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Mucktron posted:Strong Belwas did it first But not from the air!
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Sep 14, 2011 01:23
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Strong Belwas took a poo poo toward the city, and he swam through the poo poo in the sewers to sack the city. In other words, Strong Belwas IS the poo poo. 
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Sep 14, 2011 01:44
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Putin It In Mah rear end posted:That seemed to die in directly to Bloodraven become a tree and Bran kind of doing the same. That is to say, there's some kind of metamorphosis from human to tree-person going on. Who knows how those weirwood trees came to be, but maybe they were all greenseers who got treeified. That's not exactly bloody but there could well be a component of blood sacrifice we don't witness. Pretty sure there was direct mention of some Northern houses (like karstark and umber I think was said) holding to ancient sacrificial rituals, even if it's not publicly acknowledged anymore. Pretty sure on Skagos there's some savage poo poo going on too.
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Sep 14, 2011 08:17
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Putin It In Mah rear end posted:
I think its because all the other religions are organized religions with established temples, hierarchies, orthodox teachings and of course clergy. The religion of the Old Gods doesn't eve have a named set of gods. If you want to commune with them all you have to do is go sit under a tree and talk. No intermediaries to interpret poo poo or tell you should be killing someone because they don't pray to the right imaginary entity. In short, Martin has a dim view of organized religion.
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Sep 14, 2011 10:15
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Tater_tot posted:In short, Martin has a dim view of organized religion. This is such a common fallacy. I wish they taught people how to think critically in schools. It's such a chore having to defend stories and storytellers from people who think that writers literally support raping women because they had a character rape a woman. There are also examples of positive figures that follow both organized religions. Melisandre isn't evil, she's just more of a "means to an end" person. The red priest that helps Victarion seems to be a nice fellow. Thoros ended up being alright. We haven't seen much of the followers of the Faith yet, but the guys who took in the Hound were good people. The Faith has been building in significance for a while, and I suspect the next couple of books will have more characters involved with that religion. I'm sure we will see many varied characters in the Faith just like we do amongst all the other social classes. Keep in mind that in the history of Europe, conflict between religions and conflict between religious orders and the crown was a major part of life. Having the Faith arm itself against the crown and having Melisandre burn the "idols of false gods" is just keeping with tradition when it comes to religion. It's also interesting in that the religion of the red god is being exported to Westeros much like Christianity has been brought to every "savage" nation. While the trappings of the Faith are much more like Catholicism, the way the followers of R'hllor convert people is closer to the history of the Christian religion in general. Of course it's generally understood amongst the people that worship of ALL gods grants power. They just believe that their god is the "right" one. They say, "I swear it by old gods and new." even though the new gods have been around for thousands of years. The people in general seem flexible. Cat prays at a heart tree. Victarion seems to be able to incorporate the red god into his very serious faith that worships the sea god. Victarion is an interesting character because he's incredibly religious but doesn't come across that way at all because he incorporates his faith so perfectly into his warrior's way of life. It might seem like wearing full armor on a ship is totally badass or crazy, but no it's just his faith in his god.
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Sep 14, 2011 10:54
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Fuckings TARG's get all the fun. e posting from the wrong page like a baller
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Sep 14, 2011 11:55
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There's one thing I don't understand about the theory that the Maesters made up the Seven to help destroy magic. I thought the Targaryens brought it with them, and imposed it on Westeros. Wouldn't that make it Valyrian in origin?
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Sep 14, 2011 15:55
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Ambiguatron posted:There's one thing I don't understand about the theory that the Maesters made up the Seven to help destroy magic. I thought the Targaryens brought it with them, and imposed it on Westeros. Wouldn't that make it Valyrian in origin? There were several waves of colonization and conquering in Westeros history. The Andals brought the Faith and were only conquered by the Targaryens, who adopted it as their religion (but didn't really stick to its tenets like NO INCEST).
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Sep 14, 2011 15:57
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Quantify! posted:
This was how a lot of polytheistic societies were. The Romans seemed to incorporate every new god they encountered into their pantheon. The only assholes that wouldn't play the game were the monotheists and that's why people hated them so much. The Roman gods ruled in Rome, the Egyptian gods in Egypt, etc. and you respected the gods of that particular people and place. That doesn't mean there weren't conflicts and such.
