Petals of Titanium -- My Life as a Mecha Setting Bridge Bunny Quest
- Thread starter Gazetteer
- Start date
- Original Sci-Fi Users' Choice!
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
The Sandman
So Zetta Slowpoke
- Location
- Wherever I am, which isn't where I'm not
His civil authority does not and should not insulate him from the consequences of this level of sheer stupidity, especially when it implies that he makes it more likely that the Saturnians consider switching sides every time he opens his mouth.
And if he does call in his dinner mate, we apologize to the captain and only the captain. He has no authority to actually issue us orders since he's not in our chain of command, so while we show him some actual respect we can also politely refuse to do what he says if his orders aren't things like "put down the chair leg before I call the MPs" or "we're under attack, as the highest-ranking officer here I'm taking command".
To be fair, that's option also says "try". I can think of at least a few ways that could go wrong, too.I feel like Anja might react poorly to us just kowtowing to him, and I'm not really a fan of that either. My first thought was to go for the attempt to explain one, but it occurs to me that it's attempt to explain, and, well, we're a couple cups in at this point. The charming apology option is likewise attempt a charming apology.
I think I'll vote for:
[X] Try to get the attention of some of the other crew members from the Rose who might be in the room
since it's the one that seems the least hindered by our drunkenness.
Okay, I guess call him racist is the one that's technically the least hindered by our drunkenness, maybe even boosted by it. But that's the intentionally torpedo this option so I'd still rather not.
Yes, and neither the moral of the story nor morality says "keep your head down".
For reference, the story being compared to Anja and North's situation:
Article: In The Navy, His Fate is Sealed
FRANCE, MILITARY, RESTAURANT, TOULON | RIGHT | NOVEMBER 21, 2010
(The restaurant is near a Navy base and therefore, sometimes, sailors and officers off-duty come to eat. A man and his girlfriend come in. They haven't reserved a table, are rude and snotty with my coworkers, complain a lot about the food, talk loudly, and sometimes mock the other customers. My manager decides that enough is enough when the man lights a cigarette after requesting his bill.)
Manager: "Sir, you can't smoke here."
Customer: "Yes, I can."
Manager: "Sir, you're in a smoke-free zone. Either go away or put out this cigarette."
(The customer gets up. He's clearly taller and larger than the manager and glances at him.)
Customer: "Buddy, listen. I'm a Navy's lieutenant, so I'm not going to take crap from civvies. Just shut up and let me smoke."
(At this point, I decide to call the police when I notice another customer with his family getting up and going straight to the troublemaker.)
Customer #2: "Did I hear you're in the Navy?"
Customer: "Yeah, so?"
Customer #2: "You work at the base here?"
Customer: "What? Get the f*** out, you d*** civvie!"
Customer #2: "You know [Name]?"
Customer: "Who the f*** are you and what the f*** do you want?"
Customer #2: "Do you know [Name]?"
Customer: "[Name] is my superior!"
Customer #2: "Well, I'm HIS superior, and as soon as I'm out of here, I'll make sure he lights your a** up."
(The second customer pulls out a military ID and shows it to him. The troublemaking customer goes white, apologizes profusely to the manager and the customer, pays his bill, and storms off with his girl WHILE SOBBING. Turns out the man showed him his military ID, and he's a Navy's rear-admiral. Needless to say, we gave a huge discount to the officer.)
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cB557
voOOP
Yeah
Ehhh, don't be too sure of that.
It might not be the moral they were going for, but it's still a reasonable one to take from it. Not sure what you mean by the moral calculus?
- Location
- United States of America, Michigan
I think mister Lord Secretary is a noble so the fact he's insulting the military means a lot less than it would in real life especially since we're barely above a peasant.
You really need to learn how the Vote Tally tool works if approval votes are still giving your trouble. It takes 2 clicks to set the tool to divide by 'line' rather than 'none'.
Edited "moral calculus" -> "morality".
The lesson the story tries to impart is don't be an asshole and in particular don't use military service as an excuse to treat civilians like shit.
The lesson is not "keep your head down". The waiter certainly didn't, even as they tried to remain respectful.
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UrsaTempest
Don't Panic!
JUSTICE!
[X] Call the Lord Secretary racist
[X] Call the Lord Secretary racist
Nervos Belli
Don't think this means you've won!
- Location
- Murica
Or maybe she doesn't want to do approval voting for this vote?
The Sandman
So Zetta Slowpoke
- Location
- Wherever I am, which isn't where I'm not
In this case I'd think it means a bit more, seeing as how the other Imperials are currently invading the system and the military is the main thing standing between Mr. Secretary's neck and Mr. Axe's blade.
