Wednesday, August 8, 2007

MNN NEWSBRIEF – FLAME SPIRIT “CINDAH” APPLIES FOR SIN

In an unprecedented move today, the flame spirit “Cindah” attempted to apply for a SIN today at the Royer Building, and when asked to leave by planar security staff, made an appearance at Council Island appealing the decision with S-S Councilpeople.

In a roaring, sparking speech on Council Island, “Cindah” appealed, “Muust vooote for Brihnn AAA… Muuust vooote for Ackart…”

“Cindah” is just one among many other spirits and Metahumans seeking for the first time their legal citizenship to vote. Masses could be seen outside the Royer Building waiting in line to appeal their current citizenship, some even taken into custody for having previous modified or fake SIN’s.

One unidentified Ork outside the Royer Building says, “I’m gonna risk it, I gotta try, it’s worth it, I’ve gotten by without one before, but this is worth the trouble.”

Much of this is in response to Brin Ackart’s recent announcement of candidacy for Seattle Metroplex Attorney General’s Office.

We’ll have more from the scene this morning on our evening newscast, I’m Johann Spark, Metahuman News Network. Keep punk in your heart and one in the chamber, chummers.

Artwork by Mike Underhill.

31 comments:

Kilroy said...

Umm, I think that should be "SIN" not "SIM".

And I'm very dubious about the ethics of giving spirits voting rights. For one thing, they are natives of another plane of reality. They can't even be subject to our legal system as no process I've heard of can prevent them from returning to their metaplane. At most they can be subject to the death penalty via ritualized destruction invoking a spirit's True Name.

Second, most spirits don't comprehend mundane life, let alone politics. A few very unique free spirits have made the effort but for the most part our ways and means are completely alien to them.

Thirdly, they can be forced to vote for a particular candidate. It's almost impossible to detect or prevent someone who has access to a spirit's true name from having influence.

So this is almost guaranteed to be a publicity stunt. Cindah is probably a free spirit performing this task in return for whatever it is it values. Karma, possibly, or material sacrifice.

Makes me nervous when people grandstand this much.

Anonymous said...

Oh this is wonderful, disenfranchised metahumans trying to enter the democratic process and get genuine SINs, become good citizens and all that getting carted off by the Man.

And completely aside from the debate on whether spirits should be able to vote "Cindah" sounds dreadfully like some barely intelligent minor spirit summoned as a publicity stunt for Ackart. I've met a few spirits and for the most part our politics don't interest them. That and they're usually more eloquent and less comprehensible.

I expect a lucky somebody to be getting a call from Mr. J. to look into this soon.

Anonymous said...

I think it's odd that "cindah" might get the vote before me, and I have a SIN. Of course I'm an extraterritorial, so I've never had the bother of voting or taxes or any of that drek. The whole political system that you have here in seams wholly inefficient. Runners wonder why people join the corps and this is the reason why; they don't have to worry about school quality, garbage men strikes, rising utility bills, voting for one liar of another. I've never understood it and I never will.

Anonymous said...

Make it was mandatory for all metahumans to have SINs! It'll make them much easier to hunt down and exterminate. :)

Anonymous said...

Poli 106... why don't you track my SIN?

Anonymous said...

Kirby, you caught anything yet? Cough, cough...

Just so you know, we allow you to operate on our turf. Keep stepping out of line and it'll get your whole family dusted quickly, instead of slowly and painfully.

Anonymous said...

What's he talking about Kirby?

Anything I can help with? I got bullets to spare and a debt to pay off...

Anonymous said...

Poli 106 what ever happened to Poli 64?

Oh ya I remember, that fragstick got himself geeked.
Hhmmm, how the drek did that happen?

Didn't all the bullet wounds have a low
angle of entry? Like they were fired from below him, or maybe by someone short? Maybe a dwarf?

Anonymous said...

Now play nicely children. As the wise man said, the problem with being a liberal is that you have to listen to everybody else's slotting stupid ideas. The joy of being a Liberal in the shadows is that you get to shoot them afterwards.

