Sielutonlampikana - Hi

i think i read a post of you that said western leftist can't write conservative religious women without reducing them to being brainwashed or insecure. as a western leftist I'm curious how you would have written alicent for hotd?

You mean how would I personally rewrite Alicent's character? Or how I would have liked to see GRRM's Alicent written in the show?

Either way; I'd say: Western leftists can't write a traditionally religious woman unless she's a hypocrite, brainwashed, or actively using religion to cope or to feel superior. They can't write a religious woman who genuinely and intellectually believes in and is devoted to her own religious conventions and ideals. And when they do - which is very rare - they always feel the need to attach a moral or intellectual judgment on her. She must always be "lesser". Unless she's pagan and they can co-opt her paganism to uplift their own "progressive" ideology 🙄

Anyways, I hated how they made Alicent cling to her faith as a means of "repentance" in the show. She should have clung to her faith as a means of resistance. Of claiming her identity and power back.

This will give the "Green Dress" moment and the "Where is duty? Where is sacrifice?" moment real meaning.

It's not that she can't sincerely believe in her religion and still subconsciously use it to heal her psychological and emotional wounds. It can happen. It's not mutually exclusive. But her ability to use her religion to heal should be originated from and motivated by her sincere belief in her religion.

The Faith of the Seven was always the hard and the soft power that kept the megalomanic, blood-supremacist Targs in check after they conquered Westeros. The Targs were forced to compromise and adapt to Westeros instead of forcing Westeros to be assimilated or fully subjected to Targ culture and religion.

Alicent's ambition should have reflected this spirit. Her need to have her son crowned as King should have been her own way to keep the Targs in more chains. To mold the Targ dynasty to benefit her and her children and Westeros as a whole.

What better way for an oppressed woman to feel liberated than to have the power to put her oppressors in chains? and to have the freedom to live by her own conventions and ideals without sacrificing her dignity and sanity?

Translating Period Dramas for Today

I finally got around to watching Little Women (2019) directed by Greta Gerwig and there was a scene that felt very familiar.

When Amy March is giving her speech to Laurie, talking about how marrying just for love isn't a practical option for her, it reminded me a lot of Charlotte Luca's words to Elizabeth in Pride and Prejudice (2005).

"So don't sit there and tell me that marriage isn't an economic proposition, because it is. It may not be for you but it most certainly is for me." - Amy March

"I'm twenty-seven years old, I've no money and no prospects. I'm already a burden to my parents and I'm frightened. So don't you judge me, Lizzy. Don't you dare judge me!" - Charlotte Lucas

Both are from more modernized versions of period dramas where the book is written by an author that was actually from the time period.

Both feel like the characters are anachronistically defending themselves against modern day feminists, saying "Don't judge me! I'm making the smartest decision I can given my opportunities in society in this time period!"

Which is fair I guess, but it feels out of place. Maybe a woman from that time would say that, but they wouldn't have been defending themselves as much against our modern-day sensibilities of "Marry whoever you want! It's completely your choice! Or don't marry at all! You can do whatever you want with your life!"

It feels like an attempt by modern producers and writers to translate the period drama character's circumstances to a modern audience.

But it still feels weird.

Book!Charlotte never seemed like she was defensive. She was just like, "Hey this is who I am, Lizzy. I got a sweet deal and it works for me."

It's like modern period dramas are afraid to be period dramas. Granted, I do appreciate the little bits of expositional dialogue that helps explain historical things to the audience that they might not know, like how Longbourne can only be inherited by the next male heir, but I wonder if there's a better way to translate stories to audiences today without characters having to give speeches about how you shouldn't judge a woman for lack of agency when the patriarchal society of that time period has left her little to none of it. (Still a fair point though.)

What do y'all think?

A random list of weird things I read in GOT/ASOIAF fics, in no particular order:

This one where a dude decided ravens weren’t cool enough and replaced them with eagles. I know I’ve complained about this before, I WILL do so again, eagles are all eye, no brain. Pigeons can actually do the work but no one loves them I am going to use pigeons in one of my works.

The one where Robb physically assaults Sansa after rescuing her from the Lannisters because she, get this, refused to marry a Lannister. You know, the disgraced house that she was held hostage and abused by, that one. For some reason the narrative was trying to blame HER for the conflict, rather than her brother, who was trying to marry off the PRINCESS OF THE NORTH to the house he had already defeated.

The ones where Oberyn “rescues” Sansa by marrying her himself and then Ellaria is just fine with it and becomes basically Sansa’s maid/grooms her alongside Oberyn. If I had a nickel for every fic along those lines I’d read, I’d have two nickels. Which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird it happened twice.

The one where Sansa killed her rapist(a Lannister OC) and his supposed good guy son was all mad at her, instead of just being like, “Oh, shit, my dad was a rapist, good thing he’s dead.” I’m starting to suspect this fandom has a misogyny problem.

The one where Catelyn was, like, randomly evil? You know I’m not a Catelyn fan. She is not invited to my dinners. But this one had her being all evil and stupid and decided that Barbrey Dustin(?) was supposed to be the good mom to the stark kids. It was really dumb.

The one where Arya and Sansa switch personalities and Sansa is forcibly married to Jaime Lannister and decides to just have sex with him. When she’s, like, twelve. I wasn’t going to like the fic anyhow bc it’s by that author who likes to pretend quitting a fic is the same as finishing it, but that one was really dumb.

