Sigella

How got ended ruined it for me, I can’t do re-watches and have zero intrest in it, to some extent it even soured my deep appreciation of the book series. I dare watch hotd partly because the end is already written and so is somewhat safe from swerving off the road like got did. Knowing the written material on the dance, even if it was poorly done I know what to expect.

Yes, Cersei’s feminism (bitter dead-ended as it is) exists. She’s pissed that she wasn’t given choices and possibilities on account of her gender (being sold off like brood mare, not getting a sword like Jaime etc). It has a lot of big flaws, but it is still feminism. Feminism/feminists can be misogynic. Misogyny is so deeply woven into everything its almost impossible to not ever do/say stuff that isn’t feministically correct. The reasoning you have about Cersei’s exceptionalistic tendencies fits better with Dany’s aspacian piedestal, which is DANY has a right to rule everyone because she is so very special and other women aren’t at all like that, so they deserve being ruled over. Aspasia was a highly intelligent highborn woman in Ancient greece a who won the right to vote but only specifically for HERSELF, other women didn’t matter (maybe it did, to her, but its not recorded to my knowledge).

As a reader I'm 100% black (because Rhaenyra was made heir and greens are vulgar and screw the stupid patriarchy) - but had I been an in-story character I'd go green because blacks is too dangerous, they kill anyone around them on whim and I wouldn't be up for that.

I’ve only read lotr and the Hobbits tale, I’m not big on fantasy generally, so it might well be Tolkien was more nuanced than he gets credit for. But isn’t there an ssm that says that thing about Tolkien? And what Tolkien was or wasn’t isn’t so much the question as what Grrm thinks of Tolkien.

No friendship is ever completely equal, nor any two individuals/characters either so that isn't a reason to disregard them. Cat and Lysa (granted they're family/related more than friends but right there we have one of the highest sourness-scores in the entire story, Cat's disastrous visit to the Eerie is soooooo good) is way more fascinating to me than Cat and Brienne. Cat takes pity on Brienne, Brienne comes to respect Cat's "womanly courage". Yawn. I wouldn't call the waif an acquaintance nor rate a relationship's worth based on how many pages they get. My interpretation on why Arya doesn't have female friends earlier is based off two things; Sansa and Jeyne bullying and a strong internal feminism. Girls don't play with swords, go on adventures etc, why would she want them around when those are the things Arya wants to do? The waif is finally another girl who trains to be an elite assassin. Compared to Cersei's bitter dead end-feminism ("if I had been born male") or Dany's Aspacian piedestal (same such as Sansa is well underway onto as well) - Arya's feminism seems to grant her more freedoms than the other. Still however Cersei and Dany has been way more power-succesful while they aren't at all free.

Dany and Missandei is pretty nicely depicted friendship to me. But other than that I think the closest thing we get is Arya and book-waif and Arya and the whores at the happy port. I do get why - Cersei and Taena/Cat and Lysa-types of friendships has a greater entertainment value than a nice and ”pure” friendships that only amounts to giggling and hugging and supporting each other through thick and thin. The male friendships arent entirely pure either imo, Ned lying to/ arguing with Robert and even some fake breakups along the way. Jon and Sam might look pure at first glance but Sam is pretty sour about the baby swap plus there’s room for drama when Jon learns about Bran going beyond the wall.

I think GRRM maybe tried to make only grey characters in contrast to Tolkiens black or white ones, so thats probably part why. We have the She-Bears and Asha for a lighter shade of grey, Brienne pretty much white... Granted none of them has a great deal of power en par with Cersei and Dany. I really hope for book-Dany to have a less horrid road than show-Dany but it does feel like grasping for straws in doing so.

Ok we’ll have to agree to diagree here, so far none of us seems to be able to convince the other and its off topic anyhow.

The only ones we hear from are Genna and Kevvan. Genna like Tywin because he opposed he marriage and Kevvan doesn’t reflect on Tywin from what I can remember, so thats really not any proof either way.