Did I ever tell you the story about the young graduate froma relatively prejudice free country who SURGED and the Shibata bigot in Space Operations. No?

Well one day in September 2061, graduate grows horns, painful, disturbing yah yah yah, an early SURGE in other words. Graduate gets released from hospital and goes back to his first job, assisting on the Shibata probe race entry. Shibata HR say no record of you, employee you claim to be was 'pure' Human, then they say the guy is a fraud who must have killed the graduate whose SIN they have locked and then they throw him out. Apparently men come looking for him in the night when he's out, he never goes home again and when he has worked up enough money has Shibata HR man's SIN hacked and career destroyed.

Ahh, bedtime stories for the wireless generation. Moral of the tale being, 'What goes around comes around, or: Be nice because guns, magic and the matrix make everybody equal.'

Anonymous said...

Well, for Shadowrunners, it's a good idea to vote with your good SINs. It helps give them more history that can't be broken. (After all, you *DID* vote like a good little citizen!).

As for Spirits voting, I know a few of them, and a couple are interested in politics and had expressed interest in voting a number of times.

Although, one is interested in the "Point and laugh"-type of interest.

Which, of course, just co-incides with the Metahumans that I know.

Cindah could be summoned for this task, might be unintelligent, or English might not be his/her/its first language.

Kilroy said...

Bra-vo Poli 106! I applaud your enlightened viewpoint.

The percentage of metahumans without SINs are higher than sapiens-sapiens primarily due to bigots and racists denying the masses their SINs. You are, in essence, trying to repeal nearly sixty years of Humanis' concerted efforts to lock metahumans out of society.

I'm sure MNN will quote you on this and that your policlub's elite will respect your outspoken stances.

And if my sarcastic wit is insufficiently sharp to pierce your dense gray matter, let's have a little civics lesson. The only people who do not have SINs are those who voluntarily slip into the shadows (at great effort) or are thrown into them forcibly against their will. Yours, I suspect, will soon be a criminal SIN or, if Kirby's fast enough, the SIN will be retired.

Anonymous said...

I dare one of you trogs or halfers to take a shot at me or any of my boys.

Anonymous said...

Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwww, Remmie, you're not going to dare the "Trog Lovin' Traitors" as well?

I feel so left out. *Pout*

'Course, you know I hunt. Might be too dangerous to taunt me, eh?

Barrio Billy said...

Money,

Don't mind Alamos. If he is who i think he is, he'll be getting his shortly.

Anonymous said...

While I know for a fact that my Ifrit would enjoy participating in democratic procedure more than I do (honestly I just leave selection of candidates and ballot measures to my most powerful Marid - it makes her happy and it's not a lot of effort on my part to simply mark the squares she wants); it is important to note that there is really no way for election officials to distinguish between a spirit that genuinely gives a damn and a spirit that is following instructions to appear to give said damn. Spirits are real people, but they also can have mage hands so far up their hoop that they may as well be tube socks with eyes on.

And while I have a difficult enough time seeing to the needs of five Ifrit and that really seems to cover things from my stand point, there is nothing stopping someone from summoning a spirit, sending it in on a remote service to vote, summoning a new spirit, summoning a new spirit, etc. all day.

Really, if we were going to do something like that we would be better off just eliminating the facade and go the way of Sichuan. If you're going to have a Magocracy you should just have a Magocracy. there are valid reasons to do that, but call a spade a spade.

Flint said...

I'm not a trog or a halfer I'm a good little jewboy with a brand new Rifle. any one got a bounty for these alamos wanabe joyboys?

Anonymous said...

Oh, no problem Barrio.

He didn't have the courage to invite me to the party after all.

I prefer more of a challange.

Anonymous said...

Poli 106, Remember the Alamos, its not just the meta-human population that have a problem with you... look over your shoulders, chummers... and be careful who you pick to beat at your next lynching - I take personal offense when my comrades in arms are put to the fires and brands of a witch-hunt...

Man or woman, young or old, my aim is steady, my trigger cold, laugh or run, walk or cry... you're in my sights...

Anonymous said...

Any and all of you are more than welcome to try and get some. I've been shot before, have you?

