Region/Antarctic Oasis

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Antarctic Oasis
Founder Omigodtheykilledkenny
WA Delegate Krioval
Members 40
 -  of which WA 4
Regional population
 -  2014 estimate 405 billion
GRP N/A
Regional HDI 0.530
low
Region page
Antarctic Oasis
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Antarctic Oasis

Antarctic Oasis is a dank pit of corporate tyranny and environmental crimes; its leaders shake the very foundations of earnest faith in honest and accountable government; its people are probably the rudest and most ignorant bunch of S.O.B.s ever to occupy their own sovereign territory -- oh, wait. That's actually a description of Omigodtheykilledkenny, the founding nation, but the whole region is pretty much the same, really.

Founded as a refuge for a bunch of scummy dictators and rogue tyrants trying to escape the prying eyes of international tribunals and human-rights watchdogs, the region came into being when these leaders came upon the world's last unspoiled wilderness, blinding white beauty wreathed in pale sunlight and stunning natural ice sculptures, and decided what it really needed was some strip-mining, maybe a few...thousand oil wells, and smog -- lots of smog -- so some humongous, massively polluting cities would be great, and maybe a few illegal weapons-testing facilities to make it complete. Also, what were all those penguins doing, just happily scampering along the ice and swimming in the ocean, when they could be rigged up with explosives and trained as mighty warriors? A few senseless massacres of WA compliance officials later, Antarctic Oasis had arrived.

Since then, the region and its leaders have done just about everything they could to piss off the world at large, including terrorizing peaceful countries with unprovoked saber-rattling and maniacal cackling, invading powerless countries to take out their frustrations over decisions of the WA, plying rival countries with liquor and prostitutes to compel them to spill national secrets, and corrupting the halls of the WA General Assembly with brazenly lewd and obscene conduct (see Thessadorian Ambassador), bribes-for-votes scandals, violent and disorderly behavior, and reams of repeals and blockers to neuter the WA of its power and leave it a hollow shell of what it once was. At least that's what the official AO Conspiracy manuals say; the real story is probably a bit more complex, not to mention boring.

History

According to the NS version of Lies My Teacher Told Me, Antarctic Oasis was founded on a lie. Propaganda surrounding Antarctic Oasis Day may tell you the region was formed on the principles of "freedom" and "states' rights" -- or even escaping geological catastrophe in Ameranta or "climbing to the summit of Mt. Manisthishigh and giving the world the finger," as Sen. Sulla famously stated -- but in reality it was started out to give its leaders safe haven to continue committing human rights violations and environmental destruction without interference from international watchdogs. So stick that in your "freedom" pipe and smoke it!

Following AO's founding in 2005, life in the region was pretty boring, to tell you the truth. Sure, some nation named "Palixia" did try to stage a coup and ended up leaving the region in disappointment, but afterward, everyone was just left to shrug and scoff, "Well, that was pointless." Desperately seeking attention, Antarctic nations dispatched diplomats to raise hell in the General Assembly (then called the United Nations), the very body they had founded AO to get away from. And after all the space dust from Death Star blasts had cleared, the region had collectively sponsored more legislation than any other in the NS community, earning them years of malice and contempt from other jealous regions.

The Death Star destroying the WSA fleet, 2015.

In 2006 the Allied Antarctic Asskickers treaty was formalized, and triumphant signatories immediately turned their newfound collective wrath on the innocent nation of Chechnya. Other hijinks in Antarctic history included an international contest for the hand of the Queen of Karmicaria (yeah, we know, big prize there), a kick-ass light show when an election dispute in the space-based empire of Yelda set off a civil war that spilled over into its Antarctic territories, and an effort to showcase the WA as the laughingstock that it is in the critically acclaimed reality series World Assembly, which stars many leaders from the region.

Antarctic Oasis won back its cherished Death Star in 2014 after losing it seven and a half years prior. So suck our dicks, people who hate us.

Geography

Antarctic Oasis and its membership historically haven't given a flying fuck about the rest of the world (and in fact have instituted a defense alliance and anti-gnome operations to keep the rest of the world out), so it naturally follows that they don't much care about their position in it, politically or geographically. The region assumes itself as part of an Earth-based dimension roughly resembling RL, at least in geographic terms. Malibu Islands and Gruenberg are due north, occupying NS versions of the Indian Ocean and the Indian subcontinent. The remains of Ameranta are in the Western Hemisphere. Little more is known about the planet.

