Thursday, May 16, 2013

My stance on various ASOIAF conspiracy theories, Part 29

Thursday is theory day.
This is the twenty-ninth article of the series. Since there are a lot of theories floating out there and I'm asked often enough what I think of them, I thought I write it down. You can then laugh about me when I am totally proven wrong by "The Winds of Winter" or something like that. Rules are as follows: you put a question about any theory or plot element (really, let's stress "theory" a bit for the sake of interesting questions) either in the comments of any theory post or by mail (stefan_sasse@gmx.de) and I will answer them in an upcoming post. And if you now ask "Stefan, isn't this a shameless rip-off of Sean T. Collin's "Ask me anything"?", I would tell you to shut up, because you are right.
Prepare for part 29. Spoilers for "A Song of Ice and Fire", obviously.

Why doesn't the Night's Watch tattoo its members?
That's an interesting question, not because it startles me as it does you, but because it allows us to compare important elements of Westerosi and Essosi culture. If you imagine the Night's Watch to tattoo its members like the Volantene slave holders do, it would get rid of a major problem: desertion. You would be able to spot a brother of the Night's Watch the moment you lay eyes on him. So why not do it? The answer lies in what the Watch once was, and what it is still pretending to be: a brotherhood. Back in its old days, it was comprised of a near ridiculous number of knights. Those guys are supposed to swear oaths and to keep them, so putting a tattoo on their face is one big stinky finger saying "we think your honor is worth shit". So, that way isn't feasible if you don't want no knight to go to the Wall, like, ever. But why not do it for those who aren't there voluntarily, the poachers and thiefs and murderers and rapers? Surely no one would attribute them any honor, would they? But yes, they do, as I argued in my essay about honor a while back. The Night's Watch attributes honor to all its members, the honor of being a sworn brother. Tattoo these guys, and you take that away from them, and the last reason to feel any loyalty to an institution they were forced into. So, while the tattoos would certainly get rid of a big problem, they would create an even bigger one: incesting a giant revolt. And in contrast to Essos, no one thinks that tattooing a knight is a thing you just let happen and shrug because the guy will have deserved it somehow. You don't do this to people of stature.

Why aren't there lawyers?
For the same reason why there aren't courts: where there is no law, there is no need for either. In Westeros, the lords are at the same time the judges of every problem big enough to be laid before them. All other problems are handled by the communities involved, most like by someone in a mayor like capactiy or a council of elders or such. There are pretty primal mechanisms of social ostracism involved in order to punish someone and settle an affair without involving a lord. And you don't want to get a lord involved, because lords settle all affairs only one way: by punishing the perpetrator. That requires a world view in which there are crimes that need to be punished, and the "judging" part of the lord is to determine the punishment. Look at Randyl Tarly in "A Feast for Crows" to see this at work. Since there is no written law that you could use for orientation, but only the "right of pits and gallows" for a lord and elsewise his own wisdom to decide, this makes lawyers a profession without a ground to stand on. Westeros would certainly profit from lawyers and courts, but since for both you need a law (else, what to judge?), and there is no canonical law in Westeros, there are no lawyers. 

What will happen to Slaver's Bay?
It depends wildly on the manner of Danaerys' return with Drogon. I'd guess that there's a lot of blood involved in some battle that she will win, and the will get her stuff and make for Westeros. Whether she'll bother to order her affairs in Slaver's Bay at all remains to be seen. Since it's likely that she'll hit Volantis on the way to Westeros, and Yunkai will be defeated, it may be that her new order takes control, but the more realistic option is a stalemate between the new elites and those parts of the old ones that survive the initial purge. What then happens is up for debate, of course. Suffice to say, I don't see a sunny future for Slaver's Bay, where the freed slaves live happily ever after. I guess it's much more likely that they're going to see kind of a Reconstruction like it hit the freed slaves of the American South, with the old elites regaining power and enforcing the old order in all but name.

23 comments:

  1. Putting a concentration camp tatto on every black brother would be insta-revolt, duh.
    It's almost as if people don't like being treated like lifestock. You're really sweet to spend so much time explaining no-brainers, Stefan.

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  2. Plus, branding slaves is used to mark a man as "property of" by slavers (just like branding stock) rather than "belonging to" as the hypothesis for the NW.

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  3. I saw somebody once wonder why, if Melisandre was a Volantis slave, she would have gotten rid of her face tattoo!

    Maybe in modern times it's just tough for some to imagine how awful it would be to be essentially livestock, and just how far one would go to escape that stigma.

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  4. Is Benjen Stark really dead? Maybe, if still alive, he can reveal Jon true parents? I was sure that Coldhands is Benjen, but obviously I waswrong...

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    1. How would Benjen know this? And I think he's dead.

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  5. I bet 2 bucks that Benjen will return changed as Nightking , King of the North and leader of the Others

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  6. If not burned, Benjen will appear, dead or alive, he was mentioned too many times, and his destiny is not solved, yet...
    It is logical that Benjen knows how his sister died... We will see.
    Who can reveal truth about true Jon's parents?
    Howland Reed, Jojen or Meera Reed, Vylla (wet nurse), something is hidden in a Winterfell crypts, and I guess, Benjen Stark.

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  7. Re: your tower of the Hand Article

    Yeah, the only problem with Stefan's argument is that Littlefinger of the novels isn't evil. Being creepy certainly isn't the same as being evil, which Stefan knows. AND the main method of climbing the social latter in Westeros is plunging the realm into war. Not to mention that littlefinger commands no armies. He can't make anyone do anything, so the realm plunged itself into war. He was partially responsible but less so the Cersei, Tywin or Catelyn.

    The fact that the character on the show is "evil" is precisely why everyone complains about it. And the character is an idiot as well, so he's not only evil he's stupidly evil. Challenging Cersei outright in public about incest? Openly approaching Sansa himself in person? Come on, this is not littlefinger.

    The Littlefinger on the show would be dead he's openly stupid and evil and pisses off powerful people left and right.

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    1. I can't go with you there. Climbing the social ladder is not an excuse, and it doesn't justify evil. By the way, LF advanced pretty far without war. It's his petty jealousy that brings him further and further. Starting wars for personal gain, killing people (even stupid corrupt ones) for personal gain, staging the murder of other people for personal gain, all that is evil. And, by the way, the justice system of every nation on this planet judges them that and punished them more harshly than "other" killings.
      He didn't approach Cersei in public, but 1v1 (the guards don't count).
      And Sansa...that's due to the constraints of the show. Such stuff needs to be overlooked, I'm afraid.

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  8. I was trying to explain why there isn't any evil to justify. So of course the conclusion can't be assumed within your premise. That's called begging the question.

    First, Littlefinger doesn't start the war. Again, Cersei, Tywin, Catelyn all do more to start he war. (Also, all the wars in Westeros are for personal gain. If you want to call all the knights and lords who earn advancement this way, evil, then fine. Ned's evil, Hoster Tully is definitely evil, Aegon the conqueror, Robert, ect.)

    Second, I don't think killing people for personal gain qualifies as evil. Killing people for sake of gaining enjoyment from their suffering, that's evil. (Justice systems, don't measure good and evil, they measure desirable and non desirable societal outcomes. I didn't say what like Littlefinger didn't wasn't illegal, I said it wasn't evil. A society has good reason to prevent murder regardless of whether its good or evil. Primarily in that the State reserves a monopoly on sanctioned violence.)


    P.S. yeah, I just mean he approached Cersei openly. Not publicly. That's really stupid.

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    1. First, you're right about the ultimate responsibility, but LF definitely sparked the whole thing intentionally. He wanted Stark and Lannister to go to war. And he did it with the intent of climbing the social ladder. Yes, Aegon conquered for personal gain, but at least, he conquered for something. LF doesn't want to build anything. He wants to be the king of ashes. - The War of the Usurper was another matter, I'd argue. They didn't want personal gain, they more or less defended themselves. Of course, if you're smallfolk in any of these conflicts, it doesn't really matter. All wars are evil. But I'd atttribute LF with more evil motives than most. He's not a Machiavellian.

