Now while I'm not the biggest fan of the Dice, EBR's willingness to stand by it is one of the unique things about the TL. SaB has already pulled through one fumble (Japan's nat 20 vs the US's 1 in the roll for the GPW) it would seem rather off-putting to drop it now simply because situationism failed in Britain.
Separated at Birth: America and Drakia
- Thread starter Ephraim Ben Raphael
- Start date
- Status
Chapter Þ (Part Two)
Ephraim Ben Raphael
Banned
Chapter Þ Again
China had been in crisis for a while now.
First you had the decay of the Qing Dynasty that resulted in the rise of the Tiandao. Then you had the craziness of the Tian Dynasty, taking orders from Wusheng Laomu via automatic writing and seeking to cope with the challenges of modernity by rejecting new innovations and going backwards to the golden days of the Ming. Tian mismanagement opened the way for Russia, Britain, Japan, and the United States to undermine Chinese sovereignty and dominate Chinese markets. The collapse of the Russian and British Empires permitted Japan to force China to become a Japanese protectorate until Tokyo decided to annex it outright, triggering the Great Pacific War. The Middle Kingdom then had years of war and forced integration into the Japanese Empire to look forward to, until the Japanese Civil War offered the opportunity for the people of China to free themselves from foreign rule. The fighting was bloody and multi-sided, between the Japanese loyalists, the Pan-Asians, and the different Chinese rebel groups, but it ended with an internationally recognized Great Han Republic signing a peace deal with the Confederation of East Asia that recognized China’s borders under Japanese rule as the boundaries of the new state, and agreeing to an armistice with Tokyo that left the coastal Chinese islands in Japanese hands. The GHR was a member of the Jakarta Pact and a fascist democracy, and the relocation of large amounts of Japanese manufacturing there during the war left it with a pretty solid industrial base. But the new government was weak, inexperienced, unable to entirely bring the independent rebel groups that had fought alongside it in line, and the Chinese people themselves were struggling with an identity crisis.
Oh, don’t get me wrong- they were very proudly Chinese. If Japan’s efforts at promoting a Pan-Asian culture in China accomplished nothing else, they left the Han with a very determined sense of national identity and a hostility towards efforts to erase their culture. But the failure of the Tian Dynasty to modernize, and the way that the Tian obsession with (their version of) tradition had left the country vulnerable to outsiders, discredited historic Chinese customs and institutions in the eyes of many. Plus hostility towards the Pan-Asian project that Japan had forced on them triggered a reaction that saw a large part of the population open to experimenting with the culture of the West.
So post-independence the Chinese national identity (or at least the Han parts of it) was a mess of contradictions. It identified very strongly as Chinese, but was distrustful of traditional Chinese practices. It was very friendly towards Western culture and society, but deeply anti-fascist (as it associated fascism with Pan-Asianism), contributing to the unpopularity and instability of the new government. There was a kind of national soul searching going on, and it manifested most strongly in the “New China” idea.
When the Chinese government tried to intimidate Situationist artist Peng Luoyang for his criticism of the state by assigning a police officer to follow him around in public filming him, Peng responded with by creating a new Situation, hiring someone to film the officer who was filming him, and thereby making a mockery of the whole thing.
“New China” wasn’t a movement as much as it was a concept- an idea that China needed new art, new music, a new approach to doing things. This newness should be, indeed it had to be, uniquely Chinese, but it should be rooted in modern China instead of the China of the past, and it could take some inspiration from the west. A great deal of experimentation went on as different groups and people tried to determine what New China should consist of- there was a notional school of Chinese Societism, a multitude of competing Chinese Socialist groups, strains of Chinese ultra-nationalism, and of course, Chinese Situationism.
Situationism was attractive in China for a number of reasons- one being that its embrace of the value of the individual regardless of race, religion, or culture put it directly at odds with the despised values of Pan-Asianism and by extension Fascism. Another was that while Situationism had its own unique artistic style, there was nothing stopping anyone from slotting- say- the dreamlike artistic approach popular in New China Art into the framework of The Situation. So Situationism was Western, but could be made Chinese, and it had that “new ideology” smell that drew all the young revolutionaries. In America and Europe the movement was defined in large part by its opposition to modernity, but in China it offered a new and modern approach towards what the purpose of the state should be. As elsewhere, public Situations drew attention to the Chinese Chapter of the SI, which generated interest and drew people via Situationist art to Situationist political theory.