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Sep 14, 2011 16:07
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JerkyBunion posted:This was how a lot of polytheistic societies were. The Romans seemed to incorporate every new god they encountered into their pantheon. The only assholes that wouldn't play the game were the monotheists and that's why people hated them so much. Feel-good tablets, man. Why can't we go back to that way of thinking?
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Sep 14, 2011 16:13
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Quantify! posted:The Andals brought it with them, not the Targaryens. Well, to be fair, it is the maesters that control the recording of history. They could just be making poo poo up to support their anti-magic agenda.
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Sep 14, 2011 17:25
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The Walrus posted:Well, to be fair, it is the maesters that control the recording of history. They could just be making poo poo up to support their anti-magic agenda.
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Sep 14, 2011 17:32
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Quantify! posted:Oral tradition is pretty strong in this society, I doubt that would work. To a degree yes, but really only within the last hundred years or so. Beyond that there's a focus on books as being the primary source of knowledge, especially by Sam and Tyrion. edit: didn't the andals land like 2000 years previous? no oral tradition can last that long in any sort of properly representative form without accompanying textual support.
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Sep 14, 2011 17:39
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Quantify! posted:Oral tradition is pretty strong in this society, I doubt that would work. It seems the other way around. Haven't the last book or two included accounts of historical events that contradict the popular telling of those events? If anything, oral tradition here is the way that the victors are making sure that history is on their side.
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Sep 14, 2011 17:42
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I don't see how it serves the story to have the maesters make up stuff like that, but I guess they COULD.
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Sep 14, 2011 18:40
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Quantify! posted:You realize that the author isn't espousing his personal beliefs in his fiction, right? You know, I think I understand the distinction you're making here and its a valid one. You're argument would work much better however if you weren't such a passive aggressive dick about your personal attacks while delivering it. I don't think Martin has a dim view of organized religion because of his particular characterizations of individual religions in ASOIF, but because of the themes he chooses to explore through those characterizations: evangelism, religious militarism, orthodoxy, the role of clergy in interpreting (and creating) prophecy, etc. While its valid to say that an author's views are not wholly represented by the fiction he or she writes, authors never fully divest themselves of their subjectivities within their work. The "voice" of the author is always there. Ps. I've only read the books once so I haven't really had much time to think about things like how Martin uses rape in his stories. I do know that merely depicting rape isn't by itself misogynistic, but an author's over reliance on it as a trope and form of disciplining violence against his female characters might qualify as such - particularly if sexual violence only happens to women and not men as well.
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Sep 14, 2011 19:16
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The Walrus posted:Well, to be fair, it is the maesters that control the recording of history. They could just be making poo poo up to support their anti-magic agenda. I'm pretty sure in the Eastern Continent people are reasonably confident about the existence of the Andals and other mythic tales being true (eg Nymeria and her 10,000 ships going over to Dorne).
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Sep 14, 2011 19:18
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Tater_tot posted:You know, I think I understand the distinction you're making here and its a valid one. You're argument would work much better however if you weren't such a passive aggressive dick about your personal attacks while delivering it. The religions he's created need to match the rest of the society he's created. Martin's views on religion don't come into play here. The things he focuses on (evangelism, religious militarism, orthodoxy, the role of clergy in interpreting (and creating) prophecy) are important parts of the society he's created. The growing religious militarism is a response to the adventures of all the lords, traipsing around and killing all the smallfolk in their stupid wars. This is a logical outcome. Since prophecy actually exists and is a magical ability you can gain by worshiping gods, it makes sense to have clergy perform that role. They are literal prophets that actually can recieve and interpret visions. Evangelism and orthodoxy apply to religions even today. I'm not sure why Martin wouldn't include those in his religions. Your basic complaint seems to be that Martin depicts organized religion negatively, and tree-worship positively. But we've not seen much tree-worship, and we've learned that sacrifices were performed for the tree gods as well. People have done bad things in the name of religion. Martin is just being realistic in his depictions of religion at a time when there are few civilizing forces keeping people from doing these awful things.
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Sep 14, 2011 20:03
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Tater_tot posted:You know, I think I understand the distinction you're making here and its a valid one. You're argument would work much better however if you weren't such a passive aggressive dick about your personal attacks while delivering it. Considering Martin's world is incredibly patriarchal and women are often put in positions where they have little to no agency, an abundance of sexual violence against men would make no sense. They're never in a position where that's possible. Men are tortured in other ways, which levels the playing field and erases whatever possible misogyny the books are trying to project.
