Born Out of Conflict

Hi everyone, I'm going to kick off this blog's storytelling with a quick piece about the rise of the Protectorate.

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    Casey thumbed through the stacks of folders, each holding a year's worth of newspapers. Many regimes destroy evidence of their predecessors, or fudge information to make themselves look like rightful heirs. The Protectorate however did no such thing, they kept original copies of every record from the old regime, as a testament to what they swore never to become. Their rise to power started with a coup d'etat to oust the President at the time, WASP Jacob Bontty. Bontty's election at the time was, in the strictest sense, progress; he was the first openly bigoted president of the World Council. The surprise conservative victory was mostly a product of food shortage in the first world impressing the voters with xenophobia. Even with valiant efforts to properly represent less developed countries in the WC vote, first world nations always decided who was to be elected.

    Bontty took office after privately swearing oath, and declared a state of emergency for his first act as World Director. Citing the global famine, he decided the best course of action was to ban all immigration into countries with a higher average income than your homelands. This was of course met with cheers from his constituents. Next, he decreed federal takeover of all farms and food suppliers, and rations to be given out via lottery. The system he devised was divided across demographic lines. There were murmurs of disapproval here, but a little bureaucratic hand-waving silenced his many of his critics. Casey was not alive when Jacob Bontty was president, but the stories he had heard were quite disturbing. Bontty claimed his racial and sexual "classes" for the food lottery were to ensure that members of every group survived the food shortage to represent their peers in post-scarcity society. His Jim Crow approach to survival was uncouth, but there were many people saying it was the system. Even if this were the case, documents existed proving his food classes were separate and anything but equal. Unfortunately, no one could repeal his decisions, and the previous World Director made a statement that while she appreciated Bontty's intent, she thought his lottery system was quote, "... a little Hitler-y."

    Still, with complete economic, political, and military might, Bontty ruled uncontested for several more months. Given the Democratic selection of World Director, political graffiti around this time was remembered as being particularly humble. Casey recalled in his childhood seeing a fading tag in some forgotten alley. The work was unsigned, but the author had written, "I take partial responsibility, but what were we really thinking when we elected the racist, sexist, homophobic?"

    The group calling itself the Protectorate first starting appearing on the news after Bontty attempted to lower the portion of lottery rations allotted homosexuals, citing that "... on average they don't eat as much!"

    The Protectorate originally had no political affiliations, and were just an alliance of internet users attempting to inform everyone of the wrongs Bontty was committing. Responses to the Protectorate were fairly divided at first, it was only after Bontty tried lowering women's food rations, because
"... wasting so much food on them is literally the gayest thing since gay sex." That the Protectorate really gained a foothold with the populace. Once public distaste was at a climax, members of the World Council were able to confidently speak out against Bontty. Some typically forgotten clause in the WC bylaws allowed them to oust Bontty. In the ensuing scramble for power, several principal members of the Protectorate and WC favorites ran for the position of World Director. When the dust settled, a Protectorate champion was World Director, and several more social justice warriors had landed powerful seats on the WC.

    Call it guilt for their last votes, call it understanding the error of their old ways; for whatever reason people were endlessly satisfied and eager to please anyone bearing the Protectorate flag. As the party grew, so did their influence, and before long they had near 100 percent support for any decision they made. In their endless pursuit of "equality and respect for all entities" the Protectorate drew up increasingly suffocating laws. Still, most of the population didn't even flinch. Casey was around nineteen when things started to get out of hand by his reckoning. He did not start the first group of protesters, but managed to unite the metaphorical clans, a feat he was always proud to share with Genghis Khan. His newly-formed political party fought tooth and nail to keep their rights, but the Protectorate had infinite support with the rest of the population, and even in the beginning, it was clear that they would not win. Despite the Protectorate's assertions of hatefulness, the protesters only hoped to keep as much as they could, conquest was never the goal.