We are the North

Am from North. Support the North. For The Geese, Peace Was Never An Option

[pessimisticpigeonsworld]

GOT Demonizing Women and Idealizing Men

GOT had a nasty habit of portraying their female characters in the worst light possible, while painting so many men as better/more saintly than their books counterparts.

Now, obviously, I am not talking about characters like Cersei or Lysa, who very obviously are meant to be antagonists. Neither am I talking about Baristan Selmy or Ned Stark. And I am perfectly aware of how well they portrayed Ramsay Bolton and Walder Frey. Therefore I am not talking about them, nor do I need to be "reminded" of them.

The Women

Doreah

Doreah was one of Dany's only friends in AGOT (ie one of her handmaidens). She helped her learn to survive with the Dothraki, taught her ways to get Drogo to love her, and was a support to Dany as a fellow outsider in the Khalasar. When she dies in ACOK, it's in the Red Waste. Dany held her as she died and gave her water from her own skin, despite they were in a desert and needed to keep moving.

For whatever reason, the show decided to completely destroy her. In season one, she is used pretty much only for a queerbait scene, and other than that she's basically another faceless member of the Khalasar. In season two, not only does she survive the Red Waste, but she dies after betraying Dany. She sells the dragons, strangles Irri, and gets locked in Xaro's vault with him to starve to death. This is made even more disgusting by the fact that she is a victim of sex trafficking.

Now, I can understand why Dany's handmaidens don't get super fleshed out, I mean they're not very fleshed out in the books anyway. There are a lot of more important characters, and many side characters got removed to make it all less confusing. What I can't understand is turning Doreah into a shallow and sex obsessed traitor.

Sansa Stark

Now this one may seem a little confusing, "But Ellie, Sansa is one of the only women who gets a happy ending!" That may be true, but in giving her this happy ending, GOT made her into a manipulative, cold, and uncaring character.

Sansa not only constantly undermines Jon Snow as king, she flat out gets Rickon killed by refusing to tell Jon about the Vale knights when he's strategizing. According to Sophie Turner, she did this purely for the glory that moment would give her. Much like Cersei, you know, a mentally unstable tyrant, she places herself and her desire for power over the lives of her last living relatives (that she knows of) when she's spent almost the whole show wishing to be reunited with her family.

She openly takes inspiration for her ruling from Cersei and Littlefinger, two of the primary antagonists in her storyline. Like them, she doesn't care about anyone or anything but her own desire to rule.

When Daenerys arrives in the North, Sansa openly insults her and risks driving her away or goading her into attacking. Daenerys' dragons and army are needed to prevent the literal apocalypse; but Sansa doesn't care about the literal end of the world, she just wants to be the most powerful person in the room. Again, much like Cersei.

Speaking of her relationship with Dany, something D&D literally said about their meeting was that Sansa literally dislikes her because she's "too pretty". As in Sansa hates a woman because she might be prettier than her. How fucking shallow and insulting to women is that? And, again, they make her a reflection of Cersei in that.

For some reason, D&D decided that in order for Sansa to have her "good" ending, she has to become Cersei 2.0; in other words, yet another vain and cruel tyrant. Even D&D's supposedly favorite character is completely destroyed.

In the books, while Sansa is cruel to Arya and superficial in AGOT, she grows. She is learning that those who she was taught are lesser than are actually equally deserving of care and understanding (as Alayne Stone). She desires to care for her people if she was ever to become queen (even though she is currently being manipulated by Littlefinger). The last thing she would ever want to be is a second Cersei, yet that is what D&D turned her into.

The Sand Snakes

The show decided to defang the Sand Snakes (and the entire Dornish Plot) and turn them into simply opportunities for more sex scenes. They lose any individual personalities, competency, and ambition. Their plan is only used to kill off Myrcella. After that, they fail and are basically useless except to be turned into sex objects to please the horny male audience D&D most wanted to target.

Daenerys Targaryen

I have made so many posts about how GOT fucked over Dany. I don't really feel like going into it in a lot of detail again, but instead I'll try to summarize it.

Not only does Dany end the show with the bullshit "mad queen" arc, but her kindness, love for her people, intelligence, and wisdom are all systematically removed as the show goes on. Her Meereen arc has all its complexity and intrigue removed and all the problems are solved in five minutes because the Slavers decided to just stop fighting after talking to Tyrion.

Dany in the books cares so deeply for her people (calling them her children), is a brilliant strategist, and is incredibly wise despite being sixteen and younger. The show drained all of that from her before killing her by having her lover stab her in the womb.

Other

There are so many women removed, despite the importance of their characters to the plot. Jeyne Poole, Lady Stoneheart, and Arianna Martell are each cut out of the show to make room for boring and pointless arcs and bland men.