Viewed from space, Antarctic Oasis is deceptively beautiful.

But thanks to the region's dealings with other regions in the multiverse (chiefly those interested in UN/WA matters), Antarctic Oasis has become a notable part of alternate dimensions, so that the region now straddles multiple realities within NationStates. Antarctic Oasis is assumed to occupy the Antarctic continent in numerous regional maps, including those of International Democratic Union, Western Atlantic and Lavinium. Antarctica is assumed to occupy the Antarctic continent in a different dimension of Planet Earth.

Political map

Historic claims to the Antarctic continent have held that Omigodtheykilledkenny occupies the Antarctic Peninsula and the Ronne Ice Shelf, with Karmicaria, Christom and the city-state of Douria located due east. The Palentine covers Victoria Land and Oates Land on the other side of the continent, with Lois-Must-Die bordering on the south and east in the Ross Ice Shelf, and Retired WerePenguins on the west in Adelie Land. Princess Mint borders The Palentine on the south and west, while the pirates of Bloodstone Kay hold an outpost in the Balleny Islands. South Jenstown and Altani Antarctica are in East Antarctica, with Yeldan Antarctica occupying a secure undisclosed location nearby. Trek any further inland, closer to the South Pole, and you might stumble across psychotic colonies of Evil Smurfs and N00bianans, who might want to abduct you and dissect you in the name of science. (The pole itself is claimed by the Kennyites, who occupy a research station there.) Zarquon Froods and Flibbleites Puppet inhabit floating landmasses that both defy gravity and occasionally block out the sun on the mainland (and may or may not actually be over Antarctica at any given point in time). The locations of satellite countries like Alqanian Antarctica and Antarctic Snefaldia are not definite.

Several nations claiming to be politically oriented with Antarctic Oasis aren't physically located anywhere near the region (and with all the psychotic dictators in the Antarctic regularly alarming their neighbors with noisy weapons tests and maniacal laughter, who can blame them?), although Aundotutunagir is close by in the sub-Antarctic. Snefaldia resides in Western Atlantic somewheres, and Allech-Atreus is light years away, in an extra-solar system that oddly enough has never been named (possibly "Imperia"). And if you can find a way to Cobdenia or New Leicestershire, let us know; their only connection to the NS world seems to be through odd time-space portals that could also lead to John Malkovich's head, if travelers take a wrong turn.

Climate and wildlife

Rising polar temperatures are increasingly allowing for idiots like this one to go naked at the South Pole and not freeze their nuts off.

For an Antarctic region, Antarctic Oasis is unusually warm. This is due largely to environmentally destructive activities in the region's many cities, military installations, weapons-testing facilities and mines. Fossil-fuel production and consumption is irregularly high among Oasis societies; much of this can be attributed to defiance of the UN in the region's early days, and, well, the inability to stop once problematic restrictions were removed. This has resulted in the accelerated erosion of glaciers and ice shelves in the formerly pristine wilderness, and unseasonably warm temperatures in coastal areas. Climatologists, indubitably, blame it all on global warming.

Local wildlife in South Jenstown, safely penned off with warning signs lest they explode.

Despite it all, the local wildlife have thrived. The numbers of the native penguin have not diminished in recent years, even after a large number of them inexplicably began spontaneously to combust. Of all species in the Antarctic, native and imported, penguins (of many varieties) remain the most prominent and numerous, with the "exploding" kind most common in nations such as Omigodtheykilledkenny and The Palentine, where military leaders pioneered regional efforts to recruit the natives to defend their beloved homeland.

Though mainly known for its fiercely loyal "native" warriors, Antarctic Oasis does boast other interesting sentient and sapient wildlife. Medieval Gnomish Warbands roam the lands hunting for compliance gnomes and collecting rent (although "committing armed robbery" might be more accurate phrasing). The Palentine has inducted dolphins into its navy, mainly for the purposes of detecting underwater mines, but their service as seamen has rendered their mouths the scourge of the southern seas. Parents must shield their children's virgin ears whenever a Palentine Navy Dolphin is near; they talk so filthily, they have been immortalized in a Palentine Board of Tourism slogan: "Come visit The Palentine: Our Dolphins Swear Like Drunken Sailors!"

The region has also been known for housing Mashtopian yetis wielding cigar-cutters, and has been threatened before with bands of mutant polar bears.

Politics

Yeldan colonial leader Felix Dzerzhinsky in a 2007 propaganda poster.

