#also about the nazi thing

[mieczyhale]

[glorious-spoon]

i do in fact think that violent misogynists should be denied the tacit acceptance and social approval that comes with being frictionlessly accepted into social groups for much the same reason that i think you should also disinvite nazis from your parties and i cannot fucking believe that this is such a controversial goddamn opinion on tumblr dot com

[throwawayasoiafaccount]

Why do you think the tides have slightly turned from "Elia deserves better than Rhaegar" to shipping her and Rhaegar together? Like what is the psychology behind these people because I've seen some of them like/reblog anti Rhaegar posts while also shipping Rhaegar x Elia at the same time.

hey anon! my thoughts are a bit messy, but i’ve done my best to explain them coherently :)

so, rhaegar was the best man anyone could have when elia was alive, and most people want the best for their favs. he was considered the most handsome, didn’t have a bad personality, and he was crown prince—meaning elia was almost queen, which is often seen as the greatest role a woman can have. the narrative also treats rhaegar as a beautiful, tragic, haunting figure, and elia actually had this very aesthetically pleasing man all to herself at one point! she was married to him, had children with him, and her life was so close to perfect! but rhaegar just had to go and ruin it. 😠

for many elia stans, if rhaegar hadn’t fallen in love with another woman (they want him to have been a completely different character), then everything would’ve been perfect, and elia would’ve had the best, most desirable life. however, that’s not what happened—elia met a very tragic end, and as a result, these stans feel double the bitterness. because of this bitterness, they blame rhaegar for everything (even though it’s not logical to do so), but he’s just too ‘perfect’ to let go of. so, for years these stans have made rhaegar revolve around elia, filling his tag with posts about her out of bitterness. so, i do believe that this obsession with rhaegar x elia has always been there, but i think it’s become a more favorable stance on the elia stan side of the fandom because of a mix of reasons.

plus, rhaegar is one of the few canon relationships we know elia had, since she’s not much of a character. because of this, and the fact that most people don’t like to stray too far from canon, most elia stans are forced to focus on rhaegar, which has created an echo chamber. basically, if a sentiment about elia and rhaegar’s relationship becomes popular, then the whole elia stan side of the fandom will likely regurgitate the sentiment. (also, this desire to stick close to canon is likely why the elia x arthur ship was so popular. while it’s a total crack ship, it had good aesthetics, and since elia and arthur at least knew each other, it allowed the stans to create their perfect fanfiction whilst sticking it to rhaegar. but remember, elia was actually married to rhaegar and had children with him, so while arthur is cool, rhaegar was always ‘top dog,’ meaning arthur would never be able to match up to rhaegar to most elia stans. also, the arthur x elia crack ship is likely her second most popular ship, which just shows how little elia stans have to work with, so they’re always forced to eventually return back to rhaegar for a lot of things.)

however, even if the elia x rhaegar ship gains more popularity, these stans will never stop hating rhaegar because he wasn’t ‘perfect’—and he wasn’t perfect because he didn’t love elia. plus, rhaegar loving another woman and supposedly kidnapping her is what began the war that led to elia’s tragic death. that’s bitterness times 1000. and while i don’t actually blame rhaegar for the war, i do think that this is how an elia stan sees it. i also don’t view rhaegar’s complex relationship with elia as a bad thing—it’s actually a very realistic take on an arranged marriage between two decent people. but most elia stans will never be able to get over the fact that they almost had everything, which is why many have it out for lyanna, as they consider her a thief who ruined their ‘perfection.’

tbh, that might be why so many elia stans are so obsessed with the idea that rhaegar only got with lyanna because of the prophecy—they don’t want to believe that rhaegar actually loved a different woman and not their perfect self insert elia. that’s a bit mean of me… but i don’t know what else one would call the ‘elia’ elia stans have created.

now that i’ve laid all those thoughts out, i’ll try to explain why the tides seem to be turning… i think it may have something to do with the ‘targaryens are all evil and bad’ sentiment losing popularity. i think this shift has occurred due to a mix of factors, such as years of fandom fights and fandom cycles leading to the targs being more liked now than before. it helps that canon doesn’t actually condemn the targs/favors them quite a bit, and the influx of new targ fans from HOTD has also contributed. this combination of reasons seems to have shifted the way the mainstream fandom discusses all the targaryen characters, including rhaegar. so, with this shift, it’s only natural that some elia stans/elia x rhaegar shippers—who’ve always been there—are using this opportunity to push their agenda. while these stans still hate rhaegar and see him as the bad guy, they just can’t let go of him. and as the mainstream fandom moves away from the anti targaryen sentiment, these smaller corners of the fandom, which tend to be echo chambers, are also affected, which has therefore led to a rise in rhaegar x elia shippers and the ‘shifting tide’ that you’ve also noticed.