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Sep 14, 2011 20:23
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Azure_Horizon posted:Considering Martin's world is incredibly patriarchal and women are often put in positions where they have little to no agency, an abundance of sexual violence against men would make no sense. They're never in a position where that's possible. Men are tortured in other ways, which levels the playing field and erases whatever possible misogyny the books are trying to project.  If you want to talk sexual violence towards men, Jaime losing his sword hand is a symbolic castration!
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Sep 14, 2011 20:38
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Quantify! posted:
Toplowtech fucked around with this message at 21:10 on Sep 14, 2011 |
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Sep 14, 2011 21:07
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I don't know that all castrations are necessarily sexual. Like with the unsullied its more like neutering your dog to influence their character. Nothing sexual bout that.
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Sep 14, 2011 21:23
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niethan posted:I don't know that all castrations are necessarily sexual. Like with the unsullied its more like neutering your dog to influence their character. Nothing sexual bout that. It removes a man's ability to have sex. How is that not sexual?
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Sep 14, 2011 22:03
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Quantify! posted:
I think this is the thing. You see Martin's take on religion as "logical" and "normal." A really religious person would see Martin's portrayal of the Church of the Seven and the barbarism of the followers of R'hlorr as direct imprecations against established religion. I suppose it's possible that Martin is actually a devout Christian but is just a psychologically elastic writer. Maybe he can temporarily become someone who thinks the "logical" response of humans to supernatural phenomena is to create oppressive institutions and otherwise make a horrible nightmare world for themselves. And then he goes to church and prays to his crucified sacrificed crown-of-thorns wearing god. I don't really care to argue the point, I just think in this case Martin is communicating an honestly held view of reality through his works. If you can point me to evidence that he actually doesn't hold these views, I'd be interested to be proven wrong.
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Sep 14, 2011 22:45
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Azure_Horizon posted:It removes a man's ability to have sex. How is that not sexual? Because it's not done for a sexual purpose. Putting a man in a prison cell removes his ability to have sex too. Making someone paraplegic removes his ability to have sex. Doesn't make em sexual violence.
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Sep 14, 2011 22:50
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Calef posted:I think this is the thing. You see Martin's take on religion as "logical" and "normal." A really religious person would see Martin's portrayal of the Church of the Seven and the barbarism of the followers of R'hlorr as direct imprecations against established religion. I suppose it's possible that Martin is actually a devout Christian but is just a psychologically elastic writer. Maybe he can temporarily become someone who thinks the "logical" response of humans to supernatural phenomena is to create oppressive institutions and otherwise make a horrible nightmare world for themselves. And then he goes to church and prays to his crucified sacrificed crown-of-thorns wearing god.
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Sep 14, 2011 23:16
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niethan posted:Because it's not done for a sexual purpose. Putting a man in a prison cell removes his ability to have sex too. Making someone paraplegic removes his ability to have sex. Doesn't make em sexual violence. They're called "unsullied" for a reason, you know. It's a very sexual reason.
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Sep 15, 2011 00:17
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niethan posted:Because it's not done for a sexual purpose. Putting a man in a prison cell removes his ability to have sex too. Making someone paraplegic removes his ability to have sex. Doesn't make em sexual violence. Well we could have an argument about whether chopping Varys' dick off for a magic spell is sexual violence, but I'm pretty sure Varys' cares one hell of a lot more about the fact that his dick was chopped off than he cares about what happened to it afterwards. Is raping a virgin to cure AIDS sexual violence? Who cares, it's hosed up.
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Sep 15, 2011 01:00
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Is female circumcision sexual violence? I was under the impression that the unsullied (good point about the name) were castrated so they wouldn't stray while looking to fulfill any possible sexual desires. Lacking testosterone is certainly not an advantage for a warrior. Yes, the same argument would apply to dog castration, except dogs aren't human, so I don't believe that they deserve all the same rights as humans. Edit: I think I should clarify. Female circumcision is done to prevent girls from liking or wanting sex. Unsullied castration is done for the same purpose. Day Man fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Sep 15, 2011 |
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Sep 15, 2011 01:09
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I love the religions of this book. Besides, how funny was Victarion's 3 way sacrifice?
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Sep 15, 2011 01:44
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I leave the thread for 8 hours and I come back to a discussion about female circumcision. Oh GRRM. 
