#jzxuan is *fine* with defending the weak

[mxtxfanatic]

Random Thought #33: Idk how to say this without sounding like I’m tryna diminish Jin Zixuan’s one moment of unambiguous good, but I don’t think Jin Zixuan defending Mianmian would ever have happened if he had to do something more proactive than just…ignoring the words of a man he had been building a simmering hatred for over the course of a few weeks.

Jin Zixuan is shown (and explicitly said) to side with people he considers “his people.” While they are all hostages of the Wen during the indoctrination camp, outside of that shared victimhood, Mianmian is simply a stranger to Jin Zixuan, while his “defense” of her is simply refusing to move out of the way when Wen Chao—the man who had been targeting him for harassment every day for weeks on end—ordered him to. This is a very passive resistance. And not to say that this wasn’t a good deed or any less of a powerful moment, but if Wen Chao hadn’t singled out Jin Zixuan for bullying, would he have still ignored the former’s words to move out of the way? If Jin Zixuan hadn’t happened to be standing by Lan Wangji and Mianmian hid behind only the Lan, instead, would he have said anything in her defense? Would he have even physically moved to shield her? Is any of that in-character with the behavior we are shown of his throughout any of the rest of the novel?

[crossdressingdeath]

You are being a bit too hard on JYL. While she wasn't a perfect sister, she was also a victim to her parents dysfunctional relationship and she was only 2 years older than the boys. She was a poor cultivator and had a very weak constitution. She also had no political power despite her high birth. I'm pretty sure she never got any apologies for any of the slights against her character and on the pheonix mountain scene doesn't Jin Zixun storm off and then madam jin completely dismisses the situation as JYL being silly? Madam Jin loves JYL but I would say she doesn't respect her. JGS doesn't respect Madam Jin either so even if JYL went to her, nothing would be done. However JZXuan does invite WWX genuinely so I would say JYL was trying to improve WWX's situation as much as she could. As for not giving any financial support, she was completely dependent on JC and then the Jins, so I dont see how she could have helped there. Also I could totally see JC selling JYL to the Jins to appease JGS so she could be used as a political hostage against WWX.

Some points, in no particular order: First off, Madam Jin for sure respects JYL. Yeah, she dismisses JZXun insulting WWX (that’s important; he’s insulting WWX, a glorified servant, not JYL) because WWX is just a servant, but when JYL says that this isn’t a minor thing to her Madam Jin orders JZXun to apologise. To a servant. To appease JYL. That suggests the opposite of what you’re saying; it suggests that Madam Jin adores and respects JYL enough that she’ll force her family to lower themselves to the level of a man viewed by the Jins as a servant for her sake. And if she’s prepared to do that, maybe she could be convinced to do other things! Like... I don’t know, send servants to buy some food at market that can then be sent to Yiling? Or, alternately, JYL could ask the adoring husband who will give her anything she wants for money which she could then send to Yiling. And if she doesn’t trust anyone from Lanling (or Yunmeng; if she can ask JC to bring her to Yiling she can ask him to deliver some money) enough to think they could be persuaded to help her out with this, including the brother who she knows knows the Wens and WWX are innocent, then that raises a whole bunch of other questions about things like why the fuck she trusted anything the Jiangs and Jins said about WWX.

In fact, that’s kind of the issue here. Everything about her being dependant on JC and then the Jins raises an important question: if she, as she seems to, doesn’t doubt that JC and the Jins are being honest in their dealings with WWX... then why doesn’t she ask them to help him? Why doesn’t she even try? She goes to the Burial Mounds with JC and sees how badly things are going for WWX... and doesn’t feel the need to question whatever story JC gave her about what WWX was doing?

See, that’s the problem at the end of the day. It’s not about whether JYL could have done anything (although I’d say she could’ve done more than she did), it’s about whether or not she tried. Which... there’s no evidence she did. She brings WWX soup one time, but there’s no evidence that she tried to send him and his people actual supplies, or the means to acquire those supplies on their own. She convinces JZX to invite WWX to JL’s one month anniversary, but JZX is still assuming that WWX is the aggressor even though at least in CQL JYL knows for a fact he’s not and should have told him that. She shows up in her fucking wedding dress talking about her approaching marriage to the son of the man who’s in the process of ruining WWX’s life and there isn’t a single word that implies she’s at all unhappy with this situation; while I did say that JC could have forced her to marry JZX against her will there is no evidence that that was in fact the case and it looks more like he was just doing what she wanted him to. (Honestly the wedding dress thing in general is like... on the surface it’s a sweet gesture, and I’m sure that’s what she meant it as, but if you think about it her showing up in the dress WWX won’t be able to see her get married in to give him enough soup to keep a couple people fed for maybe a day when he’s got fifty starving civilians up that mountain and let him name the nephew he’s never going to get to meet and talk about her marriage into the family that’s currently running a massive smear campaign to get WWX killed and then leaving and as far as we see never trying to help him after that beyond wrangling him an invite to an event that clearly no one wants him at besides her is such a slap in the face whether that was intentional on her part or not that I’m surprised it doesn’t get talked about more.)

Look, JYL may be a woman in a patriarchal society and a weak cultivator, but it does not follow that she has no power. Or that no one respects her or is willing to apologise to her for slights against her, for that matter. She’s the sister of a sect leader. The wife of a sect heir. Even if she failed to actually achieve anything, the fact is that her lack of suspicion towards her family (by birth and marriage) and their actions in regards to WWX’s situation makes it pretty obvious to me that either she asked them to help or look further into the matter and didn’t feel the need to question why the only person willing to so much as make an attempt was her husband... or she didn’t ask at all. And the latter seems more likely, given how we see her react to conflict between her brothers; it’s “boys will be boys” and “they’re just teasing, they’re as bad as each other” all the way down, even when JC is threatening WWX with his literal worst fear or telling him that the children of servants will never amount to anything. JYL will defend WWX from outsiders, but the second he’s being targeted by JC she just decides everything’s fine. Maybe she really couldn’t have helped him! Maybe bringing him a bowl of soup and pretending everything was fine really was all she could do! But given there’s no mention either from her or from the narration itself that she so much as tried to do more... Well, it raises questions, and the fact that those questions are never brought up in this fandom means that I perhaps feel the need to be a little firmer on this point than I might be otherwise.