#or that targs are blood purists

[ethereal-elegance]

Peak comedy,clownery,delusion,and projection is Stark stans/Jonas's/Stansas accusing the Targaryens (mainly Dany who doesn't judge or look down on people based off their differences in race,appearance,and culture from hers but by their actions and embraces good people,the downtrodden and the oppressed such as slaves and the people who can't care for and protect themselves who she takes under her wing as a mother and Champion of the People in spite of being forced to perserve the peace in Mereen with the slavers to prevent further bloodshed of slaves and even assimilates into the culture such as the Dothraki for example despite hating their pillaging and violence against innocent civillians hasn't even been intimate with another Targaryen or Valyrian but had a son with Khal Drogo of the Dothraki🙃🤨🙄) of being blood purists and Targaryen/Valyrian supremacists when it's evident in the books the Valyrians practiced brother-sister incest/inbreeding before the Doom of Old Valyria which the Targaryens still managed to do while marrying into various other houses of various races in Westeros to preserve not only their Valyrian blood but their heritage and culture concerning the magic and their bond with dragons in their bloodline considering the Targaryens were the last only dragonlord house left who escaped the Doom,not to mention Starks' ancestors of the race of the First Men barely/rarely-if at all-married outside of northern houses of the First Men.Starkies' hypocrisy is giving their projection of the Stark ancestors the First Men actually committing genocide against the indigenous people of the North,the Children of the Forest,except for their daughters who they forced to marry into House Stark to steal the magic in their bloodline,hence why the Starks including all the Starklings just automatically have skinchanging abilities besides the Starks long history of being Northern/First Men blood purists and supremacists.Not to mention on top of that the Starks' ancestors waged/engaged in many wars against other Northern houses and wiped out their rival threats of their own race-to make matters far worse-only just so the Starks could rule in the North as the kings of winter.But Starkies fandom lack self-awareness with their superiority complex and narcissism,so they'll never acknowledge these facts,be willfully blind and conveniently ignore to spin the narrative and the push their anti-Dany/anti-Rhaegar agenda.Not to mention the Starks pushed out and displaced the Blackwoods (one of the houses that married into House Targaryen after Aegon's conquest) from the wolfwood.Not to mention the First Men imposed their religion of the Old gods unlike the Targaryens who adopted Westerosi culture and religion of the Seven after Aegon the Conqueror conquered and unified the Seven Kingdoms,not to mention Aegon's intentions for conquering was to unite the Westerosi and the kingdoms to fight against the Long Night due to a dragon dream he had about the incoming imminent threat beyond the wall in the North.But antis act like the warring kingdoms' kings playing the game of thrones weren't neglecting and harming their so called people but living in a utopia in which there was only peace,happiness,and good health until Aegon,Rhaenys,and Visenya came along with their dragons🤦🏾‍♀️Imagine accusing others of the atrocities your fav house is guilty of🤡☠️These antis tend project every negative action on characters and houses they're threatened by,because they're insecure of their glorified self-inserts and their fav houses they identify with just to cope with delusions,oh the irony🤣

Daenerys Targaryen + Non-Targaryen Houses of Descent

[the-daily-dreamer]

Every time a targ stan blames someone else for them seeing a properly tagged post, a dragonrider dies

Like to charge. Reblog to cast on your local cross tag cry baby.

[jessescatorccio]

sometimes i really wish asoiaf had never hit the mainstream (got and hotd) bc now i have to see so many horrific ridiculous takes about house targaryen

[gameofthronedd]

I'm sorry but it freaks me out that some people act as if House Targaryen is their own incestuous dragon family and everyone even a smidge critical is slandering their Ma and Pa and Uncle Tom.

[visenyaism]

also it IS concerning none of you fake fire and blood book purists remembered Aeriana Targaryen? I mean it’s one of George’s sillier targ names but thought Maegor’s daughter with Tyanna who got disowned for being born blind but later went on to marry into the Darklyns and become an influential figure in the reorganization of the faith post-faith militant through her writings on knighthood was such a compelling character?

[rainhadaenerys]

One thing that Dany/Targ antis say is that the Doctrine of Exceptionalism is proof that Targaryens are blood purists… but it really isn't. First, because it wasn't even created with any "blood purist" motivation. The motivation for the creation of the doctrine was simply because Jaehaerys and Alysanne got married, but were afraid that the realm wouldn't accept their marriage because of the Faith of the Seven. So they had to create a whole propaganda to make people believe that the Targaryens were a different kind of people because they rode dragons, and that the gods allowed them to marry each other. At the end of the day, the Doctrine of Exceptionalism was just an excuse that Jaehaerys and Alysanne created so that they could get married, and so that the Targaryens could keep following Valyrian traditions, without getting into conflict with the Faith. And the only thing the Doctrine of Exceptionalism did was to allow incest between Targaryens, but at no point did the Doctrine ever dictate that Targaryens must only marry each other, that they must only marry those of Valyrian blood, or that they should never mix with other people (and indeed, Targaryens married outside their family and outside of Valyrian families many times). The Doctrine has nothing to do with forbidding mixing of blood or with "keeping the blood pure", the Doctrine simply allowed Targaryens to marry each other. The doctrine had nothing to do with "blood purity".

[horizon-verizon]

Not people jumping to blame DAEMON'S influence for Jace calling bastards "mongrels." When has Daemon EVER been bastardphobic? His attitudes towards Jace's parentage include some possible jealousy while he and Laena were both being good natured about it, seeming kind of proud of Rhaenyra when she admitted it, seeming pretty enthusiastic about wedding his daughters to "bastards", and literally killing a man for insulting Rhaenyra and her boys. I just simply don't get where this "Daemon is a blood supremacist" (more than any other noble is) comes from when he gives no fuck aside from jealousy about Rhaenyra "sullying" their Valyrian blood with Strong blood and putting her bastards on their precious dragons. Alicent is the most likely source of Jace's internalized insecurities (because that's what that was) so why do people keep pretending otherwise? Am I missing something?

I think that it's an opportunity to slam Targs, use the less-than-great reputation Daemon has amongst some fans--which includes his supposed "special" pride, and finally to incorporate Jacaerys into that to "prove" Targ-evil and unique amorality. That is pretty much all, aside from how Condal & co have written their version of a Jace to be less secure in himself and have less...I guess "family" as its truest phenomenon. Again, Daemon lived w/Rhaenyra her her co on Dragonstone for abt 1o or a little more with both Baela & Rhaena. Before that, it had been Harwin with occasional & then more frequent visits from Laenor. He more or less grew up away from the court Alicent presided even as he experienced some of the stigma of being even suspected as a bastard, esp from Alicent's supporters, here & there. But more so from his uncles: Aegon, Aemond, perhaps Daeron, too who'd follow his older brothers.

I also think it's bc Daemon has a lot of pride in his house that they are bound to think are white supremacists/colonizers and has disliked Rhea Royce from the beginning while being more amenable to Laena and Rhaenyra, who are both much more Valyrian-by-lineage than Rhea, who has none. Nobles are engrossed in making sure their marriages afford them the best possible access to resources and the prestige associated to whatever house so that they may have issue who can brings usch things into the "home" house or out to the house(s) chosen and favored. It's a way to organize wealth and power. Targs on Valyria and the rest of Valyria saw strength in their dragons, the pinnacle of such power matter of fact. So--as they too, maybe, didn't have that much knowledge about genetics work outside of the magic that in Planetos is more unpredictable than other magical systems--they decided that to preserve their power/dragon bonds, they must do as many other aristocracies did--marry closely and keep that line towards power amongst themselves. I said all of this before, but it bears repeating. Daemon & the Westerosi ruling Targs , however, has never gone out of their way to create a racist system except maybe Daeron I with Dorne if he had ever succeeded in conquering it (in which case, the Dornish are not nonwhite in GRRM's lore, so that racial system would not really mirror out own very well and be its own thing entirely).

Daemon has never even displayed true blood purity the way Alicent was closer to in 1x06 when she commented on how she called them "plain-featured" and groused abt how she couldn't understand how they could have hatched their dragons...while 3 of her kids had to wait till they were much older to bond with one. Daemon never called anyone anything that espoused he thought them as lesser in the exact degree or way that Lord Celtigar does in I think 2x06? 7? (I recently ___ epi 7 and watched w/ a few friends) when he protested against Alyn getting a dragon and even called it "theft". And we see in how he interacts with Alys how he was never actually blood purist with her...an actual unrelated bastard. Daemon just cares about whether you can be trusted to not supplant family, and the Targtowers are too mired in Seven/Faith influence to be "trustworthy".

It also stems from people not truly understanding what blood purity is & its elements or what it looks like when practiced and in the open, active. You hear people make the mistake of assuming the Targs are all blood purists bc they dislike how "keeping the blood pure" thru sibling marriage for dragonriding sounds to them like the Valyrians were ready for phrenology and eugenics and all that...If this were true, however, every single society (or at least most)--and that includes many non-white societies like the Egyptians, some Polynesians, East Asians, etc. as that particular kind of "blood purists". I list of these out bc you will find such "keeping blood pure" practices in nonwhite ancient societies as well. Often. Class=/= race, though it definitely laid the frames for race as we know it; racial systems have inherited ideas of racial difference from class assumptions of difference b/t aristocratic classes and the have-nots. To put it oversimply.

Still, they are not the same. Or we wouldn't have "white" people of real life AND Westeros also hate or abuse the other in their systems. If the Westerosi ruling Targs were that sort of "blood purists", they would have never allowed themselves to marry outside of their own family for fear of "dirtying" their "blood", or lineage. And they, more than the Starks, have had quite a diverse set of outer marriages through their entire dynasty.

I think Daemon just has a lot more expressed pride and arrogance that puts people off and leads them to make wrong, well-meaning conclusions. Oh, & of course HotD hasn't helped, with how they reduced his character at every turn possible.

[spider-stark]

Just saw leaks from an insider in the writers room for s3 for stuff that condal and Hess are throwing around… let’s just say our beautiful cregan stark will likely be ruined done so dirty I’m rly about to just stop watching this show bc there is no way ppl can keep doing this like not to be a book purist but what was the point of the books. And even so should characters no be written consistently regardless am I the crazy one

Can we start hotd filming from the beginning and do this ourselves im so serious

I have... so many things... to say about this...

for the sake of keeping it simple: I will not be thrilled if any of these turn out to be facts.

I've seen a few people throw around the "Daeron is gonna be a bastard" thing and while I do think that would be funny, it's also not possible?? not unless we're going to reveal that a person doesn't need Targ blood to be a dragon rider, that is---which, if they were going to do that then fine, but I don't think Daeron is the best character for that storyline.

and then Cregan....

to say Cregan's promise ends when Jace dies would be absolute bullshit in every way. honor and loyalty are quite literally the foundation of House Stark. it would be the stupidest thing they've ever done (which, honestly, I wouldn't be that surprised by. hbo has a habit of doing stupid things).

ugh. idk. there are too many things to say about all of these and it makes my head hurt.

agreed that fans just need to redo the show at this point. get some fanfic writers in a room with GRRM and this show would come out on fucking top---especially because the actors are already incredible, and sometimes the writing is amazing, too.

I understand things need to be cut and changed for television at times---but most of these changes are just unnecessary, harmful to the overall plot, and just plain ridiculous.

[lotofexplosions]

Not team green on TikTok talking about being "less blood purist" because they "don't believe in targ supremacy" after spending months telling people bastards are intently worse for the throne

[darklinaforever]

"The canonically purist blood woman" girl where? the blood purists are daemon and rhaenyra. the targtowers and hightowers are not "pureblood targs" as you TB LOVE to remind us.

alicent never gave a sh*t about house targ, blood purity or any of that bs. that's team black. book!alicent wanted the throne and power - and never gave a f*ck about rhaenyra. and why should she? y'all just hate alicent because she's advocating for herself and her children instead of your lame favs.

but sure, keep defending your racist qween - we'll just keep calling you out on your bs.

Alicent has never been primarily interested in the safety of its children. Otherwise she would never have prepared a coup d'état to usurp the legitimate heir, putting them all in mortal danger, or even ask her last descendant to try to assassinate Aegon III.

She literally harassed Rhaenyra since she was little to try to take her down, simply because she was the heir. An adult woman against a child.

She literally told Rhaenyra that her children were nothing more than the blood of unimportant bastards shed in war... All while trying to negotiate the survival of her own children whom she considered superior ! How stupid do you have to be ?!

That's just for the book.

Just caring about bastards is a ridiculous issue of blood purity. Which Team Blacks never actually had (and no, contrary to what a lot of people say, Daemon had nothing against the Velaryon boys). But obviously, Alicent is not a blood purist, even if she cares about the so-called bastards... Not to mention Aemond openly spewing his hatred for bastards. But the Hightowers don't care about blood purity, obviously... Let me laugh.

A little consistency.

And in the show's version, his remarks about Rhaenyra's children are more than revealing on this subject. She compares them to animals and simple beings for not coming from marriage. For not being what she judges to be true Targaryens, because she doesn't understand that their eggs hatched. She literally married off her two children to reinforce / give more weight to her son's so-called baseless legitimization, while she criticized Rhaenyra a few episodes before for having had an affair with Daemon. A hypocrite who did not hesitate to use Targaryen traditions when it benefited her. But anyway...

Yes, the Alicent of the book is ambitious and power hungry above all else. That's the only thing I like about her.

But stop pretending that she was worried about the safety of her children or her children at all. If that had been the case, she wouldn't have done everything I mentioned above.

And don't come and tell me the excuse that his children were in danger and that it was his only option because that's bullshit.

Anyway, I'm going to stop responding to the demands of the antis. I'm tired of you harassing me since yesterday. It's almost the new year, go find other things to do.

[greenbloods]

on one hand having purple eyed targs would’ve been cool to see onscreen and added to their whole exceptionalist aura but on the other hand it would’ve made unironic targ blood purists insufferable so I guess not including it was for the best. plus imagine watching the funny dragon show on sunday and just being greeted with the 🟣🟣 stare from your tv screen

[the-daily-dreamer]

One thing I would like to bring up that I think has been forgotten a little bit was remember how Black Stans were baying for Blood & Cheese? How delighted they were for it? How they could not wait for it? How it was deserved after what happened?

And Rhaenyra was horrified by it. She was sicken by the idea she could do something like that to someone else, especially her own sister. At this point, Rhaenyra had absolutely no interest in slaying her own kin and that little boy was her nephew. (I have my issues with the way the show is going and characterizations but I do think even in the books she wouldn't have wanted that for Helaena). People in Westeros thought Blood and Cheese was horrific.

Black Stans, your idol would have been sicken by the way you were acting. Your idol would have been disgusted by what you were excited to do. We got a reduced version of Blood and Cheese because HBO thought it was too much. Really, people need to check themselves and think why they were so excited to murder an innocent little boy and psychological torture of two other innocent little children and their genuinely kind and sweet mother.

“Black stans, your idol would have been sickened by the way you were acting. Your idol would have been disgusted by what you were excited to do”

LOUDERRRRR!!!

If I have to deal with an angelic Rhaenyra who can do no wrong (according to the show), you best believe imma use that against team black.

Rhaenyra would be disgusted by yall. Hell, she’s disgusted by the man she has been infatuated with since she was 15. You’re all fanatics hiding behind a cloak of righteousness and feminism to disguise your bizarre hatred of victims and non-Targaryen characters.

[lemonhemlock]

A true unpopular opinion, but some Green fans need to acknowledge that House Hightower has always been unabashedly pro Targaryen in canon. They married three times into the Targs (Maegor with Ceryse, Alicent with Viserys 1, and Garmund with Rhaena). They sided with them against the Faith Militant, took the side of one branch of Targs in the Dance, and sided with Aerys II in Robert's Rebellion (Daenerys literally describes them as loyal to her family in the books).

I get that it's funny to poke fun at cringe Targ stans for hating the Hightowers *blood purity and bullshit 🙄* but it becomes much less of a dunk because House Hightower has always been canonically loyal to the Targaryens. Feel free to disagree with me, but that's just my opinion.

