Why do Lannisters have a reputation as a "villain family"?

[Dofs]

9 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Hoster Tully - A stubborn patriarch who isn't very likeable, but who nevertheless seems a run of the mill medieval Lord without major psychopathic or narcissistic tendencies. Regarded fondly by Cat and Edmure, although Lysa rightly has her issues with him.

Except for when he burnt an entire village during Robert's Rebellion when the lord to whom it belonged stayed loyal to Aerys.

[Erkan12]

Cercei and Tywin.

You ask why ?

[Lion of the West]

28 minutes ago, Lew Theobald said:

Sorry, no.  The mere fact that Jon Arryn was wronged by a madwoman, is not proof that he deserved to be wronged; or that he engineered his own fate by driving the madwoman insane.

Like I said, I know to little about his life at large to lay a final verdict but it remains that Lysa become, to my knowledge, insane during her years with him. That don't mean that Jon Arryn deserved to be murdered, and since I don't support capital punishment I can't think of anyone who deserves to be murdered, I do not mean that Jon Arryn was a roaring monster but I contend that he wasn't a flawless saint defined by only good qualities.

[Lion of the West]

2 minutes ago, Lew Theobald said:

She was hardly fully sane to begin with, if she was in love with Littlefinger.  But yeah, sure.  That bastard Jon Arryn drove her insane.  It was his bad breath that did it.

I seriously doubt Littlefinger was the kind of guy he is in the series when he was a child. People changed.

Furthermore it was certainly a bad love and twisted by the false memory Lysa had of Petyr. As for Lysa's insanity I think it was a combination of several factors. I think it was her father's betrayal of her trust, a vast age difference between Lysa and Jon and a sense of isolation which would have only been exaggerated in the Eyrie or in a Red Keep far away from any friendly people she knew. To lay everything at Jon Arryn's feet is a mistake. I doubt that he was like Robert who tried to hurt his wife but rather couldn't understand her needs as a teenage girl sent away from everything and everyone she knew with a forced abortion right behind her.

[Lion of the West]

9 minutes ago, Lew Theobald said:

Of course not.  That bastard Jon Arryn was mean to Littlefinger's puppy.  That's what drove him over the edge.

Do you have a quote for this? I am sceptical about it.

[Universal Sword Donor]

Just now, Lew Theobald said:

Come on.  It's obvious.  If Jon Arryn had not been mean to Littlefinger, Littlefinger never would have murdered Jon Arryn.  And Littlefinger does not have a puppy, so there you go.  Jon Arryn must have done away with it.

Not if Bloodraven warged Joffrey to do it and then blame Jon Arryn.

[devilish]

I don't really blame the Lannisters for what they did to the Reynes. The latter were their bannermen and they shouldn't have rebelled against their Lords. 

However, what they did to Elia and her children is unforgivable. 

A- they were innocent and they were of higher nobility standing then Tywin was. They should have been judged by their own peers not by a warden. 
B- The Targs had never done anything wrong to the Lannisters. Quite contrary, Tywin was appointed the youngest HOTK in Targ history
C- the Lannisters stayed neutral throughout the war only to backstab the Targs at the very end. That stinks of opportunism to me.

Prior to the Lannisters the rebellion was fully justified. Aerys had gone rogue by ordering Arryn to kill 2 innocent young men who had nothing to do with what was going on. The Lannister's intervention shifted the blame from Aerys to the rebels. Elia, Aegon and Rhaenys were as innocent as Robert and Ned were. 

[TMIFairy]

3 hours ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

Where did we learn that Jaime raped Tysha? We get the garrison paying her silver and Tyrion paying her gold because he's worth more as a lannister. Plenty of things to not like Jaime for but that would not be accurate.

Yeah, I goofed. I already admitted that to Kissedbyfire.

3 hours ago, Dofs said:

Except for when he burnt an entire village during Robert's Rebellion when the lord to whom it belonged stayed loyal to Aerys.

That is not very nice of Hoster, true. But this is more or less the "standard" of the setting. Same applies to his "purging" of Lysa.

Whereas IMO Tywin orders/allows ser Gregor and his other goons to go beyond the "standard".

[Dofs]

29 minutes ago, TMIFairy said:

That is not very nice of Hoster, true. But this is more or less the "standard" of the setting. Same applies to his "purging" of Lysa.

Whereas IMO Tywin orders/allows ser Gregor and his other goons to go beyond the "standard".

How exactly is burning a village to the ground with people in there any better than Gregor's raids?

