The only proof she's not mad

[Dany Girl]

One reason why is that the Targaryens had been living just offshore of Westeros for a century, had adopted the faith of the seven, given up slavery, &c. Their ways were more similar to those of the rest of Westeros by the time Aegon launched his invasion, I suspect, than they were to the customs of Valyria that had been left behind a century before.

the Valarians had little to no interaction with Westeros from what I remember. Even if they had, not all of Westeros followed the 7, so they pushed that religion on everybody. Also, Dany isn't trying to change anyone's religion. She doesn't follow any religion in reality. A bit of 7, a bit of the Dothraki gods, but not really. She's like Stannis in that way. She's just trying to end slavery, the rest of their customs she allows and embraces, including wearing their traditional garb even though she hates it and eventually allowing the fighting pits to reopen against her better judgement, and look how well that turned out! Conquering is conquering, no matter how pretty the package is. Aegon made a lot of changes to Westeros and Dany is making arguably fewer changes.

[Samwell Gamgi]

I think her paradox is that she wants to be good and kind; but her ambitions will require the deaths of thousands, in order to be fulfilled.

I think that by the end of ADWD, she's become reconciled to that fact.

That quote about she and Daario both being monsters was fairly early on in ADWD. So I think deep down she's known she's not capable of being a hero and only a violent conqueror for a long while. She's not smart enough to build, only destroy.

[JeepCSC]

I'm sorry, we see no difference in seating a king on top of the 7k and Dany's Mereen misadventure? The ones most affected by Aegon's conquest was perhaps a dozen or so families, those that knelt, those that died out, those that were raised up. The Greyjoys, the Starks, the Tullys, the Hoares, the Tyrells, etc. For 99% of everyone else, nothing changed. They were already kneelers, and the Targaryens simply replaced whoever was their previous king.

In Mereen, Dany decided to end the engine that ran the economy. She didn't simply place herself at the top of the heap, she decided to suddenly and forcefully end how society ran. Her reasons can not be questioned much, but her ability, and what drove her to even contemplate pulling it off must be questioned. Again, imagine Aegon invading Westeros, replacing their leaders, AND ending feudalism. That is what Dany did. And it is perhaps the most deluded thing attempted in a series that has Cersei Lannister in it.

[Lord of Beyond the Wall]

This BS if often spread by the fan of the usurpers but there isn't any proof that she is mad, Heh, GRRM hasn't show us the least minuscule proof that Aerys was anything other than an eccentric ruler. If having visions is a proof of madness then Bran, Jon, Jaime, Rickon, Arya, etc, are all mad.

[The Great Walrus]

This BS if often spread by the fan of the usurpers but there isn't any proof that she is mad, Heh, GRRM hasn't show us the least minuscule proof that Aerys was anything other than an eccentric ruler. If having visions is a proof of madness then Bran, Jon, Jaime, Rickon, Arya, etc, are all mad.

Are you serious? Aerys burned men alive for the hell of it, he was even aroused by it. Are you honestly telling me that being an extremely sadisitic pyromaniac only makes you an "eccentric ruler"? Aerys wasn't called the Mad King because he was an "eccentric ruler"...

[Dany Girl]

Ya, because the kings Aegon sat himself down upon were just so ok with it? No, they fought, waged wars against them. They did not want to give up their ways at all. The North did not want to give up their Stark kings and old gods but were forced to submit under brute force. And Dorne fought even harder to not give up their leaders which is why they still have princes/princesses in Dorne. Since we don't have a POV account of how the conquest went you cannot say it was different since we know wars were fought to stop it. And replacing 7 different feudal systems with 1 united feudal system would be an equally large task as abolishing slavery. Conquest is conquest no matter how you slice it. It doesn't happen in a week with unicorns and butterflies. It's bloody, drawn out, and messy. So I do not see a difference in Aegon's "righy" to conquer Westeros and change many many things about their lives and Dany's "right" to take Slaver's Bay with brute force and change 1 thing. Yes, she went about it the wrong way, but as she has no experience with this sort of thing mistakes can be expected. She's trying to bring peace now, activity trying. That's why she allows the fighting pits to reopen, to show the people that she's not trying to take their entire way of life, that she respects their society, she just doesn't approve of slavery. So yes, they'll need a new way to build their economy but are you actually faulting her for ending slavery? Cuz I cannot find fault in that. She's not flawless and made mistakes but she's been trying to fix it.

