#spookyphilosophertaco

[the-real-sasuke-uchiha]

Not sure if you have done this before, but thoughts on Itachi?

Hi there! Uf, tough question with a lot of chances of bringing us hate, but, let's be brave! As a very obvious disclaimer, please bear in mind that you can love a character and still justify none of its actions. And that trying to understand what led someone to do something is by no means equal to trying to justify them.

Itachi committed a monstrous action exterminating his clan, there is no denying that. Still, I refuse to dump all the blame on him because he was used as a mere tool to fulfil the genocidal plans of Konoha's oligarchy. This issue was extensively discussed before in way more eloquent ways than I ever could so, I will just point out that Itachi was a traumatized child, educated in violence, trained for violence and encouraged to master his talent for violence by literally everyone in his life. Violence was his only tool, the only thing he was good at, and the only means to solve problems in the world he lived in.

He was given an impossible choice and he had to decide quickly and under duress. He was gifted, but still a child, and thus immature. He had obviously no capacity or possibility to solve such a conflict. He was given a choice of killing his clan quietly or risking a catastrophe that would lead to his brother's death (or, rather, he was straight out threatened with the assassination of his little brother by the village's leadership). Now, I of course believe such things were nonsense and that the uprising of the Uchiha didn't necessarily have to lead to a war. And, even if it did, there were plenty other means to avoid it. I also would have taken my brother with me and run, let hell unleash or whatever, before harming a single member of my family. But I am not a manipulated child soldier growing under a military regime that has traumatized me with war and brainwashed me since birth, so, what do I know.

I think I also take issue with Itachi being solely and mainly blamed for the massacre, because it personalizes in him an oppression that was systemic. The leadership of Konoha was determined to exterminate the Uchiha and had been establishing the bases for a genocide for at least two generations. The Uchiha had been racially profiled, discriminated, denied of civil rights, physically segregated, kept under surveillance, relegated to a specific job, and pseudoscientific theories had been formulated to justify their inadequacy for leadership as an excuse to exclude them from political decisions and important roles in the village they co-founded. Tobirama's political heirs in the council happily proposed a genocide with petty opposition form the highest political authority, with the sole excuse of keeping all power to themselves. Using Itachi, a member of the oppressed group, to do the dirty job for them, is just an additional level of atrocity. Having Itachi embody all the evilness is, I believe, a misinterpretation of the whole issue here and also kind of victim blaming.

In this line, I would like to point out something that I believe is important: Itachi won nothing from the massacre. He obtained no privilege, no reward at al. He remained excluded and powerless, he took all the blame and all the bad consequences, suffered an illness in silence and with no help from Konoha, and died as a villain getting nothing in return but hope that his brother would survive the vultures that would be forever after him. While the orchestrators of the genocide kept their power and privileges and took no damage, and even got to have the sole survivors of the Uchiha serving them like loyal pawns. I think it is easy to figure out who is really to blame and who is just an alienated useful tool.

Having said that, I don't think he was retconed, but, as a criticism for the creators, I believe they overdid his evil phase a bit. There is little justification for the torture he inflicted on Kakashi (I am not too sorry for him, I just think that 5 minutes of genjutsu torture would have been enough for Itachi to maintain his bad guy cover, he didn't need 72 hours unless he had a true personal reason for punishing him) or for torturing his little brother twice (I can see he wanted to make sure he was hated, but there were other ways, he certainly went too far). No wonder some fans believe he was retconed taking these things into account. I can only interpret that, after all the violence he went through, Itachi was sort of desensitized to it. Still, he left his brother, the person he loved most in the world, severely incapacitated (only Tsunade was able to heal him, and Itachi couldn't have foreseen that she would go back to Konoha. Had he not enough experience with Tsukuyomi and severely underestimated its consequences?). There is little explanation for this.

Now, what I find really curious and disappointing here, is that the narrative could never allow Itachi to acknowledge that the Uchiha were right or, at least, that the genocide was unjustifiable. But he is a good guy so, of course he has to show remorse. So, he is certainly suffering from what he did, he loved his family and feels extremely remorseful. But, for being so clever, he regrets absurd things. "I tried to do everything alone", well, Itachi, you were alone and that was not your fault. Is not like you could summon your anbu colleagues and propose a poll to decide what you should do with Danzo's orders. "I was arrogant", like, when did that happen? "I treated you like a child", well, because, he was a child? "I should have involved you, you could have changed the Uchiha" really? involve a 7 year old child? sure he would have been able to convince his family to just endure, why not. All so he wouldn't say the quiet part out loud. Konoha was a genocidal regime and the sole wrong thing here was annihilating the Uchiha, which he did because he was given no choice and, as a child, he was incapable of finding another way. That was probably asking too much of this story, where the military dictators are basically the good guys and their moral is sacrificing their family for the state.

Another funny thing I would like to mention is how Itachi talks about the Uchiha in the edo tensei arc. I talked about this before, but it is as if he was fed and believed all possible nonsensical Uchiha-hating stories:

I understand the message we are trying to convey here. The Uchiha were power-thirsty mean people, see, the genocide was justified. But it doesn't make sense. Assuming every person has two sharingans (Danzo and his sick experiments aside), there is zero possibility for that "endless reworkings" situation. Also, the Uchiha needed a jutsu to keep themselves humble and honorable, because the izanagi was so dishonorable (we only saw it used once in a repetitive, sick way in canon, and it was by Danzo, but whatever). As if the Uchiha are the ones that need to keep their humbleness in check because they have tendencies to do megalomaniac things like hoarding power, accumulating and trading with mass destruction weapons, carving their faces in stone, or commissioning crazy big statues to commemorate their victorious fights. Even when stating that the Uchiha created a jutsu themselves to solve a problem they had among themselves and that never threatened any outsider, they are presented as some irrational, greedy people.