The Men

Jorah Mormont

In the books, Jorah is a creepy, obsessive man who actively tries to sabotage Dany by trying to push away any other men in her life. He kissed her without consent and constantly made Dany uncomfortable with his inappropriate behavior. When Tyrion finds him in Volantis, he literally is finding prostitutes (who are sex slaves btw) who resemble her.

The show, however, decided to make his obsession with Dany into a noble and chivalric love. He's made out to be heroic and just wants to spend his life protecting her, even if she doesn't love him. Dany is portrayed as overreacting when she sends him away for literally selling her out to the man who wants to kill her.

I think these choices with Jorah show just how perverted D&D are. Jorah is a pedophile who tries to groom Dany. Even his second wife, Lynesse, was half his age; GRRM makes it clear this is a pattern for him. But D&D took this and made him into the only one of Dany's "love interests" to truly care about her.

Euron Greyjoy

I know, I know, Euron is still an antagonist in the show. However, he is made tame and even at times comedic rather than the complete psychopath who can give Ramsay a run for his money that he is in the books.

In the books, Euron literally molested his younger brother Urrigon, tortures and murders Aeron, and is implied to have murdered Baelon (or at least had a hand in his death somehow). His ship is manned by men he cut the tongues out of. He is obsessed with Valyrian magic, has a full suit of Valyrian steel armor and a dragon binder. His end goal is to literally help bring about the Long Night and help the Others.

Euron is meant to be in direct conflict with Jon and Dany, not an accessory to Cersei. The only big role he played in the show was when he brokered a marriage deal with Cersei and was killed by Jaime. Sure, the Iron Fleet shot down Rhaegal (which was total bullshit btw), but that wasn't even Euron's plan, it happened by sheer luck.

Euron is the most fantastical villain in the books aside from the Others themselves. But the show took all of that away and made him boring yet more palatable.

Varys

I literally can't understand where the show got that Varys' only true goal is "to serve the realm". Sure, that is a line he says to Tyrion in ACOK, but it is so obvious that he's lying. If Varys had been a woman, the show would have kept that motivation as a lie, but instead they made him a "true servant of the realm".

His true motivation is revealed in ADWD: to put Young Griff aka Aegon VI (supposedly) on the Iron Throne. Varys is implied to be a descendant of the Blackfyres (when he was castrated it was by a red priest who needed his flesh and blood for a ritual, ie blood of kings, he works with the Golden Company, who were founded by a Blackfyre), as is Young Griff. He's also believed to have encouraged Aerys' madness to increase the likelihood of a rebellion. Meaning his motivation is to fulfill Daemon Blackfyre's ambition, to put the Blackfyres on the Iron Throne.

The show chose to write Young Griff out completely (part of the destruction of the Dornish Plot), which left Varys free to be turned into a supposedly noble man who just wanted to protect Westeros.

Tyrion Lannister

Up until season 5, Tyrion is portrayed rather faithfully (as most characters were). After that point, D&D decided to make him the show's moral authority and the audience stand-in.

Tyrion is arguably the most morally gray of the key five, yet that is completely ignored. They use him to magically solve all Dany's problems in Essos, condemn Dany, and prop up Sansa and Bran. It's through this new Tyrion's eyes we are supposed to view the world. As such, he is given the morals of a 21st century man, rather than what he truly had in the book.

Conclusion

D&D make their sexism painfully clear in how they chose to alter GRRM's characters. Every woman is butchered while the men are given the best light possible for their positions.

[ghostinwinterfell]

. . . and for the first time in hundreds of years, the night came alive with the music of dragons.

(AGOT, Daenerys X)

"Drogon," she sang out loudly, sweetly, all her fear forgotten. "Dracarys."

She raised the harpy's fingers in the air . . . and then she flung the scourge aside. "Freedom!" she sang out. "Dracarys! Dracarys!"

(ASOS, Daenerys III)

daenerys targaryen the legend that you are !!!

(from hynthe_ & argentosmuse on twitter)

[witchqueenvisenya]

also, as a dany fan, i am at the point where i don't need the resolution from george about her, because the damage to her character has been long done and imo, is irreversible. i can only keep loving her as she was written and even played by emilia clarke. frankly i don't care anymore whether he ever publishes TWOW. would i like it? sure... but if not, then i have my distance from this circus already

[witchqueenvisenya]

i think i need to reword this, bc mostly what i meant is that as dany fans--as MOST dany fans--who have done a faithful reading, we already know that she is not a villain, has not even done things befitting an anti hero, let alone a villain, and that her ADWD finishing chapters already put her in a heroic--if slightly ambiguous--position. she *might* go "darker" in TWOW, but the end of ADWD cements her resolve to give no quarter to the slavers, which is objectively a heroic path to (re)start on. basically, this IS resolution to me. i see it as a statement. when dany says fire & blood to the swaying grass, i see it as meta commentary by GRRM, as an endorsement. so to rewind, i personally am happy at where we are, although i recognise the need for this viewpoint to become mainstream because it does become painful after seeing her so mischaracterized for so long. my distance now does has more to do with seeing how much grrm is struggling and not to get my hopes up, because not only has he made weird remarks in the past but he actively seems to have hit a roadblock for years now.

