#but why are they so reviled in fiction

[nekropsii]

the fandom wiki experience is just.

oh wow! wiki page for a character i like! -4 hp -4 hp -5 hp -20 hp -7 hp

Truly.

This is a totally godless entry. This is all they say about Cronus and Mituna's relationship. The way they try to lend credence to Cronus saying him and Mituna were allegedly friends "before the accident" by tacking a citation on there... When not only was it clear that Cronus was manipulating him, but also Cronus is extremely prone to lying, especially for his own benefit, and the Great Act of Heroism was NOT a fucking accident. It was a choice that Mituna made. This was not an accident- Mituna's disability did not randomly happen to him, it's not a tragedy that he did get disabled. It is canonical that his brain damage was a result of him making a sacrifice for people he thought were his friends, only for them to abandon him the second he stopped being what they wanted. THAT is the tragedy of Mituna's character in text- not that he is disabled, but that his disability, gained through heroic means, lead to him getting abandoned and reviled by the same people he made that sacrifice for in the first place. The way they try to downplay the abuse Mituna faces at Cronus's hands as just harassment. The way they downplay that further with a cute little "Citation Needed".

This was the citation, by the way. Mituna's getting sexually assaulted here. Is this just harassment? Does this sound like words you want to take as a credible source? Cronus? In the middle of assaulting a guy? Cronus? Fucking Cronus? We're taking Cronus's word on this? While he's in the middle of assaulting him? We're believing this guy? Cronus? We're believing Cronus? Cronus motherfucking Ampora? Fucking hell.

Absolute work of the devil. -1,500 HP. Cronus himself wrote this shit. Who wants to bet that Cronus transcended the lines of fiction and physically manifested to write Mituna's wiki article in a way that specifically downplays his actions. Why are we taking Cronus's word but putting a Citation Needed on Mituna getting abused harassed? Demonic!!!

There's so, so many words that can be used to describe Cronus and Mituna's relationship, and this one simple sentence uses all of the wrong ones in the complete wrong order. I hate it here. I hate the fact that they opened with Cronus's words and not Mituna's feelings. This sucks. This happens so damn often with fandom wikis- the way they downplay abuse is fucking insane. Augh.

#homestuck #homestuck analysis #homestuck meta #alpha trolls #mituna captor #cronus ampora #cw assault #cw ableism #cw abuse #mituna.pdf #nekro.pdf #nekro.sms

[acheronist]

I am reading The Goldfinch. I'm where he just started hanging out at the furniture/antiques place regularly. It's written well, it's holding my inerest, but I don't yet see what all the fuss is about. So not as a criticism but in an effort to appreciate something I might be missing, why is it a book you love?

well.

donna tartt is one of my favorite authors anyways. I think she's a spectacular freak and her storytelling skills are exceptionally good and i've read as much of her work as i can possibly get my little hands on!

but for tgf specifically, the narrative being soooo so so centered on personal emphasis & meaning being bestowed upon specific artworks despite them being very unpersonal objects (after they get out of the artist's hands, that is,) in stark comparison to the way that art that can belong to/be seen/be consumed any random fucking person alive in the modern age has been the only existential buoy in my life for a very very very long time. in my lowest times, instead of killing myself i go stand in art museums and think about how much love and creativity is innate in humanity despite times of crisis and war and disease and all of the fucking agonies and everything going wrong and having no control over it. ha ha. it's always been a balm to me, to remember that there is goodness and love preserved in artwork, and that artwork is tougher and longer-lasting than you'd initially think, and that it's always there waiting for me to come back to it and see it in a different emotional state to find new meanings in it. this is the same as how theo thinks about the painting thru different times in his life!! going from needing it desperately as a connection to his mom, obsessively as a comfort, and then reviling it for being a representation of his life's biggest trauma and yet still tending to it and caring for it, to the heartache of losing it and the relief of retrieving it with the one person who genuinely loves him as an act of devotion and apology for a previous betrayal....all while navigating how systems in power are neglectful and uncaring and capitalistic. it's all just So Much To Me.....

and I know the middle chapters where theo just goes on and on about the intricacies of antique forgery aren't as fun and sexy as the vegas chapters with boris (underage drug abuse and gay sex WHEEEEEE) OR the actual criminal chapters at the end (mysterious borderline-noir criminal heist slash subtextual romcom), but they're soooo so poignant to me. because in my own little life, curating the art and music around me and finding beauty and importance and symbolism in these subtle things is a vital central axis that i need to have, much like i need a nice bed or a good meal or a glass of clean water. much of how i cope and navigate the world is very deeply focused around art & art analysis, and I think the only other book i've read that articulated that sort of feeling quite as eloquently would be john berger's way of seeing, which is an academic and analytical text. but i just love fiction so much, so to have tgf as the extremely emotional fiction option to go along w my nonfiction art thesis books that are tonally very prim and objective and well organized..... DELICIOUS. i love it. and i love a fictive narrative built upon tragedy. i love works that call back to each other in conversation, and stories that cannot exist without the foundation of Something Else Existing A Millennia Prior. i love comparing works and establishing what makes them similar or different but how they approach the same themes. and i love to see characters (THEO. boris. pippa. hobie. andy.) that i can identify with who struggle with similiar problems i have, because it makes it easier for me to get thru my own life. this isn't groundbreaking reasoning though, that's just how every human alive consumes art and content. of course we look for ourselves in fiction. of course we as individuals want to find things that we relate to.

and also in a purely self-indulgence way, I also looooooove it when media is unbearably long and i can get completely entranced and study it closely and always be able to find new details that throw the whole story into a completely new light, which I think tgf does very well because it's almost 900 pages LMAO. every time i reread it there's a new nuanced angle for me to think about actions and thoughts leading into consequences and i just eat that up every single time.......

but despite all of this i do recognize that tgf is not everyone's cup of tea. like it's genuinely one of the most meaningful texts in my heart but i completely understand how it can be long, and boring, and melodramatic, and a bit insane, and convoluted, and pompous, and not worth the time to get from cover to cover.

but it is worth the time. to me.

#tgf

[darklinaforever]

No because once again, you are just repeating like parrots the same arguments over and over again that have already been dismantled and I don't care. As one of these anonymous messages says, it must be tiring and boring to post the same thing 24/7...

I know the definition of grooming as well as the true meaning of what is implied in a historical context. And obviously not you. I already did an entire post explaining this book and show grooming bullshit :

But all you care about is appearing morally superior and you look like a bunch of ridiculous fanatics. Or some ridiculous bigot, because I'm pretty sure it's the same person sending these stupid messages over and over again.

What is your problem ? You're bored ? Why are you spying on my accounts like that ? Seriously, why are you so obsessed with me ? I imagine him on the lookout for the slightest post on Daemyra that I make ready to pounce like a predator on its prey. My god, this person(s) must not have a life. It's sad. 😂

What do you expect ? That between the insults and the repetitions of the same stupid arguments over and over again for a long time I actually delete my account to please you ? Or that I suddenly say : Oh but my god you are right ! You delivered me from evil ! Daemyra is such a groomer ! Daemon is a monster who doesn't love anyone ! 😱😂

By the way, here is again the little free quote from GRRM Martin's book on Daemon, his favorite character whom he considers to be a gray and complex character. So your Daemon is BAD BAD BAD, well the author himself tells you no :

Over the centuries, House Targaryen has produced both great men & monsters. Prince Daemon was both. In his day there was not a man so admired, so beloved, & so reviled in all Westeros. He was made of light & darkness. To some he was a hero, to others the blackest of villains.

You really look like a bunch of disillusioned idiots. It must be hard when the true creator himself doesn't agree with you on what the character is.

It must also piss you off that these interviews for the series exist, right ?

There's no point in booing me because I say something that has already been said by the directors and screenwriters themselves. I don't agree with everything they say or do in this stupid adaptation, but at least we can agree on some points.

Oh, and I have already said I don't know how many times that I recognized that Daemyra had toxic aspects in the series version, except that, so what ? This will prevent me from shipping the Daemyra version of the series maybe ?! No. Love is not necessarily something pure, we have to stop the bullshit, especially in fiction. On the other hand, I maintain that there is nothing toxic in the book version. There is no such thing as a brothel. It's an invention of Mushroom. There is no voluntary abandonment of Daemon for 10 years. In reality he was banished under penalty of death. There is no Daemon leaving Rhaenyra to deal with childbirth alone. He was by his side in the books. There is no strangulation either. And once again, the age difference and the incest aspect are not real arguments as to a possible toxicity in their relationship, due to placing the relationship in its fictional and historical context from which GRRM draws inspiration, namely the feudal era, where age differences and incest were included in the customs of the time for specific reasons. Especially if we are in a family where incest has no impact due to their MAGIC BLOOD ! These elements are not evidence of toxicity. Open a history book. An age difference and incestuous marriage in a historical context does not necessarily result in toxic abusive relationships. This is bullshit.

Also, I don't have the impression that you will understand that the show is not the book. I always distinguish between the two and obviously you don't. Because what exactly do you believe ? That if Daemon cheats on Rhaenyra in the series, my world will fall apart ? No. My posts on Daemyra will continue because the book will always exist. You know, the book that has a different canon from the show, therefore implying that the canon of the series cannot interfere with that of the book. But you didn't remember the difference between the two. You prefer to mix it up to fix your pathetic vision.

The series is already shit. Even for the Daemyra relationship they messed up on a lot of points. And I'm not even going to start with the greens, Alicent etc. It is a disaster. The series itself is full of inconsistencies.

I will add that in reality you do not care about the so-called abuse that Rhaenyra suffered from Daemon. Otherwise you would care what Alicent and the greens team did to her. But you don't care. You even expect the show to write scenes of stupid abuse between Daemyra over and over again. Because you don't actually care about Rhaenyra. The proof tells you that no one can love the whore of Dragonstone, a nickname literally coming from the greens team. Bunch of hypocrites.

Once again I recommend going to the tumblr of @la-pheacienne and of @horizon-verizon to educate you on what the character of Daemon and the Daemyra relationship really is. The posts of @stromuprisahat are also pretty good in general on Fire and Blood.

The antis are really crazy. The bitch who should close her account apparently well she tells you to go fuck yourself and buy a life.

@aleksanderscult

#daemyra #daenyra #daemon x rhaenyra #rhaenyra x daemon #daemon and rhaenyra #rhaenyra and daemon #daemon targaryen #pro daemon targaryen #rhaenyra targaryen #pro rhaenyra targaryen #house of the dragon #anti house of the dragon #hotd #anti hotd #fire and blood #f&b #grrm #grr martin #george rr martin #team blacks #team black #pro team blacks #pro team black #queen rhaenyra #the dragon queen #the black queen #the half year queen #the rogue prince

[monstersandmaw]

Oooh that post about the implications of an "Evil Sapient Fantasy Race" has some interesting ideas. Especially on what humans would see as "evil".

I remember an old concept I had for some science-fiction themed writing that I wasn't really able to get anywhere but it was about one alien species that reproduces parasitically and thus the other races, humans included, hated and reviled them and branded them as "evil" because the idea of parasitism is an inherently unappealing notion that we find horrific and disgusting.

But the twist was, the parasitic race was actually a benevolent people. They told stories, had families, had a rich cultural tradition of art and literature and were technologically advanced and willing to meet and befriend other races to teach them new things and learn from them in turn. It just so happens that their biology, that they had no choice over, requires them to lay eggs inside living hosts to reproduce, and even though they now used non-sapient livestock animals for the purpose which were humanely euthanized before the larvae hatched and burst out of them, the other races still found them "disgusting" and were outright hostile to them, with only a few of the main protagonists seeing beyond their parasitic reproduction to the true nature within.

Idk where I was going with that concept but the post of depicting a whole sapient species as good or evil reminded me of that old idea. Perhaps some others can add on their ideas to this as well :)

Ooh, yeah, I can see why a parasitic species would cause tension and difficulties like that

#parasitic reproduction #alien biology #mention of parasite #parasite #aliens #anon ask #body horror #egg laying

[annie0183]

Hating on books and other fiction

This rant came out as some friends were talking about people’s reaction and hate towards some books and authors and how the words shitty and trashy are so used towards some genres. This is going to be long….

I think calling a genre trash is absolutely stupid. BL books are equally loved and reviled by people. Simply because the main target of these stories are women, or more exactly straight women that supposedly fetishize gay relationships. It’s similar to how the books written in the past were hated because they weren’t more than written porn for women. The reason those books were called trash was because they were written by women for women. Which I see as an insult towards women, the same way calling Mame's book's trash is an insult towards those that enjoy her books.

No, I don’t deny that there are straight women fetishizing gay relationships, and let’s be honest, that’s how BL series have appeared. And I don’t deny that some books are nothing more than porn, including those past books. I read those, they were cringy, over the top but I enjoyed them. Easy to read, something to pass time. Sometimes I need that, and there are a lot of people that sometimes need an easy read.

I hate the so-called intellectuals that pretend they are better than the rest because they hate these books. You don't need epic adventures or convoluted storylines for a book to be good. What makes a book good is the people that enjoy it. As long as you take it with a grain of salt and keep in mind that it’s fiction, therefore not real, you can read whatever you enjoy. You’re not superior for hating a book the same way you’re not superior for loving that book. Different tastes people, why do we tend to forget those exist?  

I've seen people saying a book is trash because one character annoys them or is one dimensional. And I'm like... have you met people? Do you ever go out of your room and meet people? Because let me tell you, people are one dimensional, boring, and annoying. Your expectation of epic characters is absolutely unrealistic, and if authors keep their books anchored to the real world is normal to see these types of characters. Every boring person out there is the main character of their own story. You can not like a book, which is normal and, in your right, but labeling a book trash because you find annoying a character, or the plot is not doing it for you it's trashier than the book.

The hate Mame receives in the BL world reminds me a bit of Twilight and how it became a trend to hate the books and the movies, forgetting they were targeted towards teenagers and it wasn’t supposed to be a deep story.  People have criticized Bella to hell and back: she’s a boring character, why is she so obsessed with Edward, why is everyone so attracted to her and so on.

Bella is an awkward teen girl, they are boring overall, half of the girls my year in highschool were carbon copy of Bella, so what a surprise, boring teens exist… Why is she so obsessed with Edward? Hmm, awkward teen with self-confidence issues, parents divorced, a mostly absent dad, absentminded mom and the feeling of being set aside by her mom moving maybe, and look at this, the hottest guy in school is paying attention to her and she discovers that he’s actually a vampire a supernatural being so damn amazing. Of course, she’s obsessed. I mean… have you ever had a crush in your teenage years?

Oh, but why is everyone attracted to her... Small boring town, city girl moving there, she’s not described as being an ugly alien with tentacles coming out of her eyes, so she’s cute at least if not out of this world gorgeous, of course people were curious and attracted. She was the shiny new toy on the playground.

It’s easy to see that if you actually stop and think about it, a lot of those things that were seen as flaws actually had a reason to be the way they were. An adult most probably won’t enjoy these stories, which is ok, because they weren’t written for them. Why do we have to shame kids and teens for what they like?

There is a very dangerous trend of holding fiction work on a pedestal and wanting fiction to be sanitized and even puritanical, with perfect characters and perfect plot and healthy environments. If we keep doing this, we’ll end up with the same book/series/movie under a different title. Let’s not censor fiction and let artists create their art the way they want and need.

I understand not wanting to read about an abusive character or, a scummy villain, but some people enjoy the stories, and NO it's not because they romanticize toxic relationships or SA or DV, it’s because these stories bring out things that happen in the real world and aren’t talked about as they should. Sometimes these issues aren’t dealt with as they should be in the books, but it’s maybe because a lot of these issues aren’t dealt with the right way in real life either.

There are books/series out there for everyone. With boring ass characters that lead boring lives like all of us do in real life, because let’s face it, we’re not out there slaying dragons and discovering new worlds, and epic stories with three-dimensional characters going on the adventure of their life. Go, read and watch the stories that appeal to you, whichever those may be.

You’re entitled to your opinion; you’re entitled to not like a story, but there is a difference between constructive criticism and straight up hating because the books are not your style. The line is fine, but it’s there. Before you go around calling a book shit, stop and think about it. Is it really shit, or you’re just nitpicking and straight up hating simply because the plot and characters don’t appeal to you?

Dedicated to @lutawolf

#books #rant #vent #fiction

[coulsonlives]

I'm talking to someone and apparently, we've both ran into super outspoken antis who were um, really eager to trauma-dump on us, like share in details about all the trauma they had without prompting, and use that a reason why certain topics should be reviled and banned in fiction.

Because of this, I wonder if part of the purity culture movement is because people had traumatic experiences, but they can't process the trauma, so they try to process it by instating boundaries and moral rights and wrongs in the only situation they really feel like they can control: by posing as an authoritative figure on what randos on the internet write and draw in fiction, as kinks, etc. And in the process, they can't help but spill about all their trauma because after all, that's the underlying reason for going on their lil crusades in the first place, even if it's not logical, and just emotional to the point of robbing them of any actual objectivity.

#like they feel powerless abt their trauma so they want to do something 'good' with it and they think purity culture is the answer #but it's really just an 'oh honey no' moment #there's gotta be a correlation #purity culture #antis #censorship #proship #profic #trauma #ao3

[princesskoriandr]

Your Starfire Cosplay is coming out so unbelievably good. Like how are you not working in like costumes for movie sets? It’s award worthy! So stunning! And the amount of work that must go into making everything! Wow!

I was wondering if you could give us more thoughts on the whole sibling dynamic between Kory and her siblings because I find that so fascinating! Like on one side you have Kory and everything that can be explored there but you also have Kom who is disabled and her narrative there and then you have Ryand’r who isn’t really explored as much.

what I find interesting about the dynamic of this family is that Ryand'r was so obviously tacked on at the end in an after thought which is like such a real youngest child in a busy/important/high profile family thing lmao

before we jump into it I want to make a few disclaimers:

I am not a mental health professional of any kind, I just have some surface level research behind me on like sibling and parent dynamics

I am not going to be excusing or endorsing some of Komand'r's more violent actions in her adulthood but also please remember that Kom is like a fictional character in a silly comic book

I will be talking both about the in-universe narrative that developed over time and the way it developed out of order in real time

okay let's get into it

their family dynamic honestly isn't super complicated but it is really interesting. the narrative sets Kory and Kom up as the scapegoat vs. the golden child (which is funny bc Kory is...the golden girl. goldie. etc.), Kom is also the black sheep of the family for obvious reasons, and Ryand'r is just lost in the shuffle which, as far as I understand, is pretty common for the third child in this kind of family dynamic.

Kom was set up for failure. a pretty important city, the city of Kysarr, was destroyed by the Citadel. the only source I can find on this is from Who's Who volume 2 (which is misattributed on her wiki as v. 1 #13, when it's v. 2 #13, but I'm banned from editing the wiki so whatever they'll just have to live with the mistake):

[image text: Komand'r was the eldest child of Tamaran's royal family, and the first princess born in almost a century. As such she should have been courted and showered with honors, but Komand'r was instead reviled. On the day of her birth, the dreaded Citadel Empire attacked and destroyed the western Tamaranean city of Kysarr and Killed three thousand citizens in her name. Due to no fault of her own, Komand'r was for all time inextricably linked with Tamaran's day of infamy.]

now, this destruction of Kysarr is not included in her or Kory's backgrounds in any comic, so this is something that's thrown into the continuity in 1991 and never spoken of again because it's in a total throw away comic. BUT that's exactly what makes it so interesting. so, let's go into this with the retcon context that Kom's day of birth was marked with destruction and this, alongside her disability, made her parents consider setting her aside as heir and having another kid (who would have previously been the spare, if Kom hadn't been "sickly" when she was born, as Kory says in The Tales of the New Teen Titans #4).

(as an aside: this profile on Kom also says that Myand'r is like a puppet ruler, which is not quite accurate, so we might also take this added Komand'r seasoning with a pinch of salt)

so, with this added context, we could see maybe why Kom would hold so much resentment toward her younger sister. Kory, being the golden child, is both aware of her parents treatment toward her disabled older sister and misunderstands it.

[The Tales of the New Teen Titans #4]

so, Kory says that "even when [they] were children the differences between [them] were so very apparent" but neglects to say why those differences may have been so apparent. she also says that "those were such happy days for [her]" and that there's one thing she could do that Kom couldn't, which is: fly. Kom can't fly. she has never been able to fly. in the page above, you can see Kory flying with her mother while her father watches and just below that, we can infer that the contrail in the distance behind Kom is either Kory or their mother, Luand'r.

can you see, maybe, why Kom would hate Kory? it's not Kory's fault. their parents literally pit them against each other because they're not good parents. it's clear from this alone that Myand'r and Luand'r are neglectful parents and even if they aren't neglecting Komand'r on purpose they are neglecting her in favor of Kory. so, Kom starts to escalate her abuse toward Kory in a bid for their attention and to ensure that Kory is as miserable as possible. Kom is forcing Kory to atone for the sins of the father (and mother) because in her child mind, Kory is the source of all her problems and if she can eliminate her or, at the very least, make her miserable, Kom can again gain the approval and love of their parents. it's unclear if she ever had this to begin with but she wants it so bad.

and, in turn, Kory wants her sister's love more than anything when they're children. it doesn't matter that Komand'r is abusive and will do whatever she can to make Kory's life hell, Kory wants her sister to be a sister to her. (any of you that have siblings know that sibling relationships are very rarely nice growing up, though, so Kory is striving for something that might not even be possible if Kom was like loved and cherished by their parents)

Raven quite literally asks Kory if their parents favored her over Kom and she kind of hand waves it away with a "well not in the beginning" which is like. such a golden child thing to say. they didn't care for her before she betrayed Tamaran, which is pretty clear from Kory's whole narrative up to this point, and what's the core of the why of the matter? Kom couldn't be their perfect paragon of a Tamaranean princess and she couldn't complete the image of a perfect Tamaranean royal family. which is very obvious if you read all her appearances and then read the second Tamaran arc where Myand'r uses Kory as a bargaining chip. if Komand'r had not been disabled, she would have been that very same bargaining chip, but because she's disabled she is then pushed away, punished for her disability, made into the scapegoat for an entire planet, and eventually begins to buy into that and becomes like a really bad fucking person, right?

it's like a self-fulfilling prophecy.

and then Ryand'r is just like. there.

literally, he's just there. we get this one glimpse of him (which is a hard maybe because this kid is never named) in New Teen Titans v1. #3 and then we don't see him again until 1982 when he is a literal infant:

that's a baby.

we meet full grown Ryand'r in New Teen Titans Annual #1 (love annuals) where it's revealed that he's alive! which is funny because I think most people forgot he even existed considering the last time they saw him he was like. an infant.

he does it in the funniest way possible and just pops out of the jungle after Kory curbstomped their sister. like. okay. you didn't want to, like, help your older sister who you most definitely don't remember because you had not gained sentience yet as you were busy being under a year old when she left the planet to train. I guess I wouldn't get involved either idk.

so, Kory, for some reason, believed Kom when she said Ryand'r KILLED THEIR PARENTS and then is like oh damn you're alive and you didn't kill them? that's cool I guess.

so, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that no one in this family has a real relationship with Ryand'r because Kory 1. believes this absolute lie their very obvious liar of an older sister made up and 2. is also surprised to not only see him alive but to see him as an adult and that just doesn't scream "I care about my younger brother and think about him when we are not together".