      If you kill someone because you caught him sleeping with your wife, the justice system will give you a lower sentence than if you killed him to rob him. And if you tortured the guy before, you gain an even harsher sentence, in this you are definitely right. But being "more evil" does not excuse the other evil act before.

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    2. "He wants be King of ashes" is a ridiculous statement.

      There's no evidence for this. Even in the TV show. Varys doesn't say littlefinger WANTS to be king of ashes, he said littlfinger would be WILLING to be king of ashes. And considering Aegon was KING OF ASHES (he burned down half the freaking kingdom), this rings very disingenuously.

      Littlefinger, obviously wants to build something. He built him self up from a petty lord to one of the most powerful men in the kingdom. He ran businesses, he built spy networks, he appointed a bureaucracy with men like him merchants and second sons and lesser lords. He's already building!

      (If you kill someone to rob them its premeditated. If you catch someone sleeping with your wife and then, plan for a year to kill them, the sentence is the same. The issue is the state of mind at the time of the killing. Were you calm? Or were you excited by some incredible situation and lost your head. It has nothing to do with evil)

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    3. P.S. This "Donnu whether it was season 1 or 2, when LF (who stares at the Iron Throne) tells Varys he imagines the whole court to have lost their heads. That's what he wants."

      Is why people hate Show Littlefinger. Littlefinger doesn't say shit like that. If he did he would be dead. This is Littlefinger

      "No one had ever thought to question the appointments, and why should they? Littlefinger was no threat to anyone. A clever, smiling, genial man, everyone’s friend, always able to find whatever gold the king or his Hand required"

      Not a giant asshole, who provokes everyone in power and is openly hostile.

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    4. I'm not sure whether LF wants to build anything. He pursues the quest for power as means, not as an end. Tywin wants power to secure the Lannisters against all foes. What exactly does LF want? become a Lord Paramount? He already is, and he doesn't even start stopping. My theory is that he doesn't want anything. He's the Joker of Westeros, only more sane. He thrives on this shit, and he doesn't want it to stop, keeping the wheels spinning.

      Well, he doesn't shitmouth everyone, just the ones he thinks he can afford (he does it with Ned (works) and Cersei (doesn't work), he doesn't even try with Tywin).

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    5. Personally, I think Littlefinger wants to be King. (the fact that he's too low born for the great lords to stomach it is precisely why he wants to do it, in spite of them)

      The problem with the Joker, analog is Littlefinger has built too much. He doesn't want chaos. If he wanted chaos He could have brought the Vale into the war for the Starks (the vale lords wanted to help the Starks, only Lysa stopped them). Instead Littlefinger brought the Tyrells to the Lannisters, to end the war.

      When Cersei starts to fuck up, Littlefinger COMPLAINS about the chaos...

      “You would not believe half of what is happening in King’s Landing, sweetling. Cersei stumbles from one idiocy to the next, helped along by her council of the deaf, the dim, and the blind. I always anticipated that she would beggar the realm and destroy herself, but I never expected she would do it quite so fast. It is quite vexing. I had hoped to have four or five quiet years to plant some seeds and allow some fruits to ripen, but now... it is a good thing that I thrive on chaos. What little peace and order the five kings left us will not long survive the three queens, I fear.”

      Yes Littlefinger can thrive from it. But he wanted five years to BUILD, not chaos. This is a lament, not an endorsement.

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    6. You're pretty convincing. OK, I will wait and see what future books/episodes bring.

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    7. Well thanks for being so open minded. I really do think the character is terribly misunderstood, so I feel compelled to try to explain him.

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  9. should read


    ...I didn't say what Littlefinger did wasn't illegal...

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  10. What is the relationship between "the Other" that Melisandre speaks of and "the Others"?

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    1. The "Other" Melisandre speaks of is the counter weight to R'hollor the lord of Light, essentailly the lord of darkness. The "Others" are the white walkers (possibly servants of darkness).

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    2. Yep, but we don't know yet how or if both of them are connected.

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    3. Sure, I know who they are. But I guess, to Stefan's point, I suppose I'm asking: "Do you think they're related?" And what does Bran have to do with it, if anything? Speculation, I know. I think we'll know a great deal more with The Winds of Winter.

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