#Don't tell people to kill themselves

[fr3sh-c0rn]

Hey guys. Important message.

Do NOT tell ANYONE to kill themselves, regardless of anything. Plain and simple. I've seen a lot of this happening, especially to people who voted for Trump. Trump is a horrible, depraved monster of a person, and if you did vote for him, I will heavily question your morals and character, but that doesn't mean I get the moral high ground--or right--to tell you to end your life. Doing that is wrong and disgusting, pretty much in any situation and just because someone did something horrible does it mean you can tell them that they should kill themselves. Saying something like that about Trump, as in he should kill himself, I can understand, I have made such jokes, but I don't think I could be genuinely happy at the prospect anyone committing suicide. I can sorta see where people are coming from, because they're angry about it, just like the rest of us. Like yes, they did something awful, but wishing for the death of someone because they voted for someone else sounds kind of familiar.

Hate, but don't wish the death on. (Except trump)

[deathspeaker]

Kill yourself,the world would be better off without you.weakling

Hey look! I got hate mail!

Fuck if I know why lol I just have to assume they're a libertarian.

[bixels]

I'm not getting into The Giving Tree discourse...

[randomnameless]

Why do we still have in 2024 stupid takes like Rhea created and enforces the crest system?

Bcs Rhea BaD anon.

More seriously,

FE Fodlan is one of one of the most divorced FE verses from its fantasy elements (see : Nabateans being as important as Ignatz's leather shoes) : Tellius has the Laguz existing, Archanea/Ylisse has manaketes hanging around and being a core point in FE Archanea, Elibe has its entire history involving dragons and the best ending finally be about acceptance between the two races, Magvel has zombies, Valentia has terrors and in SoV we have dragons and magic dragon blood, Fates has dragons (and laguz-like!) and even Jugdral have people with magic dragon blood.

(i ranted and ranted and ranted under the cut, so it's a bit long)

Unlike Fodlan, Jugdral's "people with magic dragon blood" are a key element to the story told at large, and it bleeds through the mechanics used to tell that story. FE4 wise, toddler!Seliph has a S rank in swords when Beowulf, even if he trains his entire life, will never achieve A rank in swords. Base!Julia with her holy weapon can smack Loptyr, when max!invested (at least lore wise) Forseti!Ced will never be able to kill him.

It's unfair for Beo and Ced, but that is how the verse works because, in that verse, some people are mc guffins or "the only ones" who are able to do something, or even, straight out, stronger/have more talent than others.

In traditional fantasy settings we have the "same" sort of rules, you have elves who do X and Y, humans won't can't, dwarves who can't either but they can do W, orc who can do J, etc etc.

Even for all of the "deconstruction of the genre!" gimmick ASOIAF has, according to some people, Dany is fire-proof and Jon most likely survives after being assassinated because he is a Stark and can use his doggo as a back up save, both things Edmure Tully will never be able to achieve.

Tolkien has Numenoreans being straight up blessed by the Valar/stronger/longer lived/etc etc than middle-earth humans, on top of also having elves, dwarves and ents.

Ergo : power inbalance is baked in the fantasy genre.

And yet, the writers often manage to tell some version of "the ones who have less power are no less important", like with Tolkien, it's a bunch of hobbits who manage to take down the greatest "evil" of their era, or some message like "having more power/being more important means you are bound to help the ones who have none" thingie.

In Fodlan, the "beings who have more power" than humans are the Nabateans (+ Sothis herself!). Sothis can create life, her daughter - through unknown means - can create artifical beings, one her children can control weather (the one who was turned in a milkshake for Charon!), one of them has monstruous strength (the one turned in a milkshake for Blaiddyd), one of them could communicate with animals (Timotheos iirc - if we assume he was a Nabatean or got his powers from his crest), her granddaughter can set up an AOE to heal what would otherwise be fatal wounds (it's heavily implied this is what Flayn did when she overused her power and went comatose) etc etc.

This is the original power inbalance in Fodlan.

Then some humans "stole" this power from Nabateans, and got a share of it themselves, which is what is later called "crest" : aka, some humans got a part of the super/magic powers that Nabateans originally had and thus, because, for all intents and purposes, "super-humans".

