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Honestly with how much they screwed over Edelgard by trying to turn her into a wifu, it makes me like Lucina a lot more than I did. Sure there were parts that were definitely there for fan service but when the chips are down Lucina is willing to complete her mission and fully prepared to kill the MU, even if they are her mother or lover

Agreed.

I mean I never disliked Lucina although I did think she often got more of the spotlight than Chrom despite me liking Chrom more, but I always felt like Lucina's fanservicey moments just for better with her character.

Like Lucina for lack of a better word was "quirky" so that allowed a lot of otherwise not very compatible character traits to all come together in one character and make a bit more sense but as you said at least when push came to shove Lucina was not about to put any familial or romantic love above her mission (now I admit when the Avatar is her mother that scene does actually kinda annoy me but that's more because I feel like they should have rewritten the scene a little more but I understand why they didn't, too much work for something a lot of players won't see).

Lucina, similar to Edelgard, is a character who is strongly masculine in the sense she is introduced while masquerading as a man, and Lucina is arguably even less "fanservicey" in design than Edelgard with her completely flat chest and an outfit that covers her from head to toe (Edelgard dress not only emphasises her breasts but the skirt gives the impression of shapely hips as well. Lucina by comparison... Is literally a plank of wood 🤷🏻‍♀️). But when Lucina has her gap moe moments they feel less forced because 1. They aren't all involving the self insert main character, like Lucina being scared of the bug in her sibling supports have absolutely nothing to do with her relationship with Robin, it's there to be cute and funny and to give her and her sibling something to bond over. It's a dumb slice of life joke but it doesn't completely go against her as a character.

Edelgard on the other hand only ever shows her "vulnerability" to Byleth. Her cute gap moe moments all involve Player-sensei which makes them just feel more artificial. I don't care how "guarded" someone is, she'd slip up around someone else at least once. Even Marx from Fates showed his more vulnerable side around more than just Corn and while he wasn't experimented on he was hardly the poster child for a healthy childhood upbringing.

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I've gotten into an argument about how Ingrids racism isn't properly address and yet Hildas is and i disagreed with them. What is your take?

First you have to define what “properly addressed” means, because that’s a subjective interpretation. 

I’d be more inclined to say the opposite, because there’s never a point where House Goneril keeping Almyran children is addressed in any more than an offhand manner whereas Ingrid at least has one support where she talks through her prejudices against Duscur. Her Dedue support line may not be perfect - especially not when viewed through the contemporary progressive lens it’s always scrutinized under - but Ingrid does demonstrate genuine growth over the course of the supports whereas the most you could ever say about Hilda is that she can eventually marry either Cyril or Claude (although notably she doesn’t find out that Claude is half-Almyran onscreen). It doesn’t help either that tensions between Almyra and Fòdlan/the Alliance are established as longstanding and systemic whereas little is known of Faerghus’s relations with Duscur before the Tragedy and hostility toward the Duscur people is always framed in the immediate context of the loss of loved ones in the Tragedy and the political destabilization of the Kingdom that resulted from Lambert’s assassination.

I think this has more to do with fandom reaction than anything in canon, though. Ingrid got labeled a racist and lambasted from multiple sides for her behavior almost from the beginning (not helped by the unrelated fact that she’s straight and rejects Dorothea’s advances, which to the performative progressive side of the fandom is also terrible), whereas Hilda’s casual prejudice toward Almyrans was never made into a major part of her character in the same way.

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Honestly, my biggest issue with Edelgard is that nobody really challenges her. Claude? Hilda is the least yes-man-y of the retainers, and Lorenz's criticisms are treated as being valid. Dimitri? Felix chews him out multiple times (with the game showing that Felix is right). Edelgard? Hubert is Hubert, and CF!Ferdinand seems more interested on hopping on Hubert's dick. It's kinda sad that AM!Ferdinand (after Deirdru) is the one who gets to do his actual job.

