#there are a BUNCH of conservative lighteyes characters who push against social progress in their own ways who are represented

[basket-of-radiants]

moash is just what kaladin could have been without a few key good influences/nudges in the right direction. they’re foils, guys ! foils !

Hey guys, nice to hear from you all. These are all pretty solid and different takes. I personally fall more in camp 3 out of what’s presented here. (I mean now that he can fly, I want to see where Vyre goes as well!) As much as I’m there for changing/growing arcs, it’s not a secret that I find Moash to be significantly more interesting that Elhokar’s story.

I’m gonna talk about foils now.

Moash is honestly a good foil to Kaladin in more ways than one-while I wouldn’t call them the same, their backstories and actions undeniably have a lot of parallels. I’m gonna put that aside though, because I like their contrast on bigger concerns as well. It is immensely valuable to me to have another darkeyed character who is allowed to be proactive in the story and who has his own distinct ways of coming to terms with the racism and class structure of their society that are different from what the protagonist does. I don’t even mean in terms of actions but in terms of politics as well. I am nowhere near as anti-establishment as he was, but then again I’ve never had to live under a monarch that personally had gotten my family killed. While Kaladin’s approach of proving his worth to Dalinar will probably have better long-term results for everyone, I can understand why someone might not want to be quite as patient. He thought he’d never see any form of justice so when he was suddenly dropped into proximity of Elhokar for what could have been the first or the last time, I understand why he would have wanted to take what might have been his only chance. Or later on in Oathbringer, the tipping point for Moash considering humans evil was after trying to join a group of Alethi resistance where he discovered that even without the societal structures in place to enforce it, everyone else still unquestioningly fell back into the same racist hierarchy he’d spent his whole life living. Sure that’s not the deepest understanding of how cultural structures work, but why should he want to stay if that’s going to be the case? I think his revenge quest ultimately ended up hurting him as a person, but his story’s not just about revenge. It’s about a person trying desperately to escape a society that has always told him to keep his head down and stay in his place. (He said that the reason he’d worked caravans instead of a nicer job was because he had always taken up too much space for a darkeyes and that brought trouble. I know a lot of people see it as betrayal, but don’t think he was ever on team-Alethi to begin with or vise versa.) Kaladin tries to rise within their society and hopefully change it within the current power structures and that’s all well and good. Moash believes that their society inherently brings structures of violence, racism, and exploitation, and therefore isn’t worth working with in the first place. It’s better to get rid of everything and make something new from scratch. That is the difference between Kaladin and Moash that I’m interested in. In many ways it reflects the themes of healing vs. anger as well, just on a larger scale. As I said at the beginning, Kaladin’s approach is one I personally tend to prefer, in that it feels more attainable and in that violent overthrows of governments without good alternative infrastructures already in place tend not to go that well. You are welcome to disagree with Moash on his approach if you like-I mean I just said I did-but he’s the only major character with this particular perspective, and so it’s lost from the narrative if you just throw him out.

(Well, time to not go back and add paragraph breaks. Have fun.)

#long post #moash #fuck i can't make gifs on this computer #i had to use a website! which isn't inherently bad i guess but like. image quality. #i'm robbing all of you of such a beautiful experience #i guess i need photoshop after all #asks #thaumasilva #anonymous #there are a BUNCH of conservative lighteyes characters who push against social progress in their own ways who are represented #i'm interested to see a more radical darkeyes character as well okay? #anyway thank you guys for waiting i didn't want to reply until i was in a headspace to talk about him #apparently my proper ask-answering conditions are waiting idly for shit to start #i can do a couple more