Of Sealand, corp, and country [was: nation-state]

[Lodewijk andré de la porte]

2014-10-27 23:38 GMT+01:00 grarpamp <grarpamp at gmail.com>:

> Is not the aim to demonstrate that by hoisting your flag wherever
> that you challenge that definition and fuxor their plans?
>

What plans? If anything I find "their" plans to be highly turbulent and
confused. It's as if speech disintegrates completely into white noise, and
then people become soldiers and start marching in unison. Pretty insane, if
you ask me. It's all build on the conceptions of God, King and Country. Now
with God gone, Kings dead, and Country integrated with all the others, it
becomes exceedingly unclear what people fight for. Economy? Terrorism? You
tell me.


> At least to the extent that you force them to hypocritically behave in an
> unfair or ungentlemanly manner against you, or declare war on you.
>

They send a Coast Guard Cutter and a squad of marines to escort you back
home forcefully. Or just leave you, without giving a damn. They couldn't
declare war without first declaring you a nation, which they won't, because
internationallylegally you aren't.

Unfair doesn't factor into it, if you ask me. Being a gentleman... well..
You'll probably be the offender in their eyes.

The thing is, violence is difficult. You're not allowed to harm a foreign
national (I'd be Dutch, you'd be whatever you'd be) for no reason
whatsoever. So maybe the coast guard will trick you into doing something
wrong, like shooting them first. There's no territorial waters when you're
not a nation, so they'll be allowed to ship right in.

But either they don't have a reason to care (and why would you do it?) or
they cannot do something (which is highly circumstantial) or you're just
not their match and lose. You'd say there's a chance you'd win, but there
probably isn't without being huge (Cuba is big enough though).


> All of which serves to support your legitimacy. After all, if you
> are 'not' a 'something' as they say, then they would have no such
> interest in you at all.
>

Somehow many nations still have never admitted to recognize Taiwan as an
independent nation, nor recognized it to be part of China. Taiwan still
claims to be the original and legitimate China, but sits on it's own seat
in the UN. Bottom line? Who know what will happen! Sealand exists because
at some point they were clearing it with a helicopter, but they had AA guns
on the platform (wtf?!), so the helicopter went away again and Britain
really isn't going to risk lives for winning Sealand back.


> > I'm not sure if
> > Sealand qualifies, but I think it's overhyped.
>
> It itself is overhyped in media (RedBull), but the idea of challenge
> and independance it represents is buried as too troublesome to
> publish lest people get ideas.
>

Like how a believe in a nation is similar to superstition?


> > There's plenty of island nations, why not buy one of them? If you agree
> to
> > donate shares to the government they might be all ears.
>
> It's not a purchase if you leave rights to the existing govt. That's called
> a lease. Leasees always lose in the end. Look at Hong Kong.
>

Well, Hong Kong's future is yet unsettled. It's held up surprisingly well,
if you ask me. It sure is o-so-British to invent some kind of
in-between-ownership-or-independence deal for 100 years. They always have a
ton of fun, those British lads. See also: Kowloon
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kowloon_Walled_City>.


> > You could band together with some other corporations if you don't have
> the
> > capital/value.
>
> Dilutes your interests.
>

Interests can be shared.


> > Have to wonder what's the point though. Save tax? ... Liberty?
>
> Independance, set your own rules, the ability to generally say fuck off
> and deal with whoever you wish to deal with however. aka: DPRK,
> Venezuela, Iran, China, Cuba. It's not supposed to be easy.
>

So, those nations are doing well? I'm not sure what this does for you.
Internally, the nations you mentioned give much less security, wealth,
freedom and sometimes privacy to it's people. Internationally these nations
have posed large national security risks time and time again, seemingly to
very little avail other than to remain isolated, poor and sad.

I really (really) think we have huge *huge* first world problems. But, I
don't think the mentioned nations are doing any better.

Will this independence be better? How, why? These aren't trivial questions.
I believe the right conclusion for the wrong reasons is still wrong.
Independence seems like the right conclusion, but you must know why.


> Being so closely tied to Britain, Sealand is probably not nearly as clear
> a situation as floating a square kilometer platform hundreds of km from
> any coast with many countries would be. Say off northern SouthAm,
> southeast Asia, west Africa.
>

Power of law is a security as much as it is a risk. Humans act strangely
around things such as "duty", "honor", "law", "allegiance", "right", etc.
Haven't quite found the pattern, although one's own profit is a pretty
constant factor. Sometimes honor is the act of defying game theory for the
global better, but often it's not. (Also, let's stay away from the DPRK, k?)
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