The one where an OC sensed a “secret evil” inside Sansa and decided Sansa was OPPRESSING HER RELIGION by inviting her to a sewing circle. Bear in mind, Sansa had literally just seen the OC, smiled, and invited her to hang out. Amazing. Simply amazing.

There are a lot of fics out there where Sansa randomly decides she was wrong and she IS a warrior with sword after all, and they just make no sense and bother me so much.

There’s this weird thread going thru certain pieces of fandom where they seem to think the problem with book/season 1 Arya is that she doesn’t just submit and become a little tradwife, rather than the fact that she’s an obnoxious little jerk who throws tantrums and treats the people around her unkindly for no reason. Like, there’s a lot to criticize about Arya, but her rejection of traditional gender roles isn’t one of them.

Presumed incompetence. It’s so weird, but despite the narrative having to go out of its way to kill Robb, capture Sansa, do the whole Arianne plot goes wrong thing, etc, etc, fandom seems to have taken this stance that the Starks and the Martells and the other “good guys” are somehow incompetent and stupid for, ya know, having ethics.

Presumed competence. Tywin is a bad lord, father, brother, and son. Danaerys is a literal slaver who only alters her trajectory when she can’t afford the slaves she wanted to buy, as well as a self deceptive hypocrite. Yet many fics out there would have us see both of these different sides of fascism as somehow pragmatic and heroic. In reality, they’re both shitty at their jobs, and even Danaerys is, while sympathetic, not a particularly good person.

Presumed Ned Stark good guy. Ned is a complicated dude, despite fandom’s large dismissal of him as a “too good for this sinful world” tragic hero, and I wont argue that he definitely will do the right thing if presented with an opportunity(unless the right thing involves treating his eldest daughter with actual care and consideration). However, this is also a guy who lives in a country with a large slave soldier penal colony made up of mostly non-violent property crime offenders, who plays favourites amongst his children, and has not only held a teenager hostage since the boy was a child, but also forces him to attend what basically amounts to rehearsals for his own murder. So, yeah. He’s complex.

The idea that the old gods are superior to the new is kind of straight up disputed by the books, yet fandom keeps churning out fic after fic where Sansa(and it’s almost always Sansa despite the fact that she canonically worships both sets of gods) repents of her sin of coming from a multi religion family and turns completely to the old gods. Which is just dumb. They both kind of suck in different ways.

perhaps controversial idk i’ve never seen anyone talk about it but i do agree with what mike said about them using el’s powers too much and depending on her and solely her (which is not an assumption lmao they shut the fireworks idea down because they were relying on her) i just don’t think he went about it right but i understand why he’s like that and while el can make her own decisions and only el, she would do anything for them even if it kills her so it’s not like she’s doing things out of her own interest or benefit resulting in unnecessary and harmful sacrifice so it’s not that simple

Many people are claiming "Just way for Blood and Cheese, justice will be served" That's nasty,what justice? Luke was an 18 yo adult ENVOY with a fire-breathing WMD at his disposal,making him an active participant in the conflict of Blacks VS Greens. His war machine was the one who attacked first and died on an accident. Jahaerys,Jaehaera and Maelor were not combatants. They had quite literally 0 sway on the conflict.They were 5 and 2 years old. Who's on the sane mind could call that "justice"?

These stans are so dumb. Look at the reaction to Luke's death - it was far from the reaction to Ned's death. People were shocked and devastated when he died, it literally put GoT on the map. No one really cares about Luke. He is more like an NPC than a character. When he died, we were making jokes about it - Vhagar having bad eyesight, Aemond going home in silence, Alicent's horrified reaction to the news, Aegon's oblivious reaction to Aemond's remorse, etc.

People were making fun of Luke for coming to Storm's End so unprepared. A good amount of people were thirsting after Aemond like their lives depend on it. All of this is largely in part thanks to Aemond and Luke's ages being close and their pre-established beef that resulted in Aemond's disability.

Blood and Cheese will involve 2 toddlers and a mother who is at the very least coded as autistic. The kids were made even younger than they were in the books. In the show, they babble instead of talking that's how young they are.

You also have Helaena who is sweet and shown to be childlike. When the two assassins threatened to rape one toddler and murder the other, all while their poor helpless mother watches, who will laugh at that? What jokes can you even make about a situation like that? You don't even have to care about any of these characters, they can be NPCs too but this is a horrifying act involving babies. Plus, in the books you can pretend Daemon cares about Luke but in the show, he has a contentious relationship with Jace so it's doubtful he had a good relationship with Luke.

So no, Blood and Cheese won't be seen as 'justice' by anyone besides a small group of weirdos.

Bear sploots

Reasons I like subtitles:

1. I can see how people’s names and the cities and the countries are spelled.

2. I don’t miss any words, so everything they say makes sense.

3. I get to know what background noises and conversations are.

4. The descriptions of the noises people make are freaking awesome. Ex: splutter, grunt, chuckles.

5. I can see who says what.

6. I don’t have to have the volume super loud so I can hear the dialogue, and I don’t blow my eardrums out because the ambient noises and music is SO FREAKING LOUD.

I freaking love subtitles.

a good pot of pasta would fix me