Oh, absolutely, this automatic rendering of the Hightowers as secret Targaryen-haters is faintly ridiculous. It was fine as a joke, but some people take it so seriously, when not even the Targaryens are completely demonised by the narrative. The text reads to me like they're supposed to be considered a mixed bag, with good and bad, culminating, of course, with the unspeakable cruelty of Aerys II and the justification for Robert's Rebellion. But, by some fans' reactions, you'd think GRRM intended every Targaryen ever created to be considered the devil incarnate - I really don't think that's the case.

IMO it's not that the Hightowers hate the Targaryens, it's just that they want to access some of their political power or even ingratiate themselves into the innermost circles. At the same they just generally seem to want to not die and live out their comfortable lives in their beautiful city, so sometimes you'll encounter some pretty ruthless pragmatism in their history in order to preserve that. I've written meta in the past on how I see their role in the narrative - it's clear that they will at least have some pretty important part to play in the upcoming battle for Oldtown.

Similarly, their association with the Faith of the Seven is very practical in nature - making friends within religious high circles is very often going to benefit you in some way, be it politically or even financially. I'm sure they're not faking their beliefs, but it's one thing to have normal religious beliefs for the era and instrumentalize them politically and it's one thing altogether to be a religious nutcase. Some Hightowers are said to have historically studied magic and necromancy, too, so they're periodically not bothered about being religious purists. In the books, Viserys was the one who decided to marry Aegon and Helaena, but the Hightowers were obviously not too bothered about the targcest, because they didn't put up a fight or express their reservations. Alicent herself was the one who proposed her own son be married to his half-sister. In the show, they made her wear this huge seven-pointed-star to telegraph more religious compliance than I think arose originally from the text.

I do have to add an explicatory note, though: the Hightowers didn't exactly side with Maegor during the Faith Militant's Rebellion. Their interest in this matter would have been for Ceryse to be considered his sole wife, which is why Ceryse's father, Manfred, protested to King Aenys about this issue. During this uprising, at some point Maegor, Visenya and their army (with their dragons) approached Oldtown. Initially, Martyn, Ceryse's brother, called his banners but it's likely that the might of the Targaryen host convinced him that the path of least resistance was to simply acquiesce, instead of getting burnt alive by Vhagar and Balerion. So it would be more a case of being strongarmed into supporting Maegor in this situation.

The period of Aerys II's reign in Hightower history has the potential to be very interesting, since, yes, they sided with Aerys, but the question is how much that decision was influenced by the fact that Gerold Hightower was the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard. How much sway did Ser Gerold hold over his nephew Lord Leyton? Did he essentially consider his uncle to be a hostage or just aligned himself out of solidarity with his political decisions? Did what happened during Robert's Rebellion have any bearing on his decision to later become a hermit? Personally, I would like to find out more about Ser Gerold's headspace and decision-making process during this time, because it could be an insightful exploration into the honour vs duty question, if GRRM is ever so inclined to give us more details - this goes for pretty much all members of Aerys II's Kingsguard, especially Arthur Dayne and Lewyn Martell.

[la-pheacienne]

The Targaryens being so popular in the fandom is something I will never understand. It seems people just see silver hair & dragons and think it’s cool without thinking more deeply about it. The Targaryens are blood purists who think they are demigods for having dragons. And no they don’t have to inbreed to keep their “dragon blood”. The dragon blood is obviously dominant, given how Daenerys can clearly control three dragons without any problem despite having plenty of native Westerosi blood (example: the Blackwoods). So no the Targs do not need to inbreed to keep their mystical connection to dragons, the Targtowers are another example of that.

They are quite literally 50% Valyrian and 50% Native Westerosi, and they all have and ride dragons just fine. Therefore the Targs inbreed because they do view the people they rule over as inferior because they are not Valyrian. It’s not to preserve their dragon riding ability, because Targs have married non Targs plenty of times and produced dragon riding children. So the Targs very well know that inbreeding isn’t necessary. They just do it because they are blood purists and view the Westerosi as inferior to them for their lack of Valyrian blood. The Targs are an outsider tyrannical race who imposed their rule over Westeros through the threat of dragonfire, and the Hightowers/Faith are heroic for wanting to get rid of them. Hightowers are native Westerosi protecting their culture from Targaryens.