Now, Fodlan discourse started with FE16 being released in 2019, not that long after GoT's ending - which was trash - and in an era where fandom turned from "harmless fun" to "something that looks like activism and earns you point if you manage to use it to express your real life opinions".

In 2019, after Dumb and Dumber tanked GoT and removed most of ASOIAF fantasy parts to deliver "sex that sells" with a moldy plot, some part of the fandom started to conflate and harass people over what they like, and how it, apparently, reflected on their real life opinions ("if you hate this female character it means you hate women!"/"if you think X becoming king is a good ending, you don't value democracy!").

So, we have this fantasy setting with its inherent power inbalance... that quickly became something that is/was unacceptable, because IRL, power inbalance is based on bullshit and something everyone decries - so if your beloved media reflects on what you like IRL, you can't like a setting with an objective power inbalance, even if is justified by magic which doesn't exist irl like shooting eyebeams or some people being more "special than others" who can live up to 1500 years old.

Fodlan's power inbalance, for some parts of the fandom 2019, cannot be justified by traditional fantasy settings so, those settings/fantasy elements are straight out ignored.

Thus the "crests"' magic effects/powers are ignored, and dumbed down to, roughly, what a middle school student would think "nobility" is/was in the Middle Ages/Renaissance.

Jean-François Marie Pierre de Bourbon isn't inherently better at smashing things with a sword than Bob, or at healing than Roger, any "advantage" Jean-François Marie Pierre de Bourbon has over them is, maybe, that he started training earlier.

In Fodlan?

If Jean-François Marie Pierre de Charon has a major Charon crest, he can dance and clap in his hands to summon rain. Bob and Roger, no matter how hard they train, will never be able to do that. Jean-François Marie Pierre de Charon will thus be seen as having higher "value" or being straight up "better" than Bob or Roger, because as long as he is here, your crops will never suffer from drought.

But... we can't have that, because if you confuse fandom and real life opinions and aspirations, you cannot admit that some people in Fodlan are inherently "better" at something, only because of their blood, otherwise, what would it translate to IRL?

This is why, imo, part of the fandom (and the game sure doesn't help! Fodlan is no Jugdral and its gameplay lacks coherence regarding the in-game lore! Remember how Raphael can use a relic and only loses 10HP, when Miklan, plot wise, was turned in a demonic beast?) that loves this take, arguably, reduces crests to a title and family name.

Why should the Bourbon family rule over us, when they're no better than Roger or Bob? Isn't it unfair the Bourbons are still valued nowadays when the only thing to their fame is their name, and not what they are actually doing?

The game plays coy about crests - we know each of them has a specific power - but it never reveals what are those powers (lore wise!) save for 2 of them. So are crests superpowers, or just a family name with a particle, or both? Is the "system" (a friend made a post debunking any idea of "systemic" application of this notion in the three countries) based on bullshit, or on, objective superpowers?

Dimitri tries to tackle the issue, but only around relic usage : the Gautiers are valued if they have a crest because they can use their superweapon to protect the border. But what about valuing House Charon's ability to bring rain and guarantee good harvests? What is the other superpower tied to the crest of Gautier that isn't "use a femur and wreck havoc with it"?

If Marianne's ability to talk to animals is tied to her crest, why isn't it more developed? Instead of having useless shit like talking and befriending horses like a Disney princess, we could have Maurice-blooded people be masters of counter-intelligence, imagine if they can talk to birds/rodents and ask them to scout various areas or spy/ask them what they saw ! Hell, we could have had a situation where in a fog of war map, where Marianne, if, idk, through Billy fed enough animals in the monastery, would have a better field of vision than anyone else, with some blurb/one-line about her relying on the animals around to know and see what is going on! Alas, it wasn't meant to be.

FE16 eludes the question, because the character who "questions" a world centered around "crests" is the marketable asset of the game, and cannot be challenged in any meaningful capacity v- she feels it's unfair that her crest seemingly dictate her life, and only in the gacha game with ery serious writing like the Heavy Plate Corps or Sniddies, does she get a modicum of self-reflection - or at least someone challenging her - where she is told that she could use the superpowers she has to help people instead of blaming the world for getting one.

