#FUCK i have no concept of legnth

[basket-of-radiants]

OMG!! I DON'T HATE MOASH EITHER!!!! Like I saw Elhokar dying from a mile away and I wasn't that invested in him. Also, Szeth is annoying? Why do people like Szeth (who literally killed SO MANY PEOPLE! And the rock didn't compel him? It was a normal rock?) and hate Moash?

Oooooookay. There’s. A lot to unpack here. I know you were trying to be relatable, but I reeeeeally disagree with a lot of this. (Let’s see how comprehensible I can be this late at night.)

Like first off and most importantly, how dare you call Szeth annoying, he’s my favorite character. He is a massive murderous disaster with the most edgy and Extra™ POV narration I have ever seen and I love him. (You must be new here; this is basically a Szeth fan blog.)

As for Elhokar, I wouldn’t at all say I wasn’t invested-I quite liked him in Oathbringer and I certainly was not happy that he died. I found his arc to be quite compelling, and even though he was late to the game, I appreciate that he was doing his best to assume responsibility in whatever ways he could. Like I dunno, he admitted his mistakes and worked to improve. Maybe it was too little and too late, I don’t think there’s an objective answer to that kind of thing. I do tend to hold characters who are members of the aristocracy to a higher standard than other characters, and I wouldn’t necessarily say he was a good king yet, but he was certainly trying, and that I would have liked to see. (I wasn’t quite as interested in him becoming a radiant, but that plotline didn’t happen anyway in the end so w/e.) I’m not going to be talking about him much, but please know you don’t need to defend him as a person to me, I already appreciate him.

However I don’t see the need to pick Moash or Elhokar over one another. I can understand why if you liked a character then you would hate whoever killed them, but I’m not really like that. Actually I’m glad you brought up Szeth because he’s a great example of that. I have been in love with him since chapter one. In Words of Radiance he tried-and very nearly succeeded-to murder Dalinar, Adolin, and Kaladin. Of course I hoped he wouldn’t succeed. Of course I wanted them to survive. But even if he had killed one-or hell all-of them, I genuinely believe I would still like him as a character. Part of that is Szeth’s circumstances-I know that he never (welllllll) actually had ill will towards these people and I know he’s already going to suffer for any actions he takes. He knew what the right thing was, and he would have done the wrong thing, knowing it was the wrong thing to do. That’s honestly a lot of what attracts me to his character, he has this web of contradictions that he both hates and depends on and it can be fascinating to watch. I both want him to accept responsibility for his actions and find it hard to blame him for them. Moash on the other hand is in a totally different situation, but I feel like I can apply similar principles to him. If I can still appreciate Szeth’s character in spite of all he’s done, then I feel I can do the same for Moash. I happen to not think Moash’s actions were as objectively bad as a lot of people did, but I’ll get to that later.

One thing I do agree with you on is that Szeth is a worse person than Moash. No seriously, if you want to tell me that Moash is bad because of his actions in Oathbringer, you’ll have to convince me that his actions are so bad that they’re worse than all the killing and destabilizing of entire nations that Szeth has done. Again, I don’t entirely blame Szeth, but it is his fault. And if we’re going by actions alone, then he’s done a hell of a lot worse than quite a lot of characters. That’s fine though, because I don’t judge characters by their actions alone. There’s a reason these are told as nuanced stories with the points of view and feelings of different characters taken into account and not as history textbooks just stating the events that happened.

(Hopefully this all ties together. It’s after 2 am and I have no idea where I’m going with this. Be prepared for tangents.)

So! Let’s talk about Moash.

I’m sure I’m not fully representing all the richness of the anti-Moash arguments here because it seems people have spent a lot of time finding reasons to hate him. I’d guess there are a few main reasons? From what I can tell, they are (in no particular order) betraying Kaladin/Bridge Four, Killing Elhokar, Killing Jez, and the whole denying personal responsibility thing. There’s a also just a lot of general hate and calling him an asshole (which I really don’t get? I don’t think he’s ever just been needlessly cruel or anything, I mean he hates lighteyes but that’s about it) but that’s kind of hard to argue about so whatever. Anyway if those are absolute sticking points for you, and you cannot possibly like a character who did those things, then I guess that’s fine, you do you. I’m mostly just going to set out my interpretation of the character and talk a little bit about my beliefs. It’s not really a defense per se, but it’s how I understand him.

I want to talk about the Alethi. Moash’s character is clearly focused heavily on themes of revenge. We’re already not off to a great start here because I personally do not believe in revenge. I do believe in justice, and I think that for Moash the two are one and the same. I also think that for literally the entirety of Alethi culture the ideas of justice and revenge are one and the same. See, that’s something I am willing to blame on circumstance. It’s not just the Alethi, all across Roshar violent crimes (which I would consider the deaths of Moash’s grandparents to be) can be punished by execution, and while, again, I disagree, it’s indisputably the cultural norm. (The act of forgiveness that characters like Kaladin were showing is a radical thing.) In terms of Moash’s vengeance, I find it really hard to condemn that when he’s trying to kill just one guy, if we’re not also going to massively get on Dalinar’s case and Elhokar’s case and fucking everyone else’s case for waging a six year genocide war on the Parshendi for the sake of revenge. Violence is an Alethi cultural value-it has repulsed me since day one but it’s very much undenyable.