[rainhadaenerys]

[mutter-of-dragons]

#dany will forever be misinterpreted by the fandom and general audience; the damage is done#maybe in 200 years some feminists will finally rediscover her character#and will realize how the audience didn't give the character the credits she deserved#but it's not happening in our lifetime especially with the show being the most known version of the character#and i totally agree that dany's story as it is now has a very satisfactory resolution#in fact i'd wager that of all the asoiaf characters dany is the one with the most 'complete' arc so far#she has an ending to her character arc#something you can't say about other characters Just adding my 2 cents, I think this is so sad. That Dany will be forever misinterpreted by not just the fandom from the books but from the casuals from the tv show as well. The damage D&D did to her is irreparable, I agree. It's impossible - I say IMPOSSIBLE - to mention her name, as a fellow Dany fan, and not fear the reactions of others. If they will start mocking her tv show death by Jon's hands, if they will keep parroting she was always meant to be 'the mad queen', completely ignoring that this wasn't what was intended at all for her in the early seasons, and so on. As a Dany fan I agree with the sentiment. I'm tired. Tired of seeing my girl being hated and misinterpreted because random fan prefers Sansa, random fan prefers insert more masculine male character here, and she simply cannot win.

[wearenorth]

"A coppersmith had fashioned her a suit of burnished rings to wear to war. She accepted it with fulsome thanks; it was lovely to behold, and all that burnished copper would flash prettily in the sun, though if actual battle threatened, she would sooner be clad in steel. Even a young girl who knew nothing of the ways of war knew that." (ADWD Daenerys I)

Daenerys is brave and strong—she's not going to hide from the battle and is protecting her people. She's smart—even without proper education, she knows what's better. She's dutiful—she says it's the ruler's job to hear all that the people say. She's willing to marry someone she doesn't love and accept other cultures just for peace. She's caring and kind—she says it's the ruler's job to help all people. Daenerys is feminine, but it's easier and more comfortable to ride wearing pants and a vest, and for the battle she would prefer proper armor. She would much rather rest, laugh, plant trees and see them grow, but she knows that duties don't allow her that. She already shows that she's capable of ruling, yet still says that she needs to learn a lot. And she's so much more. I would say that the biggest problem anyone has with Daenerys is that she's just too powerful and well written compared with their favorite characters, which pisses them off. That's why they search for Dany's flaws, create nonsense theories, or steal from other characters to make their fave look better.

[yennefers-geralt]

Arya Stark is a character in her own right. In fact, she is one of the five main protagonists of this series. She should not be reduced to being just her sister’s servant. She should not be reduced to nothing but violence. And, this is a new one, she certainly should not be reduced to nothing but an object her sister wields. Arya is not a prop. She is a complex, well-written (in the novels) main heroine.

No one is required to like her, but reducing her to this in order to make another character more significant shows an extreme misunderstanding of the source material.

[queen-of-andor]

Next time someone says that all Westerosi people hate Targaryen show them this passage:

Here we have poor people disliking Stark, Tully and Lannister families and even preferring King Aerys over King Robert.

And before someone jump on the opportunity to tell me I'm an Aerys apologist, I'm not. That man had a lot he should apologize for, starting by how he treated his family. But that doesn't mean that all Targaryen are automatically as bad as him and neither it means that the other Houses don't have some questionable members themselves. And the smallfolk continue leading poor lives while Baratheon ( and their allies ) were on top.

So, just because you think that a specific House has the moral ground( they haven't) the smallfolk don't share the same opinion with you.

[lizzie-queenofmeigas]

I also find the framing that “Mirri owes Daenerys nothing” interesting. Mirri goes beyond that. Torturing a 14 year old with a violent stillbirth, compared to knives ripping through her body, and murdering the unborn child within her, moves Mirri’s actions from “doesn’t owe her anything” to “has affirmatively harmed her.”

Not owing her anything is one thing, but harm ? Why isn’t this logic used literally anywhere else ? Does Daenerys owe anything to the Starks, Lannisters, Baratheons, Tullys, and Arryns, considering the role they played in taking down her family, directly leading to her being sold into sexual slavery and raped ? Since Mirri is a rape victim and doesn’t owe Daenerys anything, does Daenery, a rape victim, owe anything to these families ? And if she doesn’t, does that mean Daenerys now has the right to murder their children or harm their children ?

Can we absolve Lysa Arryn by saying she doesn’t owe anything to the Starks and Arryns ? Lysa is a rape victim after all, and she was forced to marry Jon Arryn by her father, Hoster Tully. No Tully, Arryn, or Stark takes accountability for this. So is Lysa’s violence and abuse of Sansa justified ?