And so the movement grew.
The Situationist Yu Gang displaying one of his ornate pieces of porcelain with modern scenes from the Chinese War of Independence.
The decision by the government of the Great Han Republic to prohibit Situations and clamp down on its more radical activism only made it more popular. In the heady days of the 1960s it seemed like anything might be possible in China, and the utopian promises of Situationism were attractive. Meanwhile the relatively moderate GHR government was hemorrhaging legitimacy, disappointing and disillusioning its former supporters, and radicalizing an increasingly large segment of the public. When President Zhuan Zexi cancelled the 1964 congressional election that polls predicted would have seen the Republican Party voted out of power overwhelmingly, the people began to mobilize and turned out in force. The young and handsome Situationist revolutionary Xian Chun led them to seize the city of Xian, where he proclaimed the inhabitants eternally free from The Spectacle. In response Zhuan ordered out the army…
… who promptly joined the mob!
The Chinese Revolution wasn’t bloodless, but it had more in common with the Silent Revolutions of Europe than the Chinese War of Independence. As King Mob Echo fought and died in the United Kingdom, China held a new round of elections that saw Xian elected President of China and Situationist candidates take a commanding majority in the Chinese Congress. With the sometimes-grudging assistance of more moderate Socialist and Utopian allies they put together the two-thirds majority needed to amend the constitution and set about the radical transformation of Chinese government and society.
It was a rather avant-garde revolution, but not a particularly bad one, all things considered.
"The Canvas"- the new Chinese capital building- was a product of the avant-garde Situationist architectural experimentation intended to transform China's cities. It was originally designed to resemble the thirty-two geometric provinces of Free China, and the designs was kept even after the thirty-two province system was abandoned. Most of the year The Canvas covered in unrestricted art and grafitti, although a private association of independent Chinese artists is quick to paint their own works over anything they consider to be too obscene and unbefiting their capital. Once a year the artists are kept away for a week so that the building can be cleaned and repainted white before they're allowed at it again.
There was a new calendar, of course, and an attempt to create a rational new religion, and an attempt to create a new pan-religious union of all faiths. There was a new style of address for fellow revolutionaries and sympathizers of course (because every good revolution has one of those), the creation of new holidays, and mass re-naming of streets, towns, and people. China was divided up into thirty-two arbitrarily designed geometric provinces that were created by the simple expedient of drawing 11.5 degree angles off of the new capital of Xi’an without regard for population or geography. Situations were everywhere and art materialized on every state building with the decriminalization of graffiti on public property. The constitution was amended to make SUN WUKONG (“The Monkey King”- a figure from Chinese folklore modernized by the Chinese Chapter of the Situationist International to be their equivalent of The Critic in America and King Mob Echo in Britain) the ceremonial head of state. Since anyone could become Sun Wukong at any time (as with The Critic and King Mob Echo) this meant that any Chinese citizen could legitimately claim to be the country’s head of state. The country was renamed from “The Great Han Republic” to “Free China”. There was truth, justice, freedom, and reasonably priced love (courtesy of the newly formed Chinese Sex Workers Union) for the nation.
Of course you didn’t have to use the new calendar, or participate in one of the experimental new religions (the attempt at a rationalist “religion” never really went anywhere, but the project to unify all faiths picked up a couple million followers and as “The Great Faith” became another piece of China’s religious mélange), or use the new style of address if you didn’t want to. Situationism tended more towards anarchism in its governing philosophy and while Xian Chun (the revolutionary leader, not to be confused with the Chinese capital of Xi’an) wanted to “unchain” the people he refused to force them in line with his thinking.
As it was, the circumstances surrounding the Chinese Revolution meant that the Situationists never did put their full program into practice.
The Millenium Redoubt was a project by the authorities of the city of Chengdu, the architect Xiao Yun, and a number of minor artists. Conceived of as a prototype Situationist response to the need for industry, the building was an art piece that hosted a number of smaller art pieces while simultaneously being a functioning factory for volunteer workers, the products of which were to be distributed via give-away shops. Ultimately China opted to pursue a more conventional approach to industry, and the Millenium ended up being run by an art/labor co-operative.
