#poltroons

[flickeringflame216]

"It is not very easy to draw one's sword when one is swinging round in the air by one's tail" mr lewis sir do you have personal experience with this

[articulatetrick]

I reject the idea that any of you, be it you, the cerulean, the Violet, or especially any of the pathetic humans, should be regarded as gods. You are all very powerful but that does NOT make you divine. Do you truly believe you all are deserving of such a title?

=in spite of the gravity and degree of hostility of such accusations you remain hidden behind anonymity with all the glory of your cowardice=

=your fantasies of absolute despotism shall never bear fruit=

=should we not deserve the title of god you deserve even less to be regarded as one=

=i shall show even the slightest ounce of respect once you shall face me like a true troll=

[natalieironside]

I got Brother Walter (he's the time-sick Fraticelli friar who sleeps on my couch) to watch Scooby Doo and he loves it. He says it's "a most fine and worthy Tale" and Shaggy is his favorite because "he is a poltroon, and yet a hero nonetheless."

[nigesakis]

Crozier and Fitzjames' Dialogue during their off-screen fight in episode 5, from Dave K Q&A 3

James: “We both know what is happening with you and I came to discuss it, as a friend!”

Francis: “That word is alien here! You don’t have friends, James, you have admirers. That I am not one has always chafed you!”

James: “Don’t sell me a dog about this, Francis! You are caught in the grip of this and it’s coopered you out. It’s made you dennis, man!”

Francis: “I am out of words for you!” (Dave K: Which is a really handy line in, I think, any marriage.)

James: “Do you think it was possible to hide this from a ship full of seamen? Most of whom share this affliction on land?”

Francis: “You’re a miserable man. A miserable poltroon of a man, James.”

James: “You’re going to name it, by God. How must I do to get the word out of you? Hound you? Call you out? I will do!”

They did film the scene (iirc) but they didn't keep it in because Dave thought it would falter next to the "Do you plan on being the worst kind of first as well?" and Francis hitting James in front of people.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Under the influence of great fear, almost everybody becomes superstitious. The sailors who threw Jonah overboard imagined his presence to be the cause of the storm which threatened to wreck their ship. In a similar spirit the Japanese, at the time of the Tokyo earthquake took to massacring Koreans and Liberals. When the Romans won victories in the Punic wars, the Carthaginians became persuaded that their misfortunes were due to a certain laxity which had crept into the worship of Moloch. Moloch liked having children sacrificed to him, and preferred them aristocratic; but the noble families of Carthage had adopted the practice of surreptitiously substituting plebeian children for their own offspring. This, it was thought, had displeased the god, and at the worst moments even the most aristocratic children were duly consumed in the fire. Strange to say, the Romans were victorious in spite of this democratic reform on the part of their enemies.

Collective fear stimulates herd instinct, and tends to produce ferocity toward those who are not regarded as members of the herd. So it was in the French Revolution, when dread of foreign armies produced the reign of terror. And it is to be feared that the Nazis, as defeat draws nearer, will increase the intensity of their campaign for exterminating Jews. Fear generates impulses of cruelty, and therefore promotes such superstitious beliefs as seem to justify cruelty. Neither a man nor a crowd nor a nation can be trusted to act humanely or to think sanely under the influence of a great fear. And for this reason poltroons are more prone to cruelty than brave men, and are also more prone to superstition. When I say this, I am thinking of men who are brave in all respects, not only in facing death. Many a man will have the courage to die gallantly, but will not have the courage to say, or even to think, that the cause for which he is asked to die is an unworthy one. Obloquy is, to most men, more painful than death; that is one reason why, in times of collective excitement, so few men venture to dissent from the prevailing opinion. No Carthaginian denied Moloch, because to do so would have required more courage than was required to face death in battle.

—Bertrand Russell, An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish, in Unpopular Essays (1943)

[Robert Scott Horton]

[literarydesire]

People dont seem to appreciate the intricacies of being a real smart dumbass. Like, I am academically smart and quite intelligent, but god damn am I stupid. A real dumbdumb. A poltroon, one might say.

[rraaaarrl]

POLTROONS!

HEED DOOM'S LATEST DECREE! YOU MUST GET IN TOUCH WITH YOUR FEELINGS!

COMPLY NOW OR FEEL DOOM'S WRATH!

I spent way to much time on this, the Doctor Doom Wheel of Feels, plese clap!!!!