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Sep 15, 2011 01:50
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Day Man posted:Is female circumcision sexual violence? I was under the impression that the unsullied (good point about the name) were castrated so they wouldn't stray while looking to fulfill any possible sexual desires. Lacking testosterone is certainly not an advantage for a warrior. Castration keeps people from having sex, obviously it has nothing to do with sex. I mean, come on, buddy.
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Sep 15, 2011 02:31
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Azure_Horizon posted:Considering Martin's world is incredibly patriarchal and women are often put in positions where they have little to no agency, an abundance of sexual violence against men would make no sense. They're never in a position where that's possible. Men are tortured in other ways, which levels the playing field and erases whatever possible misogyny the books are trying to project. Except numerous male side characters get raped. Whoresbane committed sexual violence against male whores, one of the Golden Company makes reference to new recruits being forced to fellate veteran members (heh) of the band, and Victarion recalls the ship's septon being 'used as a woman' by other sailors.
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Sep 15, 2011 03:34
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So this is how the Bad Thread started.
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Sep 15, 2011 03:37
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1stGear posted:So this is how the Bad Thread started. Once someone posts only the word "rape" thousands of times without other content, you'll know we're there. (Please, don't let this happen.)
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Sep 15, 2011 03:42
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Mad Hamish posted:Except numerous male side characters get raped. Whoresbane committed sexual violence against male whores, one of the Golden Company makes reference to new recruits being forced to fellate veteran members (heh) of the band, and Victarion recalls the ship's septon being 'used as a woman' by other sailors. I guess I forgot about them. Either way, the issue seems to be that people see only prominent female characters get raped, when, apparently, there is violence on both sides of the gender line in all ways.
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Sep 15, 2011 05:19
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Quantify! posted:Your basic complaint seems to be that Martin depicts organized religion negatively, and tree-worship positively. But we've not seen much tree-worship, and we've learned that sacrifices were performed for the tree gods as well. People have done bad things in the name of religion. Martin is just being realistic in his depictions of religion at a time when there are few civilizing forces keeping people from doing these awful things. Actually, and this may be my fault for writing late at night, but I wasn't really complaining about Martin depicting organized religion negatively and tree-worship positively. I was simply stating the impression I got from his writing in ASOIF. Whether my impression is correct or not, well that's open to debate. It's just a theme I've seen a lot of author's explore in fiction and its always interesting to see how different authors handle it. To Martin's credit, while I do think he's definitely critical of organized religion, he's pretty good at not turning it into a straw man.
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Sep 15, 2011 06:07
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Azure_Horizon posted:Considering Martin's world is incredibly patriarchal and women are often put in positions where they have little to no agency, an abundance of sexual violence against men would make no sense. They're never in a position where that's possible. Men are tortured in other ways, which levels the playing field and erases whatever possible misogyny the books are trying to project. Well that's the thing. Patriarchal societies and institutional settings don't preclude sexual violence against men or make it less likely. In fact, male rape is often seen and used as the ultimate form of degradation and emasculation in similar settings in the real world. It actually makes a lot of sense for a setting such as the one created by Martin. Principal male characters in ASOIF find themselves in all sorts of situations where rape and other forms of sexual violence could and would have been used against them: as captives, prisoners in dungeons, during interrogations, while slaves, etc. Yet, the only time we get an explicit hint of sexual violence against a man is with Theon. Martin has no qualms about implicitly or explicitly writing acts of sexual violence against women in ASOIF, but he seems rather shy about doing the same for men in situations where it would be perfectly in line with the world he's created. I think its funny that a lot of people defend this particular weakness in his novels by suggesting that "he's only writing a realistic portrayal of pre-industrial society similar to Medieval Euorpe - of course women got raped!" Well, no poo poo, but so did men. And that there is one of the reasons why people suggest some of his misogynistic or patriarchal biases show in ASOIF. He presents sexual violence (whether its rape, threats of rape, sexual assault, etc.) as a form of violence only suited for, and used against women. Ps. Defending Martin's choices with the argument that he's trying to create a world that semi-realistically portrays the attitudes and life ways of a medieval setting is a fundamentally flawed argument. Martin isn't an anthropologist or historian for whom ethnographic realism is a concern. The world of ASOIF is his own, wholly formed from his own imagination of what medieval societies were like. He routinely introduces anachronisms, changes, amalgamations, generalizations and fabrications that deviate from the real world pre-industrial European societies his works use as inspiration. To say that he writes something because he is staying true to a real world counterpart doesn't hold water because he regularly deviates from that counterpart when it suits his needs. Edit: It seems that I forgot Vary's balls, the Unsullied and Jamie's hand. All acts of sexual violence to be sure, but not rape. To be clear, this is not to say that castration is somehow "less than" rape as form of violence or violation. It just seems to imply that rape is to women as castration is to men - which to me, says something about how Martin characterizes sexual violence within neat gendered categories. Tater_tot fucked around with this message at 06:59 on Sep 15, 2011 |
