Forward to Victory!
by Jacob Lin
Tau correspondent Taylor Belcher writes:
I am a calculus teacher at the South Carolina Governor’s School For Science and Mathematics. I like to assign a “Circle Constant debate/discussion” assignment to my students every year which requires them to read the Pi and Tau Manifestos, pick a side, and make their case. This year a student modified some old Soviet propaganda to fit the context of the debate written to be pro-Tau against the invading Pi supporters and the result was so funny I wanted to share it with you.
Wonderful! With kind permission from the author, Jacob Lin, the full text is reproduced below:
COMRADES, people of the Tau students and Tau teachers, Students and mathematical instructors, working Students and working Teachers, collective men and women, workers in the intellectual professions, brothers and sisters in the rear of our enemy who have temporarily fallen under the yoke of the Pi brigands, and our valiant men and women mathematicians who are destroying the argument of the Pi invaders!
On behalf of the Tau Government and our Tauist Party I am greeting you and congratulating you on the tenth anniversary of the Great Tau Manifesto.
Comrades, it is in strenuous circumstances that we are to-day celebrating the tenth anniversary of the Tau Manifesto. The perfidious attack of the Pi brigands and the argument which has been forced upon us have created a threat to our idea. We have temporarily lost a number of defensive positions; the enemy has appeared at the gates of Vi Hart and Bob Palais. The enemy reckoned that after the very first blow our students would be dispersed, and our idea would be forced to her knees. But the enemy gravely miscalculated. In spite of temporary reverses, our Students and Teachers are heroically repulsing the enemy’s attacks along the entire front and inflicting rebuttals upon him, while our idea—our entire idea—has organized itself into one fighting camp in order, together with our Students and our Teachers, to encompass the rout of the Pi invaders.
There were times when our idea was in a still more difficult position. Remember the year 2010, when we celebrated the first anniversary of the Tau Manifesto. Three-quarters of Tau was at that time still only $3\pi/2$. We had no allies, we had no Tau Students—we had only just begun to create it; there was a shortage of Arguments, of Rebuttals, of counterclaims for the Students. Pi states were pressing against our Idea. But we did not become despondent, we did not lose heart. In the fire of argument, we forged the Tau Students and converted our Idea into a military camp. The spirit of the great Michael Hartl animated us at that time for the argument against the Pi people. And what happened? We halted the Pi students and achieved stalemate.
To-day the position of our idea is far better than ten years ago. Our idea is now many times more flushed out than it was ten years ago as regards Arguments, Rebuttals, and counterclaims. We now have allies, who together with us are maintaining a united front against the Pi invaders. We now enjoy the sympathy and support of all the nations of Circlelandia who have fallen under the yoke of Archimedes’ tyranny. We now have splendid Students and splendid Teachers, who are defending with their thesis the liberty and independence of our Idea. We experience no serious shortage of either Arguments, Rebuttals, or counterclaims. Our entire Idea, all the peoples of our Idea, support our Students and our Teachers, helping them to smash the invading hordes of Pi conventionalist. Our reserves of brainpower are inexhaustible. The spirit of the great Michael Hartl and his victorious banner animate us now in this patriotic argument just as they did ten years ago.
Can there be any doubt that we can, and are bound to, defeat the Pi invaders?
The enemy is not so strong as some frightened little intellectuals picture him. The devil is not so terrible as he is painted. Who can deny that our Tau Students has more than once put the vaunted Pi troops to panic flight? If one judges, not by the boastful assertions of the Pi propagandists, but by the actual position of Pi, it will not be difficult to understand that the Pi-conventionalist invaders are facing disaster. Bad claims and Terrible rebuttals reign in Pi to-day; in four months of argument Pi has lost four and a half million brain cells; Pi is bleeding, her reserves of brain-power are giving out, the spirit of indignation is spreading not only among the peoples of Circlelandia who have fallen under the yoke of the Pi invaders but also among the Pi people themselves, who see no end to Argument. The Pi invaders are straining their last efforts. There is no doubt that Pi cannot sustain such a strain for long. Another few months, another half-year, perhaps another year, and Pi must burst under the pressure of her crimes.
Comrades, men of the Tau Students and Tau Teachers, students and mathematical instructors, men and women debaters, the whole world is looking to you as the force capable of destroying the plundering hordes of Pi invaders. The enslaved peoples of Circlelandia who have fallen under the yoke of the Pi invaders look to you as their liberators. A great liberating mission has fallen to your lot. Be worthy of this mission! The argument you are waging is a argument of liberation, a just argument. Let the manly images of our great ancestors—Bob Palais, Vi Hart, and Peter Harremoës—inspire you in this argument! May the victorious banner of the great Michael Hartl be your lodestar!
For the complete destruction of the Pi invaders!
Defeat to the Pi invaders!
Long live our glorious Motherland, her liberty and her independence!
Under the banner of Michael Hartl, forward to victory!