[Lord of Beyond the Wall]

I'm sorry, we see no difference in seating a king on top of the 7k and Dany's Mereen misadventure? The ones most affected by Aegon's conquest was perhaps a dozen or so families, those that knelt, those that died out, those that were raised up. The Greyjoys, the Starks, the Tullys, the Hoares, the Tyrells, etc. For 99% of everyone else, nothing changed. They were already kneelers, and the Targaryens simply replaced whoever was their previous king.

In Mereen, Dany decided to end the engine that ran the economy. She didn't simply place herself at the top of the heap, she decided to suddenly and forcefully end how society ran. Her reasons can not be questioned much, but her ability, and what drove her to even contemplate pulling it off must be questioned. Again, imagine Aegon invading Westeros, replacing their leaders, AND ending feudalism. That is what Dany did. And it is perhaps the most deluded thing attempted in a series that has Cersei Lannister in it.

According to this line of thinking Abrahan Lincoln was a madman and let's not forget that chaos and dictatorship was what come next after the French revolution.

[JeepCSC]

Replacing 7 feudal systems with one is fairly easy. Kings become lords paramount. Everyone else stays the same. It was bloody because it was a conquest. But once the kneeling was done, that was mostly the end of change to society. The North kept the Starks and the old gods and their lands and their peasants. Their way of life stayed the exact same. That is not what happened in Mereen. The idea fighting pits would change anything was more delusion.

This Lincoln business needs to stop. He was not a conqueror of the South, he was the president. The war was not started by him to end slavery. And abolition in this country was not a spur of the moment thing sprung out of nowhere. It had 200+ years of buildup that laid a groundwork for the end of slavery. The Civil War eventually fast forwarded the process, that is all. In no way shape or form was Dany Lincolnesque.

The French Revolution is a more intriguing comparison. I'd accept that. Dany is an inchoate response to a societal ill that does too much too fast too drastically and too ineptly to survive on it's own for long and finally collapsed into itself.

[Lord of Beyond the Wall]

For the people of the south Lincoln sure looked ;ike a conqueror

[Lord of Beyond the Wall]

And we don't need to go as far as the French Revolution, just watch Iraq after the intervention and deposition of Sadam Hussein.

[caravaggio]

I was having fun earlier answering one of these online tests for personality disorders using characters. Here is the score I got for her....

Paranoid: Moderate more info | forum Schizoid: Low more info | forum Schizotypal: Low more info | forum Antisocial: Moderate more info | forum Borderline: Low more info | forum Histrionic: High more info | forum Narcissistic: High more info | forum Avoidant: Low more info | forum Dependent: Low more info | forum Obsessive-Compulsive: Low

From: http://www.4degreez.com/misc/personality_disorder_test.mv

[Parwan]

I maintain that the issue of what Dany is doing in regard to slavery has not been well defined in this thread. It is not true that she is trying to end slavery. It's not even true that she is trying to end the slave trade.

...

Daenerys goes beyond Nymeria, Robert, Viserys, and even Aegon. She is a conqueror, true as those were or wish to have been. But none of those people tried to end feudalism in Westeros....

And Dany is not trying to end slavey in Essos.

Certainly it would be good if feudalism ended, but it would be delusional to believe you could end 8000 years of society simply because it is noble and you are a Baratheon. That is exactly what Dany is doing. Worse, it isn't like she is from Slavery Bay, she is from their archenemy, old Valyria. She is naive to think she could do it, she is delusional because she thinks the fact that she is a dragon allows her the right to do it.

...

No, that is not at all what she is trying to do. If you want a better comparison, you might say she is trying to be like the Braavosi, but more so. Where she goes, she frees people. That is scarcely a perfect analogy, but it's better than saying that she is trying to "end 8000 years of society." Dany leaves the society and government of Yunkai in place, along with the infrastructure, including the port and whatever ships were in it. She frees those currently in bondage and makes the Yunkai'i compensate them for their years of servitude. There is no hint in the text that this will impoverish the freeborn citizens or that the dragon queen had any intention of doing this. She does not require any promise that the Yunkai'i end slave trading; such a promise would not be enforceable anyway. Indeed, the yellow city is right back in the slave trading business as soon as she marches north.

