#I'm saying she is somewhat set up to possibly function at times as a moral-if-not-outright “reckoning” for the Powers That Be in Westeros.

[rhaenin-time]

My big issue is how dismissive and often plain disingenuous the stance the point of asoiaf is that feudalism is BAD and it's equivalents across fiction and even non-fiction often are. Because it's often used to dismiss the notion that anyone has the moral high ground, which unfortunately means too many people seem comfortable in giving themselves license to indulge in their implicit biases under the guise of "objectivity."

The reason I find it disingenuous is these people will often claim, "The whole point is that feudalism is bad," and then in the same breath express various sentiments that amount to, "Oh no, the more I look at it, the more I see the parallels between how the power structures of Slavers Bay and Westeros are both dependent upon exploitation, and how "slavery" actually comes in many different forms by many different names. I worry that when Dany gets to Westeros, there's a decent chance she might look around and decide that feudalism is bad. And that would be very bad of her to do."

love and light to everyone but if i see one more post that’s like “the point of asoiaf is that feudalism is BAD” i’m going to rip out my hair and start eating dirt and worms. like yes, it is bad. yes, monarchies are bad. yes so true it’s annoying when people ignore all of that and focus on who they think deserves the throne more. but that’s not the point—that is the premise? it’s the beginning of the exploration and deconstruction. functionally this system is rigid (specifically in terms of gender and class) and horrifically violent: so what it’s really like to live in it? to try to be a hero, a knight, to be a lady in a world where your body belongs to your family, your lord, your order? is it possible to be a good person in a hierarchal world like this, with such vast power imbalances woven throughout it and every relationship and interaction that you have informed by that? how do you navigate that imbalance in order to have meaningful relationships—can you every truly do it? and who decides what is good? how do you know if it’s truly right or it just felt right because it’s what you wanted to do? what about the people who have no name, no family, no order: what happens to them? don’t they matter? what if in a lifetime of looking the other way or actively causing others harm, you do a few things—maybe one thing—that’s objectively good: does it mean anything? does it matter, even if no one ever knows? what if the best thing you ever did broke every vow you made, every law that governs your society? how do you live with that dissonance?

what’s it like to be a ruler, to be a king or queen—is it possible to be a good one in such an unequal system? to wield power justly? who decides what is just? who decides who should rule? at which point does the amount of power someone can have cross the line into too much? is it when you stop trying to figure out how to use it correctly and worry only about how to keep it? if holding onto it costs you everything, your family and all your relationships, is it still worth it? what if having that much power available is necessary to the survival of your people, maybe even your world, but when it’s misused the carnage left behind is beyond articulation—is it still worth it? are the lives it saves worth the lives it took? how do you measure that? who carries the weight of that choice and how? how do you live with it? how do you go on living in a world that can be harsh and cruel and unfair, a world where your good intentions and your personhood seem to matter very little in the face of someone else’s greed or when compared to the yoke of your duty? and the questions never stop and the answers when and if they come are rarely easy, but the point is that you keep asking and keep trying because that’s what it means to be alive lol