Ok firstly I still can't stand Ferdinand/Hubert and I never will. It completely goes against Ferdinand as a character. I just had to get that out of the way, like I respect people who like it but I just can't stand it, especially when it's portrayee outside of Crimson Flower, like I've accepted The Black Eagles are all out of character in Crimson Flower but AUs that make Ferdinand/Hubert a thing in line Azure Moon baffle me when their only interaction post Timeskip in Moon is Ferdinand trying to somehow save.... Edelgard's life and they talk about Edelgard and not each other.... Like yep super romantic 🤦🏻‍♀️

But yes, ignoring that tangent, all the other Lords are challenged in some way. Claude is basically having to do a lot of his shit by himself because as you said Hilda doesn't just follow blindly (Hilda is the only retainer who can actually leave her Lord and join another, she's also the only one who isn't an official retainer the way Dedue and Hubert are, Hilda's just a good friend) and Lorenz spends most of the game calling Claude on his super vague explanations. Even the likes of Cyril calls Claude on his bullshit at multiple times.

Dimitri is literally a walking disaster for like a good 8 chapters and Felix makes sure we know about it. Hell Byleth even gets to momentarily be a character and sometimes call Dimitri on his bullshit. Not to mention I believe Seteth gets in a few passive aggressive comments about Dimitri's state.

Edelgard.... Gets worshipped by Hubert, Dorothea wants to write a glowing Opera about how amazing she is, Ferdinand loses all self confidence and suddenly believes she's perfect and he'll never match her, Petra goes full Stockholm Syndrome for her. It's super gross not gonna lie like the one Lord who needs called out the most... Doesn't get called out at all?!

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There were also a lot more logistical differences as well. Rhea didn't work with Albino Fantasy Nazi's, who infiltrate and weaken other nations to ensure Els conquest could be easy, the enemy had numerous Heroes Relics including unaccounted ones and Crest Stones, and potentially hundreds of Crest Bearer enemies depending on how big the clans were back in those days. So ang

Rhea is indeed better. Incidentally, I recently found a meme image of Rhea punching Edelgard in the face.

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If I may, they compare them because both started a war, and a common argument used against Edel is how she started a conflict that lasted at least 5 years. Rhea's war spanned over 60 years. But that's also missing the point like, Rhea's war was motivated by vengeance against Nemesis and his Elites, she didn't want to unify nor to rule over the continent. While Edel attacks sovereign states, Rhea targeted 12 guys. It's kind of different.

I honestly feel like Rhea and Edelgard are compared or equated too much, yes. There’s not a ton that links them aside from being bisexual women who have done things that are morally questionable.

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Good point that Rhea has lived much longer and had more opportunities to reflect and regret her actions. I do wish there had been an additional route to see a different side of Edelgard.  To be clear, I don’t think such a route needs to be - or should be - a perfectly happy route where everything ends up better than the others, but I think Edelgard’s lack of a real arc is one of the problems with how she is written.

I see people saying that Rhea is either as bad as Edelgard or even worse… seriously? Rhea actually apologizes and acknowledges she has done wrong things. Ultimately she takes less lives than Edelgard and yet Rhea is the one to apologize and Edelgard not. Rhea immediately steps down as Archbishop in non-CF endings. Edelgard on the other hand steps down when she’s an old lady years after CF ends. Edelgard thinks she was right. Rhea thinks she was wrong. There is a big difference between them.

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It’s not that I deny that Fates has weird shit that I don’t like. I don’t care for marrying the siblings, I think the armor choices for some classes are tasteless, the story reason for the child mechanic is fucking stupid, etc.

It’s just that it’s not the only game to be weird like that, Pegasus Knights have been infamous for not wearing proper pants, there’s an entire archetype of female characters who love their brother more than any other man, there are inappropriate relationships, underage romances, problematic shit for years before Fates.

It’s not a modern Fire Emblem issue, and I roll my eyes when people think it is. Especially since it’s not real and doesn’t matter.

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I don’t know why people want video games to tell them what is right or wrong. If you are looking for moral guidance, video games aren’t the first place to turn to.

And to be honest, as far as video games discussing morality at all, I think it’s more beneficial for video games to explore nuance so you can make your own decision, rather than preaching to you what is good or bad.

Fire Emblem games have always been incesty and weird, I don’t get why people think it’s only Fates. Like after I did a blind play through of FE4, it turns out I married cousins with cousins several times because everyone seems to be related in that game. 🤢 Not to mention incest being one of the main plot points of FE4... I guess it’s because the newer games have been more mainstream but people shouldn’t call out one single game for it when most games in the series have that problem.

Geneaolgy’s family tree looks like a spider web.

