A Songbird and a Black Sword (MotM/ATR)

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Hi @Arnyn and everyone - i am actually quite serious on the b-o-l-l-o-c-k-s. The 1977 trial was a real thing, as was the ruling that this is not an obsene word. Here is a report on the case. Apparently the star turn at the trial was an English professor:

Professor James Kinsley, Head of English at Nottingham University and an Anglican priest, told the court the origins of the offending word. He said that during the word's history, it had meant a small ball, a type of orchid and a nickname for a clergyman. According to Kinsley: 'Clergymen are known to talk a good deal of rubbish and so the word later developed the meaning of nonesense.' Kinsley ended by stating that the meaning of the word today (in 1977) was to mean 'nonsense'.

So while i am not actually going to launch a campaign on this, it does seem to me that plaza filtering of the word in question is a step backwards, a fall from the light and a return to the obscure mirk of language emasculated of its history.

And also it has no legal basis!

[Rivvy Elf]

@Chrysophylax Dives Words change though :(, 1977 was 46 years ago, and the English professor probably detailed an origin hundreds of years prior to that.

We are a PG-13 site, so does the average 13 year old mean "nonsense" whenever they say ball-locks/ball-ox/ball-lucks (or perhaps for some, 'balls' for short)?

[Arnyn]

Well, when I would say it, it would mean nonsense.

Alas, I am a far cry from a 13-year old these days

Also, the triumvirate must of course all agree on the proper course of action. ^^ I am not bothered with it being censored, nor with it being uncensored. So I'm being very Belgian (neutral in WW1) but of course Belgium got invaded by Germany so there is that. *swallows back lump in throat*

[Rivvy Elf]

I am American-Chinese so I am neutral on it being censored or uncensored, regardless of my bias against Great Britain for its imperialist actions in China and India in the past centuries.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

I am American-Chinese so I am neutral on it being censored or uncensored, regardless of my bias against Great Britain for its imperialist actions in China and India in the past centuries.

That is a very fair point. I am even now drinking a cup of tea. Alas, no opium.

I will accept the continual censoring of a word the true meaning of which is 'nonesense'.

[Aikári Salmarinian]

1977, what a world back then. I was two years old and running around in a confided space. Was also the year I sat between the mode dolls in the etalage while my folks shopped clothes. And I was taken to school where my mother taught students and she had nobody watching me. That was great and I remember still.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

@Chrysophylax Dives I think @Laurence makes an excellent suggestion: the Halls of Injustice would be the perfect way to settle this. If your tree-like self would truly like to bring the matter to the court and obtain justice. I am sure one or more (I would be, so that is one at least) of the admins would be willing to serve as judge(s).

Secondly, by default the threadrunner (@Silky Gooseness, or the goose supreme) would be playing the Mouth of Sauron yes. If she deigns some version of some existing or new character I and or @Rivvy Elf could play as worthy, we would be allowed to sit in.

It’s the magic of roleplay (quote="Silky Gooseness" Gondolin post - Legal)

Dear Admins (all), i've been doing some rummaging around into this court of yours, the judge, and this 'magic of roleplay'. As i write, my Fangorn riddle remains unsolved - so i could get egg on my face here. But frankly, i don't find your court in the least credible. The Mouth of Sauron looks more like a pope with a cigar, and the role play... well, i guess you all had better days in the old plaza, eh?

Your 'magic', I don't doubt, was once alive and bliss and a very wonder to behold. Today, what magic as remains is withered and stale, while this court is lost in an endless procession of mutual navel-gazing. I've been more enchanted browsing in church jumble sales.

I would like to make a suggestion. Feel free to mull it over. Your Halls of Injustice are a mess. Turn them over to a collective of @Drifa, @Fuin Elda, and myself. We shall scrub out the old, bring in the new, and ensure that Justice is meted out fairly and SPEEDILY.

Note that offering ourselves for this position we are willing to put whips and lashes on the table for negotiation.

Let me know, my door is always ajar.

[Dungeon Delver]

The sheer amount of idiotic chaos this could cause...

[Fuin Elda]

Hi @Arnyn and everyone - i am actually quite serious on the b-o-l-l-o-c-k-s. The 1977 trial was a real thing, as was the ruling that this is not an obsene word. Here is a report on the case. Apparently the star turn at the trial was an English professor:

Professor James Kinsley, Head of English at Nottingham University and an Anglican priest, told the court the origins of the offending word. He said that during the word's history, it had meant a small ball, a type of orchid and a nickname for a clergyman. According to Kinsley: 'Clergymen are known to talk a good deal of rubbish and so the word later developed the meaning of nonesense.' Kinsley ended by stating that the meaning of the word today (in 1977) was to mean 'nonsense'.

