site banner
PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   2549 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for October 31, 2025

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

2
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Do we do quotes here? I have some goodies from my commonplace; I'm skipping the Culture War stuff.

Never believe in a meritocracy in which no one is funny-looking.

Teresa Nielsen Hayden, comment #209 on "Plagiarism and the mechanics of privilege", in Making Light (2010-11-16)

BELKAR: People don’t just change who they are in an instant. It doesn’t work like that. It takes time, so you don’t even know you’re changing. Until one day, you’re just a bit different than you used to be and you can’t even tell what the hell happened.

Rich Burlew, Order of the Stick #957, "Takes One to Know One" (wiki) (2014-07-04)

It’s easy to mistakenly believe that you have learned something well enough to reason and solve problems when you are not actually made to attempt those things.

For the same reason, many people mistakenly believe that they can outrun a bear.

Justin Skycak on Twitter (xcancel) (2025-04-27)

Order of the Stick

A bit sideline

The best quote from the whole thing is "Evan's spiked tentacles of forced intrusion"

I kinda lost interest in the comic when he bent the knee to the wokish crowd about it being rapey. Of course it is was rapey. That was what made it funny.

Yeah I also lost interest in the comic when he started getting political. There's the incident you mentioned, plus the comic where Haley and some other character talk about "remember how we used to hurl gendered insults at each other, that was awful". Perhaps worst of all, he inserted that stuff in the published books. In the book that covers the general Tarquin arc, the author commentary says that the reason that Tarquin flipped out on the heroes was because he couldn't handle that he, a straight white male, lost to a party with a black man, a woman, and a genderqueer elf. The author then went on to insinuate that his readers were Bad People (TM) who shared the same character flaw of being upset because the world didn't evolve around straight white men.

I kept reading the comic online for a bit after that (until that became insufferable too), but will never again give that man another dime of support. I don't give my money to artists who go out of their way to insult me for no reason.

I don't read the fora or the director's commentary, but that doesn't even make sense. Tarquin is the only white male in his party (I don't think Malack, an albino snake, counts); Laurin is female, and she and Miron and Shoulder Pads Guy are all drawn various shades of gray and brown.

Would you mind directly quoting the things which upset you? I'm curious what exactly happened there.

Assuming I have the book still, sure. I'll have to look around to see if I kept it or got rid of it.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats