#rhaegar/lyanna fans

[legitchild]

Can the GOT/ASOIAF fandom stop saying that Robert Baratheon was always a terrible person?

There’s literally nothing bad about him pre Rebellion. The only thing I can think of is that he sleeps around, but calling him a bad person for that is slut shaming, and that’s gross.

It’s Lyanna/Rhaegar fans, who have to demonise Robert to make Lyanna not look terrible for choosing the married father of two over him, perpetuating this idea that Robert was always a terrible man. When Robert was a good man who fell into bad habits because of severe trauma and depression, made worse by a hateful emotionally abusive wife.

[katerina-q]

If you ever feel delusional and stupid, just remember that asoiaf fans are using this FANFICTION quote for their anti Rhaegar and Lyanna agenda and they also think this bullshit is from the books.

I promise you, in the CANON BOOKS, Oberyn never spoke that way about Rhaegar and never slutshamed Lyanna :)

[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.

[faeporcelain]

One-sided rivalry

[qyburnsghost]

The best thing about writing fan fiction , is being able to go back and reread the world you’ve created for comfort or escape.

[fromtheseventhhell]

Saying this an Elia Martell fan from what little we know of her, but I'm really sick of how fandom sees her as nothing but a perpetual victim and/or hater of Lyanna and Rhaegar. Where's fandom content of her being kind to baby Tyrion or headcanons of her plotting with Rhaegar against Aerys? Makes me wish GRRM would write more Fire and Blood books to flesh her out more outside of the "pretty victim" fanon Sansa stans want her to be.

It's actually so frustrating cause there are great conversations + theorizing that could be going on surrounding her character because we know we're going to be learning more about her in the future, but a lot of her "fans" are just stuck on using her as a prop. And honestly? That's because the more we learn about her, the more she moves away from being fandom's favorite passive self-insert character. If George has her doing anything it breaks their idea of her being the perfect victim which is what they love about her. They don't even like her character organically, they just like that it gives them a justification to hate Rhaegar and/or Lyanna. I'm personally neutral-positive about Elia, but I am very interested in learning more about her character. George has kept that portion of the story intentionally vague for a reason and I can't wait to see why.

[sshireens]

the people want rhaegar but if he existed in real time he’d be a 30yo adult ‘punk’ man garage band deadbeat who is dating a highschool student with clear misguidance issues that no one is helping her with and got her pregnant. and currently his mother is pregnant too snd surely he is very excited about this saying things like “aww you guys can bond lol” not seeing how weird it all is. he goes to parties (he recieves no formal invitation but he shows up every time) with a guitar people have told him expressly to leave at home and really needs you to listen to his christian rock cover band (he has never gone to church) that consists of himself and a picture of harrison ford. and yeah lyanna is there but she’s kind of too busy being in the middle of a messy as hell custody battle over herself with her brothers and a severely overbearing guy who was a senior in her lit class (she was a freshman) who became convinced she was his soulmate AND looking over her shoulder for hitmen from rhaegar’s last ex who was still not age appropriate for him but due to her vaguely mormon father is convinced lyanna is the one to target and organize school bathroom ambush fights for.

[lizzie-queenofmeigas]

Hey! Do you recommend any good fanfiction about Rhaegar and Lyanna? Most of the fanfics on ao3 either portray them as devils incarnate having immoral sex outside of marriage or as a fairy tale straight from the head of bobby the usurper.

It's actually really hard to find fics about them that aren't portraying them as the villains in Elia's story. I'm mostly focusing on my own fics rather than searching for others, but I have this one bookmarked.

The Dragon's Cloak by Rhia Writer.

I really like it, I hope you enjoy it too.

[kidcaroline]

Do people realize that hell was about to break loose in westeros before rhaegar/lyanna? tywin only goal was to overthrow aerys, he couldn't care less about rhaegar and lyanna, none of the great houses couldn't care less (except the starks and robert). They were tired of aerys' bs

[lapetiteshippeuse]

okay but we could actually have a Rhaegar and Lyanna fan art here, right ?

[katshuya]

GRRM intends for Rhaegar x Lyanna to be romance, so it's likable????? Really?

just because the author thinks it so doesn't mean it should be liked by people. So many hate it because it's unlikable for reasons. So many reasons.

It's disturbing and selfish to the point of cruelty, so of course you will have so many people against it and talk about how badly written it is.

Try to accept that your self-insert ship is not likable by a large number of the fandom for a reason. In fact, reasons.

It's not the first time, nor will it be the last time GRRM writes, disturbing unlikable things and thinks it is perfect (Dany x Drogo). In fact, even stupid things.

So no, it's not about them ending up together or not. Or about what GRRM thinks romance is.

[throwawayasoiafaccount]

I just love this fandom

reread the books PLEASE

[blissfulphilospher]

His words rang in Lyanna's ears, tears flowing from her eyes. To have that purpose… to be that close to someone…

"There is no one in the world but you who can give birth to her. Only you can bring the third head of the dragon. The Visenya of Aegon." 

How can this be the most beautiful yet the fucked up thing i have ever written?

Idk i am sorry!

[martellspear]

although I think that her story in the books is surround by tragedy, I have no strong feelings for her (the one from the tb show is a completely different story). but her stans do bring out the worst in me

[theargopriestess]

Okay, so I’m not sure how long it’ll last but I’m back in my GoT era, but, considering we hear very little about it in the show, I’d love to see a movie/series on Robert’s rebellion. There’s a few really good fics out there,

And, I don’t know if anyone rise does this, but I’ve got my own fan cast in my head.

(If you disagree, please be kind about it), but I’d love to hear your thoughts, and if you have your own ideas on your own, I’d love to know see.

Rhaegar Targaryen

Lyanna Stark

Robert Baratheon

Eddard Stark

Brandon Stark

Rickard Stark

Aerys Targaryen

Elia Martel

Jon Arryn

Jamie Lannister

So this is who I picture in my head whenever I read about these characters. Especially Rhaegar and Lyanna! 😬🥰🥰

@baratheonstarks @starkthrone @targeryan

[fromtheseventhhell]

Asoiaf tumblr is turning me into a Rhaegar's stan. I get it that he’s not perfect, but saying "all the characters who have a positive opinion on rhaegar are obviously biased, they didn't know him" is a very delusional take :/

It's getting stupid.

This is where I'm at. Disliking a character is fine, but the way people rewrite the story + characters to justify their hate is beyond annoying. And what's crazier is that their hate for him extends to characters connected to him so Dany, Jon, Lyanna, etc. end up being demonized as well. The fact that they can't just say "I hate Rhaegar" and move on is crazy, he's really living in their heads rent-free 😭