juniorfor2

[juniorfor2]

I think he won all but one

This annoys me when they say we won't know for days but then we find out the day after?

Why do they even say that then?

Also, did Trump win all the battleground states? Or most of them?

[juniorfor2]

TG never seems to understand the fact that GRRM is really weird with how young he thinks people can have consensual sex. In ASOIAF, Dany could apparently have consensual sex at 13 with a guy at least twice her age, and Robb and Theon were having it at 14.

It was really weird and obviously if you look at it from any perspective, George is just flat out wrong for this, but it also needs to be understood that you can’t really blame the character in this case, because they’re only following the rules/guidelines that were already set in place by the author. So Daemon having sex with young girls, probably 14 or over (grrm got a tiny bit better in F&B when it’s noted that Aemma’s pregnancy at 13 wasn’t good), when he’s 24 himself, is obviously not good by any perspective, but it doesn’t say anything about Daemon as a character because the world of Westeros operates under the conditions that at 14+ it’s acceptable to have sex.

Aegon is different in this case, because as you said, the age of the girl that Aegon was with is explicitly mentioned. And Septon Eustace then tries to excuse this fact with the idea that because the girl is from a good family, her situation isn’t really that bad.

GRRM, unlike with Daemon, explicitly notes the girl’s age because he wants to make the distinction that she is being assaulted compared to Daemon consensually sleeping with the women in brothels. Why he thinks 13/14 is okay but not 12 is weird, but that is how his world operates. Maybe he thinks that girls don’t get their period until they’re 13 or something, who knows.

Daemon can’t be blamed for the age that GRRM thinks is acceptable, but Aegon can be because even by the guidelines of Westeros, 12 is considered too young and is rape. There’s no getting around that.

"Nor should it be forgotten that during his youth, every brothel keeper in King’s Landing knew that Lord Flea Bottom took an especial delight in maidens, and kept aside the youngest, prettiest, and more innocent of their new girls for him to deflower." A quote from "Fire and Blood"

Since you insist Aegon's paramour Eustace mentioned was a child since he dubs her 'girl', your Daemon was prolific pedophile by your own words. New GIRLS for him to deflower.

Again, they are described as Maidens in the text primarily. In the meantime, it is from Aegon II that we have clarification on the girl's age. 🙄

[juniorfor2]

There seem to be a whole bunch of anons this month going around harassing others, refusing to answer anything, and just being annoying in general.

I’ve gotten one that seems to be chronically checking on my posts (cause I know they’re not following me) but refuses to actually go over my post, and told me that they were asking anonymously just so I couldn’t block them - which I wouldn’t have done initially but obviously now will if I ever figure out who they are - and so they could keep harassing me.

I’d suggest turning off anonymous asks for a week or so. It’s perfectly fine to have a discussion, it’s another thing to have someone only interested in being a nuisance and getting into a fruitless argument with you.

im not going to further argue with this person bc they continue to misrepresent the things that i say but what i will say is that i can admit daemon has his faults. i've never claimed that he didn't do the things he did in the book

[juniorfor2]

Corlys and Rhaenys anon here. I would like for people to finally understand that the reason why Rhaenyra will never be explicitly reffered to as "beloved" in terms of personal relationships, especially as a wife, has nothing to do with her or Daemon in their intimate life, and everything to do with what she represents in a mysoginistic and patriarchal society: she is a woman that wants to rule, that effectively does not live by the rules imposed on her - not in her attitude, not in her personality, not in her position as heir etc.

Historically, women in positions similar or identical to Rhaenyra are constantly attacked, especially in historical documents. They are considered - by men generally, but by other women too - unnatural, anomalies that look to disturb the "proper" order of things. And these attacks do not resume only at them as persons - since they are unnatural in wanting to rule, they are also seen as unnatural mothers, wives etc. Every aspect of their personal life is under scrutiny and under attack as well. Sometimes they are not even considered women.

(See how The Shepherd reffers to Rhaenyra: “this unnatural queen who sits bleeding on the Iron Throne, her whore’s lips glistening and red with the blood of her sweet sister.”)

That's why we don't have romantic songs about Rhaenyra in the way we have about Laena or Nettles. Because Laena and Nettles do not disrupt the order of things in any way - Laena is won at a duel and handled between Corlys and Daemon; Nettles comes from nowhere and goes nowhere. They depend on Daemon alone to provide some importance for them. They are, in many ways, ideal for a patriarchal society.

Rhaenyra is not only proactive in deciding to live her life as she desires, but she is also held guilty for a war that was never started by her, called a whore repeatedly, dehumanized to the point of disbelief. But it's not hard at all to discern, from the objective actions of the people in her life, how beloved she was not only by Viserys, Daemon and all of her children, but by the people also.

I'm sorry this turned out so long, it's just... I wish people would comprehend this and stop painting her as unloved, mocking her, calling her names. Because in doing so they fall directly into the trap of the maesters who obviously hated her.

The simple fact that people continued to fight for her even after she died, that it is her line that continues, should tell people who was in the right. Alas, this fandom was never known for critical thinking.

[juniorfor2]

But it was the answer to your post lol. "TG don't like Rhae because she was fat and it means she's bad". No, I don't like her because she's boring as fuck.

First off, read my post properly. I never asked a question, therefore don’t need an answer. Nor am I talking about you, I’m talking about specific TG posts that I’ve seen recently that DO use Rhaenyra’s description as a reason to bash her. Nor am I talking about who is interesting or not. If you like side characters and mass murderers, good for you, but go have a good time in your own tags instead of bothering me.

Second, the fact that you’ve responded to two separate posts of mine so fast, one without direct tags tells me that you’re chronically online and checking my account for some weird reason. I’d stop that if I were you.

And if you can’t attach your username to respond cause you’re worried that someone might check your own blog, then I’m not going to respond to anything you say after this. This site is already anonymous to your real life, covering your username is just ridiculous. I keep anonymous questions open for good faith asks, not for someone to evade criticism from anyone.

[juniorfor2]

Got to love it when TG deliberately misunderstands what I’m writing. Cause anytime that I post about the Greens being in the wrong, inevitably a TG fan will try to subvert my argument by giving their tried and not true “aChTuAlLy, wE liKe TG bEcAuSe tHeY’rE iNtErEsTiNg.”

Genuinely hilarious that somebody, instead of replying directly to me with their already anonymous username, decided to make an anonymous ask to me just to reply with that stupid argument, even though I was commenting on reading styles and about the Greens being in the wrong, not on anyone’s opinions of who is interesting or not.

Honestly, they present that argument so frequently whenever someone criticizes them that it might just become their ‘I’m not racist, I have a black friend’ catchphrase.

[juniorfor2]

The biggest difference between TG and TB book readers, it seems, is that TG often seems to use the much older style of reading/writing, where physical appearance is a tell of who is a villain and who is good. 

Think Harry Potter’s Dudley and Marge, whose obesity and punishment of growing extremely obese was used to indicate their terrible qualities. Or Star War’s Jabba the Hutt, who was technically a species, but clearly reflected the same process of a high school bully who made people give up their money/food. Their obesity was meant to signal laziness and cruelty against others (There is so little self-reflection of the author’s part in portraying the characters as cruel, it’s incredibly ironic). 

For TG people who read the book (as few of them as there clearly are), they seem to follow this style of reading the most. Rhaenyra being portrayed as fat is to them a message that she is cruel and lazy. Rather than parse through GRRM’s purposeful style that showed how women were portrayed based on what men’s opinions of them were, they believe the answer is given by the character’s looks. 

This also follows with Jace, Luke, and Joff not having the typical Targaryen looks, which, to TG, means that they were purposely denied such and therefore defined as unworthy and bastards (which is why, despite how “anti-Targaryen” they are, they’ll consistently make their OFC paired with Aemond as Laenor and Rhaenyra’s true-born, white daughter with silver hair to signal that OFC’s worthiness to be with their victimized school shooter metaphor). 

And while that style of writing isn’t always antithetical to GRRM at times - he definitely had his bad moments - it definitely isn’t GRRM’s point either. That’s why his 5 main characters are a bastard, a dwarf, an outcast abused bridal slave, a 9 year old girl who is constantly defeminized, and a cripple. He obviously wasn’t following the overall idea that looks determine/go along with terrible qualities. It wasn’t even the point in Fire & Blood. 

In fact, looks are sometimes a red herring in Fire & Blood. Daeron is described as charming and kind, yet he goes on a mass murdering spree, even killing people in Septs despite growing up in Oldtown. Rhaenyra is described as ugly and stout, yet no one in the Kingdoms cares unless they’re being misogynistic. The only point of GRRM including looks in F&B was just to develop the idea that appearance doesn’t mean everything.