In a traditional FE setting, where some Lords question why they were born with power/or are in powerful positions, the answer is always that no matter what they were born with (or without in Leif's case!) what is more important is what they decide to do with that power. Elincia never wanted to become Queen? She will still fight and protect Crimea and its people. Marth is the last hope of Altea, even if it means leaving Elice behind. Seliph doesn't want to fight in Thracia anymore or feels like he's a fraud? He can turn tail and return home, while the world around him falls apart. Leif also feels like a fraud because he doesn't have superpowers like his cousin? Does that mean he should turn his thumbs and watch as his people are being caught/enslaved/sacrificed?

In Fodlan you have no reflection like this : Linhardt is, imo, the best example.

Dude hates blood and has a crest (aka magic powers) geared towards healing, you could make a case that for someone who has hematophobia, being a healer is difficult and this would be the reason why he refuses to heal/use his powers to help people around him... but no. Lin's laziness is played for laughs, and his refusal to do anything not related to his topic of interest is never questioned/analysed under the angle of, say, a head nurse who has no crest and laments that she couldn't save everyone who was hurt during an assault, who snaps at him for having the "gift" he has and not using it for the sake of people around him.

"What Lin decides to do with his power?" : Well, nothing.

Instead we have a reflection on his bright mind going to waste if he lazes all day long, culminating in his Supreme support where an Imperial facility is created specifically to cater to his tastes, that will enable him to research crests as much as he wants...

But still, nothing about his innate "healing" power!

In the end, it's no surprise that part of the fandom latched on that "crest = nobility title" because the Fodlan verse refuses to develop anything about its fantasy elements (hell, iirc Nopes swaps "crests" for "blood" and "titles" in its Supreme route ?).

"Sure, but where does Rhea fit in this nonsense?"

Rhea is, in this vision, the ultimate target !

For all of the "I ignore fantasy elements", Rhea is always (in FE16 at least!) turning into a dragon : no matter how hard you want to ignore fantasy, she's here to remind you tht, in this verse, dragons exist.

But most importantly, as Fodlan must be analysed through an IRL lens otherwise modern fandom cannot engage with it, Rhea, by virtue of being the lady in charge of a religious organisation called "Church", is also seen through a lens : Rhea BaD bcs Religion BaD and Catholic Church BaD.

FWIW, thanks to the five years of discourse we had, I learnt more about cultural values and differences existings between, here and the rest of the world - especially a place that is overepresented on fandom spaces - on organised religions especially the catholic church. Of course this bled on fandom takes and analysis, which projected some users' irl bias against the Catholic Church on the fandom organisation and entity that is the Church of Seiros. Combine this with secularism being now weaponised and used to ridicule people in spaces like r/atheism and you have a perfect recipe for "Religion BaD = Catholic Church BaD = fictional organised religion with a catholic flair BaD".

Granted, given how a certain loLcalisation team also originates from this place, it's no surprise that some "creative liberties" they took tried to hammer even more, let it be in the script or the fucking "what is this game about?" page on their website, how this fictional organisation is basically a squenix trope of "evil cult manipulating everything in the shadows and sekritly controlling the world".

Besides, the main heroine of the game (even if that comes with a twist!) opposes this faction (CoS and especially its leader!) and, by the way those games are built, as seen earlier, they cannot disavow her too much, else the entire gut-punch the devs were gunning for (you are betrayed by your beloved character! But unlike what happens in Baten Kaitos, you only are attached to her because she is your avatar's simp) will fall apart. So she must be, somehow, right and not motivated by more personal and heinous reasons, like not accepting "non-humans" to have powers over humans, or thinking the world is not a place for them (this was carefully scrubbed out in Nopes, btw!).

If Supreme Leader, who we are supposed to root for and whom the game ultimately rewards because "reforms" happen in the endings, says that the CoS is the reason why humans value superpowers, she must be right, or at least, not completely wrong???

Which raises the final point on this topic : FE16 came in 2019, which was election year in the US, and we all know that election time in the US means the rest of the world is also affected, even if the rest of the world, well, isn't the US. As I mentionned, the US is over-represented in fandom spaces, and fandom is far from being a safehaven from all the mayhem and passion that always boil during election time and its immediate following.