What about Theon ? Isn’t he justified in sacking Winterfell, betraying the Starks, and murdering the miller’s boys ? It was Ned who sacked Pyke, leading to the rape and slaughter of countless Ironborn. It was Ned who took Theon away from his mother, and home, making him a hostage, alienating him from his Ironborn identity and culture. So Theon owes the Starks nothing, right ? Who cares if the Starks “took him in ?” Do hostages even have a choice ?

Why can’t I absolve Cersei’s actions like this too ? Isn’t Cersei justified in passing off her children with Jaime as trueborn Baratheons, considering that Robert rapes and abuses her ? Isn’t she justified in harming the Starks, considering that Ned is her rapist’s best friend and enabler ?

This. All this.

[visenyaism]

What do you think of the theory that the targaryens' dragon dreams pre-dany is actually dany hatching the dragon eggs, and they mistaken dany as themselves?

genuinely believe that like how the red wedding was a crime of such gravity that the violation of sacred guest rite literally tore a hole in the narrative and is causing time and reality in the riverlands to refract around itself and open asunder, what daenerys did at the end of AGOT was SO huge, this literal nuclear bomb of magic rippling out into the timeline, that it pinged the radar of generations of Targaryens before her who were tuned in to dreams like that. They’re little psychic aftershocks of the big one but none of them knew how to interpret it (how would they?) and so they killed themselves concluding that they were dany. they’re not dany.

[inwinterhell]

"Where are your courtesies, Sansa? I swear, of late, you've been near as bad as your sister."

Love how Arya just continues the conversation like nothing happened, like she's used to being called the bad child while she's literally sitting right there. I know it's not much compared to what she goes through later, but it's really sad how Arya gets it ingrained in her that she's "the bad one" even before becoming a child soldier. Getting labeled like that is a pretty powerful thing, especially at her age.

[visenyatargaryen-archive]

If you love "d@rk Dany" I hate to break it to you but you're not a Daenerys fan you're a delusional Daenerys HATER who needs to get a life

[agir1ukn0w]

Although I don’t completely agree with this reasoning, as it’s ok to like the idea of Dany as a cool villain, I do agree that it simply IS NOT her character, it is a completely different version of her that made absolutely no sense in the grand scheme of her story arc.

[angstywriterangst]

You know I am ok honestly with watching any character's journey as they rise to become a hero or slowly fall into the role of villian. But either or both of these (as in Daenerys' case) must be done gradually, with great care, thought, and sympathy, so wether they had a good reason we can condone or not, we can at least understand and even empathize with. That's why hero's becoming villains are great stories, they remind us how easily we can become the villian in our own story without even realizing it, much like the characters we empathize with. This is also often, but not always, a key difference in recognizing an anti-villian vs a pure villian.

Ex. Darth Vader vs Palpatine, both equally fascinating well written characters, but Darth Vader we grow to understand whats behind the mask and how he got there, he's an anti-villian of circumstance, not a pure villian or an anti-hero. Palpatine we never quite find out his motivations, he cares for no one, he can manipulate anyone, this inability to understand or predict his motives is what makes him scary and so much fun. Pure villians I think are actually much harder to write than anti-villians, because you have too keep the audience's attention and investment while making them hate them love to hate the character.

Like them or not, the sw prequels were three whole movies about just this arc, rise of a hero to fall of a villian (*cough* rise of skywalker was a shit movie with too many macguffins that failed because of pacing because it retconned the 2nd act so it only had 20 minutes to tell the 3rd act, thats why people say Ben's redemption wasn't believable. This coming from someone who wanted to see Ben redeemed. MC staying a villian with no growth, BORING, so purely from a writing perspective it just made sense thats what would happen in my mind anyway. If you disagree totally fine, we all have different interpretations. Honestly I just saw Vader 2.0 and was like, oh that's what they're gonna do, so for me it wasn't surprising and I'm not sure why anyone was surprised they did a bad rehash of the OT. The writing was on the wall from the first posters I saw in like 2014. Sorry 2019 was a shit year for franchises and I will forever be salty). It took 3 movies, ~7hrs in total, plus a 7 season tv show to tell Anakin's story. It took that long to tell it.

We spent 7 seasons of watching Dany's rise to becoming an anti-hero (she's definitely never been perfect, she's always been brutal, and it has both helped and hindered her). And then half a season to watch her fall to become a villian? Which arguably only really happens in 1 episode. Like sure once she got to Westeros she did some pretty not great stuff. But, you can see where she felt she was justified and wasn't acting any more brutal than she usually did in pursuit of her goals, like when she executed Sam's family. It was a mistake that cost her strategically, because Westeros culture was different and something she didn't understand, she was a foreigner in her own land because she didn't speak the culture even though she spoke the language.

But Dany suddenly looking ill and jumping to execute everyone around her in paranoia was so sudden it didn't make sense, the audience didn't have time to digest and understand why her paranoia was growing, especially when the writers were throwing around lines like Tyrian's when he tells Varys that Dany is just going insane because that's just what Targareyan's do? That's not even something Tyrian would say, he's usually so insightful. To Tyrian life and people are fun puzzles and he wants to understand how they tick. Nothing is ever just 'because' for Tyrian. He wouldn't be satisfied with that answer, and neither is the audience.

