Post by lemmingtopias on May 13, 2019 17:26:32 GMT
The penultimate episode of Game of Thrones has landed and people are not happy. It is the moment we have been building up to for about 9 years... An unlikely coalition of slaves, barbarian hordes, plucky Northerners and a dragon lay siege to Kings Landing in support of the Mother of Dragons and when the bells toll, signifying surrender of the city and Daenery's victory, instead of riding over to the Red Keep and taking her throne, she and her fanatical army begin to indiscriminately massacre hundreds of thousands of innocent, non-combatants - including the elderly and the children - as her allies Jon, Tyrion and Arya looked on in horror. Was that even a look of shock at the sensless genocide on Cersei's face?
The internet soon unleashed its outroar. "How could you do this to us after 9 years of building Daenerys up as the moral, ethical favourite?" "Daenerys going mad makes no sense." "The whole show has been ruined by bad plot writing in its final episodes." And even, (facepalm), "I still support Daenerys, she is the only one who will make the world a better place."
The second controversial aspect of the episode is the humanising of Cersei as her final hours crept up on her. "Cersei deserved a much more horrible death" the internet said. I disagree. I am glad they humanised Cersei and showed her as a human capable of fear, sadness, despair and terror. The most vile of peope are still cpable of basic human emotions. I don't defend her actions, she is evil. But everything she has done has been in retaliation against similar acts carried out against her or to protect or avenge her children. What is Daenerys' excuse?
Of course Daenerys Turned into a genocidal maniac
There are serious flaws in people's frustration over Daenerys decision to massacre huge amounts of innocents. She has never been a good person, she has always been the villain.
One of the reasons people like and support Daenerys is her liberation of slaves. I propose that her campign of slave liberation was never a good thing. She gave the slaves she freed a choice: "Join me, or go and live your lives in freedom." That is not a genuine choice for someone who has spent their entire lives in a dehumanising, brutal world of violent and humiliating servitude. All they know is the whip and guess what, they don't know how to be free. The job of a liberator is to educate the people they are freeing on how to build a new life of freedom, to support them in integrating with the society that has lived off their backs and ensure that the whip isn't exchanged for the equally controlling powers of wage-slavery or populist campaigns. Consider the aftermath of abolition in America, do you really think former slaves had it much better once they started getting paid a pittance for the work they did?
Daenerys had no interest in the emancipation of the people she freed. She still allowed the Masters to enjoy a monopoly on the land, business and industry, thus reinforcing their power over the former slaves. Those that joined her forces, her staff and her entourage had the security of food, protection and probably a basic form of health care and somewhere secure to live. The few who chose not to and the many who couldn't (the sick, the old, the mothers and children) were left to rot in a medieval form of a homeless shelter where they were prey to exploitation, abuse, violence and a burgeoning criminal class. When some of these people finally decided enough was enough, they begged to be allowed to go back into slavery. Look at the modern-day "voluntary" concentration camps in China and you will see how far desperate and vulnerable people will go for three meals a day and some security. Those that joined Daenerys were not in any better position to make an informed choice. These are very vulnrable men (and some women) who Dany and her advisors have groomed into joining her extremist, fanatical death cult to give their lives and freedom to fight in Daenery's terrorist insurgency (yes, even the most well thought out and reasonable definitions of terrorism would include Daenery's plot to overthrow a foreign government through violent means in order to further her own political ends).
By protecting the rights of the Masters and their control over civil and economic society, rather than supporting the freed slaves to take control over at least some of the industries and plaintations they worked upon, she caused economic ruin, as the Masters entire business model of building an economy on the backs of slaves abruptly ended. What little resources her territories had left were diverted away from the people in order to feed and supply her growing armies (See North Korea's policy of starving the populace to feed the army and the repeated waves of famine that has caused). Whether this was was solely due to her selfish desires to conquer Westeros or was also a deliberate policy (a starving populace doesn't tend to revolt, easpecially when you can blame their misfortunate on your rivals), we do not know. Of course Daenerys protected the power and status of the Masters, if she started saying that nobles don't have the right to power and control, she undermines her own belief that she has the right, as the heir of the Targaryens, to rule.