Oft-dismissed (and/or stereotyped) by international critics as a prejudicial cabal of tinpot dictators contemptuous of human rights and democratic freedoms and therefore whose opinions and WA legislation are demonstrably meritless, a survey of the actual political dispositions of the region's leaders and governments reveals a far more complex and diverse civic landscape. Prevalent ideologies range from your typical tyrannical corporatist dictatorships like Mallorea and Riva to theocratic corporatist dictatorships like (pre-reform) Snefaldia and the Kawaiian diaspora; from quasi-democratic corporatist dictatorships like Philimbesi and Retired WerePenguins to libertine/pseudo-anarchic corporatist dictatorships like The Palentine and Omigodtheykilledkenny -- even socialist/post-communist corporatist dictatorships are represented in the likes of Krioval and Iron Felix. Despite the notorious and anti-democratic tendencies of historic states like Karmicaria, Kivisto and Cluichstan, advocates for increased political freedoms have found champions in Kennyite diplomats -- and yes, naysayers, even human rights have been advocated abroad by Cobdenia and various Fine Yeldan Puppets™.

The sheer diversity of ideological bents in Antarctic Oasis, despite the advertised sympathy for dictatorial regimes, has been widely attributed to the region's steadfast support for national sovereignty, not only in the WA but also in regional diplomacy, where the prevailing "do-whatever-the-fuck-you-want" attitude (refer to Senator Sulla's "Mount Manisthishigh speech") has resulted in a refusal to establish a regional constitution or other treaties or legislative bodies dictating national policy, which are common elsewhere.

Palentine Empress Jhessan (right) meeting with troops, 2011.

Nations within Antarctic Oasis are loosely aligned both economically and militarily through the Antarctic Oasis Free Trade Zone (FTZ) and the Allied Antarctic Asskickers (AAA) -- treaties formed in 2006 but since then have been largely forgotten about. Regional governments confer on important *snort!* business matters through the Antarctic Oasis Diplomatic Corps., chaired by Kennyite Amb. Lenny Beteta. Relations between Antarctic countries are typically warm, but have been subject to occasional strain, such as in 2006 when regional powers took opposing sides in the revolt of the Altanis' stormy Antarctic colonies.

The most important bilateral relationship in the region is the "alliance with benefits" between The Palentine and Omigodtheykilledkenny, powerful countries with remarkable political, cultural, economic and familial ties. Also their leaders like to hook up from time to time. Under the AAA treaty, Omigodtheykilledkenny and The Palentine are the two permanent members of the Regional Defense Authority (RDA). And a not-so-friendly rivalry between former Kennyite VP Antigone Morgan and Palentine Empress Jhessan over who has the better rack has carried on for years (though most people in the region prefer Thessadoria's).

Government

There isn't one, really. The Kennyites, as the local tinpot "dick-tators," usually make all the decisions, and the other countries, either out of laziness or some perverted sense of respect, go along with it. There is a small group of informal governors, however, called the charter nations, who mostly rubber-stamp the dick-tators' edicts. That, and brag about being charter nations. Otherwise, they just while away the time in the clubhouse smoking themselves retarded and laughing themselves silly watching reruns of World Assembly. Hey, it's the one where Mister Jones and Iron Felix dress as a pantomime horse! This one's hilarious!

The current charter nations are Omigodtheykilledkenny, Krioval, The Palentine, Iron Felix and Snefaldia.

Also, to save money, the region found an evil talking skull named Murray and stuck him on a stool at the region's entrance as "gatekeeper" and hoped that would be enough to scare off enemies and raiders. They also dress him up in cute costumes on holidays and stuff.[1]

Delegate competitions

The semi-annual competition to select the region's delegate is the most important political event in the region. Sometimes these contests involve democratic votes, but mostly the dick-tators just pick the contestant they like best. In the past, these "smackdowns" have included "primary elections," knockoffs of reality shows like The Amazing Race and Surviving Nugent, and an auto race across the region. There was also a Klöllen hunt in there somewhere. There has not been a full-blown delegate competition since 2012; we'll get around to organizing the next one whenever we feel like it.

Past delegates of Antarctic Oasis include Omigodtheykilledkenny (2005), The Palentine and Gruenberg (2006), Kivisto (2007), Iron Felix, Douria and Snefaldia (2008), Cobdenia (2009), Krioval (2010-2012), Zarquon Froods (2012-2013), Retired WerePenguins (2013-2014), Bloodstone Kay (2014-2017), Krioval again (2017-2018), and The Palentine again (2018-present).

