Politics in a historical context

[Cealocanth]

The forum rules specifically bans discussion of real world politics, this is a hard set rule of the forum, of course. I'm curious, however, as to what extent things qualify as "real world" politics. More specifically, I'd like to start a thread discussing a campaign world I'm working on where the different factions are based on real world empires during the 16th and 17th century. These are countries that exist today, but their politics and policies are radically different, and I'd more like to discuss them on the basis of historical accuracy rather than criticism.

I am aware that the usual ruling here is "If you have to question it, don't post it.", but I figure that this subject is standing enough on the border of real and fantasy politics that it wouldn't hurt to ask. What say you, moderators?

[Roland St. Jude]

Sheriff: Real world means real world, irrespective of time period. This is true regarding both religion and politics.

You can discuss your fictional political system based on whatever you want, but the moment it crosses over to discussing the underlying historical politics, that's inappropriate for this forum. That might be in your OP (if you draw the connection yourself) or it might be in one of the responses (which sees the parallel and draws it), or it might be never (if everyone sticks to discussing your world itself or purely fictional parallels). It all depends on the extent to which your discussion calls for discussion of the underlying real world analog. Obviously, each poster is responsible for the content of the poster's own comments.

We may well lock a thread where the real world politics seems inevitable, even if it hasn't gotten there yet.