If we were actually winning the civil war, it might have been a different story. Given that we're at the edge of human civilization waiting for the hammer to fall, it's pretty obvious that at present we aren't.
Nervos Belli
Don't think this means you've won!
- Location
- Murica
On the bright side, if we do call him a racist, Anja will never force us to go drinking again.
cB557
voOOP
The waiter just repeated the rules of the establishment, as it's their job to do. I guess you could swing that as not keeping their head down, but it's not not keeping their head down.
Dude, he's a fucking Lord. He holds some sort of official position. The captain he's dining with is deferring to him. He's at the top of the pecking order here, and it's not going to do us well to try and rationalize some way to pretend he's not. What sway is an ensign going to have that a captain won't?
- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I told you that I would not be counting your vote unless you edited. I actually tallied by task, specifically so that I could make sure to keep your votes from being counted in with the others. If there is some significance to voting for multiple options in a vote where that's not allowed that you expect me to be familiar with, you'd do better to explain what you're trying to do rather than condescendingly tell me that I'm doing it wrong.
It is the kind of setting where respectable naval officers and their friends may spend time, not fine dining or anything.
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- Location
- in the trash
[X] Call the Lord Secretary racist.
This is not the sensible option, but we're drunk and even if we back down there's a chance Anja won't anyway.
This is not the sensible option, but we're drunk and even if we back down there's a chance Anja won't anyway.
If you want to say the smoking story doesn't contradict "keep your head down", fine, but can we at least acknowledge that it doesn't reflect on Anja's situation here? At best, it's irrelevant.
Anja wasn't singled out for being particularly rude, or for abusing her military position, she's just being targeted because she's Saturnian. She's didn't ask for special treatment, just to be treated the same as her fellow non-Saturnian officers.
A better analogy would be restaurant segregation (though the noble here is a fellow patron asking for an "apology" rather than the bar refusing service), not some military officer being a jerk in a restaurant.
It's up to you how you want to handle votes, and some standardization is good.
To explain what I think @Angelform was getting at, is that the tally system is compatible with approval voting, and that approval voting may have some benefits over first-past-the-post such as reducing bandwagoning and spoiler effects (fear of "wasting" your vote on an option other than the top two). I would have supported at least two of the options myself, if that were allowed.
Short video on approval voting:
If you're used to first-past-the-post it may seem like approval voting lets people cast extra votes, but all it really does is let people vote yes or no on each option instead of only siding with one. So whichever option has the most approval wins, versus only one or two options being real contenders.
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Nervos Belli
Don't think this means you've won!
- Location
- Murica
Or instead of assuming OP doesn't know what approval voting is, maybe she did things the way she did for a reason? Politely condescending to people is still condescending.
- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Okay, I am aware of alternative voting schemes in terms of democratic elections. Thank you for the explanation and the link.
I was confused, because we have not been operating under this system at any point before now. I had already asked the poster in question to only vote for one item or their vote would not be counted prior to their telling me that I don't know how to use the tallying software. I was never asked if this were an option and no one suggested it to me as a better way to count votes, so this feels a little late in the game to be making that kind of assumption. I'm not really interested in embarrassing anyone or making a big thing here, and I will consider other options in future quests, but let's just keep going with the system that the other voters are using for now.
It was not my intention to be condescending, and I'm hurt that it came across like that to you. I hope @Gazetteer didn't take it that way, and I'm sorry if it did.
It wasn't apparent to me that Gazetteer caught what Angelform meant by approval voting, so I wanted to offer a less antagonistic explanation since I care about stuff like that.
EDIT:
Understood.
cB557
voOOP
The advice of "don't talk back to your boss's boss" still holds true, regardless.
- Location
- The Surface Of A Hostile Planet
[X] Call the Lord Secretary racist
Is it a good idea? In character, not particularly, but in character we're also drunk and want to stick up for a friend.
And out of character... we're a member of the bridge crew. Getting some licks from a racist asshat might be painful in the moment, but it isn't going to be what does us in.
Is it a good idea? In character, not particularly, but in character we're also drunk and want to stick up for a friend.
And out of character... we're a member of the bridge crew. Getting some licks from a racist asshat might be painful in the moment, but it isn't going to be what does us in.
Independently of the smoking story? Sure. But let's not pretend Anja or North are comparable to the jerk in that story.
Dermonster
The Shittiest Wizard
[x] Call the Lord Secretary racist
cB557
voOOP
Oh, that's where this was coming from. Noone was saying they were, but I can understand the confusion.