Foreign relations

Antarctic Oasis is internationally famous (or rather, infamous) for its prominent role in World Assembly politics. Its members have collectively sponsored more than 60 resolutions in both the WA and its predecessor, the UN, and the region as a whole is widely recognized as a primary proponent of national sovereigntism. Numerous contingents to the World Assembly have sought to emulate the region's WA policies, including Douria, Mousebumples and Knootoss.[2] Many AO nations are members of the United Nations Old Guard.

AO diplomacy on display at the World Assembly.

Over the years, Antarctic diplomats have been praised for their handling of difficult and stormy debates in the World Assembly with necessary diversion. Who can forget the Repeal "Gay Rights" debate, when they kept the liquor flowing for weary delegates? Or the UN Fair Wage Convention, when they defenestrated practically every opponent of the bill and destroyed a statue of the UN's founder? Or the World Assembly Economic Union, which they turned into one giant pie-fight? Or WA General Fund, where the unrelenting and gratuitous violence of the Dictionary Wars made the whole world shudder? Or that one time Susa blew up the World Assembly (you know, that one time)? Or AO diplomats' shenanigans in all those idiotic SC debates about Omigodtheykilledkenny? Or that time they turned SC chambers into a lake?

It's not all fun and games, however. Especially when the region is accused of being in-cahoots with the Secretariat, participating in raids on "innocent" regions like Eastern Islands of Dharma and Osiris, "rigging" elections in Osiris and Texas, and being simultaneously bumbling and clueless, and a terrible threat to peaceful defenders everywhere. Every single one of those charges is absolutely true, of course, and the accusers have the forum screenshots to prove it. We'll get back to you if and when they actually close their case.

Witch's Tit Square, a monument to AO's allies. (They had to put up random flags, because they don't really have any.)

Conversely, AO has enjoyed positive relations with numerous NS regions, including Monkey Island, That Place Over There, Final Fantasy and Zhaucauozian Friendship (which the Kennyites call "Zack & Friends" because no one knows how to pronounce their name). Antarctica's pretty cool, too. The most important allies of Antarctic Oasis are Texas and The Pleiades, but that's just because they provided the biggest bribes. A lot of prominent figures in NationStates, mostly World Assembly power-players and several Secretariat members, maintain and have maintained puppet nations in AO (because who doesn't want to sit at the cool kids' table?). The "Antarctians" have even asserted themselves in the defending business, aiding regions like Lavinium and Zack & Friends when they came under attack by raiders, and refounding Malibu Islands after it was destroyed by people who for some reason really hated ACCEL.

Relations with regions like Gatesville Inc (formerly Gatesville), International Democratic Union and Osiris have historically been more complicated, though tensions with those regions have thawed in recent years -- after AO stopped mocking Gatesville's victories, repealing IDU's resolutions, and usurping Osiris' democratic rule, etc.

Bot sez...

Antarctic Oasis is a medium-sized region, with a thriving community of 40 nations and only 4 World Assembly Members.

In Antarctic Oasis, denizens enjoy their civil rights, although not too much, or too freely. Nations in the region are considered developing democracies, with some political freedoms afforded to denizens. The economy of the region is very strong, with a large number of very powerful trading powers. Denizens tend to pay their taxes quickly and quietly, with a median tax rate of 10%. The economies of nations in the region tend to be dominated by the private sector, with on average only 5% of the economy comprising the public sector. Commerce is a priority for governments, accounting for an average of 4% of public expenditure.

In Antarctic Oasis education, when conducted, is done with sticks and mud. The region's law enforcement officials try hard to combat a relatively high level of crime, but are hampered by a lack of funding. Defense is a major priority for governments within the region, with a large chunk of government budgets being devoted to it. Due to the lack of any Public transport, streets are packed with cars, bikes, and assorted noisy vehicles.

Nobody really knows about the state of administration in Antarctic Oasis. Observers asked for information, but found nobody was available to take calls. Hospital patients are given credit checks upon passing through emergency rooms, as no government provision is made for healthcare in the region. Welfare in the region is minimal, with only a small amount of expenditure being devoted to spending on social security. Governments in the region are avowedly atheist - no public funds are allocated to spirituality.

In Antarctic Oasis, Social inequality is total, with wealth being held by a tiny fraction of the region's populace. The environments of the nations in the region are almost universally appalling.

Additional materials