(also, ryan's age doesn't quite add up, considering Kory and Kom are the right ages but he's like...an adult...and not a preteen. like. sure. and no do not go "but time passes differently on tamaran" because in-universe it most certainly does not pass any differently because Marv Wolfman, like me, does not care to calculate time differences between planets)

so between Kory being surprised that he's alive and Kom making up whatever she wants about him I think that we could say that there's no real relationship between the siblings. like I said earlier, Ryand'r is just lost in the shuffle and like at the first sight of trouble he peaces out and leaves the planet. he's done this like as much as Kory has peaced out from Earth when she needs a break. this has, I think, impeded his ability to like truly form a relationship with Tamaran and his people because he's just neglected by everyone. there isn't a lot of info on his childhood and from the way we see his parents deal with his sisters, we might be able to come to the conclusion that he was also pretty much left to his own devices.

which is sad but nothing egregious happened to him in childhood. when he was older, he was also experimented on by the Psions and gained like the ability to burn people and things with his hands in a different way than Kom and Kory can (starbolts vs. thermal emissions) and that's like hugely traumatic and kind of binds him to his siblings in that way. is that every explored, though? no, it's not.

in Ryand'r's appearances that take place in the 90s and early 2000s (which is the last time he appears for a really long time), every time he appears it's to call Kory for help. one of these times he also asks her to help him commit genocide. so. just let that sink in. he's mostly just a plot device in later years and outside of his scant character development in the original Omega Men run he just doesn't to be an interesting character with a place in the dynamic of his family.

#can y'all tell my family has a weird dynamic or what #i've been click clacking away for like two hours on this i love it #starfire #blackfire #koriand'r #komand'r #kom and kory's dynamic is also interesting in the n52 but it's not nearly as fleshed out #so there just isn't much to talk about #i can talk more later. but i am tired now lol #thank u for the compliments and the question <3

[hellsbellschime]

Why Everyone Hates Sansa, & Why They're All Wrong

Despite the fact that A Song of Ice and Fire is a tale about creeps, weirdos, and literal mass murderers, somehow one of the most controversial and widely disliked characters in the entire series is Sansa Stark.

Sansa is undeniably not a flawless character, but her transgressions and unappealing traits pale in comparison to the vast majority of her compatriots in the world of Westeros. So, in a fictional world populated with some of the worst characters imaginable, how did a tweenage girl who spends most of her time languishing in captivity barely doing anything at all become such a reviled character? And more importantly, how did so many readers and viewers so dramatically misinterpret her character?

There are many reasons that Game of Thrones and A Song of Ice and Fire fans seem to dislike Sansa, but honestly, a great deal of the criticisms levied towards her character seem to be driven by massive misinterpretations of her characterization and choices. So what is it that people hate, and why are they totally wrong about it?

Sansa's A Bully

First off, one of the most common criticisms of Sansa Stark is simply that she's a mean girl. A great deal of fans seem to project whatever image they have of a classic tweenage Regina George bully onto her character, and the fact that she seems to fit so perfectly into the societal expectations that she was raised in is used as irrefutable proof that she must be a total nightmare. But this seems to fundamentally misunderstand Sansa as a character.

Although Game of Thrones did a pretty poor job of adapting this element of her characterization from the book to the screen, it's interesting that the A Song of Ice and Fire Fandom tends to see Sansa in much the same way, despite the fact that it seems to be a total misrepresentation of her personality.

Sure, Sansa conforms to the standards of Westerosi society when many of the other point of view characters do not, but it doesn't seem to be put on or an active choice on her part. The aspects of her personality that make her the so-called perfect lady do seem to be inherent, and her individual interests don't seem forced or faked. She is undeniably a product of her environment, but so is every other character in one way or another.

However, even beyond that, there is a pretty obvious facet to her characterization that should theoretically make her appeal to almost all of the readers of George RR Martin's epic fantasy story. And that is the fact that she is obsessed with fantasy stories.

Sansa is an interesting character in a meta-analytical sense because she feels like she is both a part of the story and an observer within the story. Because of the nature of her situation, she spends a lot of time hanging in the background and watching the action unfold. But her character is also fascinating in a meta sense because she is a character in a fantasy story who wishes that she was a character in a fantasy story. And therefore, it is incredibly ironic that a bunch of people reading a fantasy story and likely imagining themselves within that story find Sansa so viscerally unappealing, or that they presume that she is meant to be the mean popular girl of the story.

And therein lies one of the significant differences between those who seem to like Sansa and those who seem to hate her. The people who dislike her seem to imagine her the popular girl who bullied everyone in school, while the people who like her see her as essentially a relatable super fan. Everyone else might be a main character of the story, but she is the one who is a part of the story who wants to memorize every minute detail of every house and every sigil. She is literally the A Song of Ice and Fire fangirl within the world of ice and fire. Ergo, while she might not be the most powerful or magical or interesting character in the narrative, she is actually one of the most relatable, especially for anyone who considers themselves a fan of Game of Thrones or A Song of Ice and Fire.

Sansa's Stupid

Another one of the most interesting critiques of Sansa as a character is that she's unintelligent. It's not entirely shocking that readers and fans have come to the conclusion that she's not that clever, as quite a few characters literally call her stupid in the books, oftentimes straight to her face, and Sansa seems to internalize this insult and assumes that they must be correct. However, the reality of the situation seemingly couldn't be more different.

One thing that so many readers and watchers seem to lose track of in the story is simply who knows what and when. Given that the books are written from a multitude of points of view, the reader themselves constructs their own narrative and is privy to far more information than any one single character is. That typically means that the reader is confused or frustrated because characters aren't acting based on information that they literally do not know, and that seems to be especially true for Sansa.

People who dislike her drag her for a lot, but arguably the largest critique of Sansa when it comes to her lack of intelligence is the role that she played in Ned's death. While the notion that she even had much of an impact one way or another is a bit dubious, the fact of the matter is that she knew almost nothing about what was actually going on while it was happening and was therefore unaware of what kind of impact her actions might be having. Obviously all of the Lannisters were intentionally misleading her, and Ned specifically went out of his way to withhold vital information from Sansa about the danger that they were in. He largely pretended that everything was fine even at the point where it was becoming a literal life-or-death situation, and Sansa acted accordingly.

Strangely, a lot of fans seem to once again accuse Sansa of attempted murder when it comes to her cousin, Sweetrobin. Robert Arryn is a sickly child who seems to at the very least be calmed by sweetsleep, which is administered to him by a variety of people including Sansa. And while the danger of sweetsleep is directly mentioned within the narrative, the notion that Sansa would even know how much dangerous medicine is appropriate for a child or that she, a girl who has spent her entire life being socialized to know her place and occupy it, would question Littlefinger or an actual Maester about the legitimacy of his treatments, is absurd.

And unsurprisingly, this actually goes for a great deal of what Sansa experiences and what people seem to dislike her for throughout the story. She does play a role in some massive events, but in nearly every instance where she does something that yields a negative outcome, she didn't have any of the necessary information to actually make a good decision. And ignorance is not stupidity.

But even beyond that, one of the most interesting but frustrating aspects of Sansa as a character is that she is actually incredibly astute in many instances. She does have good instincts about who people are and when something is wrong, but the issue is that she actively tries to talk herself out of them. There are obvious situations where she very quickly recognizes that there is something off with someone else like Joffrey or Littlefinger, oftentimes she'll pick up on it before many other people sense that there's something wrong, but because her life circumstances are almost completely out of her control, she convinces herself that the scary people she meets aren't that scary until it's too late.

Interestingly, this is also incredibly revealing about the inherent biases that a lot of readers have against characters like Sansa, as Sansa's means of handling the uglier sides of life that she doesn't want to see is nearly identical to Ned. They both ignore really obvious problems that they know exist but that they don't want to acknowledge, and by the time the actually come around to dealing with it, it's already far too late.

However, the broader interpretation of Ned seems to be that he was an honorable man who was simply too good for the world that he lived in, while the literal child who makes the same mistakes that he does is seen as a malicious half-wit for those errors.

Sansa's Thirst For Power

A particularly fascinating criticism of Sansa as a character is that she's thirsty for power. It's primarily interesting because pretty much every character in A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones seeks out some kind of power, and yet Sansa seems to yield the most blowback for it, so it's worth asking why. There are likely some gendered and stereotype-driven elements that are making people react poorly to Sansa's behavior, i.e. many people in the broader fandom may dislike Sansa's desire for status or power specifically because she seems like the kind of person who shouldn't want power and should willingly and constantly defer to someone else.

But aside from those likely biased perceptions, what this notion of Sansa the greedy queen seems to fundamentally misunderstand is that Sansa is not actually seeking any power. She already has it. The vast majority of Sansa's storyline is driven by horrendous people who are using her as a tool to exploit her power. She's been betrothed to Joffrey, she's been forcibly wed to Tyrion, she's nearly been engaged to Willas Tyrell, she was allegedly going to marry Robin Arryn, and now Littlefinger is attempting to broker some kind of marriage pact with Harry Hardyng. Or, in Game of Thrones' even more horrifying twist, she was married off to Ramsay Bolton.

And even aside from that, in many smaller, more nuanced ways aside from marriage, literally everything that has happened to her from the start of the story has been about someone else using her value for their own gains, almost always at her expense.

But even if it can be manipulated by other people, her value is hers alone, and simply claiming the power that already belongs to her does not make her power hungry, it makes her a responsible leader.

Obviously the Sansa of the books hasn't even begun to step into her power as of yet, but it seems clear that her storyline is going in this direction, and Sansa's journey towards becoming Queen in the North in Game of Thrones is undeniably one of the most criticized and disliked aspects of her character arc. However, the negative perception of Sansa's behavior in this instance is absolutely absurd.

I mean, just consider what Sansa's options are in these situations. She's a hostage of the Lannisters, then of Littlefinger, then of the Boltons. Throughout the vast majority of her journey, the most villainous characters in the entire story are attempting to control her so they can use her for her power. If Sansa doesn't fight for her own claim and take her power back from those people, then she is ceding that control and influence to the evilest characters in the entire series. If she just let any person who wanted to abuse her power do it without resistance, she would not only be suffering horrendously herself, but the thousands of people affected by her status would suffer horrendously as well.

