#Balancing Goodness and Effectiveness

[hinamie]

inflict

[mrablogger]

Machiavelli's Wisdom: Balancing Niceness and Effectiveness

Learn how Niccolò Machiavelli challenges conventional notions of goodness and effectiveness in our quest for positive change.

In a world where goodness and effectiveness often seem at odds, the 16th-century Florentine political thinker Niccolò Machiavelli challenges conventional notions. His perspective, as outlined in “The Prince,” delves into an uncomfortable truth: that the so-called wicked often triumph over the good. Why? Because principles unburden the wicked. They employ cunning, deceit, and violence to achieve…

[glitchgh0sty]

AhHA! Finally gotchu! *quietly slides mimics au sketches across the forest floor* 🫶^u^

Extra sneakiness ✨:

- Hey Glitch,, whatcha. *cough* Doin over there??

- ,,Keferoning … - I think.

[whiskawaybelf]

Dol Amroth and their Swan Knights will never not be funny to me. Because yes, swans are elegant, of course the famously noble, very Numenorean family would have that as their banner. You know what swans also are? Territorial and absolutely feral if you approach their home and nesting site. (Mute swans are particularly vicious, many swans are just aggressively defensive, mute swans are actively dicks.)

I love the idea of of Imrahil and his family meeting important people and they're so put together and regal, and then you see them in battle and they are... so scary. I love a Lothiriel who seems so smooth and demure and then will absolutely punch the throat of anyone who touches her without permission, no hesitation, you should have known better than to the touch the Princess of Dol Amroth. I love this family of beautiful noble people who defend their home so viciously that they can bring the most troops of the principalities. What? Like it's hard? A family that will not hesitate to cut you but they'll also be the symbol for nobility and honour, with a Prince that even elves know is a pretty impressive person.

Give me the family of Dol Amroth who are loving and calculated and cold and deeply efficient at dealing with threats. Ones who surprise their enemies by being three steps ahead at all times, but 'Elphir could not have done this, he is so noble,' yeah buddy, but you hoarded grain during a siege so I hope you have fun in the Dol Amroth prisons until after Morannon when we can be bothered to deal with you.

Turncoats? Hard to turn a coat without any of the correct information and each and every one of your sources rounded up before you can warn them.

Slimy advisors? Eaten for dinner, Denethor; sad but we planned for this, Mordor and certain death? Sure, not a part of the plan but our knights are renowned for their battle prowess, let's go and tear Sauron a new one.

Give me noble, coldly efficient, wildly territorial and very slightly feral Dol Amarothians. I beg you. Make their swan a symbol of their absolutely unhinged defense of their beautiful, elegant home.

(But like wild oceans and massive mountains? I have a whole post about how this also gives us insight into Imrahil and his kids, or like, my version of them. Water and stone, commanding oceans and navigating massive peaks. The children of Dol Amroth grow up walking uphill both ways, their knees are scarred and bloody from slipping down sharp mountain paths and they are honed to their lands.)

[narfin-frood]

what you said in the tags of that post about struggling to keep the tone in check is so real. I have my own woy swap au and as tempting as it is to just straight into The Horrors tm or make it like, super edgy, it's not really what I want to do with it. For my own villain!Wander I wanted the tone to be like, oh its very silly and goofy and a bit surreal and cartoony and while it seems fine at first glance, there's an sort of undercurrent of like, a sense of wrongness or offness to the whole thing. Yknow what I mean? Like there's horrors, but it's subtle. Hope this ask makes sense lol.

oh yeah i'm real bad at keeping the tone in check. and your au seems really fun! it's hard not to get carried away when the temptation to make things as evil as possible is so strong. it's so fun to write!

[thatscarletflycatcher]

The thing is, I do love a cranky, sarcastic, clever, old man writer. I delight in Alasdair MacIntyre, and I have the time of my life reading Etienne Gilson too, even the times I disagree with them.

And then there's one Gilbert Keith Chesterton whom I find insufferable to read most of the time, unless it is fiction (The Man Who Was Thursday my beloved).

[polarmoon]

have some unedited screenshots while i mess around with reshade

[ssevenneedles]

isat speedrun bad touch%. new game+ (dialogue skipping allowed) but no other exploits. grind the house, beat the king four times in a row, watch the event, time ends when you equip the memory.

is this anything

[tqtc-art]

doing some color scheme experiments with Taako as my muse

[moregraceful]

many things i have been keeping under wraps at work, such as pronouns, but also, very critically, age. bc i got that ageless mixed race asian swag where i am very clearly not an undergrad but also??? they just don't know. and it WHIPS and it is so funny to ME because all the managers and shift supervisors are like damn this girl in her mid-twenties is so easy to talk to, it's like talking to a peer. surprise bitch i'm older than you. and maybe this means i'm performing psychological experiments on cis men, but i am ngl if i hand you a two page resume that you don't read, it is simply none of MY business if you think i am in my mid-20s. they are going to be so mad when they find out lmao

[whatwwwwwww]

anyone here got any chill TV show/movie reccs?

nothing aimed at children please

[blackberry-s0da]

I think ppl were too mean to gladiator 2 it was pretty good to me

[fiona-fififi]

I'm watching this one and mostly enjoying it, but oh do I miss the days when they effectively built stories for ALL the characters into their opening disasters.

[goldensunset]

in my mind i like creating not only fakemons but also like fake moves/abilities/stat spreads. i especially have fun thinking about what i would give characters if they were pokémon. like it’s normal to imagine your oc as a dnd character obviously or something else from a game like that but me i’m out here pokémonifying people. the thing is i’m always like ohhh is this too overpowered would this entirely hypothetical fake thing that will never be real break the meta. then i remind myself how bad gen 9 power creep is and i feel better. it could be real someday

[crowsintheforest]

three thoughts about severance 2.09:

it's totally normal to spend an entire episode of television curled up in a fetal position out of sheer stress, right?

john turturro and christopher walken have more chemistry with less screentime than most people have with entire seasons of television behind them. give my cold war old man yaoi a fucking emmy. two emmys even.

harmony cobel choosing the most dramatic possible place to stand at the end of the episode, backlit by the fireplace, the theme song flickering as the camera zooms in? how did we go so long this season without her

[sciderman]

What are some things cable likes about peter?

nathan's type:

red mask ✅ tight suit ✅ kind of stupid ✅ filters sadness through the prism of humour ✅

bonuses peter parker has to offer

cute hair ✅ cute butt ✅ cute everything ✅