Sansa and Tyrion reconciliation?

[Dany Girl]

I find many things on this thread very very disturbing, so I will not be coming back to it. Instead I will start a new thread very soon on the issue of male victims. The lack of empathy for what Tyrion, as a character has been through in his life and how it shaped his actions is being glossed over. I see many people seeming to say that Sansa is a victim and it is ok if she is traumatized, we should not expect her to act heroically etc. and yet these same people seem to be claiming that Tyrion is unworthy of compassion and respect as a character because he did not go FAR outside of the norms of Westerosi society to heroically defend her against abuse by his family - the same family who had been abusing HIM for his entire life. It is disturbing.

Furthermore, it sends a bad message to women and men alike. To girls it sends the message that they are expected to be weak and to be victims, and to boys it sends the message that if they suffer from abuse they should be expected to suck it up, recover from attempted murder in a matter of weeks, take any shit that is handed to them, and heroically sacrifice themselves for the sake of some girl, just because she is a girl. Disturbing shit.

Just to be clear, I don't think anyone us saying Tyrion has not been a victim. He certainly has. But he is not the victim in this marriage. He was not forced to marry a child hostage. He chose to do so, because she's pretty he gets a lot of perks for it. He knows it is morally wrong to marry her, but he selfishly does it anyways. He's gone from being a victim to being an abuser. This was his choice. No one forced it on him. There was no threat of bodily harm, unlike Sansa. Sansa had zero choice. It was marry him, or get beaten and marry him anyways.

Tyrion's other roll as an abuse victim does not matter in regards to this marriage. If you want to talk about poor little Tyrion being abused, by all means start a thread. But to call him a victim in this incident is just flat out ridiculous.

[Dany Girl]

the marriage to Sansa was also against Tyrion's will too. It was Tywin's call

No, it wasn't. He was given the choice between Sansa, Lollys or some other girl his father would find that would be the daughter of a lesser lord, maybe a second son. Sure, crappy choices, but Tyrion knows he's doing the wrong thing but does it anyways. It was his choice. There was no threat to Tyrion. He was going to be just fine if he refused, and he knew that. He was not scared or intimidated into the marriage. He's not the victim in this situation. He moved from victim to abuser.

[Hippocras]

the wrong thing by what standards? How are you judging this?

Not marrying Sansa would not have saved her from being married at thirteen. She would still have been forced to marry.

Not marrying Sansa would not have advanced his family's interests.

It is only by using the standard that says that what is good for Sansa Stark is good but what is good for Tyrion Lannister is bad that you can come to this conclusion. I call that an unreasonable scale of judgement and an expectation of a higher standard of behaviour from him than from her.

[Dany Girl]

the wrong thing by what standards? How are you judging this?

Not marrying Sansa would not have saved her from being married at thirteen. She would still have been forced to marry.

Not marrying Sansa would not have advanced his family's interests.

It is only by using the standard that says that what is good for Sansa Stark is good but what is good for Tyrion Lannister is bad that you can come to this conclusion. I call that an unreasonable scale of judgement and an expectation of a higher standard of behaviour from him than from her.

Even Tyrion calls it cruel!

It's wrong by Westeros standards. Everyone we've heard speak about the marriage is agast at it. It's not acceptable to force a hostage to marry. Ned never forced Theon to marry, even though marrying him to a northern family would help solidify alliances. It's just not done! He's her captor and he takes his ability to control her way to far. Her family doesn't just not consent, but disinterested her. If it had been sanctioned by anyone but the King, it would be war. If the king did that in peace time, it would likely be war.

I don't get how you can think there's anything ok with Tyrion's actions in this regard when he himself says it's cruel. Talk about blaten whitewashing.

[Hippocras]

at no point did anyone on this thread say that it was not cruel and wrong to force Sansa to marry.

It was TYWIN who forced Sansa to marry. Otherwise it was just a question of who. You are holding Tyrion responsible for Tywin's actions.

[JonCon's Red Beard]

Honestly, to call Tyrion a victim or to argue he's even remotely as victimized as Sansa in this situation is utter and complete bullshit. Tyrion had choices, not good ones maybe, but still choices. Sansa had none. It was go willing, or be beaten until she went. There was no 3rd choice. I've seen people argue she could have chosen death, but that wasn't an option. Tywin and Cersei were not about to let her die. So no, no sympathy for Tyrion om the marriage front. Not a bit.