Objectively speaking, Sansa would be doing an enormous favor to every person that her claim has influence over by wresting control of it away from these horrifically cruel and exploitative people. But honestly, she doesn't even need that excuse. Again, it is her power that she's claiming, nothing more and nothing less. Even if the people that were abusing her weren't trying to abuse her claim as well, she would be equally as justified as anyone else who is attempting to take control of a claim that they were born with.

There is of course a great deal of criticism that can be levied against the governing system of Westeros as a whole, but if Sansa is the bad guy for staking a claim that she inherited and suffered a great deal for, then so is everyone else who is doing the exact same thing.

Sansa Is The New Littlefinger/Cersei/Insert Villain Here

Sansa has learned a great deal from pretty much every person she has been held hostage by, but it seems obvious that the two characters who are poised to have more impact on her than anyone are Cersei Lannister and Petyr Baelish. But the notion that Sansa is going to learn from them by becoming like them is absolutely ridiculous.

Again, despite many people's beliefs otherwise, Sansa is actually a quite intelligent person. And considering the fact that she actually still seems to retain a great deal of kindness and empathy after everything that she's gone through, it seems safe to assume that no one is going to be able to abuse her to the point of her becoming an outright villain anyway. But, even if Sansa was as inherently cruel or uncaring as people like Cersei and Baelish, she'd have to be an absolute idiot in order to follow in their footsteps.

As the saying goes, when you play the game of thrones, you win or you die. And after being treated horrendously by Cersei and Littlefinger, Sansa is likely going to play a key hand in their ultimate demises. So with that in mind, why would Sansa ever want to replace them?

Sansa has fully experienced what it's like to be in the disadvantaged position in these kinds of dynamics. She will ultimately come to know that no matter what happens, when people use manipulation and cruelty to get what they want, the people that they're using will always want to see them destroyed, and that they will likely have an opportunity to unravel them at some point or another.

Therefore, Sansa is clearly meant to learn from these characters more than anyone else, but she is largely meant to learn exactly what not to do when she's in a position of leadership. It's not even about her personal feelings, it is quite literally about what will or won't be effective in terms of maintaining a stable structure of power. And, if Sansa wants to be a leader and stay a leader, she will inevitably realize that maintaining control or gaining influence using the methods of Cersei and Littlefinger simply will not work. However, when Sansa's actual feelings are taken into account, it seems incredibly obvious that not only is she too smart to lead in this way, but that she also would never want to.

One particular common complaint about Sansa is her lack of empathy at the start of the story. But what makes her an incredibly compelling character is that, in contrast to almost every other significant player in A Song of Ice and Fire, the more terrible things happen to her, the nicer and more empathetic that she becomes. She grew up in an outragerously privileged life, but once she knows what it's like to be treated poorly, she goes out of her way to be even kinder to others, and in some instances like with Margaery Tyrell or Dontos Hollard, she even puts herself at great personal risk to prevent them from suffering. Essentially, she learns exactly the kind of lessons that she needs to in order to be the polar opposite of a Littlefinger or a Cersei.

And, while Cersei and Petyr have both attempted to ingratiate themselves with Sansa as some kind of deranged political tutor, Sansa has already directly rejected their darker, crueler instructions. As Cersei directly states to Sansa, "The only way to keep your people loyal is to make certain they fear you more than they do the enemy. "And as Sansa thinks to herself, "she had always heard that love was a surer route to the people's loyalty than fear. If I am ever a queen, I'll make them love me."

Clearly, George RR Martin isn't trying to conclude his story by telling the audience that people like Cersei and Littlefinger will always emerge victorious, so Sansa's job isn't to become the new version of these people, it's to outright rebuke their outlook on life and choose a better way.

Sansa's Traditionally Feminine

Traditional femininity occupies a very strange space in nearly every corner of media, and it is painfully common to see the classic girly girls in fiction to be at best disregarded, and at worst outright hated by the general audience. But George RR Martin has seemingly made Sansa into a kind of litmus test for these kinds of biases in his viewers and readers, and she is a test that most people seem to fail. What makes Sansa so interesting is that according to both in-canon story rules of Westerosi society, and in the external misogynistic world that we all exist in, Sansa shouldn't be who she is or be capable of accomplishing what she does. Nearly every female character in the story goes one of two ways.

Firstly, there are the women who embrace something more traditionally masculine in order to get by. The Arya's and Brienne's of the world have essentially abandoned or outright rejected the Westerosi woman ideal because it's something they can't adhere to. Then there are the Cersei's, the women who can embody many idealized aspects of Westerosi womanhood, but who weaponize their femininity and seemingly hate women in general. But Sansa is an outlier because she embraces her femininity, seems to have a deep appreciation for other women, and she doesn't change her behavior or outlook in a way where she can use her femininity in order to manipulate or exploit others. A girly girl is simply what she is and wants to be, and there isn't an ulterior motive behind it.

Frankly, characters that are shamelessly feminine tend to be more widely rejected and discounted by audiences regardless of their more nuanced characterization. Female characters are only supposed to be feminine if they're not strong or intelligent or talented enough to choose another path for themselves. But Sansa is exceptionally frustrating to many viewers and readers because, despite the fact that she is meant to be the weakest member of her societal structure, and despite the fact that everyone around her presumes that she is weak and stupid, she repeatedly outsmarts and outplays people who should in theory be much cleverer than she is, and she does so without ever abanoning or changing her traditional feminity.

Although it's beginning to change, this type of characterization was rare in fiction, and it understandably throws a lot of people off. But the notion that the only strong woman is a tough, aggressive, and hardened woman who has learned every lesson in the most difficult way is so ingrained in audience expectation that the writers for Game of Thrones quite literally transformed Sansa into the character archetype that she was expected to be rather than letting her retain her personality in spite of what she's gone through.

Sansa is interesting because, like every character that George RR Martin has ever created, she subverts expectations. But she tends to subvert those expectations in a way that can be very irritating for people who believe that Sansa should never be capable of outwitting characters like Tyrion or Littlefinger. And to put in bluntly, Sansa is also the kind of character who would traditionally be exploited sexually in incredibly brutal ways, so the fact that Sansa is constantly threatened with some form of untoward assault but manages to evade all out violation based on her wits and ability to persuade people alone doesn't fit the narrative that people believe should belong to someone like Sansa.

And again, this belief is so strong and so ingrained that Game of Thrones completely altered her trajectory specifically so she could become one of those feminine girls who is treated abhorrently and learns to be a supposed badass because of it, despite the fact that George RR Martin outright stated that this was not in his game plan, and despite the fact that it seems incredibly unlikely that he repeatedly had Sansa escape sexual encounters she didn't want to have just so that she could ultimately have most nightmarish character in the series force himself on her in the end.

So, it's not without irony that many of the general audience came around to Sansa in the later years of the series, although it is pretty depressing. In order for her to become a likable character in the eyes of many, she had to have her softness abused out of her and become a character entirely unlike her former self. As she repulsively said to the Hound towards the end of the series, if it weren't for all of the people who exploited her, she would have stayed a little bird all her life. And that isn't just a horrific take on what Sansa actually went through, it truly seems to be exactly what George RR Martin wasn't trying to say with her character.

Sansa Is Not A Fantasy Character

One element of Sansa's characterization that makes her unappealing to most but incredibly interesting within the context of the story is that essentially, she's not really a fantasy character. She certainly had the potential to be at the start, but because her entire trajectory seems to revolve around lonely captivity, she doesn't get to do anything that the typical fantasy character does, and she doesn't have many character traits that the traditional fantasy character would.

Sure, she's probably above average in terms of intelligence, and she is clearly stated to be an exceptional beauty, but in comparison to nearly every other major player in the story, she looks incredibly pedestrian. So in that sense, her lack of popularity actually is somewhat understandable and to be expected. In a world where dragons are being born and kids are becoming kings and commanders, reading the story of a girl who has to gray rock her way through life in order to avoid as much mistreatment as possible isn't quite as appealing. But that also completely misses the depth, complexity, and interest of Sansa as a character.

Although nearly everyone who enjoys fantasy likes to envision themselves as the strong warrior or the magical prince who is capable of anything and everything, Sansa is a dose of realism that both feels out of place in the story but is a necessary component of it.

Everyone wants to be the dragon queen or the warrior princess, but this is a story that is largely about traumatized children attempting to navigate a terrifying world. And although most people like to fantasize that they would fight their way to freedom and rebel against their captors were they in the same situation as Sansa, realistically, they almost certainly would and could not.

Therefore, Sansa's presence within the narrative is an uncomfortable reflection of reality that most readers don't want to acknowledge. It's much easier to castigate her as weak and ineffectual rather than recognizing that sometimes you simply do not have the option to fight back. It's not only possible, but probable that most people would be too weak or too disadvantaged to ever act out were they in the same situation as her, and the notion of being a captive whose best option is to simply endure whatever abuse her captors choose to heap on her is an awful one, but a very real one as well.

However, the rejection of Sansa's victimhood is a tragedy in its own right, as nearly every person who has been abused has intentionally been manipulated into a position where it was borderline impossible for them to escape. And she is truly one of the most inspirational characters in the sense that she suffers helplessly for a great deal of her character arc, but she doesn't let that change her into a bad person, and her future in Westeros shows that she can move beyond the bad things that have happened to her.

Sure, she's not inspiring in the sense that she can stick a knife in the gut of all those who wronged her, but she's inspiring in a much more grounded and aspirational way, because her ultimate revenge will be to break the cycle of violence that she was pulled into and to simply not become the kind of person who abused her. And although the reflexive rejection of her character is somewhat understandable because her experience likely hits way too close to home for a lot of people, her development is also incredibly heartwarming, as most members of the audience will see a greater reflection of themselves in a character who simply experiences the cycle of abuse and then chooses to break it rather than becoming some mystical badass to wreak vengeance on all that have wronged her.

Sansa Exposes Fan Faves

It should actually come as no surprise that Sansa is one of the most widely disliked characters in both the Game of Thrones and A Song of Ice and Fire audiences, but that is not necessarily because she's an unlikable character.

Sansa is a fascinating element of the story at large, because her character has a tendency of exposing the unappealing underbellies of a lot of fan favorite characters. She comes into conflict with or is on the opposing side of many situations with a lot of really beloved characters, and because she's not so overtly coded as a hero or mastermind, it's much easier to reduce the interactions that she has with characters like Tyrion, Arya, or even Ned as Sansa being the bad guy and everyone else being the good guy rather than acknowledging the nuance that could exist between them.

For instance, Tyrion is obviously a character whose popularity outshines Sansa's by a wide margin, and it's bizarrely common for some fans to act as if Sansa should be Tyrion's reward for being so clever and so underappreciated, or even worse, that Sansa needs to learn some sort of life lesson by being forcibly married to but ultimately falling in love with Tyrion. These ideas are repulsive, but honestly not that surprising considering what the other option is.

Because in reality, Tyrion is an adult man who willingly married a child hostage in the hopes of stealing the claim to her home. He is an adult man who is bitter that his 13 year old wife who has basically been kidnapped, abused, and forced to marry into the family that slaughtered her own doesn't like him and isn't happy to be married to him. He's twice her age, and he's angry that the tween he's attracted to does not want to be intimate with him.

When taking that point of view into account, it's not at all shocking that people like to besmirch Sansa, because to acknowledge the reality of what is happening makes Tyrion an undeniably repugnant villain, and makes Sansa his helpless hostage. It is much harder to admit that a likable character could not only treat a literal child so horribly, but would be angry that she doesn't appreciate him for it, rather than just blaming Sansa for being a spoiled, superficial brat.