[juniorfor2]

People need to understand that you can’t make someone legitimate if they’re already considered legitimate. As long as Rhaenyra, Harwin, and Laenor never said a word about their secret, the boys are legitimate. Because there was no definite, objective way to prove otherwise. Alicent could shout from the roof that the boys don’t look like Velaryons, but it would always fall flat against Laenor saying, “well who cares how they look, I know that I slept with Rhaenyra and that those are my sons.” There was no way to get around that argument at the time.

"rhaenyra should have legitimized jace if she wanted him to be heir" baby, he was her heir. and she didn't have to legitimize him because according to law he was trueborn child of laenor. laenor claimed so and so did rhaenyra. as long as these two or harwin didn't say anything velaryon boys ARE actual velaryon boys and the rest is just rumors. what more, the only people that should be concerned with jace and luke's parentage - so viserys and corlys - didn't give a fuck about whom rhaenyra fucked to give them heirs. they just didn't. so i'm sorry, random jenny from storybrooke, but you can shove "they don't have silver hair" paternity test in your ass

[juniorfor2]

TG clearly gets the idea from the paragraphs about Aegon II ordering gold statues of his brothers to be built, but the idea is built off of ignoring every other part of the text about them.

Even if Aegon really did miss Aemond, it was obviously not very reciprocated. There are multiple lines about Aemond being power-hungry, taking the crown onto his head the moment he could, and not wanting to share any of the glory with his brothers. That doesn’t sound like love or care in any sense. But TG ever so conveniently acts like that part of the text doesn’t exist (or, more likely, they’ve never actually read the book).

I've heard this take a lot about the TG being a close-knit, united family and that Amond, Daeron, and Helena were loyal to Aegon.

...no. Aemond did several things, in the book, that were not conducive towards either his sister nor his brother's safety, though more on Helaena's. And Daeron wasn't that close to any of them, not likely, since he had been at Oldtown since he was 12, spending 4 years or so there before the Dance. four years doesn't sound like a lot, but the way this particular family's set up...

[juniorfor2]

Aegon was incredibly depressed after his parents and siblings died, and it’s even referenced that he “worshipped his elder three half-brothers,” the idea that he would ever kill Jace, Luke, and Joff to become king is simply a lack of reading comprehension.

Also, even if the initial Dance of Dragons never happened (perhaps if the greens never existed) and Aegon did decide to usurp the throne, most of the lords that opposed Rhaenyra wouldn’t necessarily oppose Jace.

Jace would obviously have the Starks due to their loyalty, the Vale due to his blood ties through Rhaenyra, the Velaryons through Corlys/Laenor/Lucerys, the Baratheons through his grandmother Rhaenys (who also had black hair in the book), and the Riverlands through their love of his mother.

The only ones up for dispute would be the Tyrells and the Lannisters. The Hightowers probably wouldn’t involve themselves, so the Tyrells would probably align with whoever seems stronger (Jace) or stay neutral, and if the Lannisters allied with Aegon, Jace could then probably get the Greyjoys to align with him and sack Lannisport for riches, which would take out the Lannisters.

So who would support him? Daemon? If Rhaenyra was dead, then the man who was 16 years older than her definitely would have been. And even if he wasn’t, why would he support Aegon? Through Baela and Rhaena, he got his blood and even personality onto the Iron Throne and direct inheritance to the richest house of Westeros, which Daenaera Velaryon wouldn’t have brought.

Besides, Daemon isn’t a wife killer in the books, so why is this being mixed with the show? Nor is Jace’s bastardy an obvious or even confirmed thing in the book - unless Rhaenyra, Laenor, Viserys, or Corlys declared him a bastard, he’s considered legitimate. The children don’t start out illegitimate and then gain legitimacy, they start out legitimate and are only considered otherwise if the husband or head of the house declares them a bastard.

This feels like a classic case of someone pretending to have read the books but didn’t and is clearly hoping that the show was close enough that they’ll be accurate when arguing with someone.

"Rhaenyra tried to put bastards on the throne"

[juniorfor2]

I will always find it interesting that for all that people constantly complain about "likable" or "nuanced" villians, wanting "the good old days, where a villain was just a villain and there was nothing more to them," the moment that you open any Youtube video centered on a "nothing but a villain" character, it has at least a few comments making them far more likable and nuanced than they really are. Which wouldn't be of much interest, except for one fact - they all have at least 10-20 thousand likes.

