Chris Douglas

World – 2-BNL

Government

Government is a tricky business on planet 2-BNL. To most people, it’s very simple, though; it’s a constitutional monarchy. There’s the Chamber, where the elected officials meet to create the laws, and the courts system that upholds them, and the head of everything is the current King or Queen, acting as the chief executive.

There are, of course, lower levels of elected officials – mayors, governors, city councils, etc, but these all serve the higher-powers in one way or another.

The Chamber consists of only one house, two-thirds of which is composed of commoners, the other third being composed of those from noble families. A great deal of law making, and bickering goes on at this level. The lawmaking is their function, the bickering is due to the various political parties, there are at least 8 major parties (Libertines, being the current popular favorites) for about five-hundred Chamberlains (the word for a member of the Chamber). Judges are appointed by the King or Queen, and the Chamber accepts or declines them. The judges uphold the constitution, and keep the other two groups in check.

Everything is fairly balanced on 2-BNL. This is, of course, a lie.

The Monarchy is really in control of the other two branches of government, and the higher-ups are all pleasantly aware of this. One toe out of line too far, and the Monarchy will see to it that certain… accidents occur. The people love the Monarchy, and the Monarchy makes certain that they’re seen as the friendliest of all the branches of government. For all the power that the Monarchy wields, they are very open, and friendly. Half of their power comes from sheer force, the other from the fact that the people really do adore them, and the Chamber knows it. Most of the nobles in the Chamber are on the pay from the crown anyway, to make sure that nothing really gets done, and when something is done, it’s in the crown’s favor.

Sadly, 2-BNL isn’t really a Monarchy, either.

Each and every King and Queen is brought up in the Glorious Church of 2-BNL. Everything the crown does is at the advice of the church. 2-BNL is, for all intents and purposes, a theocracy. There is no other religion, none are tolerated. The Glorious Church is a member of almost every social and political body, and presides at many important state functions. As much as the people love the King or Queen, it’s mostly brought on by what the Church says, but the Church makes quite certain that the people are more devote than anything else.

The Church is headed by the Council of Bishops, 9 in number, who direct its actions and deeds. Technically, these nine are in charge of things, so it might be better to call things an oligarchy.

It would be better to call things an Oligarchy, because that’s what they really are. Sadly, it’s not the Bishops who are really calling the shots; the Bishops are all in the pay of the shipping industry. The Church gets fatter off of the coffers of the shipping industry, and the Church makes sure that the Monarchy makes sure that the other branches of the government make laws that benefits trade and markets, and keeps import and export taxes at whatever level the Shipping industry feels is proper. As long as the shipping industry is making money, everyone is happy.

Of course, the shipping industry is being controlled by someone else – that person is currently a seven-year-old girl. She’s the only heiress to the most powerful merchant family on 2-BNL, and currently, she enjoys ponies. Zayla Quinbar, the richest person in the world, subsequently the ruler of 2-BNL by proxy, and at the moment, attempting to learn how to ride a horse.

Religion – The Glorious Church of the Divine Revelation

Religion on 2-BNL is fairly straightforward, there’s really only one; however, it tends to be complex. There are, of course, a few heresies floating about, those will be covered at the end.

Firstly, church structure – The Glorious Church of the Divine Revelation, or the Glorious Church for short – is very hierarchical. At the very top of the Glorious Church is a Council of nine Bishops. These nine bishops oversee everything else that the rest of the Glorious Church takes part in, viz. they reinforce doctrine, they interpret holy scriptures, etc. The Council votes on all issues, a vote of two-thirds is required for most normal activities, however, there are instances where the vote of all nine is required (such as in the instance where a king/queen needs to be removed).

The Council of Bishops is, however, on the payroll of the shipping industry, so sometimes their suggestions to the king/queen are a little skewed. This should be mentioned, the king or queen of 2-BNL have to promise to uphold the Glorious Church, and are fully expected to do so. The GC (as the hip youngsters will refer to it) is what keeps the monarch being the monarch, and the crown knows that quite well.