And although obviously her interactions with most other characters aren't taken to quite this extreme, Sansa's presence has a real knack for bringing other characters' less appealing qualities into the light, and therefore rejecting Sansa and acting as if she deserves all of the horrid things that happens to her allows fans of many characters to avoid truly examining what kind of people George RR Martin actually created.

However, by doing so the audience and readership miss a great deal of what makes the other characters so interesting, and miss a great deal of what makes Sansa interesting as well.

She's A Subject, Not An Object

Every character in A Song of Ice and Fire both embodies a specific fantasy archetype and subverts that archetype, and ironically, the archetype that Sansa both is and isn't makes her a somewhat inherently unappealing character. But, that's not because of the character herself, it's largely because of what the audience expects of a character like her, and because those expectations are confronted and deconstructed in a really unsettling and disturbing way.

Sansa is very much the damsel in distress, princess in the tower kind of character, and she does quite literally spend a great deal of her time imprisoned, waiting to be saved by a fabled hero. There is an interesting meta-textual angle to this aspect of Sansa's character as well, because her inner fantasies revolve around magical fairy tales, but she is also quite literally living out a classic fairy tale in her reality.

But what makes Sansa such a unique character in a way that is a bit of an affront to the typical narrative expectations is that the traditional damsel in distress is not meant to be a subject within the narrative that they're a part of, they're supposed to be an object.

The princess in the tower who needs to be saved by another is essentially meant to be the end goal of the actual characters in traditional storytelling. She's meant to be a metaphorical flag that needs to be captured from beyond enemy lines, but the real story is about the hero saving her, not the woman who actually needs to be saved.

The damsel in distress is typically a plot device that only exists through the eyes of the real characters, and when she is not in their presence or on their minds, she essentially ceases to exist. But what George RR Martin fascinatingly does with Sansa is truly reveals how deranged and dehumanizing this kind of classic fantasy is.

Because, by letting the audience see through Sansa's eyes, it truly illuminates how nightmarish it is to be that damsel. She's not a porcelain doll without any thoughts, feelings, or relevance outside of the prince who is meant to be her savior. She doesn't exist in some kind of neutral stasis while waiting to be saved. She's a real person who is in a real hostage situation, and she experiences a great deal of misery, pain, and even boredom as a result of her imprisonment.

Being that damsel leads her through a harrowing journey of manipulation and exploitation, and her distress is literal and horrifying abuse. There is nothing charming or fantastical about it.

But, audiences are not used to characters like this being humanized, and they don't expect them to have a rich inner life or acknowledge the brutality of what they've experienced, so to have a character like Sansa whose life as a captive princess is revolting and sad is a shock to the system that a lot of people don't enjoy.

However, it is an incredibly astute insight into classic fantasy, and George RR Martin has crafted a truly interesting and unique character with Sansa Stark that the vast majority of the audience apparently dislikes or is seemingly completely disinterested in purely based on their superficial interpretations of the character.

Ultimately, people are allowed to dislike whatever they dislike for whatever reason under the sun. Hating something because you hate it is entirely valid. However, when it comes to Sansa Stark, it's painfully obvious that a great deal of readers and viewers loathed her character because they completely misunderstood the points that George RR Martin was trying to make by including a character like her in A Song of Ice and Fire.

Sansa is undoubtedly a bit of an odd man out in the broader narrative, but that is largely what makes her such an interesting and worthwhile character. Her characterization is exceptionally rich in subtext, and she has one of the most realistic and relatable development arcs in the entire story.

The likelihood that she will be a fan favorite by the end of A Song of Ice and Fire is unfortunately even lower than it was in Game of Thrones, as the writers of the TV adaptation radically changed the character in a way that would fulfill expectations and appeal more broadly to the entire audience. However, Sansa is as richly complex and compelling as any other character in the series, and although many may not like her, they likely have more in common with her than any other character in A Song of Ice and Fire.

#sansa stark #sansamonth2022 #asoiaf #got #anti got #my videos #be forewarned this is a ridiculously long beast #asoiaf meta #got meta #sansa stark meta #meta #Youtube

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

[cws: non-detailed discussion of both fictional and irl SA/CSA/abuse dynamics, apologia for the previous, homophobia, fetishization of wlw, and anti rhetoric.]

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having a lot of thoughts about the wider fandom's treatment of the various abuse dynamics present in sdmi--supposedly in the name of being anti-abuse--and how instead it's propagated deeply anti-survivor/abuse apologist sentiment and behavior through where they choose to apply that rhetoric, and where they choose to look the other way.

(first off, if you're someone who does not and has not done this, thank you from the bottom of my heart. second, this is not at all exhaustive of my feelings on the subject and there will probably be more posts about these dynamics and people's behavior toward them in future. as you can imagine by the length of this post that is saying something lmao)

one of the reasons i feel as strongly as i do about the way both canon and fandom have historically been about pericles, pericky, and shitting on anyone who likes them because it Normalizes Abuse(tm), is that their fans are pretty open and emphatic about the fact that it's Fucked Up. it's why we find it compelling. it is vanishingly rare that we don't.

meanwhile, velma is the UwU Cute Sassy Lesbian Icon whose relationship with shaggy was Cringy and Immature (and mutually so 🙃) at worst, when it directly mirrored such visceral aspects of my experience with CSA that i almost threw up rewatching the second episode.

and that's not even getting into how normalized it is for women to abuse men in a relationship, in broad fucking daylight in front of other people, and how men are supposed to Always Want It and it's an insult if they don't, and how the vast majority of CSA--which it overtly is in shaggy's case, he is implied not to be an adult yet--is perpetrated by other kids.

and it's also not getting into the fact that the ~cute lesbian relationship~ is almost certainly going to end up with the other queer girl in the show also being abused, because abusers are not Magically Cured by True Queer Love's Kiss. how it is incredibly difficult for survivors of abuse in a wlw relationship to be acknowledged or get support because then they'd be a Traitor, or people would rather maintain the feel-good fuzzy feelings wlw exist to give them, or they're closeted and it's not safe to let people know they're in a relationship with a woman. how queer relationships, especially between women, are fetishized as cute pure healthy fairytale romances and not dynamics involving real people who might harm each other or be harmed and need help.

and that's not even getting into the fact that mlm are seen as inherently predatory to an extent that the majority of other queer identities are not. how older queer men grooming boys is a classic homophobic stereotype used to justify violence toward them, up to and including lynchings, and how that is the abuse dynamic everyone in the show and fandom latched onto to revile as the Disgusting Evil Predatory One while giving everything else a pass. how mlm have a long history of forced institutionalization and psychiatric torture and abuse, and the Predatory Gay Man is subjected to decades of--you guessed it!--forced institutionalization and psychiatric torture and abuse, which is framed as what he deserved and where he belonged. how he's supposed to be unattractive (and the majority of the people who do this shit lean hard on that), while people are way more likely to give Charming Attractive Aesthetically Pleasing abusers a pass.

this is just..... normal, to the fandom. it's treated as completely normal. and i think that's a whole lot more fucking harmful than finding emotional catharsis in exploring an abusive dynamic that would not fly in broad daylight irl in a million years.

#sdmi #scooby doo: mystery incorporated #professor pericles #velma dinkley #shaggy rogers #SDMItag #cws in post #like. everything about shaggy and velma's dynamic in and related to the first half of S1 is *gutwrenching* #it took me up until this rewatch to realize why every time i try to rewatch the show in linear order i can never seem to watch past E02 #and end up just skipping around #and time and personal experience have *really* made the 'fairytale queer romance that is a missing stair right into a bottomless pit' #thing hit harder #whereas exploring pericky when i was younger *made me realize things about their relationship were abuse that i hadn't understood before* #'okay so if i go back and fix *this* part that'll make it not abusive anymore and they can be happ--oh. oh geez. this goes deep doesn't it' #and the people who don't like pericky will do the opposite and *actively claim the abuse dynamics that are there do not exist* #because Then It Would Be Shipping and That's Just Gross UwU #because 'this can't have been [X kind of abuse] because [X abuse] is Gross and its potential existence near me makes me uncomfortable' #'you're the one who's gross for seeing it and pointing it out; ew how dare you ruin people's day by making them think about that' #'thank goodness it didn't happen and we can all move on with our lives (and you won't like what happens if you dare bring it up again)' #isn't. you know. famously a thing that happens all the time to gaslight and silence survivors irl and take our words away from us lol #anyway as you can maybe imagine i am bitter about this lmao #but also i just generally think it's worth talking about; especially if even one person understands their own experiences better for it #the crit files #the salt files #SDMIcrit tag #pericky #dyn: when i die i want you to die too

[destiniesfic]

Chel explain Daemon to me, I want to give the dragon show a shot and he’s captured my attention!

Anon, you have given me an impossible task in describing the person who Gizmodo termed the "Unexpectedly Sexy Evil Crimes House of the Dragon Hottie" (that article has spoilers, don't click). The reason this task is impossible is because nobody can agree on who Daemon Targaryen is. Considering the below is his defining intro paragraph in the book from which he originates, that is somewhat understandable:

Over the centuries, House Targaryen has produced both great men and monsters. Prince Daemon was both. In his day there was not a man so admired, so beloved, and so reviled in all Westeros. He was made of light and darkness in equal parts. To some he was a hero, to others the blackest of villains. (George R. R. Martin, Fire and Blood)

I reblogged my Why People Like Daemon Targaryen graphic earlier for you as a helpful visual aid, but the truth is that "Explain Daemon" has been tearing apart the Internet for about twelve weeks at this point. Let's take something very simple: what drives him? Some people would say he's fatally ambitious. Others would say he's motivated by a kind of backwards love for his family, or by spite. Matt Smith told the LA Times that Daemon is an agent of chaos who thrives on disorder. Many other questions abound! Is he a good dad or a bad dad? Did he groom his teenage niece? (Sorry, remember, Game of Thrones.) Can he ever be trusted? Does he love anyone outside of himself? Has he actually never done anything wrong in his whole life?

Maybe all of these questions get at the heart of why people like Daemon: importantly, he is not boring. The greatest sin any fictional character can commit is boring you, and Matt Smith is in those silly wigs absolutely gnawing on the scenery to ensure you will never be bored. Daemon is a delight to watch and I sincerely enjoy almost everything about him. It is my hope that you will too!

And if there is one thing we can all agree on, it's this:

#i'm sorry anon you probably wanted like #''he's the king's scoundrel younger brother'' #''he begins the series as heir to the throne'' #''he has a cool dragon'' #''his violent tendencies mean he shouldn't be allowed off-leash in public places'' #all of that is also true! #daemon targaryen #house of the dragon #anonymous #ask #grooming mention #incest mention #baegael did everything wrong actually! #and i love him!

[writinglittlebeasts]

some good lines tag

jesus fuck why is the mobile post editor doing that

i was tagged by @writernopal to post some lines I've written, and because i have revil brain worms and haven't written a line of original fiction in, like, a month, i'm gonna post from that new thing i'm working on (currently untitled, with a background radiation of romance)

1. a line that i am proud of

Blood wells on the inside of his lip where it’s punctured by his teeth, and pain builds like a flower unfurls: there, where he's cut, and then blooming dully across his jaw as the ache sets in.

