Joffrey: Product of his enviornment or Delusional little Jerk?

[Le.Chevalier.D'Eon]

Product of his environment. If he had been fostered away from Robert, Cersei, and Jaime he could have turned out pretty decent. Fostering him with the Boltons or the Freys would have made him worse. With the Tullys, he might have made out just fine.

A good thing for Ned he wasn't fostered with the Boltons. Ned might have died slowly and painfully. Sansa's skin would have been Cersei's bed rug.

[Jon's Queen Consort]

It has been known for awhile. Robert was to say "a horny bastard" even though he's not really a bastard. ;)

He likes those ladies and wine. Robert was a frat boy.

Yes he was a man with hormones but "war hungry" and "Realm stealing"? I mean come on... :shocked:

eta: By the way I like your username :thumbsup:

[The Broke Howard Hughes]

It has been known for awhile. Robert was to say "a horny bastard" even though he's not really a bastard. ;)

He likes those ladies and wine. Robert was a frat boy.

He's not a bastard but he left a school bus full. Which ironically Joffrey had killed. Or was it Cersei? The darn show has me all confused :bawl:

[GillyTarly]

He's not a bastard but he left a school bus full. Which ironically Joffrey had killed. Or was it Cersei? The darn show has me all confused :bawl:

I say they both killed those kids. I cried when they killed Barra.

Yes he was a man with hormones but "war hungry" and "Realm stealing"? I mean come on... :shocked:

eta: By the way I like your username :thumbsup:

Thank you, dearie. :D

[Pod The Impaler]

So we've examined the Mad King, lets look at Joffrey.

Lying, cheating, Kingslaying brother and sister as parents.

A war hungry, bedhopping, Realm stealing, wine drinking, dead girlfriend obsessed, surrogate father.

A slick talking, power mad, morally bankrupt, willfully blind to twincest, grandfather

Question, was Joffrey doomed from the start? Or was he simply a product of his environment?

Yeah he comes across as a complete overindulged little asshat but put in a wardship with a responsible, caring, adult would he have turned out sane or was he meant to be a little nutjob no matter where he was?

The question I guess is, was he actually insane or was he just placed in the worst possible situation with the worst possible people who indulged his every whim and set no boundaries for him?

Are some people are just born bad / defective / psychopathic ?

The age old nature vs. nurture debate.

Joffrey was raised by a father who was an avoidant drunkard and a mother who was a depraved psychopath - and both of them together made an utterly toxic marriage / example of parenthood. The family environment he was raised in was so bad that Robert's formula of 99% absence / 1% brutality is actually the better half when compared to Cersei's over-mothering of her precious golden boy, pouring every deceitful, manipulative, callous, and sadistic thing aspect of herself into him until it set like concrete. Cersei made Joffrey hers - yes, with Jaime's seed and Robert's crown, but she minimized the influence of both of them. (Myrcella and Tommen is the least screwed up of the Lannisters precisely because they were spares not heirs, so it seems like they had less "nurturing attention" from their parents.)

It is a pretty big case for the "nurture" side of the argument.

Yet, there's a lot of evidence that Joffrey is mostly like a young male Cersei - but yes, a bit of young Jaime and young Tywin too. He is a 3rd generation psychopath, and seems to be all Lannister. That family seems messed up in some deeply hard-wired ways, or at least the line of Tywin does. Maybe it is in the blood, and despite any hypothetical "correcting" that anyone else might do, there's just something hard-wired in him that will keep him alaong some sort of a Lannister outcome.

I'm willing to take a middle route:

Maybe if Joffrey (despite his biological origins) had been raised by non-toxic people, he'd be a far better person than he is, but the blood would still win out in some ways and he'd still have some serious negative tendencies. He wouldn't be a great guy, but might be something like "tolerable". (Maybe something like Theon Greyjoy ?)

At the same time, if you took a person with different (non-toxic) biological origins and put them into that Lannister environment, they would not act like a Lannister, but would be trained to their way of doing things and perhaps be conflicted about it. (Maybe like The Hound ?)