[lessthansix]

‘Why, as to that,’ said Jack, blowing on his coffee-cup and staring out of the stern-window at the harbour, ‘as to that . . . if you do not choose to call him a pragmatical clinchpoop and kick his breech, which you might think ungenteel, perhaps you could tell him to judge the pudding by its fruit.’ ‘You mean, prove the tree by its eating.’ ‘No, no, Stephen, you are quite out: eating a tree would prove nothing. And then you might ask him, had he ever seen many poltroons in the Navy?’ ‘I am not quite sure what you mean by poltroons.’ ‘You might describe them as something that cannot be attempted to be tolerated in the Navy – like wombats,’ he added, with a sudden recollection of the creatures Stephen had brought aboard an earlier command. ‘Mean-spirited worthless wretches: cowards, to put it in a word.’ ‘You are unjust to wombats, Jack; and you were unjust to my three-toed sloth – such illiberal reflections.’

The Ionian Mission, Patrick O’Brian

[ayarsi]

Good Omentober + Fictober (5)

Good Omentober Day 5 - heaven

Fictober Prompt #9 - "You're the smartest person I know"

Fanfiction - Good Omens

Rating - G

Wordcount - 452

Heavenly Poltroon

--------------------------------------------

“About your er, boss. Gabriel.”

Aziraphale wiped his mouth with his napkin and set his glass of champagne on the table. Careful not to make a sound, he moved his chair slowly backwards.

“What are you doing?” Crowley asked, puzzled.

“Oh, nothing. There’s a stray under the table. I don’t suppose cats are allowed to eat desserts, don’t they?” Aziraphale shooed the cat away and moved his chair back towards the table.

“Now what were you saying again?”

Crowley curled her lips in annoyance. Annoyance? Irritation? To Aziraphale, Crowley seemed to be cringing about something she was thinking about. But truth be told, she was contemplating a decision.

Aziraphale had shared the details of Hell’s trial earlier at St. James’s Park and Crowley was thinking of doing the same. However, was it really that important to share?

Should she tell Aziraphale? About how his heavenly bastard of a boss planned to condemn him to hellfire? About how Gabriel wanted him to just “shut his stupid mouth and die already?” Oh if not for his disguise, Crowley would’ve pounced and dragged the supreme archangel into the very pits of Hell. She would’ve tormented him first. She would not have held back, not ever.

But her angel… Her angel wouldn’t do that. He would’ve stayed put, standing and gawking there like a duck who had lost its mother. He would’ve kept his mouth shut and swallowed his words. He wouldn’t even have the courage to look Gabriel straight in the eye; he’d fidget nervously with his bowtie, pat down his coat, or do anything just so he wouldn’t provoke any fighting. Aziraphale would’ve just smiled. He would’ve accepted his fate immediately, thinking of it as God’s Plan or something similar.

How stupid. How… powerless.

Crowley snapped back out of her thoughts and turned her focus to Aziraphale. He was still busy eating his dessert and had just asked the waiter for another bottle of champagne.

“Isn’t that your third dessert already?”

Aziraphale nodded, his mouth full of cake.

Crowley didn’t understand why Aziraphale loved food so much, but if it made him happy then it made her happy seeing him happy.

Crowley wasn’t so sure of her thoughts now.

Should she tell him? Or would it break him? It would be great, rightfully so, if the angel realizes the toxicity Heaven blatantly shows.

The demon watched the angel intently.

“You’re the smartest person I know, why don’t you get it?” she groaned.

But Aziraphale didn’t hear her; he was distracted by the stray cat’s return to their table.

She sighed. Crowley might just keep it to herself. There will be another time, a better time. She’ll let her angel finish his champagne for now.

[mischieffoal]

Painted emblems of a race - a Ruddigore / Unsleeping City Iga Lisowski animatic

I did it - I made an even more obscure crossover than the last one! Based on the scene with Iga's foremothers in S2E8, "Feasts & Families", in which Iga experiences what I like to call a "Ruvthen in Act 2 of Ruddigore" moment. So here is Act 2 of Ruddigore, where the protaganist meets the ghosts of their ancestors who have come out of their portrait frames, to tell the protaganist that they must perpetuate the evil that their line has caused for hundreds of years, lest even worse things happen (which they turn out to be completely wrong about).

Description and sources under the cut:

Video description: drawings of Iga and her ancestors in the chest castle, depicting each lyric.