Partly this was because Chinese Situationism had emerged in response to very different pressures than Situationism in America and Europe- whereas elsewhere it was anti-nationalist, in China it incorporated a strong flavor of Chinese Nationalism via New China Art. Partly it was because the need for Socialist and Utopian votes to rewrite the constitution meant that the leftists were able to put the breaks on some of Situationism’s more wild ideas and insist on concessions for themselves. And partly it was because the Chinese political spectrum- regardless of ideology- was in general agreement that China needed a strong military in order to protect itself from the threat of Japan, the Confederation of East Asia, India and the Jakarta Pact (which Free China withdrew from), and Drakia and the Pact of Blood. A strong military meant maintaining heavy industry- not minimal heavy industry like the Geoists but real heavy industry, and Xian was very cognizant that a strong military necessitated a strong civilian government to keep the military in check.
So, the Situationist dream of a China run by nothing more than democratic local councils using an economy with the “work concept” abolished failed to materialize (to the condemnation of Situationist radicals elsewhere in the world, who accused Xian of practicing “trivialized Socialism” instead of true Situationism).
Instead Free China had a two-house congress, the Lower House which consisted of eligible Chinese citizens picked at random every two years, while the upper house was elected by fairly conventional means. The “Absolute Ruler” of China (in what was clearly a lampoon of Drakia’s “divine monarchy” and Eternal Autocrat) was of course Sun Wukong, but while ordinary Chinese acting as the Monkey King were duly given the opportunity to accept diplomatic credentials or ceremonially gavel in meetings of congress, the Speaker of the Upper House was commander-in-chief of the military and ran things as head of government. Chinese heavy industry and military manufacturing was put under Utopian-style centralized state management, while a more Socialist program of voluntary collectivization into autonomous democratic economic collectives was encouraged for farming and light industry with mixed results. Half of the thirty-two geometric provinces were governed via what OTL would call Soviet democracy (what the 3rd French Republic used ITTL), the other half (alternating clockwise) used decentralized participatory democracy via village assemblies and town councils, with referendums to pass province-wide laws and regional councils to deal with whatever couldn’t be handled locally.
Public housing in Situationist China. The buildings followed standardized layouts with apartments largely identical in shape and size, similar to Rationalist architecture in the United States. However features such as windows, doors, paint color, carpeting, and light fixtures were randomized (sometimes with schizophrenic results) such that no two apartments in any given building could be expected to look the same. Residents were of course permitted to make aesthetic modifications to things like paint.
(The geometric provinces only lasted one year, due to the sheer impossibility of governing triangular shaped territories whose borders paid no attention to, uh… reality. Unsurprisingly the decentralized Situationist provinces coped with this insanity much better than the more conventional Socialist ones and so became the basis for the hundred provinces- periodically redrawn by a nonpartisan committee to keep their populations equal- that replaced them. The existence of extremely weak provincial governments meant that more power accumulated in the hands of local and national authorities, but oh well)
However, despite the ideological compromises it made, Free China remained the world’s first Situationist state.
The central purpose of the government- according to the new constitution- was to help the Chinese people have fun, rewarding lives, with the freedom to experience Situations and explore after their legitimate desires. Central to Xian Chun’s administration as Speaker was the invention of “Gross National Happiness” to measure and promote greater happiness among the people. A minimum amount of spending was reserved for the creation of public art and the organization of communal events and celebrations (many of which were just basic neighborhood get-togethers). Free housing, healthcare, food, and water were guaranteed, and the construction of extensive public housing (and general public works) offered an opportunity for experimental and avant-garde styles of architecture to flourish. New public parks- from city parks to national parks- sprang into existence. Eliminating the need to work completely proved beyond the practical capabilities of Free China, but mandating flexible hours and vacation time was not. The school system experimented with different types of democratic education (not always successfully- voluntary attendance works great for a segment of the student population, but works terribly for the rest of it) and stressed critical thinking. There were frequent Situations, experiments to blur the line between life and art, and while the utopia had yet to materialize the government seemed functional.
But as China embarked on its quest to create Homo Ludens, Drakia was working to create a very different kind of human.
Earth in 1965. The geometric provinces only lasted for a year, but they're too entertaining to not include.
Ephraim Ben Raphael
Banned
Some valid criticisms, but the dice choose paths- they don't dictate the story. There were three possibilities here; Situationism wins in Britain and China, it only wins in Britain, or it only wins in China. The revolution failed in Britain, which puts Britain down a specific path that I had planned for it if it failed, and took the fate of China's revolution out of the hands of the dice. There were going to be factors (Irish support +2, that kind of thing) to make King Mob more likely to win, but they fumbled and so those things ended up not mattering.
