What is a mental marshmallow?

[K_ENG]

Can anyone explain what 'a mental marshmallow' means? I was told the word marshmallow has the meaning of 'timid' or 'cowardly' but I'm not quite sure what kind of person one is if 'He is a mental marshmallow.'

Thanks!!

[baqarah131]

"Mental marshmallow" isn't an English expression, as far as I know. It sounds to me like something that someone said, and it means whatever it he wanted it to mean.
This is very common in the way we use language.
I have not heard "marshmallow" to refer to a timid or cowardly person. But slang is often local and temporarily, and it could be that there are people who do call a coward a marshmallow.
I do use the expression "cupcake" to refer to a person who is completely harmless, the opposite of dangerous or threatening.

happy new year
edward

Can anyone explain what 'a mental marshmallow' means? I was told the word marshmallow has the meaning of 'timid' or 'cowardly' but I'm not quite sure what kind of person one is if 'He is a mental marshmallow.'

Thanks!!

[David L.]

It is a way of saying someone is a moron, brainless, or someone turned into a moron for a short time eg through lack of sleep, or a footballer who is slightly concussed after a hit on the head. It's like having 'marshmallow for brains'.

[baqarah131]

Only the person who said it could really answer that question.
It's not an English expression.
But that's okay. We don't always express ourselves in standard, recognized, expressions. English would be boring and static if we didn't invent our own ways of saying things. We invent our own expressions.

There must be thousands of ways to insult a person's intelligence.
He's an airhead/waterhead/meathead/blockhead/chowderhead/knucklehead.
He's got nothing between his ears.
He's out to lunch.
He played football too long without a helmet.

And people will go on inventing more.

I hope you don't think I'm clueless.
edward

It is a way of saying someone is a moron, brainless, or someone turned into a moron for a short time eg through lack of sleep, or a footballer who is slightly concussed after a hit on the head. It's like having 'marshmallow for brains'.

[K_ENG]

Thank you very much everyone for replying.
And Happy New Year!

P.S. Actually I got the expression from the book, 10 Clowns Don't Make a Circus, published in the U.S.A. "You don't have to be a mystic, or a mental marshmallow...."
But it's not widely used, I guess.