#fandom misgoynoir

[geekynichelle]

The last thing I just reblogged got me remembering that on two different occasions I saw a Black female character being called a rapist for *checks notes* in one instance having consensual sex with a white guy, and the other for being in a threesome with a Bi white guy and a Gay guy also consensually. You gotta love it here.

[bohemian-nights]

I’m so over the fake concern over Nettles and her relationship with Daemon when half these concerned fans ship/are sympathetic towards Dumbnyra, Hellmann’s, or Alysmond(which I like). Which are equally or even more problematic than Dattles 🤷🏽‍♀️

The only difference is that Nettles is Black so they don’t want their “fave”(Daemon) to leave their self insert for a Black woman 🤷🏽‍♀️ Or they don’t want a white woman they admire(for Team Green Stan’s who hate Daemon guts) to be considered “second best.”

Nettles must be a “victim” of Daemon like Rhaenyra. She can’t actually be loved by him. Even though he literally was going to lay down his life for her, but sure Becky you tell them 💁🏽‍♀️ It’s misgoynoir disguised as “caring” when they could care less about Nettles.

If you don’t believe me it happens like clockwork with Black women characters in fandoms. Look up Abbie Mills, Bonnie Bennet, Lacey Porter, or hell how this fandom treated Laena when she was alive 🙃

False concern over Nettles.

It feels again like an idea that we could apply to Arya or Brienne and Sansa when people say that they don't want Daemon to groom her or they want him to be a mentor or father figure.

Nettles, in the context of the story, has had to be her own family for most of her life. Her morality, her character is based on Driftmark.

A big thing I see is people comparing her to King's Landing characters. King's Landing is hell, the ghetto of Westeros. I mean this with my full heart, Nettles would be a very different character if she was raised there.

She was raised in a trading center where she had to depend on herself for her own stability, just to ensure she wouldn't die. She has been an adult for longer than a lot of the 'adults' in the current story can claim. She literally would've died if she wasn't responsible for herself. She has also had to pick and choose what she wanted to be and has had wider access to other cultures just by the nature of a place like Driftmark.

So this idea that in the story she is a character we can relate to people we've seen is unfounded.

More than likely, she's very independent and intelligent to have done it for what seems like most of her life without forming notable ties with others.

A huge part of what we know about her is that she's perceptive, patient, and problem solving. We see her be compassionate past people almost twice her age.

Mr and Mrs The heir for a day, we must have him sharply questioned would never have settled for what they gave her. At her age they were running away from arguements and being problem children. The lack of anything she was promised and continued willingness to fight is something unfounded by most of the main characters.

The fact that instead of walking up to a dragon like a crazy person, she sees that no matter who goes up to him, he doesn't trust them, and instead of giving up or moving on, she sees the potential and builds on that idea, developing the trust before establishing a bond. At a cost to herself, mind you. With mister sex for sheep writing the narrative, she literally does what she does at a cost of the way people perceive her

We see this young lady express her compassion towards the death of innocents, over the loss of her friend, while her peers are celebrating or have avenues for people to comfort them. She just openly grieves, and it's a bigger impact than most other character reactions because she doesn't have to. Everyone else is entitled who fought with her are entilted to the lives they took and don't even question it outside of Addam, a notable thing with the Driftmark folk in the story, but we see a moment of genuine compassion from a girl who grew up from the streets.

A theme with her from her introduction is the care she has that she just doesn't seem to withhold. She cries when Jace dies, when she fights in a war for the first time, when she leaves Daemon and she takes the time when taming her dragon.

The idea you have to have in your head about her being this helpless young girl who isn't exposed to the world is so strange. She just seems to choose compassion over the brutality she was exposed to. Unlike most of the men or a lot of the other women we meet in the story, there's a genuine effort on her part to be a good person.

All of this alludes to the fact that she probably has a sure idea of herself, and when Daemon meets her, although she is grieving Jace and probably is traumatized from the war, she would be able to navigate her emotions. I am aware she's 16, which is very young, but she is an adult in their world and has had to be one for quite some time to ensure she survives.

This isn't Daemon preying on some naive girl, this is both of them seemingly finding comfort in each other after times of grief and isolation.

I'm not saying I like it, but what I am saying is that this need to discredit the established character we are given is unfair and unfounded. It is a disservice to her when you treat her like a lady or hold the expectations of Arya or Brienne or even Sansa on her because that's not who she is. Her relationships with the men in this world will never read the same way simply because of her status. That's not how she was brought up in the world, either.

Another thing to say is that she doesn't have a direct parallel in the story. She was low born, claims a dragon and never gains anything to establish herself outside of the title Dragonseed.

We have no parallel with her outside of kind off with Dany in A Game of Thrones and the situations she's in. Even then, she still isn't a Targaryen and isn't deemed beautiful. She thankfully doesn't have a Viserys III comparison or a Khal Drogo we know of in her story.

Of the many things I'll call Daemon, their equivalent is never one of them.

She is clearly cared for by the people she's around as well. Daemon attaches himself to her in four months. In the same amount of time, Corlys is defending her, with grievances, in the same breath as his heir.

So I urge you to look at her character, try to characterize her past your own biases in the story, mostly only having read from the point of view of noble women in this world and understand that she's such a unique character and a different perspective in this world. You should allow any of the theories or concerns you have to operate with her as her own character, not an isolated aspect with no context like the fact that she's young or the fact that Daemon is uncharacteristically close to her, these things dont exist in one context in the books simply due to the characters we apply them too.

And if you don't like Nettles' storyline with Daemon, that's something you're allowed to not like. You don't need to justify it outside of your beliefs because it isn't something set up to be read that way.