People love Targaryen women because they come packaged with everything that looks empowering on the surface: dragons, spectacle, dominance, that whole “exceptional bloodline” mythology. Visenya is the perfect example she rides a dragon, wields a sword, stands beside conquest and violence, and she’s called a “feminist icon.” But… feminist for what exactly? She’s not dismantling patriarchy and not challenging the system. She’s actively helping build and enforce a system that is just as hierarchical and violent as any other.
But because her power is visible and aggressive, people reads it as empowerment. It’s power that looks good on screen and feels satisfying to support.
Now compare that to Alicent. Her power is quieter, more grounded, and honestly more historically accurate she works through court politics / (not military), trying to protect her kids. And she’s called “misogynistic” or “anti-woman.” Why? Because it’s not flashy. It’s not dragon-backed. It doesn’t give that same illusion of being above the system it shows what it actually looks like to live inside it.
That’s where the “selective feminism” comes in. It’s not about supporting women as a class or understanding how women being victims of the system. It’s about supporting women who feel exceptional, who look powerful in a way that’s easy to romanticize and women who can be turned into icons.
And Targaryen women fit that perfectly! They’re written as exceptional visually, politically. So people gravitates toward them and builds this idea that they represent female empowerment, while other women like Alicent, Sansa, and Catelyn get dismissed or villainized for working differently.
There’s also a deeper layer where this intersects with Valyrian exceptionalism. The way Targaryens are writing (silver hair, dragons, “closer to gods than men”) feeds into this idea that they are inherently more worthy of admiration. So when people say they support “feminist characters,” but it’s almost always Targaryen women, it starts to look less like feminism and more like a preference for a specific type of woman: powerful, and aesthetically idealized.
Meanwhile, women who don’t fit that mold who are more historically accurate, political, maternal, restrained, or just not written as “mythic” don’t get the same support. Their actions are judged more harshly and they’re denied the same complexity.
So yeah, it ends up creating this weird fandom dynamic where: Visenya can enforce conquest and still be called feminist BUT Alicent demanding power for herself & her children is framed as internalized misogyny. It’s not about feminism anymore It’s about which version of female power people find more appealing to project onto.
andulkaphoto
kianamaiart
germansingergirl
janainaart
origamiaround
