The reasons why Tywin is far worse than Cersei and why she deserves redemption more than him.

[sifth]

Tywin is actually pretty smart, despite being one of the worst humans in the series. Cersei is a complete idiot, despite being one of the worst humans in the series.

 

[kissdbyfire]

4 minutes ago, Craving Peaches said:

Funny, because that's... exactly what we see Cersei doing.

This x 1,000. And when she’s not doing nasty things in an attempt to increase her political power, she’s doing nasty things out of spite, pettiness, ego, malice, etc. 

Also, going back to the Blue Bard, she doesn’t really feel bad about it, not in any normal human being showing compassion kind of way. It’s ALL ABOUT HER, in typical Cersei fashion. And she blames Margaery for “making her do it”, literally. 
 

AFfC, Cersei IX

“Cersei blamed Margaery Tyrell for this. If not for her, Wat might have lived a long and fruitful life, singing his little songs and bedding pig girls and crofter’s daughters. Her scheming forced this on me. She has soiled me with her treachery.”

 

[kissdbyfire]

4 minutes ago, sifth said:

Tywin is actually pretty smart, despite being one of the worst humans in the series. Cersei is a complete idiot, despite being one of the worst humans in the series.

 

Agree. You reminded me that, on top of everything else, Cersei is an idiot who thinks she’s smart - always funny! And then there’s her her internal misogyny…

[StarkTullies]

Tywin and Cersei are both diabolically evil.  There are more deaths on Tywin's hands simply because he is more competent at being evil.  There was a previous thread by the same poster saying that Tyrion is worse than Cersei, but Cersei directly killed more people than Tyrion, so that contradicts the argument that a character's evil-meter is directly proportional to the number of murders they committed.

At the end of Storm of Swords, I would say that Tywin is worse than Cersei, no contest.  Then we see Cersei's POV in A Feast for Crows and... how can anyone think that her chapters make her more sympathetic?  Every thought in her mind is vile at every level.

Cersei murdered Robert as a power move, not to protect her children.  If she wanted to protect her children, she would have taken Ned's offer.  Joffrey died because she put him on the throne, and Tommen and Myrcella will soon die too because of Cersei's actions.  Since trying to prevent Maggy's prophecy is being used as a defense for Cersei's murders, there is an obvious alternative to murdering everyone left and right.  How about instead she ensured that her children would not have gold crowns?  That should be very easy, but Cersei wanted the power.

Cersei "loving her children" is a fabrication of the show.  Her "love" for Joffrey was based in narcissism like her "love" for Jaime; she loves seeing herself in them.  Remember that Joffrey died very shortly before her POV chapters started, and I don't get the sense that she is still mourning.  She is an abusive (and terrible) mother to Tommen.  And if she cared about Myrcella's well-being in the least, it was utterly idiotic to send an assassin to murder Trystane while her "beloved" daughter was still in the hands of Trystane's family.  (I must add that Cersei had no motive to murder Trystane- a young child- except deranged vindictive spite.)

Even if I concede that Tywin is worse than Cersei, so what?  That does not make Cersei any less despicable.  She is not the most evil character in the story, but she is without a doubt the most evil main POV character.

[Craving Peaches]

6 minutes ago, StarkTullies said:

it was utterly idiotic to send an assassin to murder Trystane while her "beloved" daughter was still in the hands of Trystane's family.  (I must add that Cersei had no motive to murder Trystane- a young child- except deranged vindictive spite.)

I have to say this is perhaps the only evil thing I am not entirely convinced Cersei actually did, because she never thinks about this plot and it would be hard for her to arrange it from inside a cell.

https://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?/topic/162966-is-cersei-really-plotting-to-kill-trystane/

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

3 minutes ago, Craving Peaches said:

I have to say this is perhaps the only evil thing I am not entirely convinced Cersei actually did, because she never thinks about this plot and it would be hard for her to arrange it from inside a cell.

https://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?/topic/162966-is-cersei-really-plotting-to-kill-trystane/

She might have arranged it well before being imprisoned by the Faith, when thinking to herself during a small council session about Ser Balon Swann having another mission but that some things are better left unsaid. 

Edited September 16, 2023 by Terrorthatflapsinthenight9

[sifth]

Just now, Craving Peaches said:

I have to say this is perhaps the only evil thing I am not entirely convinced Cersei actually did, because she never thinks about this plot and it would be hard for her to arrange it from inside a cell.

https://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?/topic/162966-is-cersei-really-plotting-to-kill-trystane/

Cersei does mention in one of her AFFC chapters, that Balon Swann had "another mission" aside from delivering Gregor's skull, but it was a mission best kept secret. Balon Swann was also nervous, when Doran mentioned taking a boat to Kings Landing and not the main road and even protested against it. So if it's not to kill Trystane, what other reason could it be? Doran is sending Myrecella back to Kings Landing, so it can't be to kidnap her.

[Craving Peaches]

Just now, sifth said:

So if it's not to kill Trystane, what other reason could it be? Doran is sending Myrecella back to Kings Landing, so it can't be to kidnap her.

Does Balon know that Doran is sending her back? If not, taking Myrcella back was proposed to be the 'task best left unsaid'.

It just seems out of character for Cersei to not think about the plot at all. In fact, given the relative level of complexity, I would expect her to be gloating to herself about how clever she was, how they were all going to fall for it and blame Tyrion etc.

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

And it doesn't look too strange for someone who was capable of trying to get rid of her family-in-law even through she needs them to stay in power based on pettiness and paranoia, of re-arming the Faith, slighting the Iron Bank, and naming someone Grand Admiral because he reminds her of her youth crush to be capable of setting up such a plot to kill Trystane just to have Myrcella only for herself and in her imagination to try to foil one of Tyrion's plot to destroy her.

