#Y’all continue to have absolute dog💩 reading comprehension

[jonsnowunemploymentera]

PSA: Lyanna Stark was NOT a hypocrite

It’s a little annoying how often ASOIAF fans will misread and purposefully misinterpret Lyanna’s thoughts about Robert’s true nature, as a way to prove that she’s hypocritical (while also absolving Robert from all his faults as a husband/lover).

First, let’s look at that conversation again, shall we? 

“Robert will never keep to one bed,” Lyanna had told him at Winterfell, on the night long ago when their father had promised her hand to the young Lord of Storm’s End. “I hear he has gotten a child on some girl in the Vale.” Ned had held the babe in his arms; he could scarcely deny her, nor would he lie to his sister, but he had assured her that what Robert did before their betrothal was of no matter, that he was a good man and true who would love her with all his heart. Lyanna had only smiled. “Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man’s nature.”

And we must consider the larger context:

The girl had been so young Ned had not dared to ask her age. No doubt she’d been a virgin; the better brothels could always find a virgin, if the purse was fat enough. She had light red hair and a powdering of freckles across the bridge of her nose, and when she slipped free a breast to give her nipple to the babe, he saw that her bosom was freckled as well. “I named her Barra,” she said as the child nursed. “She looks so like him, does she not, milord? She has his nose, and his hair …”

“She does.” Eddard Stark had touched the baby’s fine, dark hair. It flowed through his fingers like black silk. Robert’s firstborn had had the same fine hair, he seemed to recall.

“Tell him that when you see him, milord, as it … as it please you. Tell him how beautiful she is.”

“I will,” Ned had promised her. That was his curse. Robert would swear undying love and forget them before evenfall, but Ned Stark kept his vows. He thought of the promises he’d made Lyanna as she lay dying, and the price he’d paid to keep them.

- Eddard IX, AGOT

Ned recalls his conversation with Lya as he returns from visiting one of Robert’s bastards. He has just made a promise to tell Robert about the babe and laments that he is a man who honors and keeps his vows. When me promises to do something, he will go through with it.

Furthermore, this scene is framed within the context of Robert being a liar. He will swear one thing and then immediately perform actions that directly contradict whatever oaths he has made. Robert would say that he loves Lyanna and would remain faithful to her, and only her, but then would immediately go an and betray her trust.

That’s what Lyanna is talking about in her conversation with Ned. She’s not condemning Robert for fathering a bastard. She’s condemning him for fathering a bastard all while he swears oaths of love and loyalty to her. Because Ned tells her that Robert loves her and only her, that he’s sworn to be faithful to her alone. Yet Lyanna goes, “are you sure about that, dear brother?” Because why would he swear loyalty to her then turn around and do the exact opposite of that loyalty, which is laying with another woman and fathering a child on her?

As much as Lyanna has the right to call out her betrothed’s promiscuity, she’s really not doing that here. She’s using his promiscuity to call out his lying and unreliable nature. Robert may love her, but he will not honor that love and stay true to her. That’s literally what she means by saying

“Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man’s nature.”

Simple as that.

Also, notice how the topic of oaths and vows comes into play. This conversation undoubtedly brings into mind the concept of knighthood and the chivalric code. Robert has, from the very beginning, been a deconstruction of the knightly ideal. He’s a knight who fought a battle against the (not so) evil dragon/prince and won, but he was ultimately without honor and became a bad king. He’s the same knight who vowed to rescue his maiden (Lyanna) but was also unfaithful to her. This is a deconstruction of the chivalric tale. We’re meant to think that Robert, NOT Lyanna, is the hypocrite here. Robert is just another one of GRRM’s failed knights in ASOIAF; remember that before he was a king, Robert was a Ser.

And if we really want to bring Rhaegar into this, I’m afraid that we cannot call him a hypocrite for fathering a child on Lyanna.

He wondered if Rhaegar had frequented brothels; somehow he thought not.

The text directly contradicts the idea that Robert and Rhaegar are similar. Ned himself, who has a close personal relationship with Robert, acknowledges this. And going back to the point about the deconstruction of chivalry, Rhaegar is a knight as well. His elopement with Lyanna directly plays into the chivalric performance of a knight kidnapping an innocent young maiden. It’s a tale as old as time, literally. But this is not a clear cut case of Rhaegar being the evil knight (or the evil dragon, as some of our fantasy tales might have it) because the text goes to great lengths to paint him as the opposite of Robert.

Rhaegar did not swear vows of love and loyalty to Lyanna and then break them (as far as we know). While he was married to Elia and was fond of her, as per Barrtistan, there is no indication in the text that he personally vowed to love her above all before he ultimately absconded with Lyanna. So, Lyanna running off with Rhaegar instead of marrying Robert does not make her actions hypocritical. There’s really no reason to read this passage that way. At all.

So TL,DR:

STOP calling Lyanna a hypocrite because of this one conversation. That’s literally not supported within the text at all. Lyanna is not objecting to Robert fathering a bastard. Rather, she’s objecting too him fathering a bastard all while he tells her father and brothers that he wishes to marry her, love her, and be faithful to her.

STOP trying to compare Robert and Rhaegar through this lens - that Rhaegar and Lyanna are hypocrites. The text directly contradicts that idea. Robert is the hypoactive and the liar, NOT Lyanna or Rhaegar.

It’s that simple. No need to overcomplicate things.

I’m not entirely sure why this passage has been misinterpreted for so long but here we are…