#theres also all this stuff about not being neutral but thats getting more into boe and toc and its not what was asked

[gayregis]

do you think the moral of renfris story was geralt saying a victim is just as evil as their abuser? i see a lot of netflix fans interpret it this way and idk it just feels... off.

no, i completely disagree. the cycle of violence is probably one of the largest themes in the witcher series, and the lesser evil is only one of these stories. i actually didn’t understand the story until i read the entire saga... so sorry if i answer this question with more references to parts of the witcher that are unrelated to the lesser evil than to actually the short story itself.

this is my take: in the witcher series, everything turns to be a cycle, something inherited from the previous generation that you then pass on to the next generation. the wheel keeps turning and you inherit and pass on many different traits, and this is not confined to biological familial relations.

the biggest theme and story of the series, in my opinion, is that of the inevitable inherited violence and abandonment in the context of witchers. geralt was raised as a witcher because he was abandoned by his mother, and he was then given the burden of violence to carry out. because he doesn’t want to put this burden of violence on ciri, because he wants to somehow circumvent this cycle of inherited violence and prevent ciri from coming into contact with it, he inevitably dooms her to the inherited violence anyways - by deferring her as his child, she experiences the massacre of cintra. and by trying to prevent her from inheriting violence, he realizes after he’s left her that he’s unintentionally given her the other half of the trauma coin he has as well - abandonment. as he was abandoned by his mother, he has now abandoned her. so he searches for her, finds her, but now  undoubtedly needs to be raised as a witcher more than ever. thus she inherits the violence, too... and then she’s abandoned again (this time not intentionally), and when left to her own devices, becomes consumed with this violence. it takes her over and she just kills and kills...

i think the lesser evil is about this. maybe not all of this about inheriting things, but it’s about being consumed by violence, it’s about an unending cycle. it’s not so much about who is right and who is wrong, and stregobor and other sorcerers locked girls in towers and renfri and her gang kill people. it’s not about that so much, the actual actions that they do and weighing these actions to see which is lesser, which is eviler than the other, but the fact that because they have engaged each other in this dance, it’s now unending, and it will continue to destroy and destroy until it finally ends in misery. 

renfri isn’t “just as evil as her abuser” because it’s such a strange way to frame it... she was abused, and then she herself became an abuser and a killer. it’s not about the fact that it was wrong to abuse her, of course it fucking was. of course she deserves revenge. but she, on this quest for revenge, became obsessed with it, and became a killer in her own right, taking out her pain on others. this is also what happens to ciri, later on in the saga. except in my opinion (even though maybe this contradicts with sapkowski’s vision), ciri reigns it in at the end, and she realizes that violence is not the answer to everything, that this violence has destroyed her entire life and her entire family, and that revenge is a wild goose chase because you will never actually ever be satisfied with the amount of revenge you get, so she leaves this world, she is the chosen one but she ends her bloodline because she chooses to end the violence that has consumed her.

the message is that violence begets violence. and that if you experience violence, it is incredibly easy to internalize that, let it fester inside of you, and begin to long for nothing but vengeance and death, and that will lead to your ruin.

this is why geralt tells ciri in a voice colder than the walls of kaer morhen that she will not pick up a sword again until she understands what purpose it holds in a witcher’s hands... a sword is a tool of violence, violence is necessary at times, but it must be controlled. you cannot let the fact that you have experienced violence turn you into someone that craves inflicting violence. you cannot wield a weapon with no regard for the lives you may end. you have to think about what you do and not act on primal instinct. 

this is why ciri, after killing rampantly, has someone worse than the grim reaper set on her heels... her horrific encounters with leo bonhart are just a continuation of the violence which consumes her life. the cycle keeps turning and turning, and every time it turns, it gets worse and more grotesque.

and this is why renfri, after being dealt such horrible abuse and injustice by stregobor and the men allied with him, turns to violence as her tool to obtain justice. and the wheel turns, and people die. more blood is shed, more and more, until everything comes to a halt and it ends in final death.

it’s not saying that “the abused are as bad as their abusers,” it’s saying more like “being exposed to violence makes you vulnerable to also turn to blind and indiscriminate violence that consumes you, and you should resist this powerful temptation because it will make you a danger to yourself and others.” 

i’m not saying that this message is unequivocally right, i am just trying to interpret what i think sapkowski was trying to say in this short story and this series. i tend to feel that this message is a little milquetoast... but i think it was personally helpful for me to understand my own life, that revenge and violence aren’t always the helpful answers. they don’t always make you happy, sometimes they just add to the tragedy. and it’s way more complex than just seeing who is right... it’s delving into how feeling that when someone has hurt you or done you injustice, that’s all that matters, and it tends to blind you and make you stop thinking both about what really matters.