[agir1ukn0w]

@angstywriterangst I would also like to offer as a great example of a good hero-to-villain arc, Morgana Pendragon from the tv show ‘Merlin.’ Her arc was perfectly set up, painstakingly gradual and built to make you sympathize with her EVEN when she ended up doing horrible things because she truly believed she was justified due to all the things she’d experienced and the atrocities and injustices she’d witnessed. We didn’t want her to become a villain, but we completely understood her reasoning and even felt sympathy for her because of those reasons. When this happened to Dany, all I could think about was how superior Morgana’s story arc was to hers.

[visenyatargaryen-archive]

This is all very nice but no one asked for yalls opinion

[daenerys-targaryen-moved]

Sorry, I’m going to make this post longer Alessia.

Yeah, no. It’s not simply “Watching a hero rise and fall,” it’s much more than that.

Stealing a bit from this ask answered here;

“At the moment, there are two books left in the ASOIAF series. [...] So, who’s to say that TWOW and ADOS won’t see Daenerys slowly unravel? Who’s to say GRRM won’t try and write a well-paced, realistic downfall where, despite her best efforts, she spirals into the madness she’s tried to avoid?

I can’t say for certain this won’t happen, even though I genuinely doubt it will. [...] But, furthermore, I find the idea of Daenerys going mad to be a truly, deeply horrifying concept, beyond just undermining themes, structure, and established character. Yes, it could be drawn out and understandable; it could be foreshadowed and moving and well-paced; it could be a full-blown Shakespearean tragedy.

But that doesn’t matter, because at the end of the day, it would be GRRM taking a female character, introducing her as a victim of rape and abuse, telling the reader the story of how she gained power, how she actively tried to use it for good, showing her struggle, showing her succeed and fail, asking us to watch while fights for justice, fights to protect other people when other characters couldn’t care less.

And then ending it by saying it was all for nothing. It doesn’t matter how structurally tight this development is or could ever be. We have five books of Daenerys in a hero’s role, and in those five books she has morphed into a symbol of action and resistance.

The show might have utterly destroyed itself through poor pacing in its final season, but even if it had been a masterpiece structurally, it would have held up the same thematic monstrosity. Because we have to ask ourselves: what are we being told if Daenerys goes mad? That women can’t handle their anger or their ambition? That revolutionaries are inherently doomed to become the villains? That the oppressed are just as bad as the oppressors? That you’re doomed to follow in the footsteps of your family’s legacy and you’re a fool for trying to forge your own path?

Or that between the Jon and Daenerys, Jon is the sane, reasonable man, and Daenerys is the tragically beautiful madwoman that he has to destroy? That Daenerys was just too broken from the beginning, and she never had a chance? That violence is necessary sometimes, but not when women use it?

What does any of that add to the narrative? How is any of it subversive or meaningful?

My dislike for the Mad Queen Daenerys theory goes beyond me not thinking it’s likely to happen; it’s downright insulting. There is no version of this “twist” that could ever appeal to me, no matter how planned out or developed it might be. It is tired, repetitive, misogynistic, and beyond disappointing.

It’s a slap in the face that would mock me for ever becoming invested in the narrative, and it would be enough to undermine the entire story leading up to it.”

I agree with every single thing @maesterleia said here. It’s not subversive. It’s not an interesting story. At the end of the day grrm is a good writer, and doing that to Daenerys is not good writing. There is absolutely no ending where Daenerys ‘goes mad’ that I will be happy with. Not simply because I personally dispise it, but like Leia mentioned, at the end of the day it takes a young girl who’s known nothing but abuse and pain and suffering who gained her own power and used it to try to make the world a better place... and having her go insane - making every good thing she ever did for not. Telling us that she was wrong the entire time because eventually she would go mad.

The show had Tyrion say, “Everywhere she goes evil men die, and we cheer her for it.” Honestly as if that was a bad thing. They literally framed Daenerys as have been in the wrong and a mad woman the entire time. Essentially telling us that we were wrong to cheer for her when she punished slavers for killing one hundred and sixty three innocent children. Telling us we were wrong to cheer her on for bringing justice to murderers, rapists and slavers. Seriously? Fuck that noise and fuck anyone who actively sits there and says “Oh but it would be so interesting!” No it wouldn’t. Mad Woman is actually the oldest trick in the book and it’s not subversive or good story telling.

