#men get waaaaay more sympathy and attention to their motivations

[impulsivelycontentious]

You know, I would think people were past "Oh my poor little meow meow didn't REALLY do war crimes, it was, in fact, the Evil Woman who is a Bad Mom who *made* him because she's manipulative and bad,"

Babes. My lovelies. Cats. Please stop doing the 'women are responsible for men's crimes' thing. Even in fiction. Especially in fiction. It is old and tired.

That said, this is particularly about dragon age, where people are identifying strongly and I get that, I do, but this isn't a kid, this is a spirit of wisdom, and it isn't so easily manipulated as all of that, and she was, in fact, a spirit of benevolence and wasn't so twisted as all of that. What they became later, maybe, but you're ignoring any nuance and the inhuman natures here.

You have a few paragraphs from a 4,000 year old relationship.

Please stop doing the "evil woman made him do it," thing. There's space for her to be bad without making him a poor hapless victim without agency. There's space for her to do terrible things without being nothing but a manipulative hussy. There's space for you to like him and for him to have done bad things, too. Your enjoyment of fiction is not a reflection of your moral character.

I understand the appeal of seeing oneself in the other. It's great in fiction and fantasy. But be aware when you're just playing in to tired old sexist tropes. Hell, be aware of when the WRITER is doing that.

"Poor man did it because of bad woman :'( It's not his fault." is a tired old sexist trope.