Jun 17, 17 / Leo 00, 01 15:46 UTC

Another Asgardians take on the Constitution  

Let's  get  right  into  it.  Sadly,  this  Constitution  seems  very  poorly  done  both  grammatically/orthographically  and  in  terms  of  content,  with  parts  full  of  feel-good  -  but  legally  meaningless  -  phrases  and  parts  that  are  straight-up  frightening  in  their  implication.  If  this  Constitution  correctly  reflects  the  intentions  and  values  of  the  people  currently  in  power,  then  god  help  us...


Only  touching  on  my  major  issues,  and  this  doesn't  even  include  the  meaningless  fluff  like  "Asgardia  is  a  country  of  free  spirit"  (what  does  that  even  mean?  Has  no  place  in  a  Constitution  IMO)  or  unnecessarily  complicated  phrasing  in  order  to  sound  more  "official":


1.    No  option  to  vote  "No"  -  Dealbreaker.  Anyone  involved  with  this  decision  should  be  disqualified  from  having  anything  to  do  with  Asgardias  legal/governmental  future.

2.    "Space  Kingdom"  -  Sounds  cool,  in  practice  it's  nonsense.  Please  be  serious  with  this  stuff.  I  will  touch  more  on  this  later.

3.    "Asgardia does not engage in politics, and has no place for political  parties. But every Asgardian can freely participate in political life on  Earth."  -  Either  meaningless  or  despotic.  Sure,  everyone  here  can  name  a  political  party  they  don't  like,  but  at  its  root,  forming  a  political  party  is  a  basic  cornerstone  of  a  representative  government  by  and  for  the  people.  Why  not  add  "Asgardia  is  no  place  for  labour  unions,  but  every  Asgardian  can  freely  negotiate  their  working  conditions"  as  well  (/sarcasm)?

4.    "Asgardia creates a new exclusively peaceful non-military and progressive history of the future space humankind."  -  Meaningless  word  salad,  which  from  now  on  I  will  stop  pointing  out  to  avoid  ballooning  this  post  beyond  all  limits.

5.    "If the rights of an Asgardian are infringed, including by an Asgardian  governmental body, he/she has the right to seek legal protection in  Supreme Space Court."  -  Citizens  rights  have  to  be  guaranteed  by  a  government  body  by  default.  Why  is  it  the  responsibility  of  the  oppressed  to  seek  protection?  Such  protection  should  be  a  given, not  conditional  upon  anything!

6.    "All citizens of Asgardia must comply with the Constitution, Asgardia’s  laws and regulations, respect and implement its Supreme Values  irrespective of their location, unless this results in violation of the  law of the country in which they are located."  -  This  would  mean  Asgardia  asserting  jurisdiction  over  other  sovereign  nations.

7.    "Failure to perform citizenship obligations or failure to perform them  properly may lead to permanent revocation of Asgardian citizenship"  -  Sounds  fine,  don't  pay  your  taxes,  we  revoke  your  citizenship  (/sarcasm).

8.    "Asgardia supports its citizens in leading healthy lifestyles."  -  Not  substantive  criticism  on  my  part,  but  just  as  an  aside:  Really?  This  makes  it  into  the  CONSTITUTION?

9.    "Asgardian currency is freely exchangeable into all of the main global  currencies on the free market on Earth in line with the law of Asgardia."  -  Unenforcable,  unless  you  want  to  assert  regulatory  jurisdiction  over  all  of  Earths  currency  exchanges.

10.    "Asgardia guarantees the rights of authors, inventors and users of intellectual property in harmony and balance."  -  Meaningless  fluff.  Define  "harmony"  and  "balance"  as  it  relates  to  property  rights.

11.    "governmental property that constitutes the wealth of Asgardian citizens used for the common good"  -  Say  what?  The  wealth  of  Asgardian  citizens  constitutes  governmental  property,  to  be  used  for  the  common  good?

12.    "Prejudice during elections and referenda based on Earth country of  birth, residence, citizenship, race, nationality, gender, language,  wealth, creed or belief and other differences is prohibited."  -  Unenforcable  (or  Thoughtpolice),  also  nonsense.  I  can  not  base  my  vote  on  a  candidates  belief  or  their  language?  What  if  the  candidate  doesn't  speak  a  language  I  understand?

13.    "court protection of Asgardian citizens’ rights to run for office and be elected;"  -  Except,  as  we  shall  see  later,  to  run  for  the  highest  office  in  the  nation...