[witchqueenvisenya]

saying that dany "burned a slave alive" is a statement that is factually true and yet incorrect not only because it takes away from the context of the situation but also the identity of who and what mirri was to dany, because... there's a whole group of people in asoiaf who commit atrocities against slaves because they're slaves and thus subhuman to them. daenerys burned mirri because she was the murderer of her child and that's it. because that's something mirri as much as admits to as well as goads dany into believing was the right thing because of the stallion prophecy. but when there actually are atrocities being committed against slaves and someone (dany) decides to act against the people responsible, suddenly it's an evil and dangerous and insane act. because it can't possibly be right that all the slavers were wrong. because it just so happens that a targaryen was on the other side of the equation. because it just so happens that THE targaryen was on the other side of the equation. you know, the one that this fandom loves to hate just because.

[mutter-of-dragons]

#EXACTLY#she didn’t choose to burn mirri *because* mirri was a slave and therefore “not a person“#she chose to burn a *person* (who she recognized as such) because THAT PERSON chose to kill her baby + permanently incapacitate her husband#aka her only family (mostly rhaego) and only source of relative safety (mostly drogo) and stability#what gets me abt this argument is that her burning mirri alive is ALREADY morally questionable!! i’m not DENYING that!!#if ppl were just saying ‘i think it’s fucked up for anybody to kill anybody via as gruesomely painful of a method as live immolation is’#i would understand!! but that doesn’t actually make dany look bad enough for some people#so they somehow incorrectly extrapolate that she’s a hypocrite in regards to thinking that slaves are subhuman#from a moment that is literally just her taking revenge from her losses!!#(also abt reawakening magic but that doesn’t really change the context of this specific moral argument. so)#daenerys targaryen#dany#meta

[pessimisticpigeonsworld]

I've said it before, I'll say it again: I can't fucking stand the double standards of this fandom. Everytime I see someone bitch about how the Targaryens are "colonizers" I want to bash my brains out. And these posts always include the op talking about how great the Starks are and how they do no fucking wrong.

Like where are these people's media comprehension???? Do they know the basic definitions of things? Add to that the fact that most of these people also constantly call Dany a "white savior". Like literally read a dictionary and try actually reading the books!

I just saw a post where someone was saying that they hate the idea of Dany being the Prince that was Promised because her ancestors were colonizers and she's a white savior.

Instead, they wanted Jon Snow, who, you know, doesn't have any colonizer ancestry. Because the Starks were perfect angels, who took control of the North by asking nicely. And the First Men were gifted Westeros by the Children of the Forest when they arrived because they were all such good friends.

Literally anyone who read ASOIAF (and has the smallest bit of media comprehension) knows that that's the farthest thing from the truth.

The First Men were colonizers who waged outright war with the CotF for thousands of years and desecrated their sacred places. Yes, eventually they made the Pact, but that only resulted in the CotF being slowly pushed out of Westeros completely and they were eventually fully walled out of their ancestral land. They're literally dying out now, as Leaf explains to Bran in ADWD.

Now, doesn't that sound familiar? To me, that sounds an awful lot like what the European colonies did to the Indigenous peoples of the Americas. Of course it's similar, GRRM is heavily inspired by history.

The Targaryens are conquerors, not colonizers. By the time of the Conquest, they have lived in Westeros for hundreds of years. The Conquerors, their parents, and grandparents were all born and raised on Dragonstone in Westeros.

The Targaryens are a Westerosi house, just like the Starks, Martells, and Hightowers. The only difference between all these houses is the timing of their arrival in Westeros. What exactly are the implications of this belief?

And obviously Dany isn't a white savior. Essos is a very diverse continent, so is their slave system. It's class based, not race based. A large portion of the Essosi slaves looked like Dany because they were of Valyrian descent. The slaves span every ethnicity, why is that so difficult to understand? Not only do the books themselves describe the ethnicity of many of the slaves, GRRM himself came out and debunked this interpretation!

I understand not being comfortable with this kind of story to an extent. The concept of liberation efforts has been tainted by the white savior trope. However, one's personal preferences don't equal the actual content of the story!

I think the thing that pisses me off the most about people who take these stances in the ASOIAF fandom is their pseudo-intellectualism.

Each person who writes these posts believes they have better media comprehension and even superior morality than everyone else. They misapply definitions of extremely damaging ideas so smugly. They believe they are correcting the views of other readers and GRRM himself, and as such, refuse to see how gravely mistaken they are. It's as concerning as it is infuriating.

[wearenorth]

In both the books and the show, the Targaryens are explicitly referred to as conquerors, never as "colonizers." Like there are far more reasons to label houses like the Starks, the Baratheons or the Arryns as colonizers than the Targaryens.

The First Men were colonizers who waged outright war with the CotF for thousands of years and desecrated their sacred places. Yes, eventually they made the Pact, but that only resulted in the CotF being slowly pushed out of Westeros completely and they were eventually fully walled out of their ancestral land. They're literally dying out now, as Leaf explains to Bran in ADWD.

Leaf reiterates the same in the show. In fact, that's why the CotF created the Night King—because the First Men colonized their land and slaughtered them. Imagine the level of desperation required to create something so powerful and dangerous that it could annihilate all living beings. Yet, since the First Men are the Starks' ancestors, I suppose it’s not seen as that bad.