What you softies and trogs don't realize, is you aren't dealing with a bunch of slack-jawed rednecks fresh off the farm.

We're an army. I hope you're ready for war.

Anonymous said...

Yes I've been shot before and you'll have to shoot me many more times before I let you people say what you say without shooting you down if you'll pardon the pun.

We're not an army, you know why? Because we're better people than you; there's more in our lives than hate.

Anonymous said...

64 was a friend of mine, yah little bastard!

Remember the Alamos - Any interest in burning a haven for metahumans down?

Anonymous said...

My dance card is wide open boys,
anytime you want a dance.

Remember to bring friends, you'll need em.

Barrio Billy said...

Hey Kirby,

A little birdie with a badge told me that Alamos turned snitch on his crew three months ago when he got pinched by the Star.

Now, i was going to procure some solid evidence myself, and deliver it to his "boys", but if you're interested...

Anonymous said...

Hoi chummers stop picking on the mentally retarded policlub boyz.

lets get back to the main point of this:
a "free" spirit wants a SIN, i say more power to it. a "free" spirt should have the same rights and entitlement any meta would. but the crux point is how do we prove a free "free" and not some mages "tube sock".

oh and Poli106 you should locked the door when you went down the stuffer..

Anonymous said...

Shot, stabbed, poisoned, blown up, hit by a car, worked over, and water on the knee.

Still here.

Anonymous said...

That water on the knee drek sucks, dosen't it?

Anonymous said...

Ya, but I got banged up enough that they ended up replacing it, so that's no longer an issue.

Anonymous said...

Agreeing with reaper here and dragging our sorry arses forceably back onto the topic; I'm not a mage, can you wizboys out there tell a free spirit from one bound or otherwise under compulsion. Though how does a free spirit prove residence, perhaps astral polling stations to prevent them materialising in a different form and voting twice?

Anonymous said...

Their SIN, that's what.

When you hit the Polling Station, you have to show your SIN, and that's what's checked in the system.

And that's if you go to the Polling Station. Most people just vote from home nowadays. Gotta love the modern world, eh?

'Course, they could have a handful of fake SINs like some other types of folks we could care to mention. ;-)

Anonymous said...

Some spirits can flawlessly pass for multiple different spirits. During a SIN amnesty, they could plausibly appear multiple times in different forms, claim different SINs and vote on all of them. Of course, they can usually pretty flawlessly appear as various different humans and do the same thing - Realistic Form Voter Fraud is just something the modern age has to live with I think.

Of course we could do it like the Manchu: all spirits get the right to vote, no questions asked and if the free spirits in Manchurian Secret Police find out that a magician has been puppetting spirits on trivialities they dissappear that magician with extreme predjudice. That works for Dongbei well enough that they're still doing it almost 40 years later.

Anonymous said...

On the subject of SINs - they are overrated anyway... I used to have a real one - don't miss it.

And Alamos, you don't know the meaning of war. Training does not make a soldier - blood, courage, and camaraderie is what makes a soldier... and as for being shot... I've dodged more bullets than most of you spotlight rangers can count, and I can tell you that the worst wounds aren't the physical ones - but I walked away each time. Chummer, all the training in the world won't save you if you don't [i]behave[/i] like a soldier. The test of a soldier is the order he doesn't want to follow. The order to kill your lover, or father, or brother... the order to exterminate civilian targets, or the order to destroy something so beautiful that no human should be worthy even to gaze upon it. The reality is that the soldier does not exist. He is an illusion, an entity which his enemies cannot see or touch, having abandoned all forms of mercy, pity and compassion; now possessing the most lethal weapon a human could ever imagine: herself and her squad - extensions of one another, a cohesive whole. Pray, chummers, that you never face a soldier in battle, for her eyes know only death and her soul knows only pain. A soldier exists only for the mission - there is no malice nor mirth, only dead eyes behind the barrel of a gun.

So bring your army - the real soldiers will tear it apart, and Thanatos shall reap a river of souls that night. In the end, not even a memory shall remain.

Semper Fidelus