#and i think both the von karma haters AND the von karma apologists are in some ways not fully seeing that nuance

[starboundsingularities]

hi i have. so many thoughts on this i hope you don't mind.

before saying anything i will preface this with three things:

i have not played through or seen investigations yet. i have heard a few things about it but for the most part the flashback case does not play a part in this. neither doe the anime, for similar reasons.

i am inherently biased. i see a lot of my great grandmother in manfred von karma's behavior, and my great grandmother was, to my understanding, abusive to me. so i'm very predisposed to saying that manfred von karma was abusive to his children as well, simply due to the parallels

this is in no way meant to be mean to the op, and do not send hate to them or i swear to god i will Get You. from my understanding they asked this not because of their own personal opinion or to prove any point but simply because they wanted to hear other people's opinions on the topic and this was an easy way to do so, as it invites both sharing of a base opinion and of your reasoning.

that being said, he was definitely not a good father. it's a very complex discussion, but i feel very confident in saying he was not a good father in any way.

it's comically easy to say he wasn't a good father figure to miles. his whole reason for taking him in was solely to twist him against everything he had wanted and then ultimately pin the blame on him for his father's death. his entire reason for taking him in was a petty revenge plot, because killing his father wasn't enough for him. that alone means that he couldn't have been a good father, regardless of how well he may or may not have treated miles in the time between the dl-6 incident and turnabout goodbyes.

however, his treatment of franziska is much, much more complex. i don't doubt that he cared for franziska, however i doubt he was a good father figure to her, either. even looking at how she acts, it's clear she has so, so many issues stemming from the standards he pushed onto her. she's unable to accept failure, no doubt due to the standard of perfection she was held to. she seems to see most, if not all others as beneath her in some way, which is likely again due to her upbringing. she was no doubt always being told that as a von karma, she had to have been better than others. even if not directly, simply being told that a von karma had to be perfect would no doubt instill a similar belief. after all, nobody can be better than perfect. i would love nothing more than to go on further, but doing so greatly risks this becoming mere projection. i've spent ample time with my great grandma, who similarly only accepted perfection from me, and it left me with a whole slew of problems. she managed to give me a superiority complex and an inferiority complex at the same time.

however, i don't think that he intended to be a bad father, at least not to franziska. he likely fully believed that he was doing what was best for her, leading her to success and perfection like that which he believed he had achieved. simply leading her to carry on a legacy. and i do truly doubt that he was "comically abusive" or whatever term people are using. no, i do not believe that manfred von karma regularly beat his kids, or did not love them at all, or whatever people are saying. i believe that he truly did care for them in some form, or at the very least cared for franziska. and i do believe that he did nice things for them. i doubt they ever had to be told "no" when asking for something, i'm sure he gave them everything they could want, at least in a material sense. i'm sure he took them out places whenever possible, and i'm sure they enjoyed it. that does not negate bad parenting though.

at risk of projecting more, i would like to briefly discuss my great grandma. she loved me very dearly. she told me such often, and the rest of my family told me they had never seen her as close with anyone as she was with me. she took me out all the time, i went swimming at least once a week in summer, she took me to karaoke often (which is a strangely specific parallel to have), she gave me nearly everything i asked for. she had a big house, we had a lot of toys, a lot of movies, nearly everything i could want. and it was fun. i enjoyed it.

but she mocked me relentlessly for any mistake. i stopped taking singing lessons because i couldn't sing well enough to fit her standards. our relationship ended entirely because i couldn't play a song flawlessly on the piano after a week. when i was sad, or upset, i had to take extra care to make sure she never noticed, or i would be called a crybaby. when i was trying to avoid her, she found me anyways simply to mock me. if i recall correctly, one day i was hiding in the basement because i was upset and she stormed downstairs to tell me i had a fat ass and force me to run on the treadmill. we hadn't even been arguing about it. i told my great grandfather once that i was scared of her, and not to tell her i said that. she found out anyways. i don't even remember what she did. i just know i was more scared after. if i ever told her i didn't know something, she would continue to grill me on it until i cried, then mock me for crying.

she loved me. she thought she had my best interests at heart. but despite all the good times, and despite her attempts at spoiling me, she still traumatized me. and many, or at least all of my friends, would agree that she abused me, even if not physically so.

and i feel that having manfred von karma as a father would be a similar experience. perhaps not the exact same. most details would be different. but i believe the overall feeling would be similar enough.

(the poll is just a decoration i just want to read manfred discourse)