2. a line that is so, so silly

They don't particularly like it when he says 'the bioweapon is my friend and I want him released', either. 

(it's not a very funny story lol)

and i will taaaaag @winterandwords @liv-is @rickie-the-storyteller

#or #some good lines tag #fic stuff

[waldensblog]

Why the Hunger Games is still relevant

Or, The Hunger Games as a critique of the industrial war complex, the American empire, and exploitation of nature. 

Officially, the Hunger Games is a YA dystopian science-fiction series, but it provides an accessible way to understand eco socialist theory, if you approach it in a certain light. I don’t know if you’ve ever sat down and tried to read Marx’s Das Kapital, or other political theory, but it’s... very dense, convoluted. 

The Hunger Games is about the exploitation of workers and nature by an oligarchy who is determined to keep the workers impoverished to prop up their lifestyles.

The American Empire and the Industrial War Complex

With Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, I think we can really note the imperial core vs periphery that is central to these stories. The Capitol is (obviously) the imperial core, with the upper class at the head. Within the imperial core, there are workers, but these workers are protected from some of the brutality that the periphery (districts) are subjected to, and there’s degrees. District 12 is largely ignored, while District 11, on the periphery, feels the constant wrath of the imperial core.

District 2, meanwhile, is one of the “pets” of the imperial core, has absorbed a lot its culture, including Roman-style names, and they tend to celebrate the games vs revile them, developing a more Spartan-like culture. The imperial pets, despite being oppressed themselves, having to participate year after year in the Games, celebrate their oppressor, and are given some “treats” as a result - they behave, they do as they’re told, and they are rewarded for it. All the districts are - but 2 is more likely to toe the line than, say, 12. Even so, the Capitol continues to look down on people from District 2 - like Sejanus.

Sejanus is not from the Capitol, he is a “District person”, he will never be fully accepted in the imperial core - no matter what he does. The humanity of the people from the districts is not fully seen by the imperial core - they are there to entertain them, to make consumable products and even be the products to consume (as in the case of Finnick). Sejanus realizes this over time, of course, and he is punished for this realization. When Sejanus develops a sort of class (district-ers) consciousness after trying and failing to be seen as fully human in the Capitol, he is punished for it.

The rest of the Districts - the non-career ones especially, tend to see the Capitol’s pets as being more privileged than the rest of them, and that’s not without reason - they do get more “treats”, even if they all have to compete in the Games - there is an unfair advantage, but the very idea that the Careers are not also oppressed divides the Districts, keeps them fighting one another as they argue over scraps. It isn’t until Mockingjay, when the “pet” - the most privileged district, but still ultimately oppressed - finally develops that class consciousness and turns against the Capitol, finally realizing what Sejanus had all those years ago: that the Capitol will never see them as truly human.

Why is this relevant? Because the American empire uses war to retain a dominant position. Because the American empire exploits workers overseas and in America to prop up the lavish lifestyles of the upper class. Because workers today fight each other about whether those striking “deserve” better pay and conditions - because they’re not as oppressed, they don’t work in sweatshops, completely missing the point that we’re all workers. Yes, it’s important to note the different ways we are exploited - but exploited we all are. And exploited we will remain if we do not change.

The Exploitation of Nature

Panem exists because of a climate catastrophe sometime in their distant past - or our future - wherein nature is not seen as having any rights of it’s own, but was a “thing” to be used, controlled, and exploited - the Descartes “mechanical” perspective. 

In Panem, the Districts are forced to work the land to extract resources and create consumable products for an oligarchy. This system is re-inforced through violent suppression of any attempt to change the status quo. Sometimes, working this way even poisons or kills them outright - particularly in 12, in the coal mines. 

The Capitol seeks to control nature through engineering - creating arenas for games, literally making fire appear of out nowhere, and even life itself - mutts. The mutts are a perversion of nature, humanity’s attempt to control it. But nature constantly resists attempts to control it - as the rebels delivered false messages via the Jabberjays, the Mockingjay was born out of nature’s own resistance to attempts to control it. The Mockingjay symbolizes both nature and workers respective resistance to the capitol. 

Katniss. A plant name. Katniss is connected to her environment, not alienated from it, like most. The Capitol has fences built around the wilds, only allowing Districts to have a pre-approved relationship with nature, when it benefits the Capitol to extract resources. But Katniss hunts, she knows her environment, and is then able to weaponize the berries - Katniss will not die at the hands of the Capitol, a piece in their games, forced to kill Peeta. If she’s going to die - it will be at the hands of nature - the berries - not manufactured for consumption, entertainment. And it is this connection with nature - with this refusal to submit, to be tamed and control, that makes her a symbol - a Mockingjay, like her pin. 

The series ends with Peeta and Katniss re-establishing a connection to each other, as humans, no longer forced to be a piece in the Capitol’s games, but also - to nature. Katniss hunts, Peeta plants and tills the Earth. Even Haymitch has his geese, as District 12 comes back, re-grows, and establishes itself - able to connect to their environment, to each other, without the imperial core dictating their relationships to each other and their environments.

Why is this relevant? Because workers get mercury poisoning and companies get away with it. Because we’re experiencing climate change so the rich can have mega yachts. Because we’re completely out of balance with nature and will continue to be if we don’t change our perspective of nature as “thing”, of ourselves as separate from nature, instead of part of it. 

Conclusion

The Hunger Games is still relevant because the American empire continues to exploit workers worldwide, continues to exploit nature, and continues to barrel us towards our doom. If this doesn’t change - if we don’t end the industrial war complex, if we don’t stop fighting each other and demand real, actual, change, the catastrophe will happen.

We can choose a path before it’s chosen for us. If we choose Peeta’s path - the dandelion in the spring, we choose Hope. We choose peace, and we can try to change things before everything falls apart.  The Hunger Games is still relevant because it urges us to choose the Dandelion in the Spring - to hope for a better world, and to make one. 

#The Hunger Games

[rhaenyras]

I really hate the idea in the ASOIAF fandom that if a female character has a child not fathered by her arranged marriage husband, that she should be condemned by said fandom, that she is a “selfish” and “spoiled whore” and “unsympathetic” (as if male characters aren’t also creating bastards too). If I’m gonna go through months of vomiting during pregnancy and risk dying in childbirth, and if still surviving, get my genitals ripped apart and permanently injured pushing said child out, you bet your ass I’m gonna find a way beforehand to make sure my child is fathered by a man I love or at least attracted to. I wholeheartedly support Cersei cucking Robert and denying him biological children, and Rhaenyra having sons fathered by Harwin Strong. Especially even today women don’t get the right to abort pregnancies from rape or get to block said rapists from visiting them and their child. Noblemen in Westeros get to control their wives and daughters through arranged marriages, but god forbid noblewomen wrest back some of their agency by choosing who gets to be the biological father of their children. It’s a bold, praiseworthy, and justified act of rebellion.

I could never hate a woman for passing off her illegitimate children as trueborn. Matter of fact, I think more Westerosi women should be doing that. I do not care in the slightest about their husbands. Do what you have to do to survive.

yes, i second all of that most vehemently. furthermore, and this is something i forgot to mention in the previous ask on this same topic, i believe that systematically creating ONLY female fictional characters who will surrender their reproductive freedom & will eventually bend to the will of the men in their lives, should not be the norm for writers and the like. this creative "choice" shouldn't even benefit from the "historical accuracy" alibi because that's simply not true. let's not pretend that this one-sided crippled narrative doesn't rely entirely on female pain and the masturbatory need that most viewers/readers feel to always have more.

women can and have fathered bastards in history. men have always been so ignorant about everything involving reproductive health that I don't doubt they could be fooled rather easily, in fact.

abortions have also always existed historically as an instrument for women to claim some bodily autonomy, and in some cases, they appeared to be safer than childbirth even. so 🤷🏻‍♀️ i truly don't see what all the fuss is about. I don't know why a certain side of the asoiaf fandom will revile female characters who get abortions or conceive children out of wedlock, while simultaneously sanctifying pliant meek wives, but i get the feeling it has something to do with their political views as well

ps. isn't it funny that moontea is a thing that's widely used in westeros while abortions are so hush hush and frowned upon? it's so ironic that alicent made use of the westerosi equivalent of the day after pill, whenever she wanted to prevent her son from fathering bastards on kitchen girls (-':

#daenerysne #ask #cersei lannister #rhaenyra targaryen #prochoice

[rosy-avenger]

Review: The Women’s War by Jenna Glass

-I have read and enjoyed books that are not perfectly socially just in their approach to marginalized groups. I am capable of evaluating a book on its execution, not just whether I agree with its political stance.

-However.

-A book that is explicitly billed as a "high fantasy feminist epic" wants to be a manifesto, and therefore I feel free to criticize its politics accordingly.

-And so.

-If your feminism does not include LBPQ women, it is bullshit.

-If your feminism does not include trans women, nor address the relationship between patriarchy and gender essentialism by including trans men and nonbinary people, it is bullshit.

-If your feminism does not include disabled women, it is bullshit.

-If your feminism does not include fat women, it is bullshit.

-If your feminism makes only the barest gestures toward acknowledging that men are also harmed by the patriarchy, it is bullshit.

Further complaints:

(Initial note: I refer in this post to “women” and “men” in the book’s fictional setting with the same level of cisnormativity that the book uses. This is because if I used the correct inclusive language, ie “uterus owners” instead of “women capable of becoming pregnant” when discussing in-universe characters and events, it would make it sound like the author used that inclusive language, which she emphatically did not. When I refer, in this post, to “women” as synonomous with “people who can get pregnant” or “people who are subject to misogyny”, it’s because that’s how the author writes. Rest assured that I know trans theory, even though the author doesn’t.)

So the premise of this book is that a generations-in-the-making conspiracy finally comes to fruition with a globally-effective spell that prevents women from conceiving or carrying a pregnancy against their will. The second half of the spell relates to the prevention and punishment of rape - more on that later in the post.

There is an ensemble cast of characters from two different countries and several different societal positions:

Alys, the daughter of the king of Aaltah, who was declared illegitimate when her father divorced her mother to marry someone else;

Jinnell, Alys’ young adult daughter;

Shelvon, the abused wife of the crown prince of Aaltah (the king’s younger son and Alys’ half brother);

Chanlix, a woman who was relegated to the "Abbey of the Unwanted", where noblewomen who are rejected by their families are sent in a combination of disownment and coerced sex work, and now finds herself the Abbess and responsible for guiding the rest of the "abigails" into the future shaped by the spell;

Ellin, a princess from the country of Rhozinolm, who becomes queen of Rhozinolm in her own right following the unexpected deaths of the king and all the close male heirs;

and various other more minor POVs.

Alys’ mother Brenna was the previous Abbess, one of the women who died to cast the spell and arguably the one most responsible for it, and both Alys and Jinnell face problems from association with “the most reviled woman in Aaltah’s history”.

-If you read that and thought "wow, that sounds like one of those books that wants to be a TV show", you would be right! It absolutely wants to be a TV show. Specifically it wants to be the next Handmaid's Tale. This "cinematic" style in books doesn't usually annoy me, but for whatever reason this one did.

-Aside from not including any fat women, the only fat men are antagonists who are either exaggeratedly evil or incompetently awful, and are described with words like "corpulent" and depicted lacking self-control in regards to food.