This brings us to her most famous quote. "I am not going to stop the wheel, I am going to break the wheel". If you thought she was a moral, ethical and good person you probably took this to mean a good thing - the good people of Westeros no longer crushed under the revolving wheel of the Great Houses passing power around themselves. But breaking the wheel should always have been treated with suspicion, given the arguments I have made above. Breaking the wheel can also mean replacing the movement of power between the Great Houses with a totalitarian state, where anyone that questions Daenerys right to the throne or her policies gets buried under the pieces of the broken wheel, after being burned alive by her dragons of course. When Daenerys finally gets to Kings Landing, for the first time she finds a populace that doesn't want to be liberated, that couldn't care less about her divine powers or rightful claim to the throne and are not enamoured by her populist policies. They see Daenerys as foreign force, with an army of savage barbarians and a monster dragon (a fantasy version of a weapon of mass destruction), coming to conquer them. No matter how they feel about Cersei, they view Cersei as their protector and Daenerys as a threat to their lives and way of life and their home. So when Daenerys storms the city and wins the battle, she believes these people - elderly, sick, mothers and children included - are either traitors and/or a threat to her ultimate power and she does to them what she has always done people who oppose her. She burns them alive. This time, not just a few nobles or combatants on the field of battle, but hundreds of thouands of innocent people just trying to survive the worst day of their lives.
There is parrallels to this throughout history. When Alexander the Great finally found, on the borders of India, a populace that didn't want to be liberated from the oppressive yoke of their warlords, who didn't see him as a divine ruler (like the Egyptians had when they named him pharoah or like the Asians had done when they named him the divine Lord of Asia - even the Greeks who hated the idea of divine right to rule or deity-kings turned a blind eye so long as he didn't try that shit in Greece), who were not as thrilled about the prospect of being offered, what Greeks and many Asians considered, a far more civilised and enlightened way of life like that in Greece and were not inspired by his belief in a united world, free from war and borders and where all nations could live in equality and peace. So he butchered them and he suffered such losses and depletion of morale that his campaigns came to an end, forcing him to return to Babylon and consolidate his rule. Just like Alexander, Daenerys found a city that couldnt give a toss what she was offering and she hated them for it and she did the only thing she knows how to do... murder. Her fanatical followers were only to pleased to join in the slaughter. Not because they were doing what they were told, but because they are fanatical, bloodthirsty extremists not too dissimilar from the extremist groups in the Middle East that have emerged to fill the power vaccum after the Iraq War and civil collapse in Syria and other states. Is there any real difference between a nasty Caliphate that is supported because it claims to have the interests of the increasingly margianlised Sunni sect of Islam at heart and a totalitarian Queen who is supported because she claims to have the interests of a radical group of former slaves at heart? I don't think there is.
To those that supported Daenerys, you have got what you wanted. It has a sour taste, but it is what you asked for. Just like Grey Worm and Missandei, you have been groomed into believing that the populist platform of Daenerys and her advisors is a good thing and that it doesn't need questioning and scrutinising. The creators of the show have given you exactly what you deserve.
So what happens next? The trailer for next week has some brilliant imagery that parallels 1930s fascist movements and the popular modern portrayal of the early Roman Empire (the rise of which was steeped in the politics of the anti-slavery movement of the time, though Augustus, Ceaser and Mark Antony never actually did anything to stop the slave trade once they got into power). Will Dany wipe out her rivals? Will her rule be thankfully short? Will there even be an iron throne or will the people finally get fed up and kill the lot of the self-entitled, noble brats?
I'd be happy with any of these outcomes.... so long as someone kills that fucking dragon.