Coupled with the "my fandom faves define my real life opinions" thingie I already wrote about, and we had an explosive cocktail for bad takes, needless aggressivity, ridiculing people with dissident opinions because they are seen as "wrong", etc etc. And let it be something trendy or not, especially when (young?) people are arguing about "politics" in online spaces, but it always boils down to gross simplification of various complex issues and/or using catchphrases or "shock-value" words to win over whoever is reading/listening.

(et je ne dis pas ça parce que certains de nos politiques font des "immigrés clandestins ou pas" la source de tous les maux, ou le fait que nos députés font la même chose en ce moment, Jonluk et Marine main dans la main, pour paralyser l'Etat afin de pousser Manu à la démission et éviter la case prison pour Marine)

I always thought the "CEO of racism" was a meme, but through Fodlan discourse, I started to wonder if it was something started seriously by someone who really thought that "racism" is caused by one person.

And we finally get to the point : somehow, somewhat, Rhea is supposed to be responsible for people/humans valuing superpowers.

Forget that the same "quest to obtain those superpowers" led to the extermination of her kin, or how the devs themselves explained that people - at least in their setting - always want more power :

As a result, what would happen to humans who gained power... they would want even more power, and find a dragon much stronger to beat in order to collect materials forcefully, in order to make even more powerful weapons... and so that was the cycle that was born. And that was the birth of Fodlan's Ten Elites

Wait, kill that, those superpowers don't exist since the game and the characters (bar Catherine, but I agree with @9thwither here, Cat is one of the most overlooked characters in this fandom!) never talk about them, so they don't exist...

Rhea is thus the reason why people value bloodlines - especially since those bloodlines don't come out with superpowers.

It sounds better and closer to what you could "hear" irl, from someone who's discoursing on the internet to explain "why" some people are more valued than other, it's because of religion and the Pope! It cannot be because of, well, human greed or just the need to have more power (for good or wrong reasons), no.

"But random, the Church most likely promotes a "divine right to rule" doctrine and let the 10 Elites' families rule over their clans in Faerghus thus gain nobility!"

Sure, but everything is moot if you consider this : to make this take viable, we ignore the game and consider that crests are just bloodlines, and not, objective sources of superpowers.

So why are we, discussing about this hypothesis/theory, even arguing about what the game says and/or does?

Bob Blaiddyd can kill a giant lion/wolf with his fists at base level, is it because of a supposed doctrine that people rally and want to be in Bob's graces, or because Bob has the power to protect them all? Karen Charon can summon rain, are people siding with her because Rhea told them to, or because Karen can make crops grow?

In conclusion : why people are still, in 2024, sprouting those takes?

1- Because they refuse to engage with the game and realise that it is a fantasy game belonging to a very specific genre

2- Because fandom opinions reflect on your real life opinions and likes : so they must find a reason to oppose what their perceive as an unacceptable power inbalance otherwise it means that they support the various inequalities that exist IRL

3- Because Religion BaD and bar the "projected takes from transposing feelings about an IRL church on a fantasy one" more and more people tend to prefer an "easy to proceed" solution than think about multi-causal issues and find solutions that might not.

Of course, I can already guess that some people might argue that they don't "refuse to engage with the game" since this take is more a less a condensed version of the Supreme spiel, and as developed above, the game does - willingly - a shit job at demonstrating that her spiel is nonsense (they had to add the "greed" part in an interview released after the game and its only and final DLC!), just like her sockpuppet who supposedly learns how misguided he was in certain routes... only to end with the same ice cream, albeit with a different topping.

However, Dimitri and Sylvain mention how crestless children are disowned in Faerghus... when Dimitri's own uncle is ruling over a domain himself, Ingrid's brothers exist in the background and Gustave is still Baron Dominic's brother, on top of having been the royal master at arms for at least, depending on the route, 3 generations of Faerghan kings.

In a game where Dorothea can blame the Goddess for fighting in a war her bestie started - without anyone pointing this out - it's obvious this verse has unreliable narrators, but after 5 years and having played all routes in both games + a DLC + a dev interview explaining how and why some humans acquired crests...