-I debated on whether to include this as a complaint, so consider this bullet point a provisional complaint: there is no racism, antisemitism, or Islamophobia in this setting, as there is no systemic racism, or any irl religions. The characters are all fairly racially ambiguous. (Hence why I didn't refer to exclusion of WOC as a your-feminism-is-bullshit point above.)

However, just because there's no racism or religious bigotry in the setting doesn't mean the author didn't bring her own biases to the story. I quote goodreads user pdbkwm, who wrote an extensive one-star review of this book:

He falls in love for an older Abby, a discarded woman who is forced into sex work, and tells her this:

"But for now, just take it off. It's only you and me, and I assure you I won't be scandalized at the sight of a woman's hair."

Abbys have to wear heavy wimples and a cloak around their bodies...sound familiar? It seems like whenever there’s a novel about feminism, there’s always a subset of women who are so oppressed that they have to wear some sort of head covering. As a hijabi, I’m just tired of these tropes. When it comes to Muslim stories, there’s always this white boy who encourages the Muslim girl to shed her hijab off and embrace his way of life. Tynthanal’s entire purpose is to be that white guy, even though I don’t think he’s actually white in the book. He’s described as nut-brown, but who knows what nut this is referring to.

I'm not hijabi, but on a technical level, the depiction of the issue of the abigails wearing robes felt very shallow and unexamined. I don't think Chanlix, the Abbess, was even ever described as wearing a head covering until the scene pdbkwm references, so it was a weird surprise to have this major dynamic-building moment between Chanlix and Tynthanal be based around a detail of Chanlix's character that had never been talked about before.

The only aspect of that plot point that I approved of is that after the scene where Chanlix is willing to take off the head covering when alone with Tynthanal, she does continue to wear it when in wider company. The other abigails are also described (in a one-off sentence) as variously choosing to continue wearing their robes or not, and to wear dresses or pants as they prefer. This is, however, the bare minimum of showing that women are individuals who want different things.

The psychology of modesty is a complicated issue, not only loaded with sociopolitical context but also just difficult to parse. Different individuals have different feelings about modesty, so I’m not going to say that Chanlix’s feelings about her clothing are unrealistic, but I was hoping for a higher level of nuance in the depiction of her attitude towards modesty garb, both her own and the other abigails’.

Further: I don’t understand how a ~feminist author~ doesn’t realize that a man telling a woman to take off a garment because her not wearing it won’t bother him is not appealing. His comfort is not the issue here!

-The magic system is interesting, influenced by alchemy and requiring that naturally occurring elements be combined in certain ways to create spells. However, this is tainted by gender essentialism, as there are "male", "female" and "neuter" elements and the expected way of the world is that only men can see male elements and only women can see female ones. There is a point where Alys realizes she can see some male elements, but it's not because she's trans.

-The parameters of the anti-pregnancy spell are that a woman will not become pregnant against her will, and that the spell can tell when a woman is being coerced and won’t let her become pregnant if she consents under coercion either. Since coercion can be either outright or subtle, I had a very hard time suspending my disbelief to accept that the spell can figure out something that a woman might not even know herself.

We see the spell in action in the case of Shelvon, who has been pressured for a long time to produce an heir for the crown prince (Delnamal, the main antagonist of the book). Shelvon was wed to Delnamal as part of an international trade agreement, which requires an active marriage between the two countries. Shelvon’s plotline includes facing the risk that if she can’t produce an heir, Delnamal will divorce her, and Jinnell will have to marry Shelvon’s father, a known abuser, in order to maintain the trade agreement. Even though Shelvon wants to save Jinnell from that fate, her not wanting to bear Delnamal’s child is enough for the spell to prevent her from becoming pregnant.

The author does not seem to be aware that choice is an action, not a feeling, and that rational human beings are capable of making choices contradictory to their unreasoning emotions. The ability to choose something that goes against our base instincts is one of the things that makes us human rather than animals; the spell takes that option away from some women like Shelvon.

The confusion gets worse with the second half of the spell, which as I said above concerns consequences for rape. We are told about the element “kai”, which relates to death. Prior to the events of the story it was only ever produced by men when they died slow, violent deaths, and could be used to create spells of mass destruction. However, the spell cast by Alys’ mother allows for a new kind of kai, women’s kai, which is produced when a woman is raped by a man. (Of course the book never references the possibility of men being rape victims or women being rapists.) I immediately thought this wouldn’t actually help any women, because it would turn women from baby factories into weapons factories; but the author hastened to plaster this plot hole by saying that a mote of kai can only be used by the woman it belongs to, and she can’t be forced or coerced in its use either. Ok, fine. But the next detail is that a woman only receives a mote of kai if she resisted/said no to her rapist. Somehow we are expected to believe that the very same spell that can tell whether a woman is being coerced into becoming pregnant, is incapable of telling when a woman was coerced into sex even if she didn’t actively resist.

From a technical perspective, the only reason the author constructed the spell this way is so that Shelvon, who submits to Delnamal despite her hatred of him, wouldn’t have a mote of kai that she could use on him. I call so much bullshit.

This second half of the spell also makes less sense in that, if the goal was to prevent rape, and the spellcasters were capable of creating spells that can read minds, I don’t understand why the spell only allows for punishing rape after the fact rather than stopping men from committing rape at all. They could have created a spell that made a guy’s boner go away at the sound of the word “no”, or made a man fall unconscious when thoughts of committing rape appeared in his head.

Both parts of the spell including the provision against coercion also doesn’t inspire confidence that women’s lot in society will improve. Just because a woman can’t be coerced by threats, torture, starvation, or any other means to concieve or to use her mote of kai, doesn’t mean men won’t still hurt women to confirm through experimentation that coercion doesn't work, or to take out their frustrations that they can’t make women behave anymore. And a male rapist who becomes impotent as a result of his victim using her mote of kai can still hurt women nonsexually, or even still commit more sexual assault by means other than with his penis.

I would have accepted if either Brenna or any of the other female POVs had acknowledged that the spell couldn’t possibly be written with enough detail to protect every woman from every kind of sexist violence, but no one ever did. It’s just not good writing.

-There is only a very basic level of differing characterization between Alys, Jinnell, Chanlix, Shelvon, and Ellin. Multiple POV characters should bring different things to the narrative; otherwise, you could have just restricted the POV to one person.

There are very rarely any times when women wanting different things (at any level) is important to the story. There are multiple points where it seemed as though groundwork was being laid for a conflict of interests between two women, and then it just never went anywhere.

-There is one antagonistic female character who only appears in a single scene; she is a chaperone who supervises Jinnell on Delnamal's orders to enforce his control over Jinnell. She is the only exception  — and a very minor one  — to a rule that otherwise spans the entire book: all the female characters are "good guys". There are no other female antagonists, nor are there any other situations where a female character does anything that inconveniences or harms any other female character. You can't be a feminist writer if you don't let female characters be wrong sometimes, with the agency for their bad decisions to actually cause problems.

At the very least you need to let female characters conflict with each other because of differing wants or needs, even if none of them are exactly "wrong". The premise of this book was perfectly set up to have some women supporting the patriarchy unquestioningly and/or some women who work with the patriarchy under duress; there could also have been women, or factions of women, who were all opposed to the patriarchy but had conflicting views about politics, ethics, and the best way to proceed into their new future. But instead, all the women seem to agree with each other about everything, even when it doesn’t make sense for them to do so.

-All the interpersonal dynamics between women have a tone of saccharine sweetness where no woman ever has any bad feelings about any other woman. Chanlix never feels so much as a brief resentment of the other abigails who she’s responsible for; Jinnell, despite being a teenager, never gets irritated with her mother; Alys does not get angry at Shelvon for being unable to produce an heir for Delnamal even as that puts Jinnell in danger; Shelvon, despite being habitually frightened and nervous of what Delnamal will do to her, doesn't resent other women for putting her in positions of increased risk, nor does her fear make other women resent her. The author evidently subscribes to the concept of the inherent sisterhood between all women, as unrealistic as it is. The experience of reading about the conflictless interpersonal relationships between women was exactly the same as eating pasta with no salt.

-You will also notice the high saturation of noblewomen in the main cast. Even Chanlix, while not currently allowed the status and privilege of a noblewoman, was born into a noble family, as are all the women relegated to the Abbey. There are no common-born women who get POV chapters. The only servant woman who gets any notable screen time is the personal maid of the queen; she is a Loyal Servant and that is her only character trait. She also only has a couple of scenes and is otherwise unimportant to the narrative. This is especially bizarre considering that one of Ellin's struggles as queen is not having very many people she can trust; we're told that she trusts the maid, but the maid has so little screen time that her position as a supposedly trusted confidante was meaningless to the narrative.

-Alys and Chanlix become friends, but their friendship is entirely uncompelling. Friendship between female characters is not interesting if the progression of the relationship is just “they exist in the same space and then they become friends”, and especially not when the narrative just says they're friends now without doing the work to actually portray the friendship.

-The world overall just doesn't seem to have poor people in it. One of the early plot events was an earthquake, which Alys predicted would cause a tidal wave; she immediately went out of her way to go to the harbor district that is mainly inhabited by the lower classes, and warn them of the upcoming tidal wave that would sweep away their neighborhood. This whole plot sequence was presumably meant to virtue-signal that Alys cares about poor people despite being a noblewoman, but the author avoided actually putting poor people on-page by only describing the sequence in retrospect.

Re economic status, while Chanlix is somewhat concerned with the problem of how to organize the abigails to make money to support themselves, the possible consequence of them all falling into poverty doesn't feel real. You know that post about how the MCU tells us that Peter Parker is poor and then depicts him tossing away his backpack when he needs to get into costume quickly, with no concern for getting it back, or consequences when he can't get it back? This felt like that. The narrative gestures vaguely in the direction of the abigails being working-class, but doesn't say anything realistic or believable about what their economic position actually feels like.

The plotline that Chanlix is part of is kicked off by the previous Abbess, Alys’ mother Brenna, casting the anti-pregnancy spell at the beginning. Even though Brenna didn’t survive the casting, the king and crown prince are determined to punish all the other abigails, and so send them all away into exile. Chanlix’s story is mainly about how the abigails establish a new town in exile, aided by the appearance of a new Well (where the magic in the world comes from) that allows them to create the same kind of spells they always have, and also experiment with magic to create new spells, and thereby establish themselves as useful to the surrounding settlements without having to continue their sex work.

There’s a description of the new town, Women’s Well, that says it’s a cooperative community where no one is desperately poor. This implies that the author is aware of the importance of community construction and maintenance that avoids letting anyone fall into poverty, but she continues to not depict poor people on page, or address feminist issues that affect poor women.

The whole Women’s Well plotline is badly executed in another way: Chanlix is the leader, and you would expect that her arc would be about her struggles with leadership, right? Even if the author is committed to no woman ever having negative feelings toward any other woman for any reason, and therefore doesn’t want to depict anyone opposing Chanlix’s leadership, Chanlix could still have a plot arc about gaining confidence in her leadership skills, right?

No such luck. There are ZERO scenes of Chanlix exercising her leadership after they arrive at the site where they will establish Women’s Well. The only scene in the entire book where she has to make a leadership decision is before they go into exile: one of the subordinate abigails has used her mote of kai to create a spell that will render a particular man permanently impotent. She asks Chanlix’s permission to cast it. Chanlix tells her no, but she does it anyway. Chanlix has a single moment of doubt as to what she should do  — punish the disobedience or let it go  — and decides to let it go. At the time, this read like foreshadowing for Chanlix being a weak leader who would struggle with keeping the people in her charge from constantly disobeying her. But like all the other things that seemed like groundwork for conflict, this never went anywhere.

