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Knights V Cowboys

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13:31 / 30.07.03

Ok, sirrah does thous't bite thine own thumb at me?
Why doggone you nasty varmint, I'll be hornswoggled if you're gone beat me dagnabitt.

OK, who's better Cowboys or Knights?, and It doesn't have to be just in terms of weaponary, insults, clothes, you name it, who gets your vote and why?

13:57 / 30.07.03

Knights are, without a shadow of doubt, far superior. Unless you mean the modern lot, who should be sent out to fight the next time there's a war. I can just see the expression on Sir Cliff Richard's face when he's handed a dirty great sword and packed off to Afghanistan or Iraq.

Tryphena Absent

14:15 / 30.07.03

Weirdly the words dirty great big sword came in to my head before I read Unencumbered's reply. So yeah, definitely Knights.

14:19 / 30.07.03

Knights of the realm- they are better horsemen, have much cooler weapons, armour, a castle and a princess. Cowboys suck (except Clint of course) and are stoopid.

14:27 / 30.07.03

'Cowboys know that Cowgirls ride on the Indian side.'
So I'd have to say, Cowgirls rule.

14:29 / 30.07.03

Knights are cowboys, in the same way that ninja are pirates. Don't you understand yet?

14:33 / 30.07.03

The decision came down to music in the end. Gene Autry or madrigals? I guess I'm still fence-sitting here.

14:35 / 30.07.03

No, ninjas and pirates are mostly different. But cowboys ARE knights... without armor... in a savage land!

Paladin!

Paladin!

15:23 / 30.07.03

"Come on you fackin' cowboys, let's have it!"

We're The Great Old Ones Now

15:57 / 30.07.03

I'm with grant. Cowboys vs. Knights isn't a proper clash of nemeses. Knights vs. Wizards, Knights vs. Monsters, sure. Cowboys vs. Sherrifs, Cowboys vs. Gangsters, maybe.

Whisky Priestess

16:55 / 30.07.03

How is Ninjas and Pirates any better? is it just a chronology thang?

17:16 / 30.07.03

Because Pirates swashbuckle while Ninjas lurk.

All the difference in the world, right there.

Cowboys, well, the good ones wear white hats and rescue damsels in distress from the bad ones, who wear black hats. They live by a code and they ride horses. The only difference from knights is that knights don't have guns.

17:24 / 30.07.03

Or cows. They do, however, have harts and dragons, but you can't really herd harts and dragons.

17:54 / 30.07.03

But, the Knight a hereditary remnant of the aristocracy, a holdover of the old order.The cowboy is everyman, coming from humble origins to build a new life, by new rules. While there may be similarities in the code, the cowboy embraces it by conscious decision, while the knight simply takes to it by default. Except in that Martin Lawrence movie.

19:04 / 30.07.03

Knights are handsome equestrian noblemen with a high moral code.

Cowboys eat beans and fart a lot.

Must be a cowboy. Xoc Holliday.

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

19:09 / 30.07.03

i gotta give cowboys this one.

ok ok, knights ARE cool and all. But unlike ninjas stalking in a sneaky way towards a gun toting pirate, knights charge. Cowboys have AT LEAST 6 shots (12 with 2 guns) with which to blast a charging knight.

I do NOT accept that knights are better horsemen. Cowboys ride over on the side of the horse so it looks like they arent there, they can scoop up cowgirls while riding by. Cowboy gear is MUCH easier to move in, as I have worn both.

So yeah, old west beats old english any day.

19:15 / 30.07.03

And there are the cows. Cows are good.

20:07 / 30.07.03

Cowboys have AT LEAST 6 shots (12 with 2 guns) with which to blast a charging knight.

Through all that armour and past the shield? Mind you, I suppose you might get the horse, and a knight off his horse would be pretty immobile...

21:06 / 30.07.03

While there may be similarities in the code, the cowboy embraces it by conscious decision, while the knight simply takes to it by default.

See, I'm not sure I buy that -- knights are always struggling with their relationship to the code. Cowboys struggle to define their code in a similar way. Sir Gawain in Le Morte D'Arthur and Lee Van Cleef's character in The Good, The Bad and The Ugly would have a lot to talk about, I think.

And the whole "cows" thing is secondary. Sheesh. Except maybe in Rawhide or Lonesome Dove, the cowboy is usually just riding the range on his own. They do have ties to the land, but knights do too. I wonder if anyone ever did an Old West version of the Grail Quest, out to see who's been poisoning the herd at the Kingfisher Ranch....

We're The Great Old Ones Now

21:19 / 30.07.03

I'm trying to remember the last cowboy movie I saw which featured cows in any serious way. Cows are mentioned, cows are seen from a distance, very occasionally cows are stolen or cows are cut off from water...

Very few movie cowboys interact with or display any knowledge of cows at any time.

Like the man said - cowboys and knights save damsels from baddies, ride horses and conduct meaningful dialogues about their relationship to similar warrior codes.