People say Fates is the main offender because it “normalizes” incest because it doesn’t say anything negative about it happening, whereas Genealogy does rightfully makes it seem awful by having the main incest pairing result in Dragon Satan coming back.

...But as you said, there are many other incestuous pairings you can do in that game with no such negative connotations, so the point is kind of moot.

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I see the value in staying out of the “main tags” or using a special tag for discourse. Some people just want to look at posts about their favorite character or whatever, without seeing discourse. I definitely respect that, especially since there can be bad takes in certain tags. That said, that doesn’t really excuse harassing people with asks because you don’t like their takes on the main tags. That’s much worse.

Why are people so feral over a post they see on a tag. It’s a post not a gun to your head, you won’t die lol. Anyway, I enjoy your blog posts! Post and tag whatever you want. They’re just mad they aren’t as insightful as you are.

I will say that a lot of other people do have specific tags for discourse and whatnot, so I should really try to do so as well, but it’s really not even a discourse thing, it’s just an obnoxious stigma that’s been present for nearly 5 years.

Thanks for the compliments! I wouldn’t say I’m insightful so much as I just find the attitude of “This franchise was so much better when it wasn’t horny garbage” to be annoying, and I like poking fun at it.

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When you put into consideration that for every possible relationship in Three Houses, there’s probably someone who thinks it’s immoral to even be possible in the game, I can’t take certain criticisms seriously. One of the latest and most ridiculous criticisms floated around is that every interracial relationship in Fire Emblem is racist and problematic.

Even aside from the relationship aspect, there’s a lot of other things in the Fire Emblem series that would be questionable IRL at best - like the usage of soldiers under the age of 18.

In Three Houses itself, you have the option to support a colonizing dictatorship that holds prejudicial views towards people of a certain religion and people of a certain race, assassinates political rivals, and that hides and enables war crimes. And of course, starting a war that kills scores of people.

But it’s things like Annette dating Mercedes - both adults when the game is over mind you - that get people crying out that the developers are bad people.

To be clear, I don’t think the developers should be criticized as immoral for the war mechanics/story either, but a lot of the people who do criticize the developers as problematic have their priorities backwards when they focus on the relationships.

It’s not that I deny that Fates has weird shit that I don’t like. I don’t care for marrying the siblings, I think the armor choices for some classes are tasteless, the story reason for the child mechanic is fucking stupid, etc.

It’s just that it’s not the only game to be weird like that, Pegasus Knights have been infamous for not wearing proper pants, there’s an entire archetype of female characters who love their brother more than any other man, there are inappropriate relationships, underage romances, problematic shit for years before Fates.

It’s not a modern Fire Emblem issue, and I roll my eyes when people think it is. Especially since it’s not real and doesn’t matter.

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Oh I definitely think they were cribbing from Judeo-Christian in that regards, but with only AM having Edelgard fully descend into the Devil and becoming as monstrous on the outside as the darkness she chooses to embrace within. It's why people have reference Persona/SMT in regards to the game and route. El's taking pretty well from Chaos.

TBH I kinda think AM suffers the least from the weird Byleth-Edelgard two-step of “equals” and it’s yet another reason why AM gennnnerally is the best route in terms of quality character work.

Dimitri and Edelgard are foils to one another as well, and thanks to both of them being actual characters and not just blank self-inserts, it works way better if not in some kinda OTT pseudo-divinity way.  Dimitri and Edelgard were both driven to believe their “mission” needed to come before anything and anyone else, and violence was the only method, but Dimitri thanks to Character Growth was able to turn from that path whereas Edelgard follows it to its conclusion where she becomes a literal monster.  But the devil imagery doesn’t work quite as well because Byleth isn’t the corresponding deity in the final battle.  I kinda chalk that up to the need to give each route a different  Final Boss, because Rhea makes zero thematic sense in SS and Nemesis is an ass-pull if there ever was one in VW.

The thing that stops me from believing Edelgard’s route is a Chaos One is, quite simply, that it’s an entirely authoritarian ordered one.  She ascends to become the singular, all-encompassing Law.  

Which isn’t a good thing, mind.  The twist of OG Star Wars is that the Empire is the ultimate body of Order, and that Order is “obey or die.”

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A mutual shared this essay with me yesterday and I’ve only now had the opportunity to read through the whole thing.

