The 'James was always bad and you can tell because he doesn't trust or listen to others' argument is always just... So weird to me. XD Because James does display trust and listen to others.
When James fans point out that he openly accepts the council of others like Glynda and the Ace Ops, they say “he only trusts the people he keeps close to him.” And then when we point out that James shows open trust to Team RWBYJNOR when they first arrive, they say “he only trusts until he's given the slightest reason to distrust or there’s a disagreement or people challenge him, then he won't listen to anyone.” And James fans could point out that he literally trusts Team RWBYJNOR despite them stealing a plane unnecessarily, and works with Robyn willingly even after she started stealing needed supplies, and forgives Ruby for lying to him, and trusts Qrow to tell him to lead his men in V3 even after they’ve been arguing pretty severely and right after it seemed like Qrow was literally trying to kill him. But the response to that is usually “HE'S ONLY EVER NICE TO PEOPLE TO MANIPULATE THEM, SO IT WASN’T SHOWING REAL TRUST, YOU IDIOT!” Which is always fun.
So it’s not that he never displays trust or listens to others, it’s that people don’t want to believe he’s sincere. That’s fair and I honestly don’t care. So long as hate against Ironwood is tagged as 'anti ironwood,' I couldn't care less. People are well within their rights to headcanon what they want to make RWBY more enjoyable for them personally. My problem is that a lot of people get mad at IW fans for not subscribing to the ‘right’ headcanon that lines up with the ‘villain James’ that we believe is severely out of character.
But also the ‘trust and love and friendship will see us through’ theme is so badly done. And Ironwood is supposed to be the horrible anti-friend, anti-trust person who contrasts Team RWBYJNOR (And more specifically Ruby’s) pro-friends, pro trust beliefs. The main protagonist team wins because they trust, they’re good because they love their friends, we should root for them because they give second chances and listen to others! Except that the writers did a terrible job, because their ‘trust’ and ‘second chances’ and ‘listening to others’ isn’t consistent at all. We’re meant to ignore the fact that they drew their weapons on Qrow for stepping forward and saying hey and told him to fall in line or get lost when he didn’t like their completely unnecessary ‘steal a plane’ plan in Argus, because also they think the Ace Ops should be friends. We’re meant to ignore the fact that every single person in RWBYJNOR was willing to consider Whitley a snotty unwanted nuisance and no one had a problem with Weiss pointing her loaded weapon in his face, because once Whitley starts doing what they want, Weiss gives him a hug. We’re meant to ignore the fact that Ruby lied to Ironwood literally because she was suspicious of him despite him having reasons she believed in for the things that he did, because also Yang and Blake randomly told a hot tempered vigilante stealing from the project they believed in all or their plans. We’re meant to ignore the fact that they act like doubting Ruby is some horrible, scandalous thing and that they act like Ren not always telling Nora everything and not just being her boyfriend when she wants him to and then doubting that they’re doing much good makes him a horrible friend and a bad partner, because the group laughs along with someone who was trying to help murder Penny yesterday because now she says that they’ve improved and are actually good and right and that they grew. The protagonists don’t always act with trust anymore. Sometimes they just randomly pick the people that it’s arguably unwise to trust and share everything with them. But then they’ll act like the slightest protest to Ruby’s desires is morally wrong, or only tolerate some people when they’re doing everything they want, or they play mean spirited pranks on people who are soldiers or Whitley just because they don’t immediately like them. Or they suggest someone is being like already evil Ironwood if they so much as say “maybe we should decide to do something that would help people” when Ruby doesn’t want to commit. And they’ll decide someone is probably evil actually if that person explains everything they’re doing in detail and has a plan that the heroes one hundred percent like and back up but also they look tired. But then they’ll be like “Yeeeeah Winter did suggest martial law, which is a concept we’ve acted like has horrified us, and she did work with Ironwood willingly, the person we’ve literally warned the entire world couldn’t be trusted because we distrusted him and thought he was evil that much, and we have no reason besides her sometimes cold displays of affection towards Weiss to believe that she’s randomly turned her back on everything she believed yesterday and honestly every ‘indication of evil’ that we seemed wary of with Ironwood is something Winter has displayed just as much if not more than he did in season seven, but we really want her to be nice, so of course we trust Winter! We love trust! We always give second chances and listen to others!” You know what the protagonist team’s morals are now?
The writers just have things work out for Team Protagonists and their random as heck granting of trust and goodwill or doling out distrust and a complete lack of care and compassion because they’re the protagonists. It’s like Ruby has a script that lets her see who’s definitely going to turn evil and who’s going to be good, or she hears the same plucky or heroic music when some people talk and the same ‘trouble a’brewing’ and foreboding music when others talk that we as the audience do. Just like her choices don’t always make even a lick of sense, and somehow work out because protagonist magic and author-admitted letting her cheat the rules because they wrote themselves into a corner. Ruby and co don’t always trust, aren’t always nice, don’t always give second or even first chances, don’t always want to be friends, don’t always try to bridge a gap, definitely don’t always listen to others, and they oftentimes act like everyone should have to do what they say and that doubting Ruby is akin to declaring war or at the very least being a terrible friend. But if Ironwood so much as says ‘maybe Ozpin is wrong about some things even though we’re on the same side and are friends, and I shouldn’t just blindly do everything he tells me,’ that’s treated as proof of evil.
In short, the RWBY writers are not good and convincing writers anymore and despite the fact that they’re clearly trying to say there’s a theme of ‘Trust, friendship, and togetherness’ in this show, they just aren’t putting in the work of carrying that out in a consistent, well written, and thoughtful way. So I wish people would stop saying James was clearly always a bad guy ‘because he didn’t trust or listen to others.’ Trust doesn’t actually mean as much as the season seven theme song would have us believe in this show, and even if it did, James was one of the most trusting people in the whole show until the writers randomly made him evil at the speed of light.