So while i am not actually going to launch a campaign on this, it does seem to me that plaza filtering of the word in question is a step backwards, a fall from the light and a return to the obscure mirk of language emasculated of its history.

And also it has no legal basis!

HOnestly one of the characters I've taken to cosplaying fairly often is Scottish. So I MAY have developed a heavy use of the Scottish slang of the same meaning. I am quite tempted to see if it gets censored too because I have always been one to toe the line before ripping through it like the fool I am.

[Arnyn]

@Chrysophylax Dives not my thread to hand over, nor should Sil just hand it over if she wants to keep it. However! Surely there could be an opposing court in Mordor. You know. Healthy competition. Scrub away! *hands brooms and supplies* But watch the acidic stuff in the products, it's worse than the lava pits.

@Fuin Elda I kinda want to poke the bear and see what you've got....

[Silky Gooseness]

The Halls of Injustice are an open court, and you should feel free to run parallel court cases in there should you so wish - I suggest you simply title your posts for ease of reference.

I do have to say, the idea that justice is meted out speedily and fairly is quite against what “The Halls of Injustice” was originally envisioned as: the worst of evils, the dull bureaucracy of Mordor that gets nowhere and satisfies no-one. (Except me, of course). Don’t worry, I’ve consulted extensively with lorists on this matter… But should any of you wish to actually bring an efficient case through the courts: they’re open to you.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

@Chrysophylax Dives not my thread to hand over, nor should Sil just hand it over if she wants to keep it. However! Surely there could be an opposing court in Mordor. You know. Healthy competition. Scrub away! *hands brooms and supplies* But watch the acidic stuff in the products, it's worse than the lava pits.

sorry, Arnyn. point taken. i was up all night in the hope my riddle would be solved. i know i should just go to sleep, but i'd kind of like to wake up like the guy in the last video that i posted on the what u watching. but anyway - yes. apologies, and no acid.

Edit. by the way, Arnyn. your 'answer' 'are u your own name' was actually what prompted me to post that video. just before the guy wakes up on a bench on the street he is served for supper his own head - which smiles and grins at him; he looks at his own head, and passes out - then to wake up on the bench. just saying, everything is connected.

[Fuin Elda]

@Fuin Elda I kinda want to poke the bear and see what you've got....

I'm taking this as permission mistakes were made

Bawbag

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Dear Admins (all), i've been doing some rummaging around into this court of yours, the judge, and this 'magic of roleplay'. As i write, my Fangorn riddle remains unsolved - so i could get egg on my face here. But frankly, i don't find your court in the least credible. The Mouth of Sauron looks more like a pope with a cigar, and the role play... well, i guess you all had better days in the old plaza, eh?

Riddles are good training for a scholar cos u got to (a) put your heart and soul into the proposed solution - u gotta believe it when you say it, and (b) u gotta learn to radically revise even the most cherised preconceptions. But what went on here had nothing to do with any of that. Actually, you would not believe it but - as i mentioned on my punk posts - i wear glasses. but they have been scratched beyond measure of late and i sometimes don't see so good.

Turns out that i wasn't in the Halls of Injustice after all, but 'Me and My Hobbit-pony: Poems & Pics' in some corner of the Shire. lol. must have been one of my Gollum spots.

So it seems that this Silky Gooseness who claims the magic of role play for the Mouth of Sauron is in fact The Goose. Right? If that is actually the case then i feel very lucky to have got this far still alive. The Goose terrifies me. And I absolutely withdraw anything and everything i said about the Hobbit-Pony thead, because maybe she likes ponies for all i know? i aint risking nothing.

Still, the proposal to hand over Plaza Justice to our little triumverate was of course made with the genuine interests of the plaza in mind. So I'd still urge you to mull on that one. I feel the three of us would make a very good team (not an admin team, please, but a Justice team of some kind, you know M-e capes and whathaveyou).

[Arnyn]

Still, the proposal to hand over Plaza Justice to our little triumverate was of course made with the genuine interests of the plaza in mind. So I'd still urge you to mull on that one. I feel the three of us would make a very good team (not an admin team, please, but a Justice team of some kind, you know M-e capes and whathaveyou).

Ahhh but then...

"It is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till. What weather they shall have is not ours to rule."

[Chrysophylax Dives]

i am silenced (again). but all's well that ends better, eh?

[Arnyn]

It's an ill wind as blows nobody any good, though.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Arnyn, if you just collected another 2 or 3 more then you could play around with them and string them into an excellent riddle.
just saying.

[Arnyn]

But folly is my cloak, a veil before riddlers' eyes! For riddlers are very wise, and weigh all things to a nicety in the scales of their knowledge. The only measure riddlers know is desire, a desire for riddles; and so they judge all hearts.