I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to read an entertainingly terrible amount of pearl-clutching over all the horrible incest and pedophilia and grooming in FE, particularly in Three Houses (but still missing the magical quintuple incest, somehow), and how IS and the fandom are horrible for not caring about this. I was almost tempted to do an old-fashioned sporking instead of just linking it, but as long as this post is I don’t think I could summon the effort.

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Silly, Claude's PoC status overrides the fact he's biracial.

No, the added irony is that Claude only exists because of an interracial relationship, even as he’s the fave of someone vocally opposed to such relationships. Tiana oppressed the king of Almyra with her evil fetishization! 

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It’s funny that one post had warned Edelbert shippers not to interact. I have a feeling it ties into some Edelgard fans wanting to completely avoid any semblance of evidence that Edelgard is bisexual instead of a lesbian or that she is desired by men.

Meanwhile, no Rhea fans seem to be bothered by the idea of admitting that Rhea is bisexual.

LMAO did you see the post by the same person that claims "Hubert is the way he is because he has anxiety"

About that post celebrating Edelgard's and Hubert's "friendship," their reaction to your post was essentially adding an image saying "I ignore their A Support" i.e. cannon content lol. I have no problems with liking Edelgard, but it's fascinating how little CF/Edelgard fans critique the storyline and go as far as treating headcannon as cannon and now ignoring actual content to fit their narrative.

Combining these two related anons.

I didn’t see these at first, but I took a look out of curiosity. I’ve always had trouble understanding these people who claim to like Hubert but contort themselves into logical knots to say things like he isn’t really an evil murderer and war criminal and that he’s motivated to do everything he does (which still includes murder and war crimes, among other things) because he just cares and worries so much about Edelgard in a totally platonic way. It’s so...banal compared to the full picture of their relationship, which incidentally requires you to ignore a lot more than just their A support in order to arrive at a much weaker conclusion: the other supports where Hubert admits to his attraction to Edelgard (Dorothea and Petra come to mind), the Ferdibert paired ending with Edelgard’s jealousy, Hubert being possessive before the ball, the jealousy and repeated death threats directed at Byleth, Edelgard’s constant framing of her path as a solitary one.

When the text gives you all that to work with, and these are villains doing extremely villainous things to boot, what’s the appeal in turning them into fluffy BFFs instead? It’s such fascinating stuff even with Byleth (and how often do I give their presence credit for anything?), but there are people who want to disregard it entirely. I’m sure they’re equally annoyed by Hubert/Ferdibert fans like me who pull no punches with how terrible the man is, but it reminds me so much of those dismal forecasts of a fandom controlled by purity shippers where it’s all G-rated coffee shop AUs as far as the eye can see.

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I hope the kind of people who think the same as this essay leave the fandom.

A mutual shared this essay with me yesterday and I’ve only now had the opportunity to read through the whole thing.

I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to read an entertainingly terrible amount of pearl-clutching over all the horrible incest and pedophilia and grooming in FE, particularly in Three Houses (but still missing the magical quintuple incest, somehow), and how IS and the fandom are horrible for not caring about this. I was almost tempted to do an old-fashioned sporking instead of just linking it, but as long as this post is I don’t think I could summon the effort.

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LGB content that isn’t “accidental” is most likely made for the other gender instead, too. Women are the primary consumers for popular gay male content in Japanese works, for instance. There’s also the element of men who like lesbian content.

I have to admit, I find this fetishization annoying, but it’s the reality when LGB consumers are outnumbered and actually being LGB IRL isn’t totally accepted.

I highly agree with your assessment on Edelgard - it reminds me of Tharja/Rhajat thing actually.

What do u mean, far removed?

What I mean is that the primary demographic for FE has always been straight Japanese men, which is reflected in the marketing and in the fanservice prioritization. The particular appeal the series may have for other demographics seems to be mostly accidental, and this is true of its queer content as much as its “problematic” aspects that nevertheless provide someone somewhere with wank material (as I brought up a bit earlier re: jailbait dragons). 

Edelgard is a useful example of this, as in the West she has quite the fanbase of queer women even though it’s fairly obvious from the way that Edeleth and everything surrounding it is written that the developers had male players in mind with regard to that self-insert fantasy. She just happened to end up bi-for-Byleth because the romance became so central to her character that it would have been harder to make it platonic for f!Byleth.