That’s just something to mull on, it’s honestly not even one of the more major factors in terms of how I view Moash. His revenge aspect in Oathbringer was less interesting to me than other aspects of him, but as that is a part of his character, I wanted to first set aside why I can…well, set it aside.

In Words of Radiance, Kaladin very much sympathized with Moash. Not only that, he legitimately felt Moash was in the right for a considerable amount of time. The turning point for Kaladin was coming to the realization that Elhokar was an important person to Dalinar, which is all well and good, but it doesn’t actually address these underlying contradictions. I actually found that very frustrating at the time when I read it, so I might not be the most objective judge when it comes to Moash’s betrayal. I do know that before Elhokar’s assassination attempt, Moash had not gone forward with anything until Kaladin was on board. And he didn’t know that Kaladin was “off board” until he was already in the middle of the act. Kaladin, to his credit, did offer him an out, but for someone like Moash who had been working tirelessly in anticipation of this moment…I can understand why he wasn’t that receptive then and there. Moash certainly threw the first punch, but he also felt betrayed in that moment. In Oathbringer, at the core of his anger, there was the thought “Kaladin was protecting a murderer” which was how the whole scene had seemed framed to him. Perspective is crucial for understanding Moash. I guess think if Kaladin’s best friend, after learning the truth about Amaram and all he’d done and acknowledging that it was horrible, had at the last moment put their life on the line to protect him. In the end, Moash still felt terrible about having hurt Kaladin and Kaladin had felt terrible about letting Moash get to that point. Both of them regretted everything having to do with the assassination attempt when they went their separate ways.

I don’t know if it seems like I’m taking Moash’s side here, because I’m honestly not trying to do that, I honestly don’t view it as “sides” I view it as two different characters deserving of understanding.

But again! I actually tend not to think about Elhokar’s death in terms of revenge as much as one might expect!

Next I would like to talk about the circumstances under which Elhokar was killed. Because…it was a battle, you know? People on both sides were killing people on both sides. Moash killed Elhokar, but someone else could have been the hand to hold the spear just as easily. I don’t think there was coincidence, I do think that Moash was intentionally seeking to kill Elhokar once he realized he was there. But here’s my super controversial take? In that kind of situation, revenge or not, I don’t even think he was wrong to do so. Moash’s goal was to help and serve the soldiers on his (the singers’) side. If Elhokar had lived, they would have had a shardbearer and another radiant to have to deal with. Lots of named characters in that scene (god that scene was so sad to read) killed lots of named characters on both sides. If Elhokar’s side had gained the upper hand, Khen and Moash probably would have died. In a situation like that, I’m not really sure I can be mad at him for doing a tactically correct move like that, even if his intentions were more personal.

That’s actually…kind of a big distinction between how I view Moash and how a lot of people do. I know there were a lot of people who were holding out for a potential redemption until Moash killed Jez, but I didn’t…exactly…see it as a thing that needed redeeming. I didn’t want Elhokar to die, of course I didn’t, but Moash was a soldier in combat, who just so happened to be faced off against someone he saw (and not necessarily incorrectly at that) as representative of all the discrimination and suffering he’d endured. What do you expect him to do?

Yes, it sucks that he killed Elhokar while he was in the middle of changing, but you can’t honestly expect Moash to know about that.

I mentioned Jez, so let’s start on him next. I will admit, when I was reading Oathbringer, the point at which Moash killed Jez was a very “what the fuck” moment for me. But…honestly the more I think back on it and try to understand him, the more it seems that that was the obvious course of action for him. After all, at that point in the story, I already knew and had accepted that he had defected to the singers’ side. (God his defection is another really fascinating thing actually! And it’s honestly such a huge part in why I care about him even now. I would love to talk a bit about Moash’s relationships with the singers vs the humans in more detail at some point, but this post is probably already way too long. Someone remind me later, I promise the post will be shorter than this one.) He was also literally a slave, but not just that, he was a slave who genuinely wanted the side he was working for to succeed. And also a soldier who had killed before. Honestly, if the fused had asked him to kill someone for them, it would surprise me more if he didn’t do it for them.

I think after he killed Elhokar, Moash was at his lowest point. He was already depressed and really fucked up, but the idealized idea of vengeance deep inside him still had somehow kept him going. Then when he finally got what he had been dreaming of he didn’t feel happy or satisfied or any of that. Not only that, but in having completed his goal he no longer felt he had any purpose. So why not do whatever the fused ask of him? He has no ambition of his own, but he truly believes that once they’re in power, they’ll make a better, fairer society for people in the future. Honestly the more I think about it, the fact that Jez was a herald is all the more reason for Moash to agree to kill him. It provided a very real tactical advantage in a war. I’m not going to touch on whether this act was right or not, but I know that I personally can understand why Moash felt that helping the side of the singers was the right thing to do. And I guess if I can accept that then everything else follows.