Tl;Dr :

Reason 1- is most likely the most prevalent why this take exists anon, "because some people refuse to engage with the game" with the added topping of "save for what Supreme Leader and her sockpuppet say that I can use to demonise the characters I don't like".

[eldest-of-katts]

okay because people have shown up in my dms talking smack I'm going to make one blanket statement on the 1000 year loli chilchuck thing.

yes, there has been a problem with young girls being put in suggestive positions in anime with the "uhmmm she's actually a bajillion years old" excuse. yes, other characters don't treat chilchuck like an adult. yes, he is short with big eyes.

However, chilchuck consistently acts like a grown man. he- in both the manga and the anime- straight up just is an adult. He looks like an adult when he is any other race during the swaps in the manga. When the other characters get turned into half-foots they look similar to chilchuck. He is explicitly stated to have more dungeon and general life experience than laios, and he acts like it.

The 1000 year loli trope explicitly functions as an excuse to prey on people who are inexperienced and unable to advocate for themselves. Chilchuck is a parent, is a union organizer, has explicit boundaries that he enforces rigidly, and he is treated as an adult man by everyone who doesn't have a fantasy racism-focused character arc/issue.

I can see how if you haven't read the manga and seen that he has an established life that he later reveals (and haven't paid attention to him in the anime lol) you could get a mistaken impression about him. Marcielle does too in the source material! It's part of her character at the start of her arc that she has issues with longevity!

The thing that irks me a little about this interpretation is that it leans into the child-coded discourse that was prominent a while ago (she's short!!!!! but has boob???? ILLEGAL!!1!) and it does a disservice to the themes of infantilization as a policy maneuver hurting the working class.

I saw chilchuck and his labor advocacy for half-foots both as a metaphor for racism (obvious take ik) and for ageism.

The working gen z as a cohort are being infantilized and pushed out of job markets due to infantilization, similar to half-foots in the show. gen z is being maliciously portrayed as too young to vote, enter office, know themselves, know their rights, and take advantage of their resources. Simultaneously, child labor protections and protections against workplace abuse are being rolled back in the US. In Japan, young people are being worked to the bone for nothing and are becoming disenfranchised as a generation while simultaneously expected to be the labor faction that supports the postwar generations in their old age.

Chilchuck's being treated poorly I saw as a clever commentary on the ways infantilization allows for protections to be stripped away under the guise that "oh it's just a job for teenagers- they don't need more than minimum wage" or "let the kids rescue the economy! they're always complaining about that job market!" while simultaneously stripping away rights under the guise of protection- "We can't have that on the internet! think of the children!" "to protect these young people we must raise the age of medical consent for hormones/reproductive health decisions!"

Kui's work with this series spoke to me on many levels, and specifically, the infantilization issue touched me in a way that few other pieces of media have. The struggle to be taken seriously in a stem field as someone young, as someone female, and as someone who had a high-pitched voice to the point I did years of voice training to be taken seriously, chilchuck's character resonated. I (kinda) understand your instinct to think "SHORT! CHILD! RALLY THE MASSES AND KILL THE PEDOS!!1!" but in this case, it's misdirected- mostly because the author was trying to use this misdirection to prove something to you, the reader.

Kui consistently makes cutting commentary on modern issues, the show's take on food neutrality as its headliner, but also the author's takes on cultural issues and the environment (with a focus on our place in the food web as animals). I feel that reducing chilchuck's very conscious position as a tradesman and an activist discounted due to his apparent age down to "1000 year loli ewwww let's send this random tumblr user suicide bait" just displays a lack of critical analysis of the show and a level of disrespect towards Kui and the work as a whole.

TL:DR- stop sending me kys messages I'm fucking that old man

[camellcat]

first xander brought her back with human breath and determination... then willow with supernatural power and love.... smth smth two halves to keep their third in balance from drifting too far into either side and losing herself.....

[lady-hibiscus]

the election results are basically confirmed and tensions are running high right now, but condemning people for wanting to exterminate entire groups then turning around and saying they should all slit their throats is... not something we want to be doing.

also, trolls are looking for rage bait or engagement. it's easier to report and block their comments, or delete them if it's your post.