Underneath the Council of Bishops is the Association of Pilgrims. As each of the nine bishops is in charge of a 9^th of the planet (supposedly) the Association of Pilgrims is composed of 81 Pilgrims, nine Pilgrims of each for the nine Bishoprics. It is from the Association of Pilgrims that the Bishops are chosen, whenever one steps down, or dies. Pilgrims spend their time overseeing the business affairs for their Pilgrimages (designated as their ‘walking area’) and in instructing the lower orders.

Beneath the Pilgrims are the Ministers. Ministers are those who actually go out and preach, give services, perform marriage ceremonies, etc. There are a great number of these, they number in the thousands.

Between the Pilgrim and Minister there is a half-step, the Arch-Minister. Arch-Ministers oversee a small group of churches, you guessed it, nine. Are there a number of churches divisible by nine in the world? No, not really, so there’s always an Arch-Minister that has fewer than nine churches under his Governance. Poor guy.

Below the Minister are Errants; Errants, as their name would suggest, wander. They take holy orders to help the faithful wherever they can. Many places, hospitals, orphanages, etc, are run by errants; however, the staffs of these places are constantly changing, the errants are usually on the move, after all.

Women and Men may hold any position in the GC.

Now, for the belief system.

The holy scripture of the Glorious Church is the Ninefold Revelation. The Ninefold Revelation is a collection of nine different topics on the nature of God and religeion. The first books about God are entitled, appropriately – “Who, What, How, Where, When, Why,” and the final three – “Of Miracles, Of Devotion, and Of Divinity” are on the relation of God to humans.

The GC teaches that there is but one God, perfect in aspect, form, and nature, who is opposed by a deity, slightly less powerful, who is imperfect in aspect, form and nature – in essence, dualism. The church, of course, worships the good deity, giving the name Adversary to the second one.

Man is constantly tempted by the Adversary, so that he needs instruction, to worship God, so as his soul will not be devoured at his death, to be destroyed utterly when he dies. Fear is a wonderful teacher.

Heresies –

1. Roboticism – The worship of the creation of men, some believe that man’s creations achieve perfection where he does not, some go so far as to consider robots to be a more perfect human, and worship one they call “the Artificer” or the ultimate creator. The Artificer is the most talented robot creator on 2-BNL, and has a bit of a cult around him.

2. Adversarian Worship – There are some depraved souls who choose to worship the Adversary; they are of course a detriment to society, and are generally killed in whatever fashion is deemed necessary.

Society & Culture

Society and culture on 2-NBL is fairly straightforward. We’ll begin with classes of people, and work our way from there.

Comprising about 5% of the population are the very poor. These are the people who do not have a job, a place to live, or something along similar lines. There are governmental and religious institutions where such people can find shelter and food; they’re seen as a drain by much of the upper classes, however, nobody can ever eliminate the poor.

About 30% of the population would be considered working class. These are the people that do the jobs that nobody else really wants to do. If you can get from being poor to working class, you’re considered lucky. Working class jobs include things like janitors, food-service workers, errants, factory workers, etc.

A good 41% of the population is middle class. Better off than the working class, they’re the ones that have jobs that require more training – educators, starship repairmen, managers, robot-technicians, ministers, etc.

18% of the populace is upper-middle class. These are the people who like to pretend that they’re upper class, but they aren’t, really. These are the vice-presidents, the arch-ministers, the robot-creators, Chamberlains, the lower members of the gentry (Squire, Knight/Lady, Baron/Baroness), etc.

~5% of the population is upper-class. These are the very rich, the well-to-do. People in this class typically inherited gobs of money from dead relatives, or climbed through the Glorious Church hierarchy. The upper levels of the gentry (Count/Countess, Duke/Duchess), account for much of this, but also included are the heads of industry, and Pilgrims.

Less than one percent of the population is ultra-rich. This is a short list of people: the Royal Family, the Council of Bishops, and the heads of the Shipping Industry. These three groups have, basically, a good 20% of the wealth of the world in their hands.