In any case, Joffrey Baratheon Lannister Hill is both biologically and educationally screwed up. One of the few 100% detestable people in ASOIAF, with no upside.

[PatrickStormborn]

More like: "I just want to be my daddy."

Question: Was the Ros and Joffery thing in the books? I'm just wondering if Robert did that to the women he slept with.

Ros is not a character in the books, but we know from Cersei's recollection that Robert was very abusive towards her during sex.

[The Broke Howard Hughes]

Are some people are just born bad / defective / psychopathic ?

The age old nature vs. nurture debate.

Joffrey was raised by a father who was an avoidant drunkard and a mother who was a depraved psychopath - and both of them together made an utterly toxic marriage / example of parenthood. The family environment he was raised in was so bad that Robert's formula of 99% absence / 1% brutality is actually the better half when compared to Cersei's over-mothering of her precious golden boy, pouring every deceitful, manipulative, callous, and sadistic thing aspect of herself into him until it set like concrete. Cersei made Joffrey hers - yes, with Jaime's seed and Robert's crown, but she minimized the influence of both of them. (Myrcella and Tommen is the least screwed up of the Lannisters precisely because they were spares not heirs, so it seems like they had less "nurturing attention" from their parents.)

It is a pretty big case for the "nurture" side of the argument.

Yet, there's a lot of evidence that Joffrey is mostly like a young male Cersei - but yes, a bit of young Jaime and young Tywin too. He is a 3rd generation psychopath, and seems to be all Lannister. That family seems messed up in some deeply hard-wired ways, or at least the line of Tywin does. Maybe it is in the blood, and despite any hypothetical "correcting" that anyone else might do, there's just something hard-wired in him that will keep him alaong some sort of a Lannister outcome.

I'm willing to take a middle route:

Maybe if Joffrey (despite his biological origins) had been raised by non-toxic people, he'd be a far better person than he is, but the blood would still win out in some ways and he'd still have some serious negative tendencies. He wouldn't be a great guy, but might be something like "tolerable". (Maybe something like Theon Greyjoy ?)

At the same time, if you took a person with different (non-toxic) biological origins and put them into that Lannister environment, they would not act like a Lannister, but would be trained to their way of doing things and perhaps be conflicted about it. (Maybe like The Hound ?)

In any case, Joffrey Baratheon Lannister Hill is both biologically and educationally screwed up. One of the few 100% detestable people in ASOIAF, with no upside.

Well said.

[GillyTarly]

Ros is not a character in the books, but we know from Cersei's recollection that Robert was very abusive towards her during sex.

I'm surprised she didn't make "burn" remark to him about Lyanna.

[King Aerys the Just]

Are some people are just born bad / defective / psychopathic ?

The age old nature vs. nurture debate.

Joffrey was raised by a father who was an avoidant drunkard and a mother who was a depraved psychopath - and both of them together made an utterly toxic marriage / example of parenthood. The family environment he was raised in was so bad that Robert's formula of 99% absence / 1% brutality is actually the better half when compared to Cersei's over-mothering of her precious golden boy, pouring every deceitful, manipulative, callous, and sadistic thing aspect of herself into him until it set like concrete. Cersei made Joffrey hers - yes, with Jaime's seed and Robert's crown, but she minimized the influence of both of them. (Myrcella and Tommen is the least screwed up of the Lannisters precisely because they were spares not heirs, so it seems like they had less "nurturing attention" from their parents.)

It is a pretty big case for the "nurture" side of the argument.

Yet, there's a lot of evidence that Joffrey is mostly like a young male Cersei - but yes, a bit of young Jaime and young Tywin too. He is a 3rd generation psychopath, and seems to be all Lannister. That family seems messed up in some deeply hard-wired ways, or at least the line of Tywin does. Maybe it is in the blood, and despite any hypothetical "correcting" that anyone else might do, there's just something hard-wired in him that will keep him alaong some sort of a Lannister outcome.