Tyrion has no choices: he's pretty much a woman with a penis in Westeros. If he doesn't have the money and support of the Lannisters, he had no chances at all to survive by himself. He might have certain freedom in order to make small decisions of his life, but the ones who matter are quite limited.

[Dany Girl]

at no point did anyone on this thread say that it was not cruel and wrong to force Sansa to marry.

It was TYWIN who forced Sansa to marry. Otherwise it was just a question of who. You are holding Tyrion responsible for Tywin's actions.

Because Tyrion voluntarily takes part in them!

Just because someone doesn't plan a robbery, if they help a robber to commit the crime they are also guilty of the crime.

Tyrion absolutely voluntarily takes part in this marriage. Just because it wasn't his plan does not let him off the hook. Nobody forced him. And if he really felt bad about it he could have let the Tyrells in on the plan so that they could try to get her to marry Willas instead, as SANSA wanted. Instead he took part in the forced marriage of a child hostage.

[Dany Girl]

Tyrion has no choices: he's pretty much a woman with a penis in Westeros. If he doesn't have the money and support of the Lannisters, he had no chances at all to survive by himself. He might have certain freedom in order to make small decisions of his life, but the ones who matter are quite limited.

:bs: he did have choices. He took the one with the best outcome for himself, even though he himself considers it cruel. He's not a victim. Not in this instance.

[WeddinGuest]

He had a lot of compassion and there are many examples. I do not have access to the books to find quotes, but there are many.

No, the bit you quoted had to do with the unreasonable expectation of defiance that would work against his own interests that people hold for Tyrion. They do not hold Sansa to this same standard of judgement. In other words, they do not expect Sansa to risk her family, her livelihood, all future social status and possibly her life to defend Tyrion from the constant bullying he faces. Yet this is how they expect Tyrion to have behaved.

I can't speak for anyone else, but for me, the question is not "how is it fair for the objective observer judge Tyrion" and "how is it fair for Sansa to judge Tyrion". You claim Tyrion never did anything to harm Sansa directly, but even if we accept that premise, even if we accept that Tyrion at the very least perceived he had no choice but to bend to Tywin's commands, how is Sansa to know that? If you actually review the wedding scene that is from her POV, her refusal to kneel has nothing to do with wanting to personally harm Tyrion, it is a general form of protest against everyone who forced her into this position, and once she realizes Tyrion is embarrassed, she DOES kneel. She's not thinking "Yay! I get the chance to be the cruel oppressor for once, let me abuse this dwarf just for the lulz".

I do not expect or think Tysha is obligated to forgive Tyrion either, even though Tywin had much more control over a 13 year old Tyrion than a 20-something one, and there seems to be a general consensus that he has minimal culpability for his involvement in the rape of Tysha. However, I wouldn't judge Tysha at all if she refused to reconcile with Tyrion. Some events are just too traumatic to get over.

[Dany Girl]

see, if that is all there is to it, I will find it quite disappointing. The end message of the series is that all characters are responsible for everything their families ever did? Serious bummer.

I would rather think that Martin, as an anti-Vietnam activist and all, has more of a peace agenda hidden in all the gore.

And the best way of confronting war and the scenarios that lead to it is to find ways to bury historic distrust between GROUPS and to judge INDIVIDUALS.

Now there's the thing, I am judging the individual. I am judging Tyrion for his voluntarily choice to marry Sansa. He had choices, he made a bad one. More importantly, he knows it's a bad one.

[Jory Cassel]

Tyrion would have been a monster if he had doomed his younger nephew and his niece to be killed. He sent Myrcella away in time.

And the best way to avoid the victims of war in KL would have been never to attack the city. Tyrion defended the city. What would a sack by Stannis' men have meant to the people of KL, guess!

Apart from that - what influence exactly does this consideration have on a possible reconciliation of Tyrion and Sansa? It is quite irrelevant what you or I think of Tyrion's actions. Only what Sansa herself thinks of Tyrion will be relevant in the end. And Martin has yet to decide what he will make Sansa think.

Note how the examples I mentioned were not any of direct casualties of the war, but Joffreys general cruelty, deaths that would not have occurred had he not been king. And even though this is irrelevant; one can say many things about Stannis, but a violent sack á la Tywin would not follow a victory of his.

Besides, it would've been within Tyrion's power to save Tommen and Myrcella or at least attempt to do so, revealing their parentage endangers them, but need not mean certain death.

