#and gaslight myself into believing that the clones have rights so I can keep supporting the jedi :)

[weregonnabecoolbeans]

I've been thinkin' too many thoughts about the clones recently...anyways...

If it had never been acknowledged in universe…I think I might’ve been able to ignore how unbelievably fucked up the whole clone army concept is

I might’ve been able to accept it as just a convenient plot point for the republic to have an army to use

That’s what most stories do…they use a faceless army of “disposable” soldiers so that viewers don’t get too upset when so many die in battles

It’s what keeps those stories from feeling too dark

Hell, the stormtroopers from the OT are one of the most famous examples of that

But the thing is…it is acknowledged in universe

Multiple characters on multiple occasions have pointed the fucked-up-ness of it all

Even Obi-Wan in the AOTC novel is kinda horrified at the concept when he sees the clones for the first time

And it’s soooo hard to look past that

Especially with the jedi…I find it so hard to accept that the jedi are able to just ignore and accept it once the army proves to be useful

And like, yeah, when I look at star wars as a whole I understand that a lot of inconsistencies like this are just an inevitability with massive franchises

But it gets super frustrating to hold onto my suspension of disbelief capabilities when these problems are literally mentioned to and acknowledged by the jedi

Especially because I mostly love the jedi

[plounce]

reading thru nick coa’s new posts and like

“And like you mentioned with Kurogane, both are acting selfishly - Fai for putting his wish to die above how much this will shatter his family, and Kurogane for putting his love for Fai above Fai’s own wishes.”

i actually really really like this post (especially how it brings up the point of kurogane’s protectiveness being shown in extremes, to the point of slaughter with tomoyo (although that’s a response to the trauma of suwa) and to the point of forcible life-giving with fai) but like. oooooooof i cannot wait until nick has the context to understand that from fai’s perspective, letting himself die is... not tooooootally selfish? because beyond his everpresent death wish, everything about his life and his entire experience of the world has him firmly believing that he inherently brings death and destruction and unhappiness upon those he loves... so it’s not that fai doesn’t care as much for how this will impact those he loves (and who he can barely believe love him, will actually care if he lives or dies - yuuko has to go HEY DUMB ASS DON’T FORGET YOU MATTER TO THEM), it’s that he cares more about how his absence will help them. no curse in their hearts. no traitor in their midst.

and nick also talks about “different values” and perspectives and i just think that’s very good. and maybe it’s because i’m a depressed bastard and Fai Stan PH.D but like. OOOOOOOOF!!!!!!!!!

i guess my point is... i’m not saying fai is “right” because 1. different values 2. i know how his narrative will go 3. i know tsubasa’s themes so i know that in tsubasa’s context, fai eventually grows to think differently.................. so anyway i’m not saying that he’s “right” because i’m not interested in that, i’m focused on understanding fai’s reactions to things and i have a total bias to go “yeah that’s justified. look at this poor bastard. he has anxiety”

although speaking personally (as i just said i’m not interested in doing lmao): i do disagree with anon about kurogane’s decision being “horribly selfish.” maybe because i read “horribly” as “negative” here but like........ fai was still making that decision to die under REALLY FUCKED UP MENTAL ISSUES! and kurogane could tell fai’s gone through shit to make him deeply unhappy! and kurogane is demonstrably willing to put in the love and effort to help fai through dealing with that! he is ride or die, baby!

i guess at the end of the day: fai is a character who has been manipulated by people for their own goals. but at the end of the day, kurogane is the one w

hm i just had a thought. a weird thought. i don’t like it because i don’t like ashura because he’s a gaslighting bastard, but ashura also does all that he does for the sake of freeing fai from fwr’s curse/manipulations, in a really fucky way to return agency to fai, in a way that fai REALLY DOESN’T LIKE AND NEVER ASKED FOR AND DOESN’T WISH FOR, in a way that sort of... sacrifices his own wellbeing? mental wellbeing?

i guess the main difference is that kurogane keeping fai alive after fai asks to go gently into that foul night is not the same as slaughtering a whole country of people. i’m actually kind of annoyed with myself because i’m drawing more connections and parallels between kurogane and ashura than i want to, because i dislike ashura, but the problem is ashura did try to help fai in his really terrible way. and to fai as he was in tokyo - with very little capacity to have the desire to live - kurogane was helping him in a really terrible way too.

ashura did all that he did to help fai escape fwr’s curses. i’ve said before that kurogane’s goals were to help fai continue to live so/and then help him regain a grip on his agency. i guess the thing is: ashura did ‘sacrifice himself’ (idk the particulars of how he ‘went mad’), but he also sacrificed (read: murdered) hundreds of lives. at the least. clamp presents his love for fai in a complex way - he loves his son, so he does monstrous things to help him on a grand scale, as in rg veda. that’s what ashura does. kurogane never put anyone in harm’s way but himself, and he never gave up his own life. so ashura and fai were always unequal, while kurogane and fai are.

the tsubasa/holic narrative has four stories about bringing someone back from the brink of death by way of a deal: three are virtuous, one is... a disaster. in-series order: the clones’ memory/feathers deal, the kf vampirism deal, the original’s reservoir deal (that they were manipulated into thinking), and... clow’s wish for yuuko to open her eyes again.

the difference here is that yuuko was already dead. c!sakura, fai, and r!sakura were about to die, but the syaorans and kurogane interceded and made their deals in time. they asked for lives, but the lives were still there, and they did pay MASSIVE prices for them in their own ways. (relationships, captivity, etc). so there’s that theme of “moving forward and claiming your future and wanting to live happily in the future you choose” that tsubasa fucking adores. kurogane pushes for that. and i guess in the end, kurogane’s action in tokyo........ ok wait i was about to say “is more heroic/virtuous because he isn’t totally sacrificing his life for fai,” and right NOW i was about to say “because this post is meant to be about fai’s agency” but THEN i remembered that clamp has all those themes about total self-sacrifice being bad so i guess it kind of IS about kurogane not sacrificing himself? fuck!

well here’s what i think. kurogane didn’t re-traumatize fai in tokyo. c!syaoran did. fai was responding to the physical and mental trauma he’d just experienced, and kurogane was going WAIT HOLD ON A SECOND LET’S GET THROUGH THIS AND THEN WE CAN HAVE A NICE SIT-DOWN AND TALK ABOUT WHAT JUST HAPPENED WITH OUR SON AND YOUR EYE AND OH MY GOD? MY FAMILY JUST VIOLENTLY DISSOLVED AROUND ME? I NEED TO TALK ABOUT THIS TOO BABE

but of course kurogane is only halfway through his character arc as is fai, so he just has a couple awkward conversations with r!syaoran while fai Hides and Plots with sakura. OH YOU TWO!

okay last thing: yes it’s bad to be suicidal. i’m just gonna say this. speaking objectively, and not as me at a bad moment who would be kicking and screaming against what i’m about to say, but that’s me in the grips of depression: people should not be allowed to kill themselves. people should be stopped from killing themselves. fai was not a geriatric turning off the life support, or someone in need of a mercy killing because they could do nothing else but die slowly and painfully: fai was passively suicidal. kurogane has known about this tendency for like maybe a year now?

so yeah. kurogane stopping fai from basically killing himself is absolutely different from ashura slaughtering a population of people in an attempt to free fai from his curses that didn’t work at all, and directly re-traumatized into thinking that he brought death doom destruction etc wherever he lived and loved. glad i had this talk with myself to arrive at my regular conclusions. HOORAY