Unlike the Yunkai'i, the Meereenese chose not to negotiate with Dany. We can't be sure what would have happened in Meereen if the leaders had not decided to be arrogant and defiant. It is at least possible that Daenerys would have made the same demands on them that she made on their southern neighbor. Again, this would not have ended slavery or even the slave trade. At one point, Hizdahr says that Dany smashed the slave trade. Later, he claims that she disrupted it. "Smash" and "disrupt" are not synonyms. The latter verb is a better description of what the young queen did. She cannot reduce the demand for slaves or the supply of potential slaves (short of doing something evil and outlandish, something like killing everyone). She has not done anything to even reduce the power of the slave-making groups (basically Dothraki and pirates). Thus, one can scarcely say that she smashed the trade.

And even if you maintain (on some basis or other) that she tried to end the trade, that's not the same as saying she tried to end slavery. She obviously did not make any demands on slave holding cities elsewhere in Essos that they free those in bondage.

...

.... She believed that by freeing the slaves of Astapor and putting together a ruling council that they would be fine, that was naive. She soon learns how badly that went hence she stays in Meereen to make sure it doesn't happen again. This also doesn't go well, but at least it's a step in the right direction.

It does seem that Daenerys learned something from Astapor. How much? That's a good question. Marching from the city was also a strategic error, but that is a matter for discussion elsewhere.

...

I don't think that her trying to abolish slavery makes her insane. She just started doing somethiing without a plan . But to say that trying to make a change in the world is equivalent to insanity does not make sense. Think of it this way, had she planned better and actually had a strategy for saving the slaves and solved the problem, would you be saying that she was insane? No, because she succeeded. But because she is causing more issues instead of solving one, people are saying she's mad, which I don't agree with. Failure does not mean that you are insane.

She's not trying to abolish slavery. She's freeing slaves in areas that she conquers. The two things are not the same. Your phrase "make a change in the world" is a good one, better than "end slavery" or "end 8000 years of society."

I don't think what Dany is doing in Mereen is conquering per se. Not like Nymeria or Aegon or Robert ever did. Again, she is conquering AND restructuring ten thousand years of society from the bottom up...

She is definitely not restructuring from the bottom up. Her procedures are mainly top down. She leaves a good bit of Meereenese society in place. Indeed, one of her main mistakes was to brutalize the former ruling class but fail to break its power. She reduces said power, but she clearly does not break it.

the Valarians had little to no interaction with Westeros from what I remember. Even if they had, not all of Westeros followed the 7, so they pushed that religion on everybody. Also, Dany isn't trying to change anyone's religion.. She's just trying to end slavery, the rest of their customs she allows and embraces, including wearing their traditional garb even though she hates it and eventually allowing the fighting pits to reopen against her better judgement, and look how well that turned out! Conquering is conquering, no matter how pretty the package is. Aegon made a lot of changes to Westeros and Dany is making arguably fewer changes.

I'd be more specific. She ended slavery in Meereen. Other than that, you make good points. Dany is definitely not a revolutionary. She is not overthrowing thousands of years of culture, religion, and political organziation.

...

In Mereen, Dany decided to end the engine that ran the economy. She didn't simply place herself at the top of the heap, she decided to suddenly and forcefully end how society ran...

She did not end how society ran. Did she end the engine that ran the economy? That is a better claim. Here the comparison with Lincoln is apt. Destroying slavery in the south did bring the engine to a halt.

I don't think that Dany's actions impoverished Meereen. That is a complicated issue that would take too long to argue here.

[JeepCSC]

I don't think I understand your point. Is it that Dany has not conquered the entire of continent of Essos and therefore she didn't end slavery in totality? She has tried ruling completely in one place, and in that place she has done everything to end slavery. That is thousands of years of Mereen society (it was an outpost of the old Ghis empire, no?). She has little concept of how the society, economy, or really anything about the city works, but she decides she can do this because she is the blood of the dragon and she means well. It is delusional, we have a whole chapters on why it is delusional. In a society that is a one-trick pony economically, killing that pony does affect society greatly. And when you leave the infrastructure of society (ruling families, religion) in place and instead focus on broad issues (like, well, slavery), I think that is the definition of bottom up change.