[sifth]

4 minutes ago, Craving Peaches said:

Does Balon know that Doran is sending her back? If not, taking Myrcella back was proposed to be the 'task best left unsaid'.

It just seems out of character for Cersei to not think about the plot at all. In fact, given the relative level of complexity, I would expect her to be gloating to herself about how clever she was, how they were all going to fall for it and blame Tyrion etc.

Myrcella's return to Kings Landing, is the very thing they're talking about, when Doran mentions going there by ship and Balon nervously protested against it.

Also don't forget Cersei is a complete idiot. This is the woman who got conned into building a pirate king his fleet, we're talking about.

Edited September 16, 2023 by sifth

[Sir Tumbleweed]

It's a lot harder to give Cersei a pass because we see her POV and watch her unravel. Even if she thinks what she's doing is necessary, it's usually needlessly cruel. What she did to the Blue Bard was pretty sick and ultimately didn't change anything. Falyse more or less got the same treatment and that was just to coverup Cersei's failed 'plot'. Her style of ruling seems alot closer to Joff than it does to Tywin in my opinon.

I have to agree that Tywin is just as morally bankrupt, but when he's excessively cruel it tends to have a long lasting payoff (Red Wedding, Reynes of Castamere, Sacking KL) and thus not seen as pointless. At least he's gaining alliances, prestige, or loyalty. When he talks to Tyrion at the Green Fork and says how every toolbox needs a hammer it reminds me of Roose coaching Ramsey about discretion.

 

[Alester Florent]

I do love the way the OP accuses the readership of applying a double standard to Cersei vs Tywin because she's female, claims that Cersei has a "deeply tragic backstory", which on closer examination turns out to amount to "she is a woman", and argues that that tragic backstory mitigates her crimes, thereby, er, applying the same double standard in reverse.

The reason (some) people accord Tywin a measure of respect that they don't Cersei has nothing to do with sex. It's because Tywin, when he's not committing atrocities, and sometimes when he is, is a competent administrator and ruler. The ends do not justify the means, but at least in Tywin's case that's a conversation it's possible to have. In Cersei's case, not only do the ends not justify the means, but the means don't even accomplish the ends she wants, and the ends she's trying to accomplish aren't worth accomplishing even on their own terms. 

If anything, these threads have made me like Cersei less than I did already, because they've really brought into sharp focus how utterly inexcusable she is as a person.

And what's with the thread title, anyway? Tywin isn't going to be redeemed. Nobody is arguing that Tywin should be or will be redeemed. He died unredeemed. But in any event, redemption requires acknowledging that at some point you have done something wrong, and taking steps to correct or make up for it. Neither Tywin when he was alive, nor Cersei in any of her appearances (POV or otherwise) has shown the slightest inclination of either that recognition or intention. 

Lancel is trying to redeem himself. We might question the way he's going about it but the recognition and intention are there. Same goes for Jaime, on some level. Tywin never did, because he never thought he needed to. Nor, on any of the current evidence, will Cersei. 

Edited September 17, 2023 by Alester Florent

[Craving Peaches]

10 hours ago, sifth said:

Also don't forget Cersei is a complete idiot.

That's what I'm saying though, the plan is too clever for her when you compare it to her other plots...

[kissdbyfire]

7 hours ago, Alester Florent said:

f anything, these threads have made me like Cersei less than I did already

Hear, hear! 
 

dumb autocorrect 

Edited September 17, 2023 by kissdbyfire

[SeanF]

12 minutes ago, kissdbyfire said:

Here, hear! 

There are moments I feel some sympathy for Cersei, in her POV chapters, such as recalling her love for Rhaegar - but she usually goes and spoils it by doing something vile.

Her chapters can be blackly funny, like praying to the Mother to spare her nightmares of the people she's had tortured, or her habit of attributing to others faults that she possesses in full measure - but the most sympathy I can muster for her is to say that she suffers from some form of personality disorder.

[SeanF]

I would agree with the O/P that Tywin was a worse person than Cersei, because he felt no remorse at all over his actions, but it's like saying that an unrepentant Nazi was worse than a Nazi who had some qualms about shooting women and children, but still shot them anyway.  True, but it does not exonerate the latter.

Edited September 17, 2023 by SeanF

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

1 hour ago, Craving Peaches said:

That's what I'm saying though, the plan is too clever for her when you compare it to her other plots...

A plot to murder a prince of Dorne just to get Myrcella for herself, and putting the blame on Tyrion, who is very unlikely to have the ressources or motives to do so is very hardly a clever plan. 

[Craving Peaches]

3 minutes ago, Terrorthatflapsinthenight9 said:

A plot to murder a prince of Dorne just to get Myrcella for herself, and putting the blame on Tyrion, who is very unlikely to have the ressources or motives to do so is very hardly a clever plan. 

The execution of the plot is too clever for Cersei though in my opinion.

[sifth]

2 hours ago, Craving Peaches said:

That's what I'm saying though, the plan is too clever for her when you compare it to her other plots...

I don't know, it seems pretty stupid to me. Dorne is currently a powder cage, ready to go off and one more dead member of the royal family, who is killed under Lannister protection would probably do it. Cersei has nearly destroyed her alliance with the Tyrell's, so it's only natural for her to destroy her alliance with Dorne as well.

Edited September 17, 2023 by sifth

[Terrorthatflapsinthenight9]

1 hour ago, Craving Peaches said:

The execution of the plot is too clever for Cersei though in my opinion.

A plan to eliminate a dornish prince, involving a Kingsguard and using Tyrion, who hasn't been seen in Westeros for a long time and surely hasn't the means to organise something like this, and with men that can surely be traced faster to Cersei and the Iron Throne than to Tyrion. 

Even with the "Halfman" cry most people with enough logic and deduction skills will be able of smelling a rat.