[pinkinsect]

Heartwarming: Multicultural Couple Teaches Each Other About Suicide Baiting

[loony2star]

People like this are why the fandom really sucks sometimes

I've already blocked the anon, but whomever this was, you have no right to tell to kill myself just because you're feeling petty about something that happened, or the reblog I made, in my reblog I had no intention on making anyone angry, but I was just stating common knowledge on being polite to others.

[miraculouslumination]

When loving a vulnerable and marginalized group of people, please remember first and foremost that they are people. They are people, which means they won't be perfect. They'll be unique and individual. In the best ways, and the worst ways. You cannot deny them of their identity or personhood if they start to show they aren't part of that Perfect [Blank] idea you've cooked in your head. Don't convince yourself, either, that these people can do no wrong all because of who they are.

And when propping up their personhood, please don't try to allocate that personhood from a different group of vulnerable and marginalized people.

[antiendovents]

as a schizophrenic osdd system i think it’s really really ableist, uninformed, and just plain rude when fellow antis call endos “delusional.”

like yeah, thanks so much for perpetuating the harmful stereotypes about my disorder that are literally outside of my conrtrol!

also telling anyone to kill themselves, endo or not, is not a good look and is pretty toxic imo :(

nod, we were going to make a comment on that but anger is anger. They aren't telling people directly to kill themselves (I should hope) and I did mention in the tags I dont agree with telling people to kill themselves. Thought crimes are not a thing though and this is infact a vent blog, we will allow people to vent their anger here since that's what this is intended for.

We do agree that calling them delusional is a little odd, but I do not believe they meant it in an offensive way,, do I agree with it? No. But I will let them be angry for now, people make mistakes when they are angry and I'm sure that person had no intentions of perpetuating sterotypes or being ableist. Not trying to excuse it, but trying to give an explanation for why I allowed it to post. I did try add trigger warnings too, but if I am missing any feel free to let me know

It's important to know the difference between uniformed and ableist, there is also a chance they simply do not realise that calling others delusional may be offensive

[jichanxo]

playing LJ and idk what’s in the japanese water but Yagami is INSUFFERABLE!!!

He’s so fucking annoying his only argument is “muhhh sawa sensei” when Kuwana, Reiko or Ehara say the horrible things their kids endured like SHUT UP!!!! Reiko and Ehara’s children killed themselves bc they were bullied, I understand and support them fully for getting revenge, especially since the justice system is shitty when it comes to such cases

Did you feel the same or am I tripping?

putting this under the cut

sorry i know you sent this days ago and maybe your opinion has changed since then but i'll answer the best i can? (also i hope i don't accidentally spoil anything ahahah)

this take is not uncommon (and i felt the same at some point, though i've since changed my mind) so no, you're not tripping lmao. despite changing my mind, the fact that people say this pretty regularly probably means the writers didn't execute the idea as well as they could have. i would say that it feels clumsy and almost like a joke (cue sawa-sensei counter) to the point that it detracts from the point they're trying to make. i think some people will disagree with me on this -- rather than the writers, it's the players who aren't fully understanding what's being said to them in the text -- but regardless of whose "fault" that is, yes it's a Known Thing

(funnily enough, during my first playthrough, my sister mentioned seeing a meme about "sawa sensei" getting repeated a lot, and by the time the 2nd/3rd time hit we were like OH MY GOD THE MEME WAS REAL. which is a funny memory to me. lmao)

i think the thing that's getting lost here is that the "sawa sensei" argument is not meant to discredit how kuwana, reiko and ehara feel about the injustice. this part is not in question. yagami's stance on doing illegal shit is also not relevant to this conversation (and i'm not sure i could provide a compelling argument on this front anyway, aside from that he's very anti-murder, lol. clearly he does illegal shit himself so he's not against doing illegal shit based on principle alone. depends on circumstances probably)

sawa gets brought up because she clearly did not deserve to die. almost everyone agrees that sawa was a good person. kuwana puts her on a pedestal for confronting him about kusumoto being bullied, idealises her and muses that she would've understood him for what he's doing (killing people. and this is clearly a stretch). reiko says that sawa was the only person who visited kusumoto in hospital without an ulterior motive, which is one of the best testaments of character that she could give, really, imo. ehara probably holds a negative opinion of sawa for her false testimony about there being no evidence of bullying -- but this was clearly done under pressure of the people around her, and ehara's opinion is the exception to the rule.