As for the personal responsibility thing, I…don’t judge him very much for that. He was a slave, he was dysfunctional and depressed, and his mind kept returning to how he had hurt Kaladin which I’m pretty sure also sort of makes him hate himself. If he needed coping mechanisms to stay alive in that situation, then I’m willing to accept that. Even if he hadn’t had that mindset, he would still be a slave in the exact same situation. And…honestly he’s really not the first character to be in heavy denial over personal responsibility and past actions. I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you about the other examples.

When I was reading Oathbringer my sister and I talked a lot about this worldview, “Alethi society is bad so anything I did when I was a part of it can be written away, because being in that bad society is really what’s to blame.” I will admit I was sort of doing that earlier in this very post, although my intention was more to highlight hypocrisy than anything else. Moash’s denial of personal responsibility probably would have rubbed me the wrong way a lot more if he…didn’t actually take responsibility…all over the place… He stood up for Sah, Khen, etc. when they were being hurt and took it upon himself personally to risk his life to go talk to management and angrily give them constructive criticism on how to make their society fair. He definitely blames his past on the society he lived in, but in the present he was adamant that that had been bad and so the next thing has to be better. Flawed as it may have been, I think it was his way of putting his past behind him and accepting his new life.

Again, not saying that this mentality is good or even justifiable, that’s up to you. I feel that it’s at the very least compelling.

…WHICH! To tie it all together, here’s why I like Moash. In Oathbringer he is a mess of a person, but I still find a lot of nuance and this broken sort of humanity in his actions. I can tell that he still cares about right and wrong, he just feels it’s impossible to find justice in the preexisting human society. (I wanna talk more about his opinions on the singers later.) He definitely did bad things, but he’s not so far gone that I don’t think he’s worth understanding. I don’t necessarily like characters just because they’re good or nice people, they can even be irredeemable people, and maybe Moash is just that. I don’t know. I understand why people would feel that way about him, I really do. But I still find his story compelling, I’m still interested to see what he does next, and against all reason, I’m still hoping he somehow makes it out okay somehow.

It’s like after 3:30, jesus, I need to sleep. Um. Reeeeal quick end notes. This post was mostly me rambling about the bad shit he did in Oathbringer, but I think he did good stuff too! He is a morally grey character and I would go into that more if I weren’t so tired. Uh. I’m sorry for writing so much, I know this probably isn’t what you expect from this kind of blog. If you actually read all this then 1) wow and 2) lmk how comprehensible it was. Also if there’s anything I’m wrong about lmk I do not mind criticism.

Yeah. G’night.

[dbssh]

2, 5, 7, 15, 22, 24 (a LOT i know) anyone you want really but i was thinking vic and aja

NEVER APOLOGIZE FOR SENDING TOO MANY I LOOVE THISSSS

2. What is their weapon of choice, and what weapon do they dislike using the most?

Aja is best with hand-to-hand and also likes to use staffs (as much as i like the concept of aja with a sword the uh. lethality of it is not her style). She hates guns and wont use them unless she has no other option and then she still would rather throw a punch.

victor uses enchanted weapons, primarily his big magic gun that does whatever i need it to do to make the scene work. he's impressively capable as a spellslinger with no weapons as well, though hes bogus with any melee weapon or hand-to-hand, or anything that requires physical strength.

5.What kind of weather makes them happy, and what kind makes them sad?

hm. neither of them really like thunderstorms, bad memories and all. Aja still does like the rain, though, especially the grey air right after the rain has stopped. She also loves foggy mornings, and snow. Victor would prefer All Weather to Stop Forever and generally doesnt go outside :/

7. What clothing do they like to wear, and what do they wear most often?

aja wears a lot of stuff! she loves dresses though and the only thing keeping her from only having dresses is the impracticality of fighting for your life in a floor-legnth sundress. And the fact that she has to handmake all pf her clothes and she cant really sew (fine motor control issues) and she hates asking people to do stuff for her. She basically just wears the same two outfits over and over because of that fact.

victor wears very plain and practical clothes, with the exception being that it all has to be loose as fuck. even though he's transitioned fully (top surgery and been on t for like literal decades) he still HATES anything that shows off his body. he also must at all times wear gloves, its required.

15. Where in their body do they keep stress or tension? 

Aja is her shoulders, and she also balls her fists a lot. Victor clenches his jaw really hard without noticing he's doing it.

22. What are they like when they get sick? Do they have a particular system (ears, lungs, etc) that illness gravitates to?

neither of them can really get sick anymore cuz theyre semi-immortals but when victor could get sick he tended towards fevers. he was a pretty sickly kid.

24. How do they react to being physically injured or undergoing medical treatment?

aja hates it she hates it so much. injury she can usually ignore but she hates someone else being close to her body. the only person allowed to touch her if she's hurt is hutch, which isnt great because Hutch's medical knowledge is. not great.

victor literally just ignores it which he's triply capable of post-lichy-business because he isnt rooted in his body anymore and his sensations are literally almost entirely numb. He could be walking around like that monty python sketch with no limbs and be like "no im fine! tis but a scratch aha nothing to see here im going to keep working!" its not necesarily self-destructive he just views his body as disposable and second in importance to his work.