07-18-2019, 06:34 AM
XIN XUN
Xiomeran Underground News - the true Xiomeran story
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atl 17. xatl tohtli. 2019
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Extradite This, Cētlalhui
In an entirely predictable and typically authoritarian move, Secretary of Injustice Cētlalhui has sent arrest warrants to the nations where XUN is currently based: Laeral, Lauchenoiria and Zamastan. Their goal: to get us arrested, and to get XUN shut down. It apparently wasn't enough to chase us out of the country we love, away from our families, our homes and our fellow Huenyans. (And yes, we say Huenyans, not Xiomerans, because that's what we are. Well, except for those of us who are ethnic Xiomerans, but we're still Huenyans too.)
We are more bemused than afraid, at this point. Democratic nations typically have no interest in sucking up to autocrats like Emperor Topilpopoca and his band of mini-autocrats in Tlālacuetztla. Laeral and Zamastan are known for their love of freedom. The Lauchenoirians just fought a civil war to make sure they'd have freedom. If the Emperor thinks these are the kind of people who will either be swayed by the wealth at his command, or afraid of his uniformed goons, we think he had best get used to disappointment.
But even if we are wrong, we are not afraid. If the wealth at the Emperor's command, and the roaring engine of a Xiomeran economy powered by heartless competition and greed, does sway the hearts of our hosts, or if the fear of Xiomeran armies changes their minds, we'll find another place to go, and continue to fight for a future where Huenya, the golden land of our hearts, vanquishes the dark beast that is the Xiomeran Empire. And if it turns out there is no safe haven left, we will return to Xiomera and meet our fate, whatever it may be.
But if Cētlalhui really wants to try and extradite us, all of us at XUN have a finger to raise to him, and it's not the ring finger of the Emperor that he's used to kissing.
Foreign media? Yes please
(The following is a transcript of part of the XUN segment Roundtable of Rhetoric, a popular discussion show on the network.)
ITONAN (host of the show): And we're back from the mandatory paying-the-bills commercial break...I know that last commercial was for that Fishy Chips snack, but take it from me: they taste like old sweaty socks. Don't eat them. And hey, speaking of old and sweaty, did you all catch Secretary Tlanextia babbling about wanting trade to be "mutually respectful"...in other words, none of that popular foreign media trying to influence our culture?
TEUICO (retired star ōllamalitzli player): Oh yeah. That's stupid.
MAZANYA (once popular but now semi-retired Xiomeran pop singer): How so? Isn't our culture good enough?
TEUICO: Oh please. Seriously, Xiomeran TV and movies stink. How many docudramas of the Warring States era or telenovels of Camaxtica's reign do we really need to see? Or, Mixcoatl save us, another idiotic show like Tank Full Of Business Pirahnas or What Made You Think You Had Talent? Or yet another military parade or a photo op of the Emperor opening a farm or something....Xiomeran TV is enough to make you want to throw your TV out the window. If Laeral, or literally anyone else, wants to send us something to watch that's actually interesting and not insufferably predictable, I'm all for it.
MAZANYA: Hey, I happen to like What Made You Think You Had Talent?
TEUICO: That's because someone made you think you have talent. You don't, and neither does almost anyone else on Xiomeran TV or in music or movies.
MAZANYA: As I recall, I made quite a bit more money than you did playing with balls.
TEUICO: So? You haven't had a hit in so long that they're starting to measure your record sales the same way they measure continental drift.
ITONAN: Okay, before this goes even further off the rails, maybe we can hear from our other guest. Tiyaxi, wanna jump in here? Please?
TIYAXI (retired professor of media studies at Tlālacuetztla Polytechnic): As raucous as this discussion has been, it does lead to an interesting point. What does the government fear so much about letting in cultural products from other countries? Are they just afraid that Xiomerans will turn away from our own cultural products to embrace the foreign ones and thus hurt the Xiomeran economy and culture? If so, that seems to run contrary to the ethos of "competition is everything and everything is competition" that is always being touted in Xiomera. We're always told that we can compete in anything with anyone in the world - well, I say, prove it. Let other countries send us their best products, including media ones, and we'll see how well we stack up, won't we? But I think the government is really afraid that the competition it'll lose in the long run is for Xiomeran hearts and minds. If our people see how other people in other countries live, and how they are governed, and compare it to Xiomera, which way will they choose? It speaks, in my mind, of an inherent insecurity at the heart of our ruling class. They don't seem confident themselves that they'll win that fight for hearts and minds. That speaks volumes to me.
TEUICO: In other words, "competition is everything if we know we'll win?"
TIYAXI: Exactly.
TEUICO: Not very sporting, that. I agree with the professor, bring on the foreign cultural products, please. Hey Mazanya, they might even give you a part in some foreign movie or something. The people in other countries probably don't know how boring your music is yet. You might have a shot.
MAZANYA: Bite me, ball boy.
ITONAN: And on that note, it's time for another commercial break. Please, not those damn fish chips again.