I’ll elaborate why it isn’t. 1 If the child disapears people will whisper* and ofc they will think Tywin threw him in a well, 2 An abandoned child could get into the wrong hands, considering their strained relationship Aerys would probably pay a pretty penny to humiliate Tywin by parading his son around the court, any rival or rebel would love to have him as well. 3 Down the line pretenders could become a real problem, who wouldn’t like the favour of an heir to Casterly Rock? 4 All inheritances would be murky waters, Tyrion is second in line for the westerlands so every heir after Jaime would sit very uncertain * which means everyone will know that there is an abnormal child gone missing and will so react accordingly if one should turn up, talk would spread of that as well. Also I think you misunderstand the mechanics of a taboo. I don’t think Tywin is afraid to break it in itself - but he isn’t dumb so he sees the cost of social stigma. It would give Aerys SO many more barbs to puncture his overly proud Hand with, even if Tywin just left the child with some nice farmers.

Adandoning isn’t doable. Theres too much risk, Tyrion is too unique looking. One could also argue Pycelle’s account on Tywin being as truthful as his account on Joffy in the trial: "You used it all to kill the noblest child the gods ever put on this good earth.” Happy new year to you too!

I still argue kinslaying taboo. If it were to happen Tywin would be cursed in eyes of gods and men, shame his house etc. All we know is she made him laugh on occasion, which proves nothing in terms of empathy. Granted my wording ”emotion” was clumsy, the Mountain shows lot of emotion (anger primarily) but that doesn’t mean he has functioning empathy. Affection would be a better choice of word. Show me text where Tywin displays empathy or affection because I still think you might be treading head canon territory here.

Why risk getting kinslayer stamped on you if the baby is like to die naturally? And once it gets bigger and no longer risks dying it gets much more difficult to pass it off as a not murder. Especially if you abandon him in a village (which isn’t feasible when Tyrion is uniqe-looking, it would get found out in a heartbeat if someone found a toddler dwarf with mismatched eyes by their barn one morning). Being cold and reserved isn’t the issue here. Lots of characters have those traits but still manages to display emotion or empathy some way or another. I take it you don’t have any text to lean on for this claim, so its head-canon maybe? It doesn’t need to be a real resemblance though, could be the child that comes closest to the narcissists ideals. Joffrey is a lot dumber than Cersei but she favours him because she thinks he is mentally strong, unlike easily cowed Tommen. Her views on mental fitness or self asteem being pretty skewed, just like Tywin placing a lot of pride in Jaimes skill at arms, even though Tywin himself never join any actual fighting as lord of casterly rock and despises the fact that Jaime is a KG.

If Tyrion disapeared people would likely wonder and gossip. I can’t think of any display of affection, kindness or love ever displayed by Tywin towards his kids. Only thing is what I wrote earlier about ”they have my son”. Do you have any text to support?

@frenin Hard disagree. Tyrion got to live thanks to the kinslaying taboo. Tywin has no emotion towards his children, they are just his pawns or instruments. Closest to any emotion towards them is the ”they have my son”-outburst and one could argue the emphasis could just as well be on the word ”my” as on ”son”.

Sure, like all noble children in the story she was mainly raised by servants. But it is clear that it is Tywin she models herself after. Cersei never thinks about her mother but Tywin pop up many times every Cersei-chapter. We learn more about Joanna Lannister from Pycelles written account in WoIaF than we do from any of her childrens thoughts or conversations.

Firstly psychopathy isn’t an existing condition - it is called anti social personality disorder, or in children callous unemotional traits. Look it up on wikipedia. Feeling bad/having empathy does rule it out. I agree Cersei checks a lot but there are other disorders that might fit better like narcisistic personality disorder.

Nope. If she had been she wouldn't have felt nauseus/soiled after seeing Qyburn at work. You can be cruel and not a psychpath. Feeling bad about shit rules it out. To the Op: Granted Robert isn't as cruel as Cersei but his leniency and pig-headed-ostrich-behaviours causes nasty situations too. It's like he is a shit person trying to be as good as Jon Arryn tried to raise him, while Cersei was raised by Tywin who wouldn't know empathy if it slapped him in the face.