You're right, this matter has not bearing on Sansa's view of him as she does not know he is certain that the children are Jaime's and thus cannot expect him to reveal said truth, but it was you who contested that doing so would prove beneficial for Sansa and thereby started this discussion.

the marriage to Sansa was also against Tyrion's will too. It was Tywin's call

Tyrion has no choices: he's pretty much a woman with a penis in Westeros. If he doesn't have the money and support of the Lannisters, he had no chances at all to survive by himself. He might have certain freedom in order to make small decisions of his life, but the ones who matter are quite limited.

These have been repeatedly adressed before, repeating them like religious mantras does not make these claims any less false. The marriage was not against Tyrion's will, and refusing would not put Tyrion in an economically precarious situation.

[Queen Sansa Stark]

Tyrion has no choices: he's pretty much a woman with a penis in Westeros

I vehemently disagree with this. Yes Tyrion is being oppressed by the society because of ableism, but as he is a man he has the privilege to be taken seriously by his father unlike Cersei. Women in Westeros have an unique kind of oppression and to compare those two type of oppressions to each other is disrespectful.

[JonCon's Red Beard]

These have been repeatedly adressed before, repeating them like religious mantras does not make these claims any less false. The marriage was not against Tyrion's will, and refusing would not put Tyrion in an economically precarious situation.

I didn't mean Tyrion's marriage, I mean Tyrion in general. He doesn't have the same choices than many other male characters for obvious reasons.

[Dany Girl]

I didn't mean Tyrion's marriage, I mean Tyrion in general. He doesn't have the same choices than many other male characters for obvious reasons.

Of course he doesn't, no one says he does. Tyrion is definitely a victim of this world, of his father, of his sister. He does not have the options that most second sons of high lords have. He doesn't have the option to be a knight.

But, because he's a victim in some situations, that does not mean it's ok to victimize others for personal gain.

He's definitely not equal to a woman in this world, that is just crazy talk. The thing holding Tyrion back is Tywin, not society. Sure, a dwarf will never get the respect of most men, but they get a hell of a lot more respect than 99% of women.

[The Ned's Little Girl]

I agree actually, and have said in several posts, that Sansa has many reasons to hate Lannisters. My point all along is that she would have to forgive him for being a Lannister. However I have disputed emphatically that he has personally done her harm.

Certainly she was young to marry even by Westeros standards, but I was not talking about Westerosi norms in my post, I was talking about Sansa's specific situation. She would, plain and simple, have been married off by Tywin to someone at thirteen and all players in the game were trying to make sure it was to someone in their family. She was a rich prize for them with no protection. There is absolutely no question that no matter what she would still have been married.

I find many things on this thread very very disturbing, so I will not be coming back to it. Instead I will start a new thread very soon on the issue of male victims. The lack of empathy for what Tyrion, as a character has been through in his life and how it shaped his actions is being glossed over. I see many people seeming to say that Sansa is a victim and it is ok if she is traumatized, we should not expect her to act heroically etc. and yet these same people seem to be claiming that Tyrion is unworthy of compassion and respect as a character because he did not go FAR outside of the norms of Westerosi society to heroically defend her against abuse by his family - the same family who had been abusing HIM for his entire life. It is disturbing.

Furthermore, it sends a bad message to women and men alike. To girls it sends the message that they are expected to be weak and to be victims, and to boys it sends the message that if they suffer from abuse they should be expected to suck it up, recover from attempted murder in a matter of weeks, take any shit that is handed to them, and heroically sacrifice themselves for the sake of some girl, just because she is a girl. Disturbing shit.

Sorry, but you are way off base with this. Yes, he absolutely was abused by his family and had a horrible upbringing. But he is a grown man now; it's his responsibility to not be a victim of their abuse any more.

At some point for everybody, they have to decide how they are going to live their own lives for themselves, whether according to their family's dictates or ideas of their own. This is true even of people who have had a model upbringing. Tyrion's treatment at the hands of the people who should have most loved and protected him is abysmal. But that is the way it is, it can't be changed now unless Tyrion himself rejects it and forges a new life for himself. He has to accept that what he was given was wrong and horrible, but it is now his responsibility to change it in himself. That's what becoming a mature adult means.

If he continues to define himself by his family's view of him, that is not their fault any more. It's his.

Furthermore, there is no lack of empathy for Tyrion. It's terrible what happened to him, but he is now the one perpetuating it. That is the core of his tragedy.

As far as the "message" that you seem to think is being sent, that's just flat-out nonsense.

[Jory Cassel]

the wrong thing by what standards? How are you judging this?

Not marrying Sansa would not have saved her from being married at thirteen. She would still have been forced to marry.

