Jasepl From India, joined Jul 2004, 3582 posts, RR: 52 Reply 15, posted (4 years 12 months 3 days 4 hours ago) and read 710 times:
One day I will see you in Reading. Until then:
"The Republic of Elbonia is a fictional country from the comic strips Dilbert* and Plop.
"It is a extremly poor, fourth-world** Eastern-European country that has recently abandoned Communism. Most of the Elbonians have beards, even the females, and wear tall grey hats and black mittens. Their technology is very outdated, and includes tin can telephones, and giant slingshots (instead of airplanes). Elbonians are commonly portrayed as idiotic and backward. For many years the country has been mired in a civil war between the left and right-handed Elbonians, although the war was mostly bloodless, as the Elbonians didn't realize they were allowed to use weapons.
"Elbonia's government is a dictatorship, run by a right-handed Fidel Castro-esque military strongman who strives to crush the lefties. Dogbert briefly deposed the President and made himself dictator, turning Elbonia into a tourist hotspot by making prostitution and gambling Gambling not only legal, but mandatory.
"The national bird of Elbonia is the frisbee. In order to attract tourists Elbonia openly lies in its promotional videos, and claims to host five of the seven wonders of the world."
*Dilbert
Dilbert is a satirical comic strip about a micro-managed office environment, featuring a software engineer of that name. The strip, created by Scott Adams, has run in newspapers since April 16, 1989, spawning several books, an animated television series, a computer game, and numerous tie-in products ranging from stuffed dolls to ice cream.
**4th world
The term 4th World was coined by Manuel Castells to refer to black holes of social exclusion. 4th World is deliberatively opposed to 1st World, 2nd World and 3rd World, all of which imply a certain degree of connectivity. This connectivity is what is notably absent in the notion 4th World.
Examples of places described as 4th World include Sub-Saharan Africa, rural Latin America and innercity ghettos or banlieues. Because of their disconnection from the rest of the world these places are powerless, and thus unable to change. In the case of ghettos or banlieues this disconnection stands in stark contrast with the city centres which are the most connected spaces.
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