The problem was that I uploaded so many pictures for this chapter the site wouldn't let me attach any more to the post, so I had to split it in half. Which meant instead of ending with "China wins and makes Situationism work (kinda)!" I posted "Here's a cool ideology, a cool rebel movement, and oh they got crushed", and going out to walk the dog and do some shopping before posting the second half. Understandable that people found it a frustrating read and a bad story, and I hope the newly posted second half helps to fix things.
Thank you, one fumble was definitely not the end for Situationism.
I like the dice system. It adds that randomness that timelines need. Situationism will return in Britain since the king is not dead. As for china, one part of the world thinks they are crazy while the other half is taking notes.
Antarctica under Drakian boots, what an abomination. Free China is fun though
Those Chinese state borders are seizure inducing...... I love it! Despite Great Britains further slide into irrelevance its its hilarious that this world is still dominated by super powers that where once British Colonies. America, Drakia, and India are poised to achieve global hegemony if the other 2 get taken out. America's got the tech, industry but is diplomatically isolated. Drakia has the most natural resources but hampered by an inefficient system. India has the industry and manpower of South Asia plus having numerous allies.
Guess we'll be seeing the Drakian's first forays into creating Homo Drakensis or Star Trek Khan Augments soon.
Wonder if any of the powers created Seadrome's for airships and later airplanes crossing the Atlantic, before propeller and jet planes really matured.
This is what I'm thinking steam cars were like in universe during the later half of the 19th century in universe.
Wonder if any of the powers created Seadrome's for airships and later airplanes crossing the Atlantic, before propeller and jet planes really matured.
Drakia conquering the Tsala anyone.
My best guess is "bad"
This is what I'm thinking steam cars were like in universe during the later half of the 19th century in universe.
I hope we get to see an update on those different paths that did not happen since the beginning of the story but would still be cool to see.
Also, who knows, nobody says this would be the last appearance of the situationist in Britain.
Situationism is really an intereresting and cool ideology...it sucks that it was crushed in Britain (maybe a future comeback or inspiration for future movements?) but I am glad that at least it won in China (why can't we have a country like this OTL?, thoses buildings looks awesome!).
Also, this:
, thoses buildings looks awesome!).Also, this:
That's probably the best thing they can do for the rest of the world...
Last edited:
I love the dice, most scenarios on here go down one of two paths, guidance towards a particular goal by the author which can often result in implausibility to make the shape of the story fit or some of the better ones tend towards the most likely or logical consequences always happening. But that's unrealistic as well, history is full of unlikely events.
The dice are random but not guided and this you can't see the authors fingerprints too heavily.
The dice are random but not guided and this you can't see the authors fingerprints too heavily.
Skallagrim
Banned
Kick
Is that what you see? To me, it seems more like a sign of vast hysteria and madness -- people faced with a monstrously bleak world, retreating into pathetic, childish absurdism where they can pretend the world isn't a nightmare. All the while being so utterly irresponsible and even outright destructive (to any form of social cohesion) that they make the triumph of the tyrannical powers considerably more likely.
Drakia and its horrors is like a pack of wolves encircling your encampment. In England, the regime can be seen as a wolf that has already made it inside. The situationists, conversely, are like dogs driven mad by the fear; barking wildly, pissing and shitting on everything, jumping and running around in a deranged frenzy, and dangerously distracting everyone who should be facing the wolves. Their madness is a critical threat to your ability to face the wolves.
EDIT: Since a mod insists on not recognising that the last line of this post was purely metaphorical (which it was), I have removed it from the post to avoid future confusion. If any others have read it that way, I apologise for my poor phrasing, but hasten to add that it was never anything more than that. Let it be clear that any accusations against me are based solely on an interpretation of my post that I do not support, and which I did not intent.
Last edited:
I respectfully disagree.
Situationist China remains highly cognizant of the threat and scales her military force accordingly.
The Situationists are leading the ideological charge against the Drakian horrifying vision of Custodians and Servitors by proposing a different view of the future, one where people are valued as such. Such a value system is an appealing direct counternarrative to Societism.
Heck, in Britain, it was Situationism that faced the wolves. They failed, but they tried hard. And we know from the author himself that it was not an entirely doomed attempt from the start.
- Status