14.    "Propaganda of superiority and inequality of people is prohibited.  Asgardia prohibits racist, Nazi, fascist and other similar ideologies in  their historical and new forms."  -  Sounds  good,  except  you  have  just  codified  thoughtcrime  in  your  Constitution.  Which  ideology  this  will  be  applied  to  is  unforseeable.  Why  not,  instead,  defeat  these  ideologies  in  open  debate?

15.    "Asgardia prohibits the propaganda of immoral and antisocial behaviour,  the production and circulation of information on any storage media which  contains mass information that is harmful to morality and/or aims to  undermine or diminish its Supreme Values."  -  again  with  the  thoughtcrime.  "Antisocial  behaviour"  can  mean  anything  and  nothing,  the  enforcement  of  this  paragraph  will  be  completely  arbitrary.

16.    "Any persecution for expression of views and convictions is prohibited,  provided that such views do not contain propaganda of immorality, seek  to undermine or diminish Supreme Values, threaten national security,  incite violence, strife, demean the honour and dignity of individuals,  disclose restricted information, and which is not otherwise specified by  requirements for ensuring information security."  -  Great,  let's  have  more  of  these  specific  terms  like  "propaganda  of  immorality",  which  aren't  open  to  interpretation  at  all.  And  let's  persecute  people  for  hurting  other  people's  feelings,  because  that  will  turn  out  well  and  won't  lead  to  an  authoritarian  state....

17.    "Asgardia’s national motto is “One Humanity, One Unity”."  -  I'm  not  the  closest  follower  to  the  goings-on  here,  so  correct  me  if  I'm  ill-informed.  Was  this  voted  on?  If  not,  then  change  it  because  it's  terrible.

  Last edited by:  Florian Erger (Asgardian)  on Jun 17, 17 / Leo 00, 01 15:49 UTC, Total number of edits: 1 time
Reason: added numbers to list

Jun 17, 17 / Leo 00, 01 15:47 UTC

18.    "Asgardian citizens must respect and protect Asgardia’s national symbols.  Disrespect towards Asgardia’s national symbols is subject to liability  in accordance with the procedure set by the law of Asgardia."  -  More  to  do  for  the  Ministry  of  Truth,  I  guess...

19.    "In its relations with Earth nations and international organisations,  Asgardia uses one of the 12 languages chosen by Asgardia and the  interlocutor. Agreements, treaties and other international acts  concluded in the name of Asgardia may also be prepared in a different  language requested by the other party on the mutual agreement of the  parties."  -  If  you  want  to  go  with  12  official  languages,  good  luck  to  you,  but  ANY  and  ALL  official  documents  will  have  to  be  translated  professionally  to  all  12  of  these  languages.  It  can't  be  that  a  citizen  of  Asgardia  speaking  one  of  its  official  languages  can  not  read  an  official  document  pertaining  to  his/her  rights  and/or  obligations,  because  it  is  not  available  in  their  official  language.

20.    "Asgardia recognises generally accepted international principles and norms."  -  It  might  actually  be  impossible  to  be  more  vague  than  this.

21.    "The Head of Nation is the most senior official of Asgardia, the  Guarantor of the Constitution, who sets the main directions of domestic  and foreign policy and represents Asgardian government in the nation and  abroad, acting in the capacity of Commander-in-Chief."  -  That's  weird,  because  earlier,  it  said  that  "The Head of Nation is the head of the government and is not part of any of the branches of government.".  This  description,  though,  sounds  an  awful  lot  like  what  the  executive  branch  does...

22.    "The maximum age limit for the Head of Nation position is 82 years."  -  Unnecessary,  especially  since  you  go  on  to  require  candidates  to  have  the  mental  and  physical  health  to  perform  the  job.  Why  exclude  qualified  candidates  based  on  age  then?

23.    "One year prior to reaching the age limit or in the event of a voluntary  resignation, the Head of Nation nominates a candidate for the position  of Head of Nation on a hereditary or any other basis. Two other  candidates or the same candidate for the position of Head of Nation are  nominated by Parliament and the Supreme Space Council. The election of  the Head of Nation is put to a referendum in accordance with the law of  Asgardia."  -  Oh  thank  god.  Citizens  can't  form  political  parties,  but  at  least  the  ruling  elite  gets  to  choose  who  we  can  and  can't  vote  for  and  apparently  needn't  have  any  transparent  reasons  for  it,  or  indeed  any  reasons  at  all...  I  don't  see  any  systemic  conflicts  of  interest  in  this  arrangement  at  all,  move  along  everybody.  I  for  one  welcome  our  new  oligarch  overlords.

