase civil rights.

Sorry, double post.

I am planning on changing option 2 to increase funding to the police and letting them arrest vigilantes, mainly due to the fact that I asked 15 different people via IMs and none of them could think of anything good coming out of arresting vigilantes. :? Oobag, the civil rights increase because the majority of people would be hunting criminals. People would only cause crime if they were mad or really desperate.

Tis a good issue i would check it for mistakes but i don't have time 8)

No, allowing people to become vigilantes increases their personal freedom, the freedom to do what they want in their spare time. Their civil rights (due process, equal protection of the laws, freedom from discrimination, etc.) aren't affected at all, whereas the civil rights of the alleged criminals they catch (who says they'll always get the right one?) will decrease dramatically. So I still say there would be a net decrease in civil rights, though personal freedoms could go up.

I like your change to option 2 -- that sounds more workable.

BTW, do you really think "the majority of people" would start hunting criminals if vigilantes were legalized? :? I doubt that it would ever be more than a tiny minority, because (a) it's dangerous as heck (criminals often have knives or guns, and know how to use them), and (b) most people don't have enough spare time to do all the things they want to do already. Batman is arguably the most famous vigilante with no "super" powers, and he inherited millions from his dead parents -- sure, he could afford to spend all his time getting into top physical condition, improving his hand-to-hand combat skills, creating all kinds of fancy gadgets to help him, and oh, yeah, catching criminals now and then, but how many other people could?

Personal freedoms and civil rights mean the same thing to me, for some reason. :? I'll probably change that then. Which brings me to the subject of a list of things affectable by issues. I don't want to sound like I'm nagging or being a nuisance, but I really, really, really need a list.

Did I mention it's really important?

Option one should decrease crime, but increase corruption a little(for the lack of a better word)since there will be false reports which will encumber police operations.

For option two, maybe crime should decrease a little and civil rights should decrease a little.

Option three will cause crime and civil rights to skyrocket(aboslute power leads to absolute corruption).

Option four is just right, but should be spiced up a little.

Personal freedoms and civil rights mean the same thing to me, for some reason. :?
Sorry, that was my mistake; you're quite right on that. I was getting confused between the three categories that appear on your nation page (Civil Rights, Economy, and Political Freedoms) with the three freedom scales that determine your nation's classification (Personal Freedoms, Economic Freedoms, and Political Freedoms).

When I reread the NS FAQ I found that Civil Rights, Economy, and Political Freedoms correspond roughly with Personal Freedoms, Economic Freedoms, and Political Freedoms respectively (although Economy in particular can be affected by lots of other things, so a strong Economy doesn't necessarily indicate high economic freedom). Apologies for the confusion.

I don't think anyone's done a complete list of things that can be affected by issues. For one thing, I'm sure there are a lot of things that only the mods know about, which they add into issues when they edit them. However, there's a good basic list in the "Codes for Issues" sticky thread, about halfway down the first thread, where they list things like Government Priorities and general variables.

Basically, if you think something would be affected in real life that isn't on any of those lists, just list it anyway so they get the clearest possible idea of what you want the options to accomplish, and then they can translate those into the game's terms as well as they can.

Thanks, that's exactly what I've been looking for. :D Now I'll be able to go through the possible effects of each option and see which I can incorporate into the issue. :)