Painted emblems of a race, All accurst in days of yore, Each from his accustomed place Steps into the world once more. Coward, poltroon, shaker, squeamer, Blockhead, sluggard, dullard, dreamer, Earthworm, maggot, tadpole, weevil! Set upon thy course of evil, Lest the King of Spectre-Land Set on thee his grisly hand! Beware! beware! beware! Alas, poor ghost! Painted emblems of a race, All accurst in days of yore, Each to his accustomed place Steps unwillingly once more!

Audio from "Painted emblems of a race" and "He yields, he answers to our call" from Ruddigore by W.S Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan.

[seat-safety-switch]

Skullduggery is afoot! Those scoundrels in capital have, once again, scammed me out of a couple bucks on a transaction. Sure, they call it a “service fee,” but the only service involved was lining their pockets. Never mind. Those parcel-delivery poltroons will put my ten dollars to good use rebuilding their warehouse once I set it on fire with a ridiculous burnout in one of their delivery vans.

Here’s a little bit of a grand larceny pro-tip. You see those cameras up there? Yeah, you don’t want them to see you. The best way to do that is to wear a mask, so no one can identify you later. That’s why I’m wearing this hideous, vacuum-formed replica of Lee Iacocca’s face while I cut through this fence. I didn’t bring one for you, though. Maybe splash some of that airport runway mud on your cheeks, I’m sure there’s nothing bad in there.

Okay, here we go. We’re gonna hop in that body-on-frame Ford Transit and we’re gonna lay down a burnout for the ages. Well, I am. See, the key to starting a really good fire is that you’ve gotta use the belts. The rubber? Just makes smoke. Once you get through the outer carcass and start sparking those steel belts on the pavement, that’s where the good shit comes from. And then you gotta be ready. Ready for what, you ask?

Well, once the building catches on fire, it’s a good idea to get the fuck out of here. One of the real catch-22s of this whole thing is that, because the van is now currently engulfed in flames, we can’t exactly use it to flee the burning warehouse that we are trapped in. So we’re gonna have to leg it. Hope you’ve been doing your ten thousand steps a day, buddy!

Phew. That was a bit of a workout, but we got away clean. It was all worth it, though, to get revenge on the anonymous moneymen who dared to reach into my wallet and extract ten dollars for the privilege of me paying them to deliver a new fire suppression system. Who did you say you worked for again, the New York Times? Never heard of it. They got a car section?

[eleemosynecdoche]

Given that Toyosatomimi no Miko is, like, 5'4" at the most, can you cut her off in the middle of a rant by putting your hand on her face? Or does she bite? I think she'd just swish her cape around and declare, "Unhand me, poltroon!" and other such phrases redolent with Fire Emblem Localization Swearwords.

[defilerwyrm]

What's the stance on trans meds nowadays? I don't ID with them, but for me personally, being trans is a medical thing for me, because that's what helps me and my dysphroia the best to see it as such, but I don't apply that logic to everyone..some people don't see it that way and that's valid! But I'm curious if this is common? I know many don't have dysphoria and that's valid and common ans you don't need dysphoria to be trans. And having dysphoria is common too, but is it odd to view it for yourself personally as a medical thing, like being the hrt part of it? Idk if that makes me one but..Like I see myself as a biological male (I'm a trans man, and I don't agree with that bullshit of "I'm a bio woman living as a man, no, I AM a man and my "biology" is a "male! My hormones are that of a man, my body is male.) Idk just curious if others feel the same :)

Oh hell, Anon, I don’t even know, I’m so far past caring what anyone else thinks about that.

I find that there is a gulf between the lived experience of a dysphoric trans person like myself (or you!) and that of someone who’s happy with nothing more than social transition that could swallow Jupiter without getting moons in its teeth.

For me personally, I have felt like I’ve been in the wrong body since I was 4 years old at least. My parts were wrong, my voice was wrong, my height was wrong, my puberty was a traumatic clusterfuck of “oh gods no please no why,” and the expectations people had of me (very especially for sex) based on the shape of my body were all wrong. My dysphoria is/was a medical problem caused by a mismatch between my intrinsic identity and my physical form, and so it had a medical solution (HRT and multiple surgeries).

And for some others, that screaming, clawing wrongness just…isn’t there, I guess? Nor are they capable of comprehending what it’s like to have it, from all I’ve seen, any more than cis people can comprehend it.

