CivcraftImport:Conflicts2/aytosriots

The Aytos Riots
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Context
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Aytos had opened it's borders to new immigrants and welcomed anyone who wanted to be part of the town to register as a voter (providing that they were actually a resident there), although residency was poorly defined in the consitution, creating a loophole that would later be exploited by the PILF movement. During this period, Aytos saw a phenomenal increase in population. Rising from just 8 or so initial residents to well over 90 registered voters at it's height.

Prior to this period, pavel_the_hitman (always a controversial character) wilfully defied the wishes of various towns and had included them on the transport map. This is important to note, because it generated a lot of hostility to both Pavel and Aytos. Several citizens of Prusia griefed Aytos in retribution for Pavel's actions and then later pearled Pavel. Despite this, many of the same towns later asked to be placed back on the very same map to increase their publicity.

Presumably in retribution for Pavel's actions, a few citizens from Prussia started to build what was generally thought to be, the most ugly building on Civcraft, right in the central square of Aytos. The building was to reach to sky-limit, built mostly out of cobblestone, with occasional debris mixed in for good measure and was, it seems, deliberately incendiary. At this point, Pavel assaulted ad2345 but no charges were brought against him due to ad23455 (aka DJFunctipus) dropping the charges.

The 'protest' of 23 Oct 2013
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ad2345 and timmy123180 continued building their 'tennament', when Turbocactus (believed to be a Carsonite) got involved. It is unclear exactly what brought Turbocactus to Aytos but it is generally thought that we was there to wind up the local citizens. Armed in full diamond armour and wielding a S5 FA2 sword, he threatened an unarmed and naked player, TheNintechno. Complaining that he has been assaulted, Turbocactus then began to demonstrate. It was at this point that Rykleos (a member of the police) asked Turbo if he'd like to press charges. Turbo ignored him and carried on crying about how he'd been wronged and that there was 'no justice in Aytos' - this, it seems, was the excuse to start the so-called 'riots' of Aytos, which were really just a trolling of one of the more successful towns on the sever, by a variety of players from many different towns.

It is worth noting that some time after the riots, Aytos held a trial to prosecute Turbo for the actions against Nintechno. No evidence was presented in favour of Turbo's claims of self-defence but evidence clearly showing Nintechno being assaulted by Turbo was shown and Turbo was found guilty and ordered to pay reparations, (although, there are no records to indicate that he paid).

Shortly after this, Turbocactus, Whosnick and friends started barricading themselves in the town square government building. During this period they pearled a number of Aytos citizens, for laughs.

MadeOfMeat, the town's mayor at the time, sums it up nicely:

Protests like this one mainly happen because people from other towns are bored and think it is fun to disrupt other cities. They probably chose Aytos just because there are a lot of people here; Orion is also a popular spot for what I call &quot;political protest tourism&quot;. This kind of event is fine, and it's good when people (Aytians and protestors both) can just have fun with it. The problem started when a few of the protestors started shooting people with bows, hitting them with swords, and killing and pearling people (most of the victims being Aytians).

The protest turns ugly
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News spread quickly of the demonstrations and soon many people converged on the site, including landowners in aytos, carson citizens and people from as far as Commonwealth and Orion. There were numerous groups all having much fun protesting and placing pumpkins, a trend started by Jacinth_joy. However, the fun was not to last as tensions between the barricaded instigators, and the Aytos officials reached a climax. The 'gimmick independence front' had taken hostages of Aytos citizens inside the capitol and attempts to break them out ended in fights with around 6 people pearled. Peter5390 arrived to engage with Turbocactus and friends, mounted on a horse followed by a pack of dogs and shot into the crowd with his bow, setting his dogs on his targets.

The Aftermath
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Attempts to bring the guilty parties to trial were met with laughs and derision. Those accused did not respect Aytos' law or court system. Bounties were placed on the guilty parties for a time, until eventually arbitration began. Tensions did not subside and for a few days after smaller demonstrations and peaceful protests happened with the square getting pumpkin-bombed multiple times but did not lead to any further violence. The police and officials were given strict instructions not to raise to the bait, by the police chief. The protesters realised that their actions were largely being ignored and so their attention turned instead to attacking the town from within: by exploiting it's rather lax voter registration laws.

Recovery
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Aytos went through a difficult time after the riots. The PILF movement gained ground quickly, through a series of propaganda posts and by providing free housing in the tenement building. Many of the tennament's occupants were just 'alt-accounts' of the players from other towns, who didn't actually live in Aytos but only appeared for protests and voting. This was the ballot-stuffing-machine by which they eventually gained one seat in the parliament (although PILF never did anything with it). Shortly after the election where the PILF gained a seat, the population in Aytos withered and then reached almost zero for several months until Stratmatt from Nexus (now named Vale) started the process of reclamation. Once Aytos was up and running again, with a functioning government, PILF was outlawed from the town, as it was found that they had violated their oath of allegiance. Aytos recovered, although it never gained the same level of population, although that level was probably not realistic to begin with, given that many of the population were just 'alt-accounts'.