Or why is it that the same people who call the Targaryens "colonizers" don’t also call the Baratheons "usurpers" or even "colonizers"? This applies not only to Robert but to the entire House Baratheon. What ties did Orys Baratheon, the founder of House Baratheon, have to the Stormlands before Aegon’s Conquest? None. What claims or rights did Orys Baratheon have to the Stormlands before the conquest? None. It’s an open secret that Orys was Aegon’s half-brother, a dragonseed, and Aerion’s bastard son. Orys slew the last Storm King, Argilac the Arrogant, married his daughter Argella Durrandon (the rightful heir and ruler of the Stormlands), and ended House Durrandon—an ancient house founded during the Age of Heroes. Yet none of them has any problem with Baratheons.

So it seems that some people are mad that the Targaryens — a relatively new and young Great House—achieved more and became more powerful than their favourite houses.

And obviously Dany isn't a white savior. Essos is a very diverse continent, so is their slave system. It's class based, not race based. A large portion of the Essosi slaves looked like Dany because they were of Valyrian descent. The slaves span every ethnicity, why is that so difficult to understand? Not only do the books themselves describe the ethnicity of many of the slaves, GRRM himself came out and debunked this interpretation!

For example, one of Daenerys’ handmaids, Doreah—a former slave born in Lys—is described in the books as having fair hair and blue eyes. This is typical of people from Lys, Volantis, or other Free Cities. As for the show, the decision to cast slaves/former slaves with darker skin and hair complexions than Daenerys was entirely up to D&D and the casting team.

Daenerys’ actions have nothing to do with being a "white savior." She herself was enslaved — once in the books, twice in the show. She knows firsthand how horrible slavery is, so why wouldn’t she want to end it?

[naetaesarya]

....available soon in sparkly pink resin god willing <3

[tidustargaryen]

https://www.reddit.com/r/freefolk/comments/d29nt3/sansa_the_hypocrite/

[amaximumtastemakercollection]

Not to mention Jaime also killed Jory Cassell and and his bannermen killed dozens of Ned Stark’s men during Season 1

[mega-ringsandthings-world]

So since it’s been getting some traction, let’s explore the Mad Queen Sansa thing some more. I’ve made/answered some previous posts, here, here, here, about how Sansa has the capacity to become a nasty person. A person who betrays their own father for wealth and comfort and treats other people like trash because of their lower social status is already on a bad track, so don’t @me. Sansa is already shown to be selfish, classist and a bully in the books, but in the show she is also racist and untrustworthy, and completely unappreciative of other people’s sacrifices on her behalf.  That Sansa could become some variant of a “mad queen” is not a long stretch to make. She already possesses the paranoia, xenophobia, ill temper, want for power and callousness that defines others with the label “Mad.” As of right now, the North is independent, and Sansa has shown extreme prejudice to others outside her realm. She also has broken an oath and caused deaths to gain power once, and will do so again to keep her power, should anything threaten her, as it is inevitable that her position will be threatened. From her childhood Sansa was obsessed with being a queen, and once said she would “make people love her” when she became one. She has never once given up her want for a high station despite occasional disillusionments, and this want will only grow and become more warped with time. At her core, Sansa has only the interests of herself in mind, and not those of her kingdom or people.

[valyrianwarg-deactivated2023030]

[wolfwarg]

WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK HA OH MY GOD

[raangmanch]

EXCUSE ME BUT WHAT THE HELL?!

[yennefers-geralt]

In case there’s any doubt that Jonsas lack reading comprehension….

…the case has officially been closed. 

I actually wonder if they never read Jon’s chapters at all and just did a text search for “Sansa” and “sister”, leaving out any context.

[raangmanch]

Oh my god

[jackoshadows]

Haha! There’s lots more like this from this gang. Like this shit…

J0nrya has some foreshadowing as a romantic ship though, but most of the J0nrya foreshadowings are Jonsa foreshadowings in disguise, because they are foreshadowings of Stark-Tully or Targ-Stark connections or hints at Jon’s romantic interest in a ‘sister’. So, I wouldn’t agree that there is none, I just happen to think that the foreshadowing is misinterpreted. 

I cannot even figure out what this is saying, lol. Jonarya is actually Jonsa foreshadowing in disguise! Why can’t it just be Jonarya foreshadowing? No, it’s in disguise for Sansa! And lol at the Stark-Tully and Targ-Stark connections - as if Arya is not a Tully and a Stark and those connections don’t hold true for her as well.

I do think the problem is that J0nryas want Jon to have a relationship only with one person, and that person must be Arya. So they think, that Jonsas want to ‘steal’ Jon from his favourite sister. Because Jon is only capable of having one meaningful relationship. Seriously?

No, we are annoyed because you guys erase Arya from her story.