24.    "The second and subsequent Heads of Nation can be any Asgardian citizen over the age of 40 and under the age of 65"  -  Nonsense  and  contradictory  with  #22.  Why  the  special  rule  for  the  first  head  of  nation?

25.    "The Head of Nation appoints and removes the Supreme Justice of the Supreme Space Court; the Chairman of the Supreme Space Council;"  -  Appoint:  okay  I  guess,  but  remove?  In  what  way  can  you  have  independent  branches  of  government  with  appropriate  checks  and  balances,  if  one  branch  has  significant  control  over  the  others?

26.    "calls elections of members of Parliament in accordance with the  Constitution and the law of Asgardia and has the right to dissolve  Parliament;"  -  without  a  clear  description  of  the  conditions  necessary  for  dissolving  Parliament,  this  paragraph  alone  sinks  the  entire  idea  of  representative  government.

27.    "[The  Head  of  Nation] negotiates and signs international treaties, ratification instruments,  accepts letters of credence and recall from diplomatic representatives; proposes draft laws to Parliament, signs laws adopted by Parliament, or  returns them without signature with the right to enact them, and has the  right to veto laws adopted by Parliament; [...] issues decrees which are mandatory for the government bodies and Asgardian citizens"  -  You're  sure  you  aren't  talking  about  the  head  of  the  executive  branch?

28.    "awards national governmental awards and grants military ranks and honorary titles;"  -  what  now?  What  was  all  that  about  non-military  earlier?  So  there  will  be  a  military?  Why  is  this  not  mentioned  elsewhere?  Is  this  the  same  as  the  Aerospace  Fleet?  You  have  a  paragraph  on  government  helping  people  with  living  a  more  healthy  lifestyle,  but  there's  nothing  about  the  effing  military,  who  they  are  subject  to,  and  nothing  about  the  conditions  and  prerequisites  for  e.g.  a  Declaration  of  War?

29.    "Members of Parliament are elected for terms of five years from among Asgardian citizens who have reached the age of 40."  -  Again,  unnecessary.  This  insistence  on  arbitrarily  high  age-limits  is  quite  puzzling.

30.    "The Head of Nation may dissolve Parliament."  -  of  course,  why  not?

31.    "the Supreme Values Council"  -  can  we  just  take  a  minute  to  let  this  sink  in?  They  want  to  form  a  "Supreme  Values  Council"....

32.    "The Royal Court"  -  this  pops  up  from  time  to  time  in  the  Constitution.  What  is  it?  Is  it  the  same  as  the  Supreme  Space  Court?  Is  it  a  second,  different  court?  

33.    "Asgardian calendar"  -  Quick  note  on  this:  Unnecessary  nonsense  that  sounds  cool  in  theory  but  will  be  nothing  more  than  an  annoyance  in  practice.

34.    "The views of people and Asgardian citizens about human dignity are  formed and fostered through education, parenting, propaganda and the  media in accordance with Asgardia’s Supreme Values."  -  I  guess  one  can't  say  that  they  are  being  unclear  about  it.  I  hope  everyone  likes  their  Constitution  with  codified  propaganda...

  Last edited by:  Florian Erger (Asgardian)  on Jun 17, 17 / Leo 00, 01 15:49 UTC, Total number of edits: 1 time
Reason: added numbers to list

Jun 17, 17 / Leo 00, 01 15:47 UTC

I  could  go  on,  but  that  would  take  more  time  than  I  currently  have.  In  short:  This  document  reads  like  it  was  written  by  an  edgy  first-year  sociology  student  with  delusions  of  grandeur ("Yeah,  man,  let's  call  it  "Space  Kingdom",  it'll  be  so  cool  and  awesome,  they'll  totally  vote  for  it!!!".  It  is  incomprehensible  in  places,  mostly  meaningless  and  full  of  vapid  phrasology,  and  partly  authoritarian.  It's  like  nobody  thought  this  through  and  they  just  went  with  the  first  draft  someone  came  up  with.


I  am  very  disappointed  and  shall  not  be  voting  on  this.  I  encourage  everybody  reading  this  to  do  the  same.