[Universal Sword Donor]

1 hour ago, Dofs said:

How exactly is burning a village to the ground with people in there any better than Gregor's raids?

Look at Robbs campaign out west. 

But historically speaking that was how armies fought in the middle ages, especially England and France. The Agincourt campaign was specifically noteworthy for this because of its lack of chevauchee. Henry V forbade it because he was making a claim as a King of France.

Whether or not Hoster was brutal in doing so (he was), every other army marching through enemy territory has done the same thing. 

[DominusNovus]

2 hours ago, Dofs said:

How exactly is burning a village to the ground with people in there any better than Gregor's raids?

For one, the village was burned during a war.  Gregor was sent out well before any war had started, in retaliation to a political slight that should have been handled through political channels.

As for the Lannisters' villainy, I fall firmly in the 'blame Tywin' camp, but with a slight caveat: While Tywin was terrible, he was terrible with a legitimate purpose.  Terror was a tool to him, if a favorite among many tools, but not an ends.  However, what his daughter and grandson learned from him was terror and little else.  Even if he had been as terrible an opponent as he was, but a better father, I think the Lannisters would have turned out better.  Of course, the series would be unrecognizable.

[The Wolves]

17 hours ago, Lady Blizzardborn said:

Do you want to talk about the Lannisters or the Westerlanders? Because the region and people who live there have never been vilified so far as I know.

There are three main reasons why the Lannisters are considered villains: Tywin, Cersei, and Joffrey. Then a secondary reason: twincest.

It doesn't help that Jaime pushed a 7 year old out a window, crippling him for life, but I could see Bran thanking him for that some day. And Jaime did lose that hand, so he's been punished.

Why would Bran thank the man who tried to kill him and in the process took away his ability to walk and maybe his ability to produce children forever? 

And Jaime is as much a villain in this series as much as Cersei. He belongs up there with Tywin, Cersei, Joffery, and Keven. 

[Universal Sword Donor]

2 hours ago, The Wolves said:

Why would Bran thank the man who tried to kill him and in the process took away his ability to walk and maybe his ability to produce children forever? 

And Jaime is as much a villain in this series as much as Cersei. He belongs up there with Tywin, Cersei, Joffery, and Keven. 

I don't know why Bran would thank him, but Jaime actually has a redemption arc.

I don't even see how you can lump Kevan in with the other 4 honestly. 

[Lady Blizzardborn]

3 hours ago, The Wolves said:

Why would Bran thank the man who tried to kill him and in the process took away his ability to walk and maybe his ability to produce children forever? 

And Jaime is as much a villain in this series as much as Cersei. He belongs up there with Tywin, Cersei, Joffery, and Keven. 

Because if Jaime hadn't pushed him, he might never have ended up becoming protege to the 3EC, and if that never happened then the Others might have destroyed the entire world. I'm not saying Bran will give Jaime a big hug, call him brother, and buy him a car, just that he may recognize that events had to transpire as they did in order to save the world and even Jaime's part, despicable though it was, had to be played.

Did you skip AFFC entirely? Jaime's turning around. Those who turn around get credit for doing so.

Kevan? What did Kevan do? 

[Universal Sword Donor]

13 minutes ago, Lew Theobald said:

It looks suspiciously like a damnation arc to me:  complete with a warning, a rejected invitation to repentance, and a devil from beyond the grave showing up at midnight to claim his soul.

Each person has a right to satire or their opinion

[Universal Sword Donor]

23 minutes ago, Lady Blizzardborn said:

Because if Jaime hadn't pushed him, he might never have ended up becoming protege to the 3EC, and if that never happened then the Others might have destroyed the entire world. I'm not saying Bran will give Jaime a big hug, call him brother, and buy him a car, just that he may recognize that events had to transpire as they did in order to save the world and even Jaime's part, despicable though it was, had to be played.

Did you skip AFFC entirely? Jaime's turning around. Those who turn around get credit for doing so.

Kevan? What did Kevan do? 

I mean, if I had the option of no legs and no sex or saving the world, man the bitterness would push burning it all down. Specially if I thought basically my entire family had died

[Lady Blizzardborn]

6 minutes ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

I mean, if I had the option of no legs and no sex or saving the world, man the bitterness would push burning it all down. Specially if I thought basically my entire family had died

Bran is seven at the start of the story. He's never experienced sex, so giving it up probably is not as big a deal to him as it would be if faced with a choice as an adult. Besides which we don't know that he has to give it up.