so, sawa is a good person. so what? who cares? what's the point of bringing her up?

the point of what kuwana is doing is that he sees it as a way of righting the wrongs that the justice system leaves unaddressed. he needs to believe that what he is doing is right, because it gives him purpose and distracts him from his guilt.

sawa's death contradicts this. even if he and reiko didn't kill her themselves, it's proof that their extreme actions have negative consequences. they can say that the system is wrong, look what this monster did to my son, etc etc. but what they are doing also harms innocent people. the justice/revenge/whatever they pursue is at the cost of other innocent people. sawa herself represents the unforeseen cost of kuwana's self-imposed mission to kill bullies. they can justify themselves all they want, but sawa's death is a reality they can't talk around. they acknowledge she was a good person, but she died because of their actions. is this a worthwhile cost? yagami doesn't think so.

and the thing is, kuwana and reiko can be persuaded.

at least, that's kuwana's opinion about reiko

and later he says this about himself.

these screenshots are pulled from a youtube video w/ english dub so take it with a grain of salt, but you get what i'm trying to say here.

i think the repetition is the point. they agree sawa was a good person. they can be persuaded away from their current stance (that murder is an acceptable response). by repeating himself, yagami is using the argument that's most personal to them, mostly likely to convince them. repetition is not a bug, it's a feature. whether or not this was conveyed well by the writers is another argument altogether, but yagami's point itself is sound.

truthfully, i think LJ could have benefitted by leaning into what makes this case personally compelling to yagami. if you're not paying attention, the "but sawa sensei" argument can feel pretty flat, but putting emphasis on yagami's experiences would help it feel more rich and justified aside from "innocent people dying is bad" (even though that is a sound argument on its own). he does mention emi, i believe it's only once, so it's not like they don't do it at all, but i would like more. the impact of emi and of JE specifically is that yagami doesn't like to leave things unaddressed when he can do more, and that's clearly a motivating factor here. he won't leave kuwana alone for as long as there is 1. something yagami can do about it and 2. kuwana still intends to keep killing

think about the fact that yagami's parents were killed by someone seeing vigilante revenge, both a deeply personal tragedy, and a life defining event that set him on the path he walks now. leaning more into that would have helped, or at least been interesting, in my opinion. obviously it's not 100% the same since yagami's father was the lawyer and not the accused, but the key parts (vigilante justice + collateral damage) is there. of course yagami is trying to change kuwana's mind. not only does yagami understand kuwana's pain wrt the pain of inaction (yagami's regrets about emi) but he's experienced the aftermath of collateral damage, himself.

of course, yagami's personal experiences are only relevant to us, as viewers. sawa is still the best argument to convince kuwana and reiko (and i can easily imagine reiko brushing yagami off if he talked about his backstory LMAO), so that's what we get. sawa is what matters to them, so sawa is what he will keep reminding them of. that's why the sawa argument is what it is.

we can get into discussions about the inevitable failure of the legal system and what that means for "real justice", but we would never come to a consensus. instead, i think it's better to look at how kuwana and reiko are impacted on a personal level by their actions: neither of them have moved on, even after seeking their justice. they remain stuck in the past. their actions grant them no closure, and robs them of a future (reiko as a politician and mother, kuwana as a humble handyman: but as far as we know, a pretty damn good one considering how well he was able to leverage his connections to avoid being caught this whole time... at least in my opinion)

when kuwana argues, he asks how they should seek justice if legal avenues don't grant it to them. he asks, "what about the reiko kusumotos and akihiko eharas of the world?" he is right to point this out.

when yagami argues, he asks how revenge can be justified if innocents will suffer (and die) for it, even unintentionally. he asks, "what about the yoko sawas of the world?" he is also right to point this out.

there is no easy solution. they both have a point. that's what the story is ultimately about. kaito says it straight up at the end of the game:

well, that's my take. admittedly i'm not as well versed on LJ as some people are, so i could be remembering and paraphrasing some things wrong. i've seen people who really like LJ's writing, and others who straight up hate it LMAO, so yknow, your mileage may vary. hopefully this will at least help you understand the other perspective

if you want to hear another take on the sawa sensei argument, i'll put this here. i drew on it quite a bit while writing this, so yknow, credit where credit is due.