Ninjas lurk silently and then totally flip out before returning to the darkness barely noticed by any save the unfortunate victim, pirates pillage and plunder and have parrots, drink grog and have parties of surpassing loudness on the beach. A ninja would regard a pirate as an uncouth barbarian devoid of vital weapon skills and prone to drunkeness and singing, whereas a pirate would regard a ninja as a scurvy knave with no sense o' humour nor grit in his belly for a fight and a couple o' buxom wenches/well-stuffed breechclouts.

A cowboy would regard a knight as a strange lookin' fella who still an' all seems t'understand the business of doing what men have ta do, and a knight would see a cowboy as a curious kind of peasant sworn to virtues more befitting a man of stature, yet ultimately a figure upraised by a noble heart.

See?

21:25 / 30.07.03

Snowmen vs. Firesprites
Jesus vs. Galactus? anyone?

Is there a similarity between dwarves vs. elves and pirates vs. ninjas?

21:28 / 30.07.03

Yeah, I know that really, it's just that cows always make me laugh (ever since the classic Dao Jones cow post from about two years ago, which no longer exists, much to my sorrow).

Both cowboys and knights also get into ridiculous posturing squabbles with others of their kind, which usually result in a) someone being shot in a duel at noon b) someone being unseamed from the nave to the chaps.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

23:31 / 30.07.03

The similarities between cowboys and knights are, indeed, too many.

Now, a knight riding a cow... that'd be cool .

A

03:18 / 31.07.03

I'd love to see the Crusades as performed by cowboys. Or Knights running down cattle rustlin' varmints with their lances.

We're The Great Old Ones Now

09:15 / 31.07.03

There was a classic Dao Jones cow post? What cow post? And isn't it archived? Or was it a cowboy post? In which case, it was probably the one with lots of stuff from The Immediate Experience".

10:09 / 31.07.03

No - it was in a thread about pets and whether they were better than friends, and someone had asked a rhetorical question along the lines of 'what animal could ever get you a pint?' to which Dao Jones' succinct answer was 'a cow', but you probably had to be there...

12:31 / 31.07.03

I'm not convinced about the similarity between knights and cowboys. Knights - as well as being cool guys in armour with dirty great swords - represented a vital element to the system of Feudalism. As landowners they formed the backbone of medieval society, got to command during times of warfare, and appointments to knightly orders aided a country by being dispensed to cement international alliances.

Cowboys did nothing for anyone other than themselves, wore silly hats, and more often than not spent their time robbing trains and/or banks whilst roaming the prairie and singing badly.

We're The Great Old Ones Now

13:08 / 31.07.03

I think that's a bit sneaky. You're moderately serious about knights and then you're all jokey about cowboys.

You could probably make some interesting connections between feudal landowners in medieval England and the owners of vast cattle farms and mining concerns in the early midwest. Both were de facto rulers of their region owing theoretical allegiance to the government. Both needed and assembled bodies of armed men to enforce their law, etc. etc.

13:19 / 31.07.03

Surely the villeins were the backbone of feudal society?

Sam Vega - I suppose one difference might have been (though I'm not too hot on the mid-west, I must say) that the retinues of feudal landlords were held because they were obliged to supply x number of men to the King in times of battle, as well as for local enforcement - so supporting the law, rather than being supplementary (or external) to it.

14:16 / 31.07.03

I thought cowboys fought against the dinosaurs?

We're The Great Old Ones Now

14:50 / 31.07.03

Oh, I'm not saying their an exact match, by any means, though the deputisation/posse thing and the use of civilian scouts and trackers with the armed forces could sort of fill those roles.

All I'm really pointing out, though, is that the similarities between knights and cowboys are too many, and the major style differences too few, for this to be the new Ninja/Pirate divide.

15:02 / 31.07.03

Surely the villeins were the backbone of feudal society?

Not as far as the knights were concerned. Villeins just get in the way and moan about a lack of rights. Lazy slackers.

Actually, I'm still hard pressed to see cowboys being similar to knights in any way other than both rode around on horses. Although Sam Vega is quite correct in identifying this new dichotomy as being unlikely to replace the Pirates/Ninja one.

17:39 / 31.07.03

I'd love to see the Crusades as performed by cowboys.

They called it THE ALAMO, stranger.

We're The Great Old Ones Now

18:31 / 31.07.03

Actually, I'm still hard pressed to see cowboys being similar to knights in any way other than both rode around on horses.

And that in and of itself should be enough. A horse is a major undertaking. It defines the rider as someone too busy to walk. It offers an Olympian viewpoint from which to observe ordinary mortals.

For a proper clash of identities like the great ninja/pirate divide, you need conflicting worldviews and styles.

Knights vs. Wizards, now, or Cowboys vs. Accountants...

04:50 / 01.08.03

And that in and of itself should be enough. A horse is a major undertaking. Yadda yadda.

So, no Cowboys versus Cossacks, then? No charge of 14th Century Grenadine destrier with their fully armoured riders crashing into the flanks of Napoleonic cavalry? No Genghis Khan versus Sir Launcelot? No Wild Hunt versus dressage?

Hm, I wasn't sure this debate could get more absurd...

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