So, in conclusion, Itachi could have been wrong and biased, but he very clearly did not want to be the execution hand of a genocide, he did not hate his clan and he deeply loved his family. But sadly, we have to admit, he was strongly manipulated by Konoha's nationalistic bullshit and died twice with intact and convinced loyalty for Konoha. There is no denying that. However, I take issue when he is framed as a soulless Konoha bootlicker, because he was ready to leak any information he had on Konoha should they do anything to Sasuke, ready to help enemy nations and unleash the war and bloodshed he was trying to avoid with the massacre. He was canonically doing everything to ensure Sasuke's safety, not for Konoha.

In summary, for me, Itachi is a complex character whose contradictions are left unresolved in the narrative because the deranged moral of the story is, sadly, that there are circumstances where a genocide can be justified. And still, I can't help but love this character, mostly because Sasuke loves him so greatly. And Itachi was ready to give up everything for Sasuke, even Konoha and the whole ninja world. I like to believe that this is evidence that the "will of fire" cult didn't win completely with him, and that, ever after betraying his clan, he still kept some of that unfathomable and unconditional love for his family that Konoha could not tolerate in the Uchiha.

[nardo-headcanons]

Hi, I never get tired of saying how creative and talented you are ♡♡♡ I wanted to know if you would write about the Senju Clan. I know it's strange, since I haven't seen you writing anything like that and usually I don't see anything like that. I like the way you write, you're the best

Sigh. I have let this sit in my inbox way too long. I am so sorry. Thank you so much for your kind words, nonnie. I have some thoughts about the Hyuga as well, let me know if you would be interested in hearing that.

Also please note that I will change around some canon things and all of this is fanfiction/headcanon.

tagging some people i think will like reading this post: @narutobrainrotstuff , @the-real-sasuke-uchiha , @spookyphilosophertaco , @danceofthexdragons

cw for mention of genetics, racism, religion, genocide and human experiments

The Senju Clan

People

Compared to the Uchiha clan, who are phenotypically rather monotonous, the Senju clan had a very diverse population with a wider range of skin tones, eye and hair colors. There were generally very little restrictions when it came to marrying into the clan and becoming a part of it. The only traits most of the Senju shared were that of fine, straight hair whilst the Uchiha had thick and dark hair with curls not being uncommon.

The reason the Senju died out were two sides of the same coin - with many of the clan's members birthing less and less children, and those who did marrying outside of the clan to the point where there are many Konoha ninjas nowadays who are part Senju but may not even know it.

Traits and Abilities

The Senju were rather unspecified, wanting to hone their skills in all three fighting styles, though I like to think that Taijutsu was one they particularly excelled in. Once one's movements were fast enough to be evaded by the base sharingan (Mangekyou sharingan was, depending on the source material, either extremely rare or nonexistent), the Senju had an easier time fighting the Uchiha. Many of them became weapons and taijutsu specialists, making me think that Tenten might be part Senju and her idolization of Tsunade was a way to connect with her roots and get to know a fellow Senju.

Another skill of the Senju was wood style, which was a skill many Senju before Hashirama posessed, but they rarely ever utilized it in battle. Said ability was caused by a point mutation in the exome, prompting Orochimaru to later carry out experiment's on embryonic DNA to artificially induce said point mutation, killing dozens of newborns in the process.

Religion

While the Uchiha followed the way of Shintōism, most of the Senju were buddhists, like their distant relatives, the Uzumaki. Initially, the people living in the country of fire were engaging in both buddhist and shintōist practices, but with the continued rise of war between the shintō-believing Uchiha and the buddhist Senju, these two religions were more or less divided.

The Senju and the Uzumaki

The establishment of Uzushiogakure in the whirlpool country was received with mixed feelings from its inhabitants. Most Uzumaki, although practiced in the arts of combat, preferred their pacifistic lifestyle of teaching their ways on paper, and not on the battlefield. This instability made it easier for the hidden mist village to send colonialist forces, killing most of the Uzumaki in fear of their congenital abilities. And with the Senju living more and more decentralized and being too occupied with themselves, Uzushiogakure lacked the manpower compared to Kiri's extermination force.

The Senju's Legacy

Nowadays, after Konoha was founded, the Senju started living more and more decentralized, therefore there wasn't such a thing as the "Senju compound". The language of the Senju was adapted as Konoha's official language, causing the other hidden villages to adapt it as well. (You can read more about my thoughts on language in the Shinobi world here.)

There were shrines for both buddhist and shintō believers in the village, but once Hashirama became the first hokage, more and more citizens adapted the Senju's religion of buddhism, with the shintō believers dwindling in numbers. Tobirama's segregation policy did not help in the slightest; although the Uchiha, who believed in family unity and support, lived closely together, being redlined and pushed into the same profession felt patronizing. But even though the Senju as a clan is no more, their legacy continues on, in good ways, and in bad.