Craving Peaches

True. This just ignores most of the points raised in the OP.

They still need to be fed though. The Golden Company is only 10,000 and according to the sample chapter they're having to plunder food from peasants. I don't see how Daenerys can feed even that much, even if she decides to starve peasants so her army has more food, I don't think the supplies would last.

Yeah, there just isn't enough food to go around at this point. Yes, it also seems like the vast majority of people there are going to starve. I don't see how Stannis is going to avoid starvation, for example. His troops are already starving and even if they take Winterfell that won't solve the issue because Theon notes food in Winterfell is running out. And as you point out, it seems to be impossible to transport food over with those conditions. So unless the battle absolutely decimates everyone to the point where there is like Stannis plus ten guys left...

This is a massive issue for her potential invasion and I don't really see how she can resolve it. 1. There is not enough food left in Westeros for Daenerys to supply her army via foraging/using reserves. It is pointed out numerous times that the food supplies remaining in Westeros are inadequate to feed everyone already there, so there is no way they can feed even more people coming later. This issue will be compounded by the size of the army Daenerys is aiming to bring. Not to mention all the difficulties that come with a regular winter. Then we have to factor in that it will probably be supernaturally cold, icy etc. 2. Daenerys cannot just ship food from Essos in as some people have suggested. First of all, there is a food shortage in all the territories she currently controls as well. Secondly, even is we assume she takes control of territories that have food/are growing food, she cannot just start taking food from there to feed a large army without depriving people living there of food, not to mention the logistics involved in shipping it over. And unless the army is near a port it will then need to be transported overland in the winter conditions etc. 3. How she is supposed to feed all the horses the Dothraki will be bringing? Where is the fodder going to come from? So it looks like either Daenerys will have to bring a much smaller army, or her army will starve, or she'll have to make loads of other people starve so her army doesn't starve.

With the numbers of these threads and how ceaseless the legions of Stark haters are, I feel like Gingy being chased by all the zombified clones of his girlfriend in Scared Shrekless.

The Targaryens cannot seem to follow rules. Aerys had issues with rules and so did Rhaegar. Daenerys continues the ignoble family trait with what she does to poor Viserys and the black magic. Soon she will start craving blood.

Took a break for a while because no wifi or mobile reception and these threads are the delights I am greeted with...

Yet you support a house whose motto is 'Fire and Blood'....

True.

At least they won't make a mistake when it comes to Stannis, then.

To be fair though at least one peasant also seems to think Aerys was a great guy because the roads were safe.

Do you agree we should stop basing moral decisions on a subjective wiki and instead use our own skill of reading the book to draw a conclusion for ourselves? It's not like this is even a particularly hard case.

I never said they were tolerant in the modern sense, I said I didn't see how they were any worse than the other religions with regards to tolerance. Other religions imprison, torture and humiliate people (being burned alive is extremely painful, drowning is also awful until the lack of oxygen kicks in and then it's supposed to be peaceful). It's not stated explicity but I find it highly likely that they too would punish women for sexual transgressions, based on how they treat people in general. Also, the new Faith Militant don't appear to have done much so far? The only people subject to ill treatment so far after the HS took over appear to have been Cersei, Osney Kettleblack and the member of the most devout who was put on a strict diet, and (correct me if I'm wrong) Cersei was imprisoned not just because of sexual transgressions but because they believed she had killed the King and the High Septon, which would be standard practice for a murder suspect. Torturing a confession is nasty but par for the course in this series. Cersei herself does it, as does Daenerys and numerous other characters. If it was another religion in charge of Cersei's punishment she probably would have been burned alive/drowned for her actions. I mean other religions go around burning everything/anything they don't like, looting and slaving etc. Sure FotS and Old Gods have done this in the past but we don't see it much if at all anymore, unlike with R'hlorr and the Drowned God. Everything I can see paints the FotS and the Old Gods as the most tolerant out of the Westerosi religions and the Red Faith. Which is admittedly not very hard. Because the competitors love to burn other people's places of worship down, and their religious items, and them in generally. Really, I don't see how it is much of a contest. The Red Faith is hands down the most intolerant religion, endorsing slavery, painful execution of disbelievers, destruction of the property of other religions, holy war against the enemies of the faith, convert-or-die mentality, and also has a black or white morality system so if you're not with them you're against them, are an agent of evil, can be subject to extreme violence and so on. Other religions have at least a bit more nuance. FotS and Old Gods have reformed for the most part beyond this mentality, Red Faith has not. Red Faith has all the worst traits of FotS prior to reform plus a more painful execution method. FotS/Old Gods also compare favourably to religions elsewhere in the world, where you have delights such as the Black Goat, Dothraki death cult, all the other deities demanding human sacrifice, whatever is going on in places like Carcosa, etc. Really I think the only other two religions that beat the FotS/Old Gods in terms of tolerance are the Lord of Harmony and the religion in the Summer Isles.