Some people would have big problems giving up sex and legs to save the world, others would be fine with it, most would probably be somewhere in the middle. We don't know where Bran falls on that line.

If he comes to view all of it as unavoidable destiny, he'll be less likely to assign blame. Might take til he's an adult to get to that place though, and by then I expect Jaime will be dead.

If Bran doesn't learn what he needs to, everybody's families will be completely dead.
 

[Dofs]

3 hours ago, DominusNovus said:

For one, the village was burned during a war.  Gregor was sent out well before any war had started, in retaliation to a political slight that should have been handled through political channels.

As for the Lannisters' villainy, I fall firmly in the 'blame Tywin' camp, but with a slight caveat: While Tywin was terrible, he was terrible with a legitimate purpose.  Terror was a tool to him, if a favorite among many tools, but not an ends.  However, what his daughter and grandson learned from him was terror and little else.  Even if he had been as terrible an opponent as he was, but a better father, I think the Lannisters would have turned out better.  Of course, the series would be unrecognizable.

I doubt the villagers cared if there was a war or not. In both cases they have suffered terrible unjustifiable fate because of their lord's/ruling family member's behaviour. Anyway, my point was to show that not caring about the lives of smallfolk is not just Tywin's mentality, it is the mentality of many lords, including the 'non vilainous' ones like Hoster. Tywin is not some kind of an outlier, although he may be one of the more radical ones.

I disagree with you about Joffrey and Cersei. Joffrey has learnt nothing from Tywin, they barely met and Tywin is in no way responsible for his behaviour. As for Cersei, first of all Tywin did not participate much in her upbringing either, that was a job of maids, nuns and I guess Genna also participated. Cersei is also genuinely crazy, so while she did indeed get some unpleasant ideas from her father, I am not sure that she would have been any better if someone else raised her.

[Lady Blizzardborn]

3 minutes ago, Lew Theobald said:

Yes, but the amazing thing is that those who claim to see a "redemption arc" in Jaime are actually serious.

Let's look at the facts.

He's done with Cersei.
He gave a Valyrian Steel sword to Brienne to use in finding Sansa, to fulfill his promise to Catelyn.
When he gave the sword to Brienne he actually said Sansa was his last chance for honor, a concept he had spent years sneering at.
He's been fair in his recent dealings with people.
He seems to have lost the swagger he once had.
He's had to pretty much rethink his entire identity after losing his sword hand.

I can see why people think in terms of a redemption arc. You made good points with your comment about a damnation arc, but you have to keep in mind that just because that's what it looks like doesn't mean that's what it is. Those on the redemption arc bandwagon also need to keep that in mind. Remember who the author is.

[DominusNovus]

1 hour ago, Dofs said:

I doubt the villagers cared if there was a war or not. In both cases they have suffered terrible unjustifiable fate because of their lord's/ruling family member's behaviour. Anyway, my point was to show that not caring about the lives of smallfolk is not just Tywin's mentality, it is the mentality of many lords, including the 'non vilainous' ones like Hoster. Tywin is not some kind of an outlier, although he may be one of the more radical ones.

I disagree with you about Joffrey and Cersei. Joffrey has learnt nothing from Tywin, they barely met and Tywin is in no way responsible for his behaviour. As for Cersei, first of all Tywin did not participate much in her upbringing either, that was a job of maids, nuns and I guess Genna also participated. Cersei is also genuinely crazy, so while she did indeed get some unpleasant ideas from her father, I am not sure that she would have been any better if someone else raised her.

To the point of the villagers, yes, they most certainly would care whether or not there was a war going on.  People are smart, and plan according to their circumstances.  Simply the knowledge that a war was on could guide their decisions and allow them to take certain precautions, like hiding some of the population, hiding their food and other valuables, maybe even defending themselves.  Whereas, during peacetime, they have no reason to hide themselves or their belongings.  This key difference can mean the difference between life and death.

As for Joffrey and Cersei, I lay the blame for Joffrey at the feet of Cersei, and I think the text backs up the notion that Cersei is primarily to blame for his poor upbringing.  As for how Cersei turned out, given how strongly she tries to live up to her father's expectations for his son, and how dear to heart she took his worldview, I'd say that you can most certainly lay a good chunk of the blame on Tywin.  We can get into a nature vs nurture debate, but those are incredibly tedious, so I won't bother.  I'll just say that, regardless of how much of Cersei is inherent to her by birth, Tywin's parenting style certainly exacerbated her character flaws.