"Hightowers are native Westerosi" omg NOT another American thinking ASOIAF is the story of evil white Europeans slaughtering native Americans and/or colonising Africa. For the love of God. Just say you find Ewan Mitchel and/or Olivia Cooke hot and leave the political discussion to people that have enough braincells to engage in it.

I do appreciate that you were polite though and I appreciate that you want my opinion on this, but it's a really really provocative ask for a blog whose posts are the exact opposite of what you say here.

[allyriadayne]

yeah i don't get the whole daemon is a valyrian supremacist thing?

and from another anon:

Yeah why is Daemon the only one who gets called a Valyrian supremacist?

i posted this question to my twitter mutuals some time ago and got one answer that actually made so much sense when you really think about the issue. it goes something like this (sorry couldn't find the og tweet 😩): most people think of valyrian supremacy/blood purism with a harry potter background and the pureblood ideology when it's a completely different thing that doesn't actually happen in the show or books at all. and everything clicked!!

going back to daemon, show!daemon to be more specific, he does show a preference for reading the histories and knowing the language of old valyria but i wouldn't call it him being a supremacist (very weighty!) or feeling a specific superiority about it that it's not already tied to him being a prince and one of the highest ranking man in the realm. i think what most people forget about this is that targaryens are one of the last scions of a dead culture (well you'll never call a culture dead, only transformed because a part of it will always live in its people etc. but for clarity's sake. i know we are not here for an anthropology class) and to me it's normal that its member would want to preserve it in a way. viserys has his big lego model and the others have the language and their dragons as a way to connect with what it once was. i wouldn't call that a cultural superiority at all esp when daemon or any targaryen try to exterminate or oppress that which is not valyrian (again, very weighty terms! and i wish people would have more care when talking about these issues).

most of the examples i've seen about people calling daemon a purist come from 1) daemon sleeping with silver haired women 2) criticizing alicent's new decor 3) marrying laena/hating rhea 4) speaking old valyrian. which really doesn't cut it for me?? most can be explained by daemon being a hater in general. we know he hates otto and the hightowers because he's always thought they've kept viserys and him apart and therefore made viserys weak. he /would/ had a comment about alicent changing the decor and covering the dragon orgy murals. the silver haired women well, he's still the creepy uncle, we've known he's been fixated on rhaenyra for a while and it's probably also a manifestation of being cast out of the family since he was 16, an illusion of being close to his family. same thing with rhea, he doesn't hate her because she's not valyrian, i thought that was pretty obvious.

lyonel strong is the one who advises viserys to marry laena velaryon because she is of "pure valyrian stock", would you call him a blood purist? i mean there is also the issue that most men in westeros are very proud of their heritage and i wouldn't put daemon above them at all, he's squarely in the middle. would you call the northerners blood purists because most marry in the same area with descendants of the first men and don't care about southerners? i've always thought daemon marries laena in the show because she's one of the few people who could understand him and after spending almost 20 years with a wife who hated him and he hated in return, he wanted someone more compatible and who could share his hobbies (and of course, she grabbed his attention at the wedding and the storyline about the sea lord of braavos' son was someone laena wanted to get rid off too + rhaenyra marrying and him needing to forget her fast).

what i'm trying to say is that i understand there is a sort of need to keep the line "pure" but it is to keep the dragons inside the family and i wouldn't even call it purism because targs are marrying half targs like jocelyn baratheon, aemma arryn etc, at least in this side of the dance. on the other side, after it, it's another different issue altogether where targs start practicing exogamy more often. but i don't think daemon is more or less proud than other people in the same timeline even.

[arsenic-catnep]

Is Daemon a blood purist in the sense he only loves other Targs/Velaryons or can he just only be attracted to people who look like them? Because there are other places where the people have silver hair and purple eyes (like Lys).

They have to be Targ or Val, that's the pure blood of old Valyria and the blood of his ancestors

People who happen to look like Valyrians but are from Essos are just dirty blood to him

That doesn't mean he won't fuck them, but he's definitely not having kids with them or marrying them