People complain that Disney and other corporations are ruining movies, making characters far too palatable and relatable, but in truth, the same people who complain about such things will also end up liking and encouraging any thinking that characterizes the villains as such. Corporations mostly follow what their viewers want, even if slow or in a bad direction, not the other way around.

Tywin Lannister was an unmistakable bad guy in ASOIAF and Game of Thrones. He was horrible to Tyrion, cared nothing for his family beyond what they could offer to his legacy, and was willing to commit horrific deeds to climb to power. In fact, he demonstrated almost every reason for why "feudalism is bad!" as some people constantly write about. And yet, there are dozens of videos, comments, and social media posts about how Tywin Lannister was misunderstood the whole time and was really a good guy.

He should have been "the good old days where a villain was just a villain!" Isn't that what people wanted? He was an obvious antagonist to Tyrion, one of the main protagonists - perfect, right? Yet instead of grabbing onto this, people turned him into the very thing they claimed not to like.

They could have simply done this with the protagonist. Why not make the protagonist a bit more likable? It doesn't mean much to the story when done, even if it does miss the point occasionally.

But that's not what happens. In fact, the opposite does. The protagonist, the character that's supposed to be likable or nuanced according to them, is turned into the "nothing but a villain" character.

Daenerys Targaryen is one such character. She is very, very obviously one of the biggest protagonists. The first book ends with her, with "for first time in hundreds of years, the night came alive with the music of dragons." She is a bridal slave turned Breaker of Chains. She makes mistakes, as every protagonist does, but still progresses forward.

What's not to like about her? While her circumstances and the hard choices she must make do take her into the shades of grey, she is still so compassionate for those suffering that she never comes anywhere close to the darkness that Jon Snow or Tyrion have demonstrated and progressed to. Making her more likable is easy. That's not what happens though.

Instead, she is villainized. She is determined by others to become the darkest character of all, with no nuance or likability whatsoever. They make her the villain in place of the one they've made palatable.

Some of this, I think, can be summed up to people being somewhat idiots and thinking that their idea of hot means good. I remember watching the first 4 seasons back with a sort-of-friend, and she had a huge crush on Charles Dance playing Tywin (she was 16 at the time and he was in his 60s - no, I didn't understand her, and yes, I took great pleasure in showing her Tywin's death). She was so convinced that he wasn't that bad, and the only reason she thought that was because she found him hot. So obviously that does take up a part of it. But it's definitely not the main reason.

The main reason, seeming fairly obvious, is because the idea that movies/shows/books have social or political ideas is no longer something they can ignore. They'll rave about wokeness, saying that it's in every movie now, and why can't we all go back to the good old days of Star Trek and Star Wars and the Lord of the Rings books that of course had absolutely no themes. Despite them having some incredibly heavy or obvious ideas, people somehow managed to ignore them. But now they can't.

Said people do not want to go back to the good old days of "nothing but a villain." They want to back to the "good old days" where they didn't have to examine why a villain was so terrible. They don't want to see themselves in the antagonist - so they make it so villain is no longer one.

In their desperation to get rid of political themes and ideas, and to cover up their own views that could make them look at themselves as the "villain" of our real life "story," they switch the antagonist and the protagonist, the villain and the hero, to make themselves the hero.

After all, why examine your own faults when you can just make them the correct, non-woke perspective?

[juniorfor2]

Cannot believe the amount of people who say they hate Fire and Blood because GRRM was too Team Black biased. Why do these people take up about 3/4 of the grrm critical tag?

Just a hint for anyone not familiar with reading: if an author sets up a pretty obvious protagonist, with misogynistic antagonists, maybe, just maybe, there is a reason for it.

[juniorfor2]

As much as I criticized the first season's terrible design of dresses/clothing, I do think looking back, there was a little bit more to be praised about it than I initially thought (especially in comparison to the second season).

While the second season's dresses are undeniably more intricate, better designed, and more suited to GOT, I don't like the conservatism in this season for the dresses. Rhaenyra and Alicent have almost the exact same dress in different colors.

Obviously there are differences, but they are still much too similar around the neckline. The dresses are used over and over again, the designs and colors for different characters don't change as much as they should - Rhaenyra only wears black/red, Alicent only wears blue/greens - and there is a distinct lack of jewelry; Rhaenyra only wears two necklaces the entire season and only seems to have a wedding ring on, nothing else. It still feels like the budgeting for the costumes was kept small.