Also from this same person regarding the whole ‘What do you know of my heart, what do you know my sister’ part:

I think GRRM made a deliberate decision here to draw out the question which sister Jon thinks about. If we tie his inner thought back to his possible pre-canon crush on Sansa in AGOT, it could be quite a clever misdirect. If the Girl in Grey indeed turns out to be Sansa, then this scene above clearly gives a romantic meaning to Jon’s feelings for Sansa and not Arya. This is the type of foreshadowing GRRM loves. The persons speak about one person, but the foreshadowing is for another person. And I think this is what happens here.

It was all about Jon’s ‘pre-canon crush’ on Sansa you guys! Clearly the discussion here is not about Arya. While having this conversation with Mel about Arya possibly fleeing from Ramsay, Jon was standing there thinking of how pretty Sansa was pre-canon GOT. That’s the twist!

I honestly cannot imagine what kind of minds come up with this stuff… I find it both hilarious and fascinating to read this stuff.

[addamvelaryon]

They have a strange tendency to insist that mentions of Arya in Jon’s POV are not actually about Arya:

Jonsa shippers do this a lot and they do this with various characters. It is their modus operandi:

The text doesn’t need to mention or even imply Sansa and Jon being present in each other’s POV. Their presence is shown through other female characters mentioned in Jon’s chapters and other male characters being mentioned in Sansa’s chapters, according to Jonsa shippers.

They assign particular traits to characters and assume that anything resembling that trait being mentioned is about one character and one character alone:

It’s why they make claims about how the song The Maiden of the Tree is not actually about Arya, just because it’s mentioned in her POV and describes someone like Arya. It’s apparently about Sansa (because as far as Jonsas are concerned, Arya is incapable of smiling and laughing, among other things):

Apparently, a storyline in the books which does not involve Sansa in any way is about Sansa as well, rather than the actual character being mentioned in that storyline:

Jonsa shippers believe that the thought of Sansa not crossing Jon’s mind is a clever nod to the readers that Sansa is actually present in Jon’s mind:

This is just plain lack of reading comprehension, with a dose of misogyny thrown in to spice things up (which I think sums up the Jonsa ship fairly well):

[noybusiness]

The fuck did I just read? This is literally a conspiracy theory these Jonsa fans are pushing. If you’re going to re-interpret all evidence to make it mean something other than what it is, it’s impossible to argue with you using evidence. You can just randomly decide that five is really six.

Also, out of Jon’s two sisters, Val, Ygritte and Alys have more in common with Arya than with Sansa, if we *must* compare them.

[circe1fanatic]

No wonder they wrote all that nonsense out, no one would be able to keep all that bullshit straight without looking at theirJonsa cult propaganda book.

And that’s why they run off whenever someone who has read the actual books brings up proof against their argument. They don’t know how to defend their bullshit when it’s not explicitly covered in their bible.

[horizon-verizon]

The fact that Daenerys’ novella “blood of the dragon” was published in July 1996 and AGOT was published August 1996 which means she won GRRM a Hugo Award, the most prestigious literary award in science fiction and fantasy, before ASOIAF was an existing series.. yeah def don’t compare your flop faves to her.

Look it up, this is true!

[marwyn]

This is not to say that women don’t have power, but by and large, their avenues to power are circumscribed. Asha, for example, commands a remarkable amount of respect for a woman in Westeros, but not enough for the men to rally around her to take the Seastone Chair, though she’s by far the best choice to do so. And outright rule by women is an almost unheard of event. Daenerys Targaryen is remarkable and dangerous in every sense because her very existence is perilous to the current power structure.

—Caroline Spector, “Power and Feminism in Westeros,” in Beyond the Wall: Exploring George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire (ed. James Lowder)

[marwyn]

@lucy-ghoul’s tags

#yes. that's why so many people feel threatened by dany's mere existence #(ironically both in and out of universe) #she challenges the status quo simply by being a dragon queen and a breaker of chains... #no wonder that so many (unconsciously or not) reactionary-leaning fans want to see her humiliated and defeated at the end #as if her achievements amounted to nothing. as if she were only a queen of the ashes and not someone who questioned slavery #in a world where slavery is the norm #it's the old ~the revolutionary is worse than the oppressor therefore it's better if nothing changed at all actually #or you could become stalin~ adagio #(i'm not against good intentions pave the road to hell arcs or even revolutionaries shown as somehow villainous or at least morally grey #but the not so veiled subtext that challenging the status quo = BaD!!!1!! and that by doing so you're doomed to become a dictator #.... yeah. that i don't accept anymore. discussions about the validity of the goal justifies the means thinking are very welcome #and actually necessary. as le guin put it 'but what if the means are all we have?' - and she was anything but a reactionary #but i'm tired of seeing characters who have politically sound motives and reasons depicted as nothing more than terrorists or tyrants etc. #or even worse: their cause as inherently evil or something like that. see the got finale which was one of the most offending things ever #on this point and many others)