[xxplastic-cubexx]

Ppl who say charles is "a piece of shit" doesn't understand that 1: characters can have NUANCE and 2: these comics have a million different writers for each run with varying degrees of quality for each character and storyline. Some writers fuck charles up bc they dont like him/dont know how to write him. And i dont count those characterizations of Charles bc the "flaws" they gave him are in bad faith interpretation of the character. Now i love me some hypocritical asshole charles but thats not the point of his character, which is that he always struggles with trying to have a peaceful outcome which sometimes in order to get that, you have to be a manipulative asshole to bring the peace. Doesn't mean you have to like doing it either (subconsciously is a different story for a different time)

(Also sorry for giving you a wall of text lol i love your art hope you're doing well)

its just especially Interesting with charles because it's not as if Every Other Character is perfect and saintly and has never made a mistake. like i think everyone understands these characters have nuance and they'll never act 100% in the right, its only really with charles that i see people blow up his mistakes (and sometimes misinterpret his actions if not outright make up Bad Things hes done) and act as if he's ONLY ever done wrong and EVERY action he's done was done with evil or misguided intentions

[waitineedaname]

"Amestris is an allegory for nazi Germany" you fool. Amestris is not an allegory for just nazi Germany -- it's an allegory for genocidal, fascist, militaristic governments as a whole. Yes, it has parallels to fascist Europe, but it also has parallels to xenophobic militaristic US and imperialist Japan. The point is not "look at this outlier of a country committing atrocities," the point is that the country committing atrocities might be your country and you might be complicit in it no matter how morally upstanding you might think you are. To act like only one government is capable of committing genocide blinds you to the potential that any other government might commit genocide too.

[edennill-archived]

interconnected young númenórean OCs:

oruzîr: native of romenna from a faithful family, loosely associated with the brotherhood. he's taken when random people are being picked off the streets in Romenna in retaliation for a joint assassination attempt on Sauron and Ar-Pharazon (the loyalists are filtered out, of course, but he's very much not) and killed-slash-sacrificed. I am not giving any details but, uh, it's not pleasant by any means because of the whole "collective punishment and deterrent against treason" facet.

he also becomes the basis of a lot of númenórean/gondor-arnorian folklore about dead people appearing to their kin in dreams (together with gorlim from the first age probably) because he does. more than once, and all with namo's permission, he's just waiting for his best friend to arrive in the halls and there are those whose spirits can be raised by the appearance of someone who died well and is now a given value of okay.

angrod: yes, his parents chose a random name from the histories, next question; on a day to day basis he goes by something adunaic. taken on the same day as his best friend and for the same reasons, killed a few days after him. one of the people oru did talk to in dreams, they leave the halls together.

ireth: oru's cousin and other best friend, born and raised somewhere beyond romenna. her family moved to pelargir a few years before the other was killed, because the situation in númenor was getting too bad for their liking and that's probably how she survived everything that happened. also talks with oru in a dream, raises a symbolical grave for him in her garden which becomes something of a local curiosity/chapelet in later days. her letters regarding the post-mortem conversation are probably the best preserved account of the whole idea. childhood friend to several members of the brotherhood.

dirên: youth engaged to avalêzrê, very deep in illegal activities. he is killed while leading a fugitive "traitor" to the coast.

khamil: dirên's younger brother, raised by him after their parents passed on from illness, 14 at time of death. in the absence of a dirên to question he is unfortunately arrested by the king's men and brought to the temple where in dire circumstances he manages not to reveal the names of any of his brother's co-conspirators. I feel guilty for killing him off because lil bro is the same age and I realised that's actually a kid when I put the two together.

avalêzrê: she's the unofficial leader of a group in romenna that calls itself the brotherhood for lack of a better name and consists of several "full-time" and several looser affiliated members. their goals are non-military, they mostly occupy themselves with the collection of medical and financial support, preservation of art and culture, as well as passing on messages for whoever among the faithful might have need such service.

tirithon: core member of the brotherhood. taken by sauron, he is unable to keep many of the others secret under interrogation. sacrificed soon after.

azgabar: friend of tirithon betrayed by him. he holds no grudge and forgives him in the halls before they go on.

azrathel: sole survivor of the brotherhood, former neighbour of oruzîr and angrod. she meets and becomes a friend of ireth after the downfall.

súrion: an acquaintance/loose friend of azrathel and one of the people who came up with the assassination plot. if he ever learns about the azrathel-ireth-oruzir connection it's going to be awkward, especially as he's probably going to meet ireth someday. ("your cousin kinda died instead of me, and tbh neither of us should have died but uh if anyone here committed treason it was not him and maybe I should have predicted the outcome")

[ivan-fyodorovich-k]

my student for some reason: sure the Nazis murdered 11,000,000 people in extermination camps, but the United States temporarily imprisoned 110,000 Japanese Americans, and at the end of the day, those are pretty similar

me: I guess?