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Sep 15, 2011 06:53
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I don't think expecting a "tit for tat" response regarding rape is very productive. Both Jeyne Whatsherface and Reek are victims of Ramsay's insanity, but Jeyne is raped because Ramsay doesn't have interest in loving Reek. You still wouldn't say that Reek has a better time of it because he's not getting raped though. Rape isn't inherently worse than other forms of torture or being disfigured. One could argue (although I feel its an unproductive argument) that people view rape as more damaging because it's primarily against women, who are viewed as more fragile. Thus the misogyny is in the mind of the reader for thinking rape is more psychologically damaging than other forms of torture! (I don't really believe this, but it goes to show how subjective this sort of thing is.) The "the author creates the world, and he could've chosen to create a fairer world" argument seems to be a popular one when discussing works of fiction around here. That's not really the case. The world creates itself as much as the author creates it. Once you start exploring the rules of your world, you find that you have to make certain choices because they fit with other choices you've made, even if you don't like it. As a writer of stories, I can assure you that you're never 100% in control of how the story comes out. One of the things Martin obviously wants to explore is gender roles in his society. It's certainly no coincidence that there are so many female POVs. In this society, women can't help but compare themselves with men because they ARE weaker, socially. Cersei would rather be a man, Brienne acts like a man, Arya is considered boyish, Asha is fierce and flirtatious and considers herself a candidate to compete with men for the position of King. Contrast that with Sansa and Catelyn, who find themselves as victims more often than not because they lack assertive qualities and are more "feminine".
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Sep 15, 2011 07:21
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I'm not proposing a tit for tat approach to rape. I don't think because a male character doesn't get raped but is otherwise mutilated he is somehow "better off", let alone suggesting that one depiction of violence is qualitatively equivalent to another - somehow balancing the sheets on suffering and brutalization. That's a dumb argument and one I don't think I've made. I'm pointing out why I think Martin's use of rape and sexual violence has a peculiar gender bias that is ahistorical and unrealistic given the setting he's created. I think it points to his own patriarchal biases in how he conceptualizes sexual violence in general . Martin of course isn't the first author to have trouble dealing with sexual violence and he's nowhere near as horrible as some authors I've read. I don't offer that as an excuse for him, but simply to point out its a topic a lot of authors have trouble with because of patriarchy. Its a basic tenet of post-modern literary deconstruction that authors don't have complete control over what they write or how an audience interprets their work once they set it down on paper. The first point refers more to their use of tropes and cultural references than literally "this story has a life of its own". Authors can always rewrite and rethink. The second is a bit trickier and leads to long, drawn out discussions on message boards like this  To address some of your other points: - I don't think critiquing Martin for his gendered use of sexual violence is a call to create a fairer world. In a fairer world people wouldn't get raped and "small folk" wouldn't get slaughtered by the thousands on the whims of nobility. What I'm arguing is that Martin's approach to writing sexual violence repeats a gender bias regarding said violence in a troublesome way. - "One of the things Martin obviously wants to explore is gender roles in his society. It's certainly no coincidence that there are so many female POVs. In this society, women can't help but compare themselves with men because they ARE weaker, socially. Cersei would rather be a man, Brienne acts like a man, Arya is considered boyish, Asha is fierce and flirtatious and considers herself a candidate to compete with men for the position of King. Contrast that with Sansa and Catelyn, who find themselves as victims more often than not because they lack assertive qualities and are more "feminine". I'm not sure if you were trying to be sarcastic here, but this whole paragraph points to a soft form of patriarchal thinking that masks itself as enlightened gender politics... ...and before you accuse me of being a misogynist because "he saw misogyny and must therefore be the one thinking it" - like you did obliquely in your second paragraph - consider how you yourself are characterizing the comparative worth of masculinity and femininity based on how you interpretation of Martin. Is Martin really suggesting that the only way for women to be strong, not be victims and have agency is to symbolically become men? That's kinda hosed up. Actually, he might be suggesting that, lol.
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Sep 15, 2011 09:19
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