Xiomeran Underground News - the true Xiomeran story
[/hr]
atl 17. xatl tohtli. 2019
[/hr]
Extradite This, Cētlalhui
In an entirely predictable and typically authoritarian move, Secretary of Injustice Cētlalhui has sent arrest warrants to the nations where XUN is currently based: Laeral, Lauchenoiria and Zamastan. Their goal: to get us arrested, and to get XUN shut down. It apparently wasn't enough to chase us out of the country we love, away from our families, our homes and our fellow Huenyans. (And yes, we say Huenyans, not Xiomerans, because that's what we are. Well, except for those of us who are ethnic Xiomerans, but we're still Huenyans too.)
We are more bemused than afraid, at this point. Democratic nations typically have no interest in sucking up to autocrats like Emperor Topilpopoca and his band of mini-autocrats in Tlālacuetztla. Laeral and Zamastan are known for their love of freedom. The Lauchenoirians just fought a civil war to make sure they'd have freedom. If the Emperor thinks these are the kind of people who will either be swayed by the wealth at his command, or afraid of his uniformed goons, we think he had best get used to disappointment.
But even if we are wrong, we are not afraid. If the wealth at the Emperor's command, and the roaring engine of a Xiomeran economy powered by heartless competition and greed, does sway the hearts of our hosts, or if the fear of Xiomeran armies changes their minds, we'll find another place to go, and continue to fight for a future where Huenya, the golden land of our hearts, vanquishes the dark beast that is the Xiomeran Empire. And if it turns out there is no safe haven left, we will return to Xiomera and meet our fate, whatever it may be.
But if Cētlalhui really wants to try and extradite us, all of us at XUN have a finger to raise to him, and it's not the ring finger of the Emperor that he's used to kissing.
Foreign media? Yes please
(The following is a transcript of part of the XUN segment Roundtable of Rhetoric, a popular discussion show on the network.)
ITONAN (host of the show): And we're back from the mandatory paying-the-bills commercial break...I know that last commercial was for that Fishy Chips snack, but take it from me: they taste like old sweaty socks. Don't eat them. And hey, speaking of old and sweaty, did you all catch Secretary Tlanextia babbling about wanting trade to be "mutually respectful"...in other words, none of that popular foreign media trying to influence our culture?
TEUICO (retired star ōllamalitzli player): Oh yeah. That's stupid.
MAZANYA (once popular but now semi-retired Xiomeran pop singer): How so? Isn't our culture good enough?
TEUICO: Oh please. Seriously, Xiomeran TV and movies stink. How many docudramas of the Warring States era or telenovels of Camaxtica's reign do we really need to see? Or, Mixcoatl save us, another idiotic show like Tank Full Of Business Pirahnas or What Made You Think You Had Talent? Or yet another military parade or a photo op of the Emperor opening a farm or something....Xiomeran TV is enough to make you want to throw your TV out the window. If Laeral, or literally anyone else, wants to send us something to watch that's actually interesting and not insufferably predictable, I'm all for it.
MAZANYA: Hey, I happen to like What Made You Think You Had Talent?
TEUICO: That's because someone made you think you have talent. You don't, and neither does almost anyone else on Xiomeran TV or in music or movies.
MAZANYA: As I recall, I made quite a bit more money than you did playing with balls.
TEUICO: So? You haven't had a hit in so long that they're starting to measure your record sales the same way they measure continental drift.
ITONAN: Okay, before this goes even further off the rails, maybe we can hear from our other guest. Tiyaxi, wanna jump in here? Please?
TIYAXI (retired professor of media studies at Tlālacuetztla Polytechnic): As raucous as this discussion has been, it does lead to an interesting point. What does the government fear so much about letting in cultural products from other countries? Are they just afraid that Xiomerans will turn away from our own cultural products to embrace the foreign ones and thus hurt the Xiomeran economy and culture? If so, that seems to run contrary to the ethos of "competition is everything and everything is competition" that is always being touted in Xiomera. We're always told that we can compete in anything with anyone in the world - well, I say, prove it. Let other countries send us their best products, including media ones, and we'll see how well we stack up, won't we? But I think the government is really afraid that the competition it'll lose in the long run is for Xiomeran hearts and minds. If our people see how other people in other countries live, and how they are governed, and compare it to Xiomera, which way will they choose? It speaks, in my mind, of an inherent insecurity at the heart of our ruling class. They don't seem confident themselves that they'll win that fight for hearts and minds. That speaks volumes to me.
TEUICO: In other words, "competition is everything if we know we'll win?"
TIYAXI: Exactly.
TEUICO: Not very sporting, that. I agree with the professor, bring on the foreign cultural products, please. Hey Mazanya, they might even give you a part in some foreign movie or something. The people in other countries probably don't know how boring your music is yet. You might have a shot.
MAZANYA: Bite me, ball boy.
ITONAN: And on that note, it's time for another commercial break. Please, not those damn fish chips again.
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