-I never get the sense that any of the female characters like being women. Various women of the cast are said to have a range of interests, including Jinnell, the teenager, who likes ~frivolous~ female pursuits alongside many others who don't care; but nobody ever has so much as a single moment of (cis)gender euphoria where they are genuinely happy to be female. What the hell is female empowerment even for, if not that? (But of course if the author is a terf, she wouldn't want to approach such trans-influenced concepts as gender euphoria, even for cis people.)

I also would have expected a story about women's oppression to feature discussion of the injustice a female child feels as she reaches adolescence, and realizes what it means to be an adult woman in a sexist society. But by having the youngest POV character be 18, that whole phase of any woman's life is skipped over and ignored.

-The POV characters are a range of ages — Jinnell is 18, Shelvon and Ellin are early 20s, Chanlix and Alys are early 40s  — but there are no major characters who are old women or young girls. Both of those POVs would have been valuable in a story about women, and specifically a story that pivots around a major change in how the world sees women. It would have made sense to include old women who have lived their whole lives under horrific sexist conditions, and show them contributing meaningfully to the politics of the new world; and inclusion of young girls would have reinforced that the adult women are fighting for a better future, not just survival in the present.

I strongly suspect that the exclusion of younger and older female characters is because the author wants the book to be adapted into a TV show, and she was aware that Hollywood doesn't want child actresses or older actresses if they can be avoided. Making choices about how to write a novel based on a screen adaptation that may or may not happen is not a choice I can agree with.

-There were moments early on where the sex work industry was talked about as unequivocally coercive and I was like, I disagree with that stance for real life, but I'm willing to entertain it for this fictional universe where things really are worse for sex workers than irl. But then there was a conversation between Tynthanal and Chanlix where he says he has never employed an abigail because consent is important to him, and abigails can't truly consent because of the coercive nature of being paid for sex. Since that is a stance that applies to real life conditions as well, I feel free to criticize this political position along with all the others listed above.

-When it starts to sink in for the people of this world that women can no longer get pregnant against their will, one of the social changes is that women who are interested in sex can now have as much unprotected sex as they want; the narration says something like "with the same lack of consequences as men do".

At this point (listening to the audiobook while driving) I was smacking my steering wheel and shouting "STIs!" at the book. The author did not see fit to include any other risks associated with unprotected sex besides pregnancy, which is unrealistic to the point of infuriating. In regard to STIs, it should have said "with only the same risks as men have".

Even aside from STIs, there are other potential consequences for women who start to be more open about having sex in situations other than what has previously been socially acceptable. The author even acknowledges elsewhere in the book that women face societal consequences (slutshaming) for sex outside of marriage, but then doesn't carry that to a conclusion that the women characters still don't have total freedom to have sex just because they can't get pregnant.

-Later in the book, Jinnell is facing the prospect of having to marry the abuser to maintain the trade agreement, and tries to avoid that fate by finding a man to sleep with so that her potential husband will reject her as unchaste. She flirts heavily with a guardsman but can't get him to follow through on any action. Jinnell later is confronted by Delnamal, who says that the guardsman told his supervisor what Jinnell did, and Jinnell is threatened with severe punishment for her attempt to throw away her virginity. The narrative here clearly wants us to blame the guardsman, but here's the thing: he was genuinely uncomfortable with Jinnell's advances, and it doesn't read like he told on Jinnell to punish her, just to get reassigned away from anywhere he might have to encounter her again. That's right, folks: if you get harassed by someone in your workplace, you shouldn't tell your employer so the problem can be prevented from happening again, because the harasser might get in trouble for it!

Even with the focus on conception and pregnancy, there is no discussion of birth or obstetrics. Women in a setting with no modern medical science should have taken the pain and health risks of childbirth into account when thinking about pregnancy, but no births happen in the story and none of the POV characters (including the ones who are mothers) ever even think about childbirth.

-In an absolutely bizarre narrative choice, the book is very limited in its discussion of what sexism is. Issues that the book does not discuss even in passing include: childrearing or any other labor considered to be women’s work; breastfeeding or restrictions on its social acceptability; women being disenfranchised from education; women having difficulty being taken seriously by medical professionals, or a lack of concern in the medical field about women's health issues; the expectation that women should follow particular beauty standards even when it is expensive or uncomfortable to do so; the prevention of access or societal disapproval for women in sports, the arts, religion, or any other field; in short, all the issues of systemic sexism. Even though the author clearly mainly wanted to talk about reproductive injustice, I fully do not understand why anyone would write a book about women’s oppression and not talk about these issues.

-All the abigails are women. There is no mention of male sex workers, either for women clients or men clients. Gender essentialism and queer erasure again.

-The book start-to-finish has a huge problem with telling instead of showing. We're told that Jinnell likes "frivolous" typically-female things, but never see any evidence of that on-page. We're told that Alys and Chanlix are friends, but we don't see them having any interactions that support the idea that they are friends. We're told that Women's Well establishes itself as an autonomous town, but we don't see any of that process. I don't know if this is because of the writing style that is meant to be easily adapted into television, but even screen media needs to know how to show rather than tell.

It's not even that the author tried to keep the length of the book manageable by describing things briefly instead of depicting them in full, because this book is twenty audio hours or about 550 pages long.

The one and only thing I unequivocally liked:

-The characters' names all include the name of one of the magical elements, which was a cool worldbuilding detail.

---

Overall, I do not recommend this book.

If you want an epic fantasy with actually complex female characters, read "The Bone Shard Daughter" and "The Bone Shard Emperor" by Andrea Stewart instead. No queer main characters, but there is casual queerness in the world and it’s a no-sexism world as well. The female protagonist faces legitimately complicated leadership decisions including what to do about the female antagonist, who is also a complex character.

If you want a feminist fantasy and are okay with depictions of awful patriarchy and rape culture, read "Girls of Paper and Fire" by Natasha Ngan instead. There are queer main characters, as well as realistic conflicts between women who are all being oppressed by the patriarchy but react to it in different ways.

If you want a feminist fantasy with no rape, but still with a female protagonist who has to deal with sexism, and becomes a good leader through a series of leadership moments that actually happen on-screen, read “Lady Knight” by Tamora Pierce (but read the first three books in the series first).

#rosy reads #the women's war #jenna glass #rape tw #tokophobia tw #long post #really long. four thousand words long lmao oops

[plushyluke]

It is so gross that you push a heteronormative dynamic on Lashton. Doesn't it feel fetishizing to you?

thank you for sending bc normally i don't answer things like this, but since it's the holidays, i am feeling generous.

i am going to recommend a collection of essays called queerly phrased to you. particularly, a section entitled "surrogate phonology and transsexual f*ggotry." this book was written some time ago, so its views are not entirely unproblematic. however, a handful of the essays are nuanced and interesting pieces of intersectional queer theory. people on online platforms have a tendency to form opinions based on information they have heard being restated numerous times on twitter. i am here to offer a few informed quotes on slash fiction:

"one common 'explanation' of [slash] literature is to deny that it is about gay men at all, or even about two men at all..." (bagemihl 1997: pp. 387-388). when these writers are not "reviled or psychoanalyzed" they often have to "'explain' their interest in gay men as the symptom of some deeper motivation" (bagemihl 1997: p. 388).

"in all [examples], we see that (once again) any deviation from strictly heterosexual object choice or orientation...becomes problematized and subject to analysis. the issue here is not whether these analyses are correct...but why so many people seem to feel that these phenomena [--slash fics--] need to be 'explained' in the first place. in other words, if we took as a given that sexual orientation, gender identity, and biological sex are not necessarily connected, would we feel such an overwhelming need to explain instances where they don't 'coincide'?" (bagemihl 1997: p. 389) (ie: when we dress luke up in feminine clothes, when we choose a more feminine role for him, when we give lesbian characters masculine traits.)

and would you believe this author goes on to explain that queer writers are excluded from this problematic analysis in the first place? and guess the sexual orientation and gender identity of the person whose ask box you're currently in.

sorry, but don't repeat everything you see on a website.

source: bagemihl, b. (1997) "surrogate phonology and transsexual f*ggotry", in k. hall and a. livia  (eds) queerly phrased. oxford university press. new york, ny: pp. 387-389.

#swans poet society #ask swan #this has been sitting in my ask box but i have been heated bc im studying queer theory...thought i would show you all some leftist #analysis #a swan essay if you will #lashton fic #fanfic #swan writes #lashton asks #i have a feeling i know who this is

[kamoegoi]

Witch Theatre? :0 would u like to Expound?

oh hey sure!

me, from the future, after i finished writing this: oh god oh fuck im a rambly asshole and i put this underneath the cut

im pretty rusty all things considered and i dont think ive said this explicitly but my academic background is in english literature but within english literature i focused dramatic literature and within dramatic literature i focused specifically on witches and their potrayal on stage. i cant rattle off the esoterica like i used to but essentially the witch on page and on stage is the personification of a given community's anxieties and often in western literature of the anxieties associated with social hyopcrisies and, as one might imagine, socially out-grouped women end up being a pretty good vehicle for that kind of imagery. an an example i like to point to in western canon for its visibility and how explicit it is to these points, while notexactly my specialty because american literature is especially weak for me, is the scarlet letter because its a whole book about a woman suffering the punishment of a man's sin that he super duper definitely also commits but is still totally cool guys i swear and i think a lot of people have read or are aware of the general plot. in this example, they push her to the edge of town while all of them secretly continue to patron her to create a sort of ‘girl what were YOU doing at the devils sacrament’ type of  beat when they are literally all going there for her needlework. to those ends, we see the very basic theme of appearances vs reality re: social hyopcrisy, but its an extra fun layer of commentary on the community’s fears in that they revile her but seek her out specifically to embelish their own vanity (which is very on the nose for our contemporary understanding of puritans haha (wherein the text they are concerned with the appearance of virtue rather than actually acting virtuous)). so the witch in ficiton can often be portrayed yeah as sedentary because a witch who leaves the community who fears her forfeits the dissonance the community participates in that gives her power over that community in the first place. spoilers for scarlet letter, but the reason why i like to point to it as an example especially is because it really does insist on that single-placedness: in the end, neither hester nor dimmesdale can escape the puritanical rule that torments them to, in this reading, illustrate that neither witch, woman or otherwise closted as dimmesdale is, can ever really leave the seat of their power because without it they are a spooky scary reflection without the object thats casts them.

but also my head is full of fuck! and while this was my focus of study, i am by no means an expert (i actually went on to pursue education instead of getting deeper into literature or theater and that body of knowledge has waned even further for me relatively speaking lmao)! this is just one reading of literary witches that i am deeply fond of and is a very handy way to understand any (socially) isolated fictional woman’s role in a story. wrt to our blorbo in laws, consider this reading in context of say savathun or mara or eris morn and you see a lot of neat things that characters in fiction are afraid of. its also sorta funny to psychoanalyze the player base at times, esp wrt how mara is talked about at large at times (but again i cannot emphasize that i dont know anything and i know even less about social sciences and every part of history that i didnt specifically scrutinize for my own study)