Practical Diplomacy, Wednesday, January 17, 2018

[sith_happened]

Today the students found themselves in the Danger Shop, where a podium was standing at the front of a large room full of reporters. "Today we're going to have a practical exercise in diplomacy," Anakin said. "For a vast majority of your life, you are not going to be the lead diplomat in a room. You will, however, be the one who probably briefed the head diplomat, and upon your head will the anger be heaped if he, she, it, or they get embarrassed, even if it's not your fault."

And sometimes your boss turns out to just be super evil, but that was a scenario for another time.

"Your boss is about to address a group of reporters," he said. "He has not read your briefing notes, trusting instead on knowledge he gained from Force knows where. He is about to make a huge, intergalactic meme-worthy ass of himself." He smiled and began the program. "What do you do to stop it from happening? Or do you just let it play out?"

Comments

Sign in 1/17

[sith_happened]

With a headache.

Re: Sign in 1/17

[always_someone]

Norman Babcock

Re: Sign in 1/17

[misshapen_spark]

Yang Xiao Long

Scenario!

[sith_happened]

Your boss is about to address a group of reporters. He has not read your briefing notes, trusting instead on knowledge he gained from Force knows where. He is about to make a huge, intergalactic meme-worthy ass of himself. Do you stop him? Do you cause a distraction? Do you pass out popcorn to your favorite reporters?

Tell us what happens next in your version of the simulation!

Re: Scenario!

[always_someone]

"I mean, if he hasn't even read the notes... he probably has whatever humiliation coming to him, right?"

Look, Norman never claimed not to be petty. At least toward the living.

Although...

"What are the consequences if he runs off at the mouth, here? Does anybody but him get hurt?"

Re: Scenario!

[sith_happened]

"It depends how far off the talking points he goes," Anakin said. "He could risk seriously insulting your counterparts."

Re: Scenario!

[misshapen_spark]

"Find whoever I like best, tell them that if they really want a good time to ask him questions about these three things in particular, give them the actual briefing notes, and then leave to go get a drink," Yang said. "If I'm going down, I'm making it epic."

Re: Scenario!

[sith_happened]

Anakin laughed. "I appreciate your style."

Re: Scenario!

[refused2berescued]

"What's the worst they can do to me?" Uma asked.

Look, it was a legitimate question.

Re: Scenario!

[sith_happened]

"Fire you," Anakin said. "No physical harm."

Re: Scenario!

[notfinnyet]

"Well, it's not my place to correct my superiors or cause problems for them, so I should just prepare for my punishment for whatever I did wrong that led to this, and to deal with the fallout, right?" FN-2187, still operating somewhat on First Order logic, said.

Re: Scenario!

[sith_happened]

Anakin blinked. "Um," he answered eloquently. "How do you think you may have gone wrong?"

Re: Scenario!

[notamascot]

"I don't even know what briefing notes are," Kaylin admitted, "But I wouldn't work for someone who was that dumb, so it wouldn't be an issue."

Re: Scenario!

[sith_happened]

"It's what you use to tell someone about a topic you understand and they don't," Anakin said. "And sometimes you can't choose your boss."

Re: Scenario!

[snipsnspecks]

"Do I actually like my boss?"

Ahsoka had been able to count the number of politicians she respected on one hand and that was before...well, Anakin knew.

Re: Scenario!

[sith_happened]

"Nope," Anakin said.

Because really.

Re: Scenario!

[midichlorianfail]

"Hope he doesn't insult the Sith or the Hutts and make a mess for other people to clean up."

Master Zho's lessons in politics may have been slightly biased.

Re: Scenario!

[sith_happened]

Anakin snorted. "Let's say he's about to insult the Hutts. And use small enough words that they'll understand it."

Very diplomatic, Anakin.

Re: Scenario!

[reicicled]

Strangely enough, his older self had actually gone undercover as someone with this exact job at one point. And Graydon Creed had been about as prone to listening to his underlings as you'd suspect someone running for President on a campaign based on genocide would be.

"The only people I'd care about making an ass of themselves in public are also the people who would never go into something like that unprepared, soooo..." Bobby shrugged. "I'd let whoever it was screw up, and if they blamed me, I'd point out that I did give them the notes, but I'd be perfectly happy to quit and let them try to find someone else with my qualifications if they're not satisfied with my performance."

Re: Scenario!

[sith_happened]

"Excellent, Mr. Drake," Anakin said. "No doubt they'll replace you with a bootlicker who takes three tries to open a door."

Re: Scenario!

[in_sidon_we_trust]

Actually, Sidon truly was the lead diplomat in the room, aside from his father, so he admitted he had a bit of trouble wrapping his brain around this one. Since Master Skywalker used the term boss, though, he was imagining Zack in the situation, and that made it a bit easier to decide how he might act.

"Oh," he said, "I would most certainly stop him from doing anything he may regret later, to the best of my ability. I can be quite imposing when I need to be," he puffed up his chest to prove this point...and the fact that he could be quite imposing even when he didn't mean to be, "...and would make it very clear that we must stop all meetings immediately as there is a dire situation that requires his attention straight away, and I would pull him aside and explain where things are about to go wrong. I trust he will listen to my sage words, or else I might then call upon my physical strengths to ensure that he does not go out there to make such a fool of himself.

"After all," he added after a moment, "were it I in the position about to make a monumental gaffe like that to the good citizens, I should hope someone would advice me in such a way as well."

Re: Scenario!

[sith_happened]

"You seem to be much more open to learning than the beings I'm basing this exercise on," Anakin said, "so that will help you."

Talk to Anakin

[sith_happened]

Who in no way based this scenario of of the news this week. Really.

Re: Talk to Anakin

[solo_sword]

At some point, Anakin would be getting a picture sent to him of two baby boys sitting up, one crying, and one looking really annoyed about said crying.

OOC

[sith_happened]

Teething babies are the wooooorst.