By protecting the rights of the Masters and their control over civil and economic society, rather than supporting the freed slaves to take control over at least some of the industries and plaintations they worked upon, she caused economic ruin, as the Masters entire business model of building an economy on the backs of slaves abruptly ended. What little resources her territories had left were diverted away from the people in order to feed and supply her growing armies (See North Korea's policy of starving the populace to feed the army and the repeated waves of famine that has caused). Whether this was was solely due to her selfish desires to conquer Westeros or was also a deliberate policy (a starving populace doesn't tend to revolt, easpecially when you can blame their misfortunate on your rivals), we do not know. Of course Daenerys protected the power and status of the Masters, if she started saying that nobles don't have the right to power and control, she undermines her own belief that she has the right, as the heir of the Targaryens, to rule.
This brings us to her most famous quote. "I am not going to stop the wheel, I am going to break the wheel". If you thought she was a moral, ethical and good person you probably took this to mean a good thing - the good people of Westeros no longer crushed under the revolving wheel of the Great Houses passing power around themselves. But breaking the wheel should always have been treated with suspicion, given the arguments I have made above. Breaking the wheel can also mean replacing the movement of power between the Great Houses with a totalitarian state, where anyone that questions Daenerys right to the throne or her policies gets buried under the pieces of the broken wheel, after being burned alive by her dragons of course. When Daenerys finally gets to Kings Landing, for the first time she finds a populace that doesn't want to be liberated, that couldn't care less about her divine powers or rightful claim to the throne and are not enamoured by her populist policies. They see Daenerys as foreign force, with an army of savage barbarians and a monster dragon (a fantasy version of a weapon of mass destruction), coming to conquer them. No matter how they feel about Cersei, they view Cersei as their protector and Daenerys as a threat to their lives and way of life and their home. So when Daenerys storms the city and wins the battle, she believes these people - elderly, sick, mothers and children included - are either traitors and/or a threat to her ultimate power and she does to them what she has always done people who oppose her. She burns them alive. This time, not just a few nobles or combatants on the field of battle, but hundreds of thouands of innocent people just trying to survive the worst day of their lives.
There is parrallels to this throughout history. When Alexander the Great finally found, on the borders of India, a populace that didn't want to be liberated from the oppressive yoke of their warlords, who didn't see him as a divine ruler (like the Egyptians had when they named him pharoah or like the Asians had done when they named him the divine Lord of Asia - even the Greeks who hated the idea of divine right to rule or deity-kings turned a blind eye so long as he didn't try that shit in Greece), who were not as thrilled about the prospect of being offered, what Greeks and many Asians considered, a far more civilised and enlightened way of life like that in Greece and were not inspired by his belief in a united world, free from war and borders and where all nations could live in equality and peace. So he butchered them and he suffered such losses and depletion of morale that his campaigns came to an end, forcing him to return to Babylon and consolidate his rule. Just like Alexander, Daenerys found a city that couldnt give a toss what she was offering and she hated them for it and she did the only thing she knows how to do... murder. Her fanatical followers were only to pleased to join in the slaughter. Not because they were doing what they were told, but because they are fanatical, bloodthirsty extremists not too dissimilar from the extremist groups in the Middle East that have emerged to fill the power vaccum after the Iraq War and civil collapse in Syria and other states. Is there any real difference between a nasty Caliphate that is supported because it claims to have the interests of the increasingly margianlised Sunni sect of Islam at heart and a totalitarian Queen who is supported because she claims to have the interests of a radical group of former slaves at heart? I don't think there is.
To those that supported Daenerys, you have got what you wanted. It has a sour taste, but it is what you asked for. Just like Grey Worm and Missandei, you have been groomed into believing that the populist platform of Daenerys and her advisors is a good thing and that it doesn't need questioning and scrutinising. The creators of the show have given you exactly what you deserve.
So what happens next? The trailer for next week has some brilliant imagery that parallels 1930s fascist movements and the popular modern portrayal of the early Roman Empire (the rise of which was steeped in the politics of the anti-slavery movement of the time, though Augustus, Ceaser and Mark Antony never actually did anything to stop the slave trade once they got into power). Will Dany wipe out her rivals? Will her rule be thankfully short? Will there even be an iron throne or will the people finally get fed up and kill the lot of the self-entitled, noble brats?
I'd be happy with any of these outcomes.... so long as someone kills that fucking dragon.
Why are you ruining Daenerys for me with your clever words