The archetype that society would fall under would be that of a sort of happy-Victorian-Steampunk. While technology certainly isn’t powered by coal and steam, people’s general attitudes and actions would be best classified as Victorian Steampunk. Everything is quite proper, society is fairly ordered, machinery and furniture tends to be fairly ornamental, etc. This also includes Victorian inhibitions, but when you get down to it, that’s really a lot of snobbish fun. Its also the happier side of steampunk, not the dreary “oh, the world is a coal-smoke nightmare” but more of the joyous “look what technology can do!” sort.

What do people do? Well, a fair amount of life revolves around – you’ve guessed it – what people do for a living. People have to work, or they don’t get paid, this isn’t some sort of delightful socialist planet, or something; Capitalism has its stronghold here, and it isn’t really going to let go anytime soon. Social clubs tend to exist on all levels of society, except for the very bottom, dealing with hobbies, or religion, or just the fact that ‘we have more money than those people over there.’

A fair amount of popular media goes into the goings-on of the royal family, and the nobility – people just love ‘keeping in touch’ with the Crown. The planet, of course, has things like television and movies, so they have their share of movie stars mingling in the upper-class; though, since this is 2-BNL, and the Glorious Church of the Divine Revelation is so prominent, the movies would be considered fairly tame by Earth standards. There’s a lot more of the ‘1950s Bible-movies-with-lavish-sets’ sort of a feel to the films.

Large groups in society are devoted to religious activities, as would be expected. Some of them help with the Church’s goals, usually at the direction of an Errant, or Minister. There are youth groups sponsored by the Church, making sure that everyone grows up to be nice, well-mannered, devote members of society.

This is, of course, a constitutional monarchy, so political interests also run high in the country. There are many different political parties, and members of society will oftentimes become partial to one or another party, and vocalize their beliefs in the party. This provides hours of amusement, and keeps people from worrying about the real problems.

Æconomics

The æconomical system of 2-BNL is pretty much staunchly Capitalistic. A very long time ago, the system was feudalistic, and trappings of that remain, insomuch as the royal family has more wealth than just about anybody else, and most of the lords and ladies of any sort are at least middle class. As mentioned in the previous paper, society is stratified, from the poor to the extremely wealthy (hello, Your Majesty/Your Grace/Miss Quinbar).

The world is divided up into nine principle areas, each underneath the influence of a bishop. While it isn’t directly noticeable, each of these nine areas produces something lacking in at least two thirds of the other sections. Much of the revenue of the planet comes from the import and export of goods between bishoprics and pilgrimages. Of course, most of the things are produced, on some scale, in each bishopric, but each area has its specialties.

For simplicity’s sake, I’m going to use numbers, as I haven’t come up with names as of yet.

Bishopric 1 – Exports: Fruits, Grains, Vegetables, Copper, Iron.

Bishopric 2 – Exports: Robots, Starship parts, Frivolous electronics

Bishopric 3 – Exports: Seafood, Boats, Salt, Island fun

Bishopric 4 – Exports: Spices, Furs, Wood, Zinc

Bishopric 5 – Exports: Jewelry, Fine handcrafts, Gold, LAW (capital)

Bishopric 6 – Exports: Seafood, Meat, Milk, Silver

Bishopric 7 – Exports: Large electronics systems, Farm machinery, Automobiles, Plastics

Bishopric 8 – Exports: Aeroplanes, Textiles, Aluminum, Wood

Bishopric 9 – Exports: Meat, Grains, Alcohol, Leather

It’s obvious to the casual observer that there appears to be a technological split between Bishoprics, and this is true. So, in Bishoprics 2, 7, and 8, the people tend to rely more on technology, than in other Bishoprics. They do, however, have to eat, so tensions between areas are fairly low. Still, 2, 7, and 8 tend to look down a little on the other areas, with the exception of 5, which is where the capital is.

Shipping accounts for a very high amount of revenue throughout the world. There are, as of yet, no inhabited planets outside of 2-BNL, but plans for colonizing the nicer of the two moons are currently underway. If this were to occur, of course, a lot of products would be needed, and you can see where this is going.

Tourism plays a part in some areas, especially the tropical island Bishopric, #3. There is also a thriving entertainment industry as previously mentioned.