Not marrying Sansa would not have advanced his family's interests.

It is only by using the standard that says that what is good for Sansa Stark is good but what is good for Tyrion Lannister is bad that you can come to this conclusion. I call that an unreasonable scale of judgement and an expectation of a higher standard of behaviour from him than from her.

easy, let's ask a numer of characters, say; Ned, Catelyn, Brienne, Davos, Robb, Jon, Sansa etc what they think of forcibly marrying a hostage. None would do so just to expand their familiy's power.

I didn't mean Tyrion's marriage, I mean Tyrion in general. He doesn't have the same choices than many other male characters for obvious reasons.

In that case you obviously shouldn't have written that in response to a post dealing with the marriage.

[WeddinGuest]

I didn't mean Tyrion's marriage, I mean Tyrion in general. He doesn't have the same choices than many other male characters for obvious reasons.

We're not talking about Tyrion in general, though. We're talking about the relationship and marriage between Sansa and Tyrion. I'm not going to engage in Oppression Olympics in this topic in terms of comparing the oppression of women in general to the oppression of the disabled/handicapped/physically challenged in general. We're talking about Sansa and Tyrion, and who was the oppressor in the relationship here. You seem to think it was Sansa! I say it was Tyrion, hands down. I agree with those who have concluded that where this marriage was concerned, Tyrion aligned himself with the rest of his family to victimize Sansa. Sansa wasn't just oppressed because of being a woman, she was an actual HOSTAGE of the Lannisters who was forced into the marriage with Tyrion at swordpoint; the reveal that she'd be married was suddenly sprung on her with no time to even think of any way to escape that fate.

Also, while many Tyrion fans find it heroic that he didn't actually rape Sansa, note that she fully expects this to happen until the very last moment, and she still suffers the trauma of almost-rape. I don't think I'd be able to think of a man as "kind", as Sansa does if he forced me to undress, see his naked body, and grabbed my breast before finally deciding at the very last minute not to actually penetrate me. (And in most modern jurisdictions, I'd be totally justified in bringing charges against him for sexual assault.) For those who say "but it wasn't illegal for Tyrion to do those things", well it wouldn't have been illegal for him to actually rape her, either. I think Sansa has already "forgiven" Tyrion much more than most women would have.

[Hippocras]

Neither was the opressor. I don't see why we have to take sides. This is not a thread about which character is the better person.

Tywin was Tyrion's oppressor. Westeros is a society where one's obligations are to one's family, and for a dwarf, his social status was absolutely chained to his family. Yet his family was the source of his abuse.

Tywin, Cersei and LF are Sansa's oppressors.

Tyrion did what he could to help Sansa within the limited confines of his status as a dwarf and a Lannister. Certainly if he were Jamie he could have cut down her enemies with his sword and openly defied his father and abuser without consequence, but he was not Jamie.

He was not Sansa's oppressor and nor was she his.

[jet199]

Neither was the opressor. I don't see why we have to take sides. This is not a thread about which character is the better person.

Tywin was Tyrion's oppressor. Westeros is a society where one's obligations are to one's family, and for a dwarf, his social status was absolutely chained to his family. Yet his family was the source of his abuse.

Tywin, Cersei and LF are Sansa's oppressors.

Tyrion did what he could to help Sansa within the limited confines of his status as a dwarf and a Lannister. Certainly if he were Jamie he could have cut down her enemies with his sword and openly defied his father and abuser without consequence, but he was not Jamie.

He was not Sansa's oppressor and nor was she his.

Yes, i don't know why people think one will have to forgive the other. Neither seems to hate, or be particularly concerned about, the other in their POVs.

I think it is more a case of whether the relationship could work, rather than a case of like or dislike, and as they are at the moment (or how they were in KL) I don't think it could. Things could change though.

[Hippocras]

Yes, i don't know why people think one will have to forgive the other. Neither seems to hate, or be particularly concerned about, the other in their POVs.

I think it is more a case of whether the relationship could work, rather than a case of like or dislike, and as they are at the moment (or how they were in KL) I don't think it could. Things could change though.

oh no, they do both have things to forgive. A lot of it is because they don't actually know to what extent the other was complicit in things that did them harm.

Sansa would have to forgive Tyrion for being a Lannister and for being an ugly dwarf. Tyrion would have to forgive Sansa for publicly humiliating him (intentionally or not) and for, as far as he knows, being involved with framing him for regicide.

There is lots to forgive on both sides.

But all of those things are not a question of intentional personal abuse or harm on the part of either.