Jun 17, 17 / Leo 00, 01 16:53 UTC

I totally agree with you Keyser.  After having some headache because of reading constitution reviews, I finally could laugh a while with your sarcasm. 

Nicely done.

Jun 17, 17 / Leo 00, 01 17:17 UTC

I created an Etherpad with the current state of the constitution with some proposals from other users . There everyone can edit the whole text and comment on selections of text. I will put remarks and opinions on the document from other threads there, too. The idea is, that we don't have one person to manage all the proposed changes to merge with the document.

I hope this can be a central place, where everyone can directly change or remark the document to create something most citizens can accept.

Jun 17, 17 / Leo 00, 01 17:56 UTC

I  applaud  the  initiative,  but  quite  frankly,  I'm  not  sure  if  the  Constitution  in  its  current  state  has  a  salvageable  core  and  if  modifications  of  this  existing  document  are  sufficient.  I  recommend  rejection  instead  of  revision.

In  my  opinion,  this  draft  needs  to  be  discarded  completely  and  a  new  proposal  should  be  made  with  much  greater  transparency,  and  with  continuing  input  from  the  community.  Dr.  Ashurbeyli  asked  for  the  HoN  job,  nobody  said  it's  going  to  be  easy.  If  he  can't  make  a  version  that  is  acceptable,  he  will  have  to  start  over  as  many  times  as  it  takes.  If  he  can't  do  it  at  all  (or  if  the  current  Constitution  is  an  accurate,  non-negotiable  portrayal  of  his  vision  for  Asgardia),  he  should  step  aside.  I  am  not  willing  to  compromise  on  the  founding  document  of  Asgardia.

Jun 18, 17 / Leo 01, 01 02:16 UTC

@Keyser(Asgardian) on 17 June 2017, 5:56 p.m.

I invite you and everyone to add your comments and concerns to this thread I have setup.

Discussion of the Second draft Constitution

Jun 24, 17 / Leo 07, 01 06:55 UTC

Why should Master Ash care about puny ideas. He has an empire to run. 

Jun 24, 17 / Leo 07, 01 07:28 UTC

@Keyser

It is reassuring that other people as yourself see the draft constitution and ratification process for what it really is. It gives me hope that if Asgardia changes its current path (or if a tangible alternative space nation proposal emerges), there is a core of critical thinkers that can help carry it forward.

I honestly cannot see how any critical thinker that is truly interested in creating a free and equal society could willingly accept this constitution. Aside from the 5-10% that have been tricked into "voting" yes (since that was the only alternative) and the 1% that did so in the hope of changing things from the inside, there is no other way to describe the remaining 50k or so as sheep.

  Updated  on Jun 24, 17 / Leo 07, 01 07:29 UTC, Total number of edits: 1 time

Jun 24, 17 / Leo 07, 01 07:45 UTC

Heh, sheep are tasty treats. Just put em on the babie and grill em up.

Jun 24, 17 / Leo 07, 01 07:51 UTC

@Darth Aryz on 24 June 2017, 7:45 a.m.

Heh, sheep are tasty treats. Just put em on the babie and grill em up.

Can you clarify your meaning here? By "sheep," are you referring to people  you would "grill?"

Jun 24, 17 / Leo 07, 01 07:57 UTC

You sick LordZyra! Not what I said. Dont try twistin my words. It not all kangaroo meat outback. But the Kiwis "love" there sheep.

Jun 24, 17 / Leo 07, 01 08:13 UTC

@Darth Aryz(Asgardian) on 24 June 2017, 7:57 a.m.

You sick LordZyra! Not what I said. Dont try twistin my words. It not all kangaroo meat outback. But the Kiwis "love" there sheep.

Hi @Darth Aryz, Welcome to Asgardia.Space. I see you recently joined. So, maybe you have not taken a chance to become familiar with the forum rules. I have to ask how your post is relevant to the OP? The opening post regards the Constitution. 

Also, I must ask if we can please keep your posts on topic per the Code of Conduct.

I invite you to read over it here:  https://asgardia.space/en/forum/forum/forum-announcements-10/topic/code-of-conduct-for-asgardia-online-resources-4686/
If there is anything you are not sure about or have further questions, you can email the Civic.Asgardia Staff for clarifications. Here is their email if you should decide to do so: adminteam@asgardia.space .

  Last edited by:  Richie Bartlett (Asgardian)  on Jun 24, 17 / Leo 07, 01 08:18 UTC, Total number of edits: 1 time