Sorry, I should have specified in the current series. The most intolerant FotS member I can think of is Septon Chayle. High Sparrow doesn't seem very tolerant but we haven't seen much of him yet. Same issue would apply to followers of the Old Gods though, when the First Men first showed up they too slaughtered masses of children, not to mention the children themselves probably did something nasty to generate the Hammer of the Waters. And of course the Drowned Religion/Red Faith are still in this phase of wanting to kill unbelievers. Plus R'hlorr followers are also burning places of worship, artworks etc. Faith Militant doesn't sound good but it may have been beneficial in protecting roads, peasants etc, which would have been especially helpful in a time where the kingdoms weren't centralised. Septon Meribald's circuit seemed good and that was one man travelling alone. I don't know, sometimes I feel like people (just to be clear I am not trying to suggest you did this, it is more so an issue on other sites) take the Catholic church analogy and project all the bad stuff they did in real life on to the FotS even when there is not much to suggest it in the books. Yet of course those people don't then project the less savoury aspects of pre-Christian religions on to the Old Gods. I feel like there is a bit of a double standard here...

Faith of the Seven for inside cities/when around other people, Old Gods for when alone in nature. Faith of the Seven and the Old Gods seem to be the only major religions to not practice human sacrifice anymore AND be against slavery (though that might be a Weserosi custom rather than linked to religion). R'hlorr and the Drowned God both support this (thralls, temple slaves etc.), and the Many-Faced God endorses human sacrifice. So if I had to rank them: 1. FotS/Old Gods 2. Faceless God (because it is against slavery at least) 3. Drowned God 4. R'hlorr (burning is more painful than drowning) For all the people saying the FotS are intolerant, is there anything specifically that marks them out as such, or at least more intolerant than other religions? I don't think any FotS members in the series have called for non-believers to be burned (unlike R'hlorr followers), nor are they burning items/places of worship (unlike R'hlorr followers). R'hlorr followers clearly seem like the most intolerant religion in my view, closely followed by Drowned God followers.

There is a secret conspiracy to continuously purge the middle classes of Westeros to keep them small, in order to prevent Westerosi society from progressing beyond late medieval/early modern era. I love it but the only piece of 'evidence' mentioned was that Varys ratted out the Antler Men, which he could have done for numerous other reasons.

Where exactly is this second wall supposed to be hidden anyway? Or is it destroyed or something?

I don't hate them, but I find theories relying on the 'second moon' myth too much strage. Only one character in the whole series ever refers to the legend and she dies in book one, plus there are other theories about the origin of dragons which seem more realistic. If it is going to play a big role I feel like it would be made more prominent.

Yeah but it has a spear going through it meaning spear beats sun so every house with a spear is now top tier by this logic.

Scorpion beats dragon. So that's what you'd want on your sigil.

Muh honour as a Kingsguard. Like, okay, but this guy is a psycho. Could you maybe relax it this one time. Well the excuse given by the text is that he was younger. But he was presumably wearing plate armour the whole time so not sure how stealthy he could really be. There is a theory that Duskendale was an inside job though, which could explain how Barristan managed to rescue Aerys.

Renly not dying. Lannisters are done for at that point. Tywin couldn't handle Robb alone without Tyrell assistance. There is no way he could manage Robb and Renly with the Tyrells. Dorne probably jumps in to get revenge on Tywin. Stannis told no one about the incest or his claim to be king for weeks/months after Robert died for some reason though. It actually makes little sense (unless you assume Stannis was waiting for Robert to die so he could become king, which seems a bit mean). Stannis knew/suspected the incest at least since Jon Arryn died, yet he tells no one. If Stannis had tried to warn Robert or at least not sat on vital info whilst expecting everyone to develop psychic powers in order to serve him (because he waits weeks/months after Robert's death before proclaiming his claim to the throne, whilst also not responding to messages, yet gets annoyed that no one showed up before that(?)) things probably would have turned out for the better... Like if Stannis had said as soon as Robert died what happened with the incest, he would probably have got Robb's support and possibly Renly's. Instead, he just sits around, meanwhile Robb and Renly go off and do their own thing because it's not really a situation where they can just sit around. Yeah, should have let Aerys die. No one would miss him. Barristan probably indirectly killed at least a few dozen people with that action, just factoring in all the people Aerys had executed.

First Men may have been unable to smelt Iron properly but that does not necessarily mean they would not have any experience with iron at all. They could have had rare pieces of meteoric iron (or a magic variant) to make the occasional sword that was super-effective against the Others. The sword Dawn, for example, supposedly came from a meteor.

They have their own special dedicated section on the Guardian Website as far as I am aware. Thing is though people who aren't the Guardian are also annoyed by it so... If the Guardian are making more of it than is there (not sure I agree) they aren't alone and are probably being encouraged by how others are reacting.

I thought they mentioned it because it was revealed that in addition to the £10 million received already Hester had given or pledged to give a further £5 million after the comments were revealed? Another reason why it might be relevant is the new definition of extremism the Tories are pushing for. But they denied these comments would fall under the definition, because it wasn't an ideology. Still, it doesn't look very good that they are doing things like this while taking money from someone who called for an MP to be shot. It's more a 'Tory party is racist' narrative. And quite a lot of people seem to care... GPs call for health tech boss Frank Hester to resign after Abbott remarks | Frank Hester | The Guardian In addition, Hester apparently routinely says racist things, according to multiple former employees, so I get the impression this wasn't just a one off incident. I get what you are saying but the issue is that is not the justification the Tory party are using. They are claiming it is all fine again because he apologised and that he should be treated with 'Christian forgiveness'. Edit: They also claim they are transparent about donations but won't say whether they've accepted more money from Hester.