ok one reason I get so pissed off about the way "colonization" is misused in fandom is because it's a reminder that if you have half an idea and care in how the world functions, you can't even escape from that shit in fandom. All you can do is get to engage with it in various other contexts that lack the real-world degree of personal involvement — but not all of it. And that might actually be a good thing, a break from the personal connection and a chance to look at those issues in a different, less glaring light.
Or it would be. If not for all those people that can seemingly recognize that colonization is a "singular evil" when it benefits them, but who will immediately drop the subject or even get angry when it no longer does. And my big issue here is that I'm not just talking about fandom.
Now, I could write a huge essay on this and I probably will, but I've learned I tend to get things done more when I simply release little posts on the subject to gather into one for later. So that's what I'm going to do.
So I'll keep this short and sweet, and say for now, one of many reasons the overbearing misuse of "colonization" in the asoiaf fandom bothers me is because it echoes the same misuse and/or weaponization I see over and over again in real life. I see it when white anglo westerners speak of white Russians, white Latinos, Han Chinese, Arabs, Muslims, Jewish people be they zionist or not, and honestly the list goes on. Even in how European nations and overseas settler states sometimes talk about each other.
The following sentiment is shared by many I know: for a variety of reasons, I do not like it when people from colonial nations use the idea or even the fact that another group has engaged in colonialism as an excuse to be xenophobic. And I especially don't like how that's often the only time people are interested in the concept of colonization.
Probably because I do not like the mindset behind xenophobia, and I especially don't like colonization being trivialized and weaponized, often by beneficiaries of colonization, to support that mindset. And I truly hate how freely and thoughtlessly people do it to the point that it permeates not just real life but even fandom discourse, and how angry people become when you point it out.
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thinking again about my sad boys, aegon and rhaegar, the dragonbane and the last dragon, being depressed since childhood, finding solace in their happy ladies, daenaera and lyanna. but while aegon's older siblings died, rhaegar lost his younger ones. but hey, at least aegon got to be close to his dear younger bro viserys! meanwhile, rhaegar just couldn't have a chance to build any proper relationship with his younger bro viserys, with everything between them. also to think that daeron the young dragon was aegon and daenaera's son and jon, rhaegar and lyanna's son, admired him and considered him one of his heroes... oh bless them, i love them so much
[...] As she stood before the king that Maiden’s Day, clad in pale white silk, Myrish lace, and pearls, her long hair shining in the torchlight and her cheeks flush with excitement, Daenaera was but six years old, yet so beautiful she took the breath away. The blood of Old Valyria was strong in her, as is oft seen in the sons and daughters of the seahorse; her hair was silver laced with gold, her eyes as blue as a summer sea, her skin as smooth and pale as winter snow. “She sparkled,” Mushroom says, “and when she smiled, the singers in the galley rejoiced, for they knew that here at last was a maid worthy of a song.” Daenaera’s smile transformed her face, men agreed; it was sweet and bold and mischievious, all at once. Those who saw it could not fail to think, “Here is a bright, sweet, happy little girl, the perfect antidote to the young king’s gloom.” (Fire & Blood)
When Aegon III returned her smile and said, “Thank you for coming, my lady, you look very pretty,” even Lord Unwin Peake surely must have known that the game was lost. (Fire & Blood)
[...] Hope and good feeling reigned over the Red Keep as the new year dawned. Though younger than her predecessor, Queen Daenaera was a happier child, and her sunny nature did much to lighten the king’s gloom…for a while, at the least. Aegon III was seen about the court more often than had been his wont, and even left the castle on three occasions to show his bride such sights as the city offered (though he refused to take her to the Dragonpit, where Lady Rhaena’s young dragon, Morning, made her lair). His Grace seemed to take a new interest in his studies, and Mushroom was oft summoned to entertain the king and queen at supper (“The sound of the queen’s laughter was like music to this fool, so sweet that even the king was known to smile”). (Fire & Blood)
[...] “But I am not certain it was in Rhaegar to be happy.”
“You make him sound so sour,” Dany protested.
“Not sour, no, but… there was a melancholy to Prince Rhaegar, a sense…” The old man hesitated again.
“Say it,” she urged. “A sense…?”
“…of doom. He was born in grief, my queen, and that shadow hung over him all his days.”
Viserys had spoken of Rhaegar's birth only once. Perhaps the tale saddened him too much. “It was the shadow of Summerhall that haunted him, was it not?”
“Yes. And yet Summerhall was the place the prince loved best. He would go there from time to time, with only his harp for company. Even the knights of the Kingsguard did not attend him there. He liked to sleep in the ruined hall, beneath the moon and stars, and whenever he came back he would bring a song. When you heard him play his high harp with the silver strings and sing of twilights and tears and the death of kings, you could not but feel that he was singing of himself and those he loved.” (ASOS, Daenerys IV)
“At the welcoming feast, the prince had taken up his silver-stringed harp and played for them. A song of love and doom, Jon Connington recalled, and every woman in the hall was weeping when he put down the harp.” (ADWD, The Griffin Reborn)
“The dragon prince sang a song so sad it made the wolf maid sniffle.” (ASOS, Bran II)
“By night the prince played his silver harp and made her weep. When she had been presented to him, Cersei had almost drowned in the depths of his sad purple eyes.” (AFFC, Cersei V)
“No one knew,” said Meera, “but the mystery knight was short of stature, and clad in ill-fitting armor made up of bits and pieces. The device upon his shield was a heart tree of the old gods, a white weirwood with a laughing red face.” (ASOS, Bran II)
“Whoever he was, the old gods gave strength to his arm. [...] the common folk cheered lustily for the Knight of the Laughing Tree, as the new champion soon was called. When his fallen foes sought to ransom horse and armor, the Knight of the Laughing Tree spoke in a booming voice through his helm, saying, 'Teach your squires honor, that shall be ransom enough.'” (ASOS, Bran II)
“He could hear her still at times. Promise me, she had cried, in a room that smelled of blood and roses. Promise me, Ned. The fever had taken her strength and her voice had been faint as a whisper, but when he gave her his word, the fear had gone out of his sister’s eyes. Ned remembered the way she had smiled then, how tightly her fingers had clutched his as she gave up her hold on life, the rose petals spilling from her palm, dead and black.” (AGOT, Eddard I)
“Robert will never keep to one bed,” Lyanna had told him at Winterfell, on the night long ago when their father had promised her hand to the young Lord of Storm’s End. “I hear he has gotten a child on some girl in the Vale.” Ned had held the babe in his arms; he could scarcely deny her, nor would he lie to his sister, but he had assured her that what Robert did before their betrothal was of no matter, that he was a good man and true who would love her with all his heart. Lyanna had only smiled. “Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man’s nature. (AGOT, Eddard IX)
“It was said that Rhaegar had named that place the tower of joy.” (AGOT, Eddard X)
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