[supercantaloupe]

saw a post last night complaining that the sound of music film and its popularity contribute to the "universalization of the holocaust" and that by depicting an austrian catholic gentile family's opposition to the nazi regime instead of being about jews, it paints some kind of false picture of who the nazis' real targets were. and i'm sorry but that is such a narrow minded, externally motivated reading of the film/musical. and i say this as a jew who broadly agrees that holocaust universalization and the sidelining of "the jewish problem" (as it was known in that era) in film and media is a genuine and pervasive problem. the sound of music...that is really not the right target for your ire, my friend

[brick-van-dyke]

If there's one thing I've respectively noticed from Zionists and defenders of Israeli war crimes, it's that every source, argument and potential avenue to explore each explanation is riddled with cherry picking, moving the goalposts and mental gymnastics to explain why their conclusions, which typically are barely even related to the sources they use, somehow overshadow literal reality and what we see with our own eyes.

While scrolling, one example I came across was the repetitive misrepresentation of BLM, antifa and quotes from Martin Luther King Jr, as well as statistics, scholarly journal articles and government website information. These are all good sources, yet every single time they're mangled completely until the only possible "interpretation" of any of them is "well Israel is right to defend itself after shorting rockets beforehand because the retaliation was brutal and all Arabs are bad by default therefore". As if any of these sources are even about individual exceptions of Israel versus hatred towards Arabs.

I think what I find most absurd, as someone in the middle of their own studies, is how every bit of critical thinking and logic goes out the window as they do every single thing possible to do what professors worldwide say NOT to do when evaluating sources. It's like watching a race to see who can tangle and misconstrue scientific information to fit their world view the fastest. Then said people say "um actually I studied at university before so it's actually not wrong that I'm doing this exact this everyone is warned not to do because I have a permit". Ignorance I can forgive, but willful and arrogant manipulation? That's another thing entirely.

[insanostyle1231]

made id be more joyful about trying dragon age veilguard when there isnt a grifter in my ear telling me its ass

[trans-leek-cookie]

i feel like we are conflating "not realizing you were being lied to" and "accepting/ignoring obvious gross behavior" in the same realm of being Not At Fault. Yeah this is abt James Somerton cause like. Yeah you're not going to notice plagiarism unless youre familiar with the plagiarized work (or someone calls out said plagiarism) that's fine. But like? You aren't irredeemable or anything, but maybe in the future be more critical when someone you respect or like says stuff that's misogynistic or lesbophobic or biphobic or transphobic? Like you don't have to instantly persecute them, but please let that inform how you see them? Don't just write them off as having good intentions or important things to say (even if they do), you can acknowledge those intentions while also acknowledging their faults. Again: it's not an unforgivable sin, but there's a difference in being lied to and listening to someone Say Misogynistic and Bi/Trans/Lesbophobic Shit openly

[autumnrory]

i rmr when all the initial meta around endgame was coming out people were talking about steve being depressed and whatnot and it's like well yeah but he's BEEN depressed, like he woke up alone in this century and he kept going, now i can understand it being worse this time after finding a family and getting bucky back and losing them all except of course that's not why endgame steve was on about so like......the people writing meta were trying to connect these things that of course weren't really there on screen because that simply wasn't our steve

but i think it really could've been SO interesting to see this is the thing that finally makes steve stay down like he's lost so much and he just CAN'T keep fighting like i get some people think that's what they were going for but considering the ending......it's really not. and so i'm just thinking about a version after iw, maybe he gets some of the thor treatment except not turning his depression into a dumb fatphobic joke lol and maybe nat and others are trying to get through to him and it just doesn't work and then we get some flashbacks (which you could have done for all the original avengers actually which would be particularly important for bruce and nat and clint who did not have their own trilogies) including his mom telling him "you always stand up" and THAT being the thing to finally get him moving like it would've been such a perfect way to finally show sarah rogers some respect and ACTUALLY show steve really struggling instead of whatever they tried to do with him in that movie

[magnoliamyrrh]

tbh as someone whose over the years taken the time to listen to why minorities are voting for trump why nonminorities are voting for trump what it is that people say about all this and to talk to trump supporters in real life because i dont believe instantly cutting ppl off gets anyone anywhere actually or changes anything at all for the better

its very surprising to me how many people are genuinely shocked trump won and i dont mean shocked like this sucks i mean shocked like they rly didnt see this coming and they lived in a bubble where they thought kamala would rly win by a landslide

[geisterland]

I love having my hatred of people shipping the Nazi and the USSR validated

[riverofrainbows]

It's really frustrating to see people who you would get along with and agree with in activism spaces, but they met a couple really awful people who use some of the same language as you do, understandably were threatened and repulsed by that, and then decided to generalise that experience on everyone using those terms, and examine everything you say from an uncharitable point of view even though those people aren't even coming to the same conclusions as you. Like yeah that is gonna be productive.

[boycritter]

sorry. im still pissed off about my english class today. can everyone shut the fuck up about the holocaust forever. please. holy shit.