The first season, even with such bad designs, definitely seemed to have more variety - specifically around Rhaenyra, the main character. She starts with bright colors in her childhood, from gold to red to white to bronze to a very bright red/gold, adds on a darker red/gold coat, and then back to a white. The style is her own too - it's not as intricate and bold as it should be, but it's definitely not as conservative as Alicent's dresses are.

Then after the transition, as Rhaenyra has grown up and the world has become more unforgiving, she transitions to darker colors - Velaryon blue, dark red overcoat. After her time with Daemon, she wears a non-intricate, more comfortable looking darker red dress, probably trying to indicate that her life is better on Dragonstone. In court she shows with her first black dress. It's intricate, has a very different neckline/general style to the rest of her dresses, and has some unique jewelry. The last episode is the final culmination of this in Rhaenyra's very serious looking black dress, which isn't my favorite with the collar but does convey her progression from happy childhood to a more grown and serious adulthood.

Alicent also starts out somewhat conservative, but keeps the childhood part at first. She wears simple blues at the beginning, and transitions to reds as she marries into the Targaryen house, and to signal the start of her transition into adulthood, wears a bright (almost poisonously) green dress.

After the skip, she wears darker greens, and eventually wears an extremely conservative dark green dress that covers every part of her, and jewelry is restricted to symbols of the Faith. This switches back once when Alicent is symbolized as coming back to her childhood friendship, with a more open neckline and closer to Rhaenyra's style, but goes back to the heavy clothing with Viserys' death and Aegon's coronation.

While the designs often weren't very good, I will give the costume designers praise for following the plot so much with the clothing.

[juniorfor2]

The way you talk about “whiteness” in canon makes it seem like you think that Vaemond was black in the book. He wasn’t, both the Targaryens and the Velaryons were white, there was no racism as you seem to be implying. Nor is the parentage of Rhaenyra’s son so unambiguous in the books, and he was talking shit about things that could get her kids killed.

The racism of the show writers is a problem, but it ain’t Rhaenyra’s.

Let’s talk about House Velaryon’s treatment!!! Let’s talk about their legitimate grievances being sidelined and the Silent 5 erased to instead make white Rhaenyra a victim of Vaemond when in canon she sends her white husband to have him brutalized for her white children!!! And her white daddy props her up by having 5 House Velaryon members be brutalized for fighting for their house. Be sooooo fucking for real .

[juniorfor2]

But that still doesn’t take away the fact that Otto would have needed to plan around Rhaenyra killing them. After all, if she was named heir in the first place, then removed only because her brother was a boy, why didn’t Otto ever think that Rhaenyra might try to kill her siblings to become heir again?

He was either lying or at the fault of bad writing, cause Rhaenyra obviously wouldn’t do anything. As much as the writers would like to pretend that kinslaying means absolutely nothing, it usually meant death/exile/other punishment for anyone who committed the crime. And Rhaenyra was already in a precarious situation just by being a woman, regardless of any siblings, so killing them would have only made things worse for her.

If Otto was so sure that Rhaenyra would kill her siblings after becoming queen then why he wanted her daughter to marry Viserys and give birth to Rhaenyra siblings when he literally was the one that proposed Rhaenyra being an heir.

[juniorfor2]

See, the worst thing about Arcane is the fact that despite the show having very little/nothing to do with gender inequality, 99% of YouTubers that talk about the show are white men all trying to prove that misogyny doesn’t exist.

I’m not joking in the slightest. Every. Single. One. Is about how arcane is sooo good just because “they don’t bring gender into it and that automatically makes it amazing, no one cares about all the other political/social issues also present in the show” or “men don’t hate female characters they only hate badly written ones. Pls take this as fact from us white men.” It never ends.

[juniorfor2]

I will never understand how this specific fandom, mostly on tumblr, managed to create an entire group of people who love non-characterized, essentially non-existent, super “pure” side characters in a way that points to an incredibly specific group of very, very white liberal people who think that they are super accepting by engaging in political correctness to such an extreme degree that they actually end up on the queerphobic, non-feminist, and racist side of refusing to accept anyone who breaks from the social norm and only accepting “pure” and insignificant characters that have to be self-inserted into in order to have even the slightest amount of importance.