[Lord of Beyond the Wall]

Curiously enough the only two people in the whole saga of ASOI&F that have to rule and govern are considered crazy: Cersei and Danaerys. While Renly was playing like a young child and Robb was doing whatever he was doing they were not acting like rulers, they were not governing anything (Robb even abandoned his people in the North). Stannis the only thing that is good at is burning trees and people and when he finally does something worthy of a King (helping the NW at The Wall) then he try to divest the NW of all of his castles and land to give it up to his liege.

In a recent interview GRRM said that he was interested in show a King/Queen rule in tough times (I'm paraphrasing). Sometimes one King/Queen do somethings good, sometimes they make mistake but that's the nature of governing.

[JeepCSC]

There has been much governing seen in the series outside those two. Perhaps not with the title of King/Queen, but in all but name.

[Lord of Beyond the Wall]

If you count Jon...and that's stretching.

[JeepCSC]

We saw, what, 3 or 4 Hands to varying degrees, and a couple Lord Commanders. And even if you disagree with him, Stannis has been ruling.

[Parwan]

I don't think I understand your point. Is it that Dany has not conquered the entire of continent of Essos and therefore she didn't end slavery in totality?

Most of my post consisted of replies to what various people have said. For example, You said,

"Daenerys goes beyond Nymeria, Robert, Viserys, and even Aegon... But none of those people tried to end feudalism in Westeros...."

I replied that Dany did not try to end slavery in Essos. Thus, I do not see that you have much basis for saying that she tries to go beyond Aegon. I also compared her to the Braavosi. Do you think that they are trying to end slavery in Essos? If some future Sealord of Braavos were to become powerful enough to conquer and rule one of the cities of Slaver's Bay, don't you think he would end slavery there?

She has tried ruling completely in one place, and in that place she has done everything to end slavery. That is thousands of years of Mereen society (it was an outpost of the old Ghis empire, no?). She has little concept of how the society, economy, or really anything about the city works, but she decides she can do this because she is the blood of the dragon and she means well.

She has only ruled one city in Slaver's Bay. However, she defeated the Yunkai'i decisively. She did not force them to end slavery or even the slave trade. Again, the idea that she is going so far beyond other conquerers and is trying to overturn society fails.

She obviously does have a pretty good idea of how the society works, and she has shown a willingness to learn more. Some of the people of Meereen are willing to work with her. She is willing to make compromises (e.g. over the fighting pits).

It is delusional, we have a whole chapters on why it is delusional. In a society that is a one-trick pony economically, killing that pony does affect society greatly. And when you leave the infrastructure of society (ruling families, religion) in place and instead focus on broad issues (like, well, slavery), I think that is the definition of bottom up change.

"Affect society" does not mean the same thing as "end 8000 years of society." It is less than certain that the economy of Meereen was a one-trick pony. The slavers would, of course, want people to believe this. That doesn't mean it's true. As I indicated earlier, this is a complicated issue. I'll point out just one fact. In the series of bogus arguments that Xaro Xhoan Daxos puts forth when he visits Meereen, he does let some interesting things slip out. For example, he says, "I would gladly take as many olives as you care to sell me. Olive oil as well." That undercuts the "one-trick pony" argument, doesn't it. The olive trees near Meereen have been burned. That is not relevant to the current argument. The fact is that there were sources of wealth available other than the slave trade. Furthermore, many of these sources are still available. For example, olives are still being grown in the hinterlands. There's lots more that could be discussed here. For the present, I'll just say that the argument that Meereen is now a poor city is bogus.

I do not agree with you on the definition of bottom up change. It is not something that a queen will do by decree. It would be done by a revolutionary, or at least a liberal. The ideas would come from the bottom. Indeed, the structure of society would be overturned (especially by revolutionaries).

[A Man Has Said]

Oh c'mon, for peetsake! She's just a young girl, and knows little of ___________.

[Queen‍‍‍‍‍‍ Alysanne‍‍™]

Oh c'mon, for peetsake! She's just a young girl, and knows little of ___________.

the ways of war?