Really I think you could subdivide the transgender umbrella into two main types: “my sex is wrong” and “my gender and sex are two discrete things and that’s fine.” Is one more or less trans than the other? Oh fuck, who gives a shit, the right wing wants all of us dead equally.

This split is only really a problem when it comes to a) matters of representation (a reeeaaal hot button topic for me) and b) the first camp’s ongoing battle to secure the right to medical transition on grounds of it being the appropriate treatment for our condition.

IDK man, the internet is full of buffoons and poltroons and I’m much too old to give credence to whatever the opinions of non-voting Chronically Online minors are, so your guess is as good as mine

[made-myself-miserable]

i have been waiting for years to know what Francis and Fitzjames yell at each other and the fact it involves the word POLTROON is just too much to handle 

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Musings of recovering Republican Tom Nichols:

I have no patience with people who casually refer to anyone with whom they disagree as “fascists,” but such people are a small and annoying minority. The reality is that the Americans who have taught us all to hate one another instantly at the sight of a license plate or at the first intonation of a regional accent are the vanguard of the new American right, and they have found fame and money in promoting division and even sedition.

These are the people, on our radios and televisions and even in the halls of Congress, who encourage us to fly Gadsden and Confederate flags and to deface our cars with obscene and stupid bumper stickers; they subject us to inane prattle about national divorce as they watch the purchases and ratings and donations roll in. Such people have made it hard for any of us to be patriotic; they pollute the incense of patriotism with the stink of nationalism so that they can issue their shrill call to arms for Americans to oppose Americans.

Their appeals demean every voter, even those of us who resist their propaganda, because all of us who hear them find ourselves drawing lines and taking sides. When I think of Ohio, for example, I no longer think (as I did for most of my life) of a heartland state and the birthplace of presidents. Instead, I wonder how my fellow American citizens there could have sent to Congress such disgraceful poltroons as Jim Jordan and J. D. Vance—men, in my view, whose fidelity to the Constitution takes a back seat to personal ambition, and whose love of country I will, without reservation, call into question. Likewise, when I think of Florida, I envision a natural wonderland turned into a political wasteland by some of the most ridiculous and reprehensible characters in American politics.

I struggle, especially, with the shocking fact that many of my fellow Americans, led by cynical right-wing-media charlatans, are now supporting Russia while Moscow conducts a criminal war. These voters have been taught to fear their own government—and other Americans who disagree with them—more than a foreign regime that seeks the destruction of their nation. I remember the old leftists of the Cold War era: Some of them were very bad indeed, but few of them were this bad, and their half-baked anti-Americanism found little support among the broad mass of the American public. Now, thanks to the new rightists, an even worse and more enduring anti-Americanism has become the foundational belief of millions of American citizens.

I know that such thoughts make me part of the problem. And yes, I will always believe that voting for someone such as Jordan (or, for that matter, Donald Trump) is, on some level, a moral failing. But that has nothing to do with whether Ohio and Florida are part of the America I love, a nation full of good people whose politics are less important than their shared citizenship with me in this republic. I might hate the way most Floridians vote, but I would defend every square inch of the state from anyone who would want to take it from us and subjugate any of its people.

[atossofthedice]

Naruto: *making a rasenshuriken*

Madara: Just because you can accomplish an S-Rank Ninjutsu does not mean you get to abuse it and be under the impression that you can triumph everytime.

Naruto: *stops making rasenshuriken* W-what???

Naruto's Clone: ????

Obito: *exhale* He means, just 'cause you can make a cool and hard to learn jutsu doesn't mean you can use it for everything and expect it to work.

Naruto: Ohhh, that's what he meant, dattebayo.

Naruto's Clone: Well then,

Naruto: You can tell him and his fancy words to knock off! If he wants to be smug, then tell him to come here instead of staying on his Ten-tails, scaredy-cat!!!

Madara: *spins gunbai, daydreams of Hashirama, wait for his translator*

Obito: *oh my god kill me* ...what he's saying is, if you decide to be lavish and insult his choice of Jutsus, you have to get off your high horse and tell it straight to his face instead of relying on the Juubi for support.

Obito: And he's calling you a cowardly poltroon.

Madara: Fine then. If that is what he wishes will happen, we shall fulfill his wish. First and foremost, however, we must desecrate his aspirations even further.

Naruto: *not even making the Rasenshuriken anymore, just standing there scratching his head*

Sasuke: *doesn't even know what to say*

Obito: This is my life now, isn't it, to be Madara's translator