I'm willing to take a middle route:

Maybe if Joffrey (despite his biological origins) had been raised by non-toxic people, he'd be a far better person than he is, but the blood would still win out in some ways and he'd still have some serious negative tendencies. He wouldn't be a great guy, but might be something like "tolerable". (Maybe something like Theon Greyjoy ?)

At the same time, if you took a person with different (non-toxic) biological origins and put them into that Lannister environment, they would not act like a Lannister, but would be trained to their way of doing things and perhaps be conflicted about it. (Maybe like The Hound ?)

In any case, Joffrey Baratheon Lannister Hill is both biologically and educationally screwed up. One of the few 100% detestable people in ASOIAF, with no upside.

From the (admittedly limited) reading I've done on the subject regarding antisocial disorder/psychopathy/sociopathy (really just different terms for the same thing) a popular belief indeed seems to be that the condition itself is largely genetical, but that the degree of "badness" the person in question will develop is influenced by his environment. So it sounds like your middle road approach is a pretty good bet in regards to Joffrey. I don't think Theon Greyjoy is one though, he has too much of a conscience.

It's not that uncommon a condition in the real world though. Something like 1-2% of the population is estimated to have it. Certain professions or social groups can also have disproportional amounts of them, for example if I remember correctly almost the entire Nazi leadership at the Nuremberg trials were diagnosed as psychopaths by the psychiatrists evaluating them. It has also been theorized that they are overrepresented among corporate CEO's etc.

[They see me R'hollin]

I don't know who taught you biology but yes madness does run in genes and is prone to the offspring of any incestual relationship. However, Joffrey wasn't crazy, he was just a sociopath. He was murdering cats in front of Tommen as a 6/7 year old. Sadly some people are just born with antisocial personality disorder and are doomed to become psychos.

Uhm excuse me, I STUDY biology. Of course madness can run in genes in the case of incest but do you have ANY idea how many genes we have? It is EXTREMELY unlikely the circumstance would arise that Joffrey happens to be born with some mental defect because the Lannisters do not have a history of constant inbreeding. Whereas the Targaryens do. The Targaryens inbred for hundreds and hundreds of years which meant that recessive genes were just getting reused. The Lannisters did not do this (assuming Cersei and Jaime are the first example of incest in the Lannisters) therefore there is a lot of diversity in the both of them and subsequently it's very unlikely that Joffrey would be born mentally stunted like many of the Targs.

There isn't a "madness gene" carried in incest. Constant inbreeding can lead to children being born with physical problems which can degenerate later in life into "madness" which would explain why many of the Targs were sane until their later days.

[Darth Visenya]

Joffery is a Psychopath.

Nature= Psychopath

Nurture=Sociopath

Difference between the 2, not a lot.

[Sasha Steelsong]

He's not a bastard but he left a school bus full. Which ironically Joffrey had killed. Or was it Cersei? The darn show has me all confused :bawl:

In the book it was definitely Cersei, in the show I think not explicitly stated but implied it was Joffrey...which is interesting b/c it means on some level he's genuinely threatened by Robert's bastards (where as in the book I don't think he's aware of anything till Stannis' letter starts making the rounds). Can't remember exactly b/c like you I think the show and book are blending on this one.

[The Broke Howard Hughes]

In the book it was definitely Cersei, in the show I think not explicitly stated but implied it was Joffrey...which is interesting b/c it means on some level he's genuinely threatened by Robert's bastards (where as in the book I don't think he's aware of anything till Stannis' letter starts making the rounds). Can't remember exactly b/c like you I think the show and book are blending on this one.

Right, I thiought I was the only one who can hardly tell the difference anymore. I clearly need a reread. The show sort of implies that Joffrey KNOWS Ned Stark wasn't lying. In the book I don't think he does and Cersei kills the Bastards to solidify his postion. This seems like a change to humanize Cersei for TV and make her more likable. And Cersei's beauty is that she is impossible to relate to because she's batcrap crazy. It's sort of her charm.