[littlefankingdom]

~ Batgirl (2000)

They are sad and disappointed in themselves and they should be. What they did is not justice.

So, I'm mad about this issue, like really mad for personal reasons I will explain later. For context: a young girl has been kidnapped by a thief who escaped jail. It's not the first time said thief kidnapps this girl. This young girl, around 10 years old, is an artist and her mother exploits her, making money by selling her daughter's art. They are rich. This woman doesn't love her daughter, she loves the money she is making from her daughter. The man that keeps kidnapping this young girl? Her father. Her father that loves and cares for her, that turned to crime to take care of his daughter, and refuses to sell any art she makes because she made it for him, because she loves her father. And she pleads, she pleads Batgirl to let her with her father and not bring her back to her mother who doesn't love her, she pleads her to not put her father in jail. And what do Batgirl does? She stops the father, gives him to the cops and brings back the girl to her mother. On those panels, they are looking at a sad child with her abuser they brought her back to.

My mother doesn't love me. She will say she does to others, but it's not true and it has been the case for a long time, since I was very young. I wasn’t unwanted, I was just not what she wanted. My life was supposed to be centered, until my death, around taking care of my mother (she is not disabled or anything, she just wants people to do everything for her). Raised to make money I would gift to my mother, so she could have luxuries, but I was not successful in that. I grew up pleading for love, pleading for people to listen to my pain. Nobody did. I learnt that people prefer the comfort and peace of their lives over helping others. I learnt to distrust authority figures (teachers, doctors, any adults/people at least 5 years older than me in general), because either they were power hungry assholes who abuse kids, either they preferred to look away, who would tell me to be nice and listen to my mother. It's too much problem to help children. In the end, I could count on nobody but myself to get out. I can count on nobody but myself. I hate the system, and I promised myself I would never be like those who look away, I will defend any child that needs it.

So, to read a story where a little girl pleads a HERO to not bring them back to their abuser, only for said HERO to still bring her back to her abuser, to tell her to be nice and stay with her awful parent... I am furious. This issue is literally telling me that, if heroes existed, the heroes you adore since you are a child, they would not have saved you. They would have bring you back to your mother and told you to be nice, like everyone else. They would have let you go through those years of pain. Heroes would have looked away.

What is the logic here? Because it's neither justice or the good thing to do. That it is the law? Since when do they follow the law? I don't remember vigilantism being legal, or assault and battery, or owning all the weapons Bruce owns. Yes, it was still a kidnapping, her father is a criminal, it would not have been a good life for a child. But, the Bats could have tried to find a solution, instead of simply giving this child back to someone who will treat her like shit.

I know it's just a fiction, so it's not like a real child is being exploited and will be more abused later when she stops being good enough because her mental health deteriorated, nobody is going to become depressed and lose trust in heroes because the bats brought her back to her awful mother. And also, it's not the characters who are at fault, it's the writers. It's not about Cass and Bruce being bad people heroes, it's about who the fuck decided to write that. New entries in my list of enemies, Keller Puckett and Dylan Horrocks.

[pan-withnoplan]

For the person(s) behind all the troll accounts out there, I wanna know. Whichever ship you ship, regardless of opinions, disagreements, arguments and fights, and all the bad blood in this hell fandom, how does it feel to know that no matter what happened between the rival shippers, both sides are disgusted with your behaviour and would blacklist you from all fandom spaces in a heartbeat if they knew your official web id?

[cassowariess]

I genuinely hate internet censorship where people have to defang words on most social media platforms to avoid demonitization etc, but I think it would actually be really funny if an algorithm was implemented where everytime someone told you to "kill yourself" it changed to "unalive yourself."

You can still use the word "kill" but if you put "yourself" after it then it becomes the phrase above, and makes you look like the most embarrassing mfer ever when you're trying to seem threatening.

[zukkaoru]

the disparity in kudos between a skk fic and a fic for literally any other bsd characters/ship :/