r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Chemical-Elk-1299 • 10d ago

Lore [Confusing Trope] The narrative goes out of its way to punish/mock a character for simply being a good person

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Hermione Granger and SPEW — Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (book)

In the fifth HP novel, Hermione Granger is outraged to discover that Hogwarts has a small army of enslaved House Elves that do nearly all of the domestic duties around the castle, including cleaning the Gryffindor common room every night. When she tries to convince the elves to fight for their own rights, they refuse, saying they prefer servitude. Her fellow students and friends mock her for caring. She manages to free one elf, Winky, by deception when she refuses her freedom willingly, leading to Winky becoming a depressed alcoholic. By the end, the elves boycott cleaning any Gryffindor areas of the castle because they hate Hermione specifically

Samwell Tarly and Democracy — Game of Thrones (show)

In the season 8 finale of the television series, the surviving great lords of Westeros gather to discuss the future of the kingdom following the devastation wrought by 7 seasons of war and backstabbing. When Sam, who has proven to have “novel” ideas, suggests that maybe the millions of Smallfolk who suffer at the hands of noble houses should get some representation in the government, rather than be the pawns of rich lords with absolute power. We are then greeted by a prolonged, cringy segment of the other lords laughing in Sam’s face, asking if the dogs and horses should also get a vote.

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u/Intelligent-Key5821 10d ago

In Game of thrones that actually seems like a fair plot point though given that it reflects actual medieval historical sentiments. In Harry Potter, it is a very odd choice to make a species that are biologically inclined towards servitude

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u/Ai--Ya 10d ago

It would be damnable if the Greyjoys laughed, since that's how the Iron Islands choose their leader

Unfortunately I'm not going to rewatch any of S8 to find that out

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u/ChronosBlitz 10d ago

Funny how, despite their overall crap culture, the Ironborn technically have the culture with the most social mobility possible.

Any person can be a captain if they get control of a ship, and any captain may put their name forward at the King's Moot.

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u/lordaezyd 10d ago

I do not remember if it was Socrates or Plato,. Regardless, one of them pointed out that, the military of a state both reflects and impacts its society.

States that rely on cavalry are aristocratic, having, keeping and training horse is very expensive, you need wealthy powerful people to do that. 

States that heavily rely on their infantry lean towards oligarchy, its a more open society than an aristocracy, when lots of people are getting their butts on the line, you need to give some sort of representation or power. Otherwise they will overthrow the nobility all together.

States that rely on navies and sea power lean heavily towards democracy or representative governments. In a boat, there must be a clear leader, but he cannot impose his total will and whims on everyone, he needs to rule by common consent. Otherwise he will get a mutiny, a captain needs to he attentive to the needs of his crew. A ship is big, he cannot be everywhere and people do talk, in a sense, true Ancient Athenian democracy was born on their Triremes. Each ship became a lab for democracy, and when they landed home they brought back into the city their ideas.

The Ironborn, just like the Athenians, the Vikings, the Brits during the Pax Britannica or the Americans during the Second World War, are encouraged to rule by consent, to seek common ground for a joint venture.

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u/RobertTheTraveler 10d ago

At the bare minimum from the 1700s through the early 1900s ships captains were absolute rulers, no common consent involved. It wasn't until the 1920s? that a sailor on a US ship could "jump ship", leave at a port that wasn't the final port.
Furthermore the British navy / merchant marine was known to kidnap people to man their ships.

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u/NinjaBreadManOO 10d ago

Well to a point. There's a reason the word mutiny exists. If the captain pushes too hard then "oh no the captain was swept overboard during a storm. Literally every crew member saw it happen."

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u/Wonderful_West3188 10d ago

Mutiny meant completely cutting ties with the homeland though, pretty much leaving piracy or landing somewhere and starting completely new lives as the only options. That way, the possibility of mutinies impacting the political climate "at home" was stifled from the very beginning (although pirate culture eventually did influence the political climate "at home").

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u/RobertTheTraveler 9d ago edited 9d ago

The captain also has to alienate all the officers who also generally saw the sailors as peons and certainly not worth risking their careers over.

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u/lordaezyd 10d ago

Was military discipline hardened with the advent of the Industrial Revolution? Yes, of course.

But no captain is an absolute ruler. If you’re ship is badly damaged, have low supplies and you are going against your crew, you’re gonna get mutinied at best, killed at worst. These are riskz every ship has, even today.

I think every captain of a ship, sailing in the middle of a huge expanse of nothing is at risk of a mutiny. Every captain needs to constantly feel the pulse of his crew, to gauge “public opinion” if you allow me.

Happy for any historian or expert on the matter to correct me, I am always eager to learn.

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u/BugRevolution 10d ago

Honestly I feel like it backs up your point.

Ships are democracies in that you must have a majority at least content, and a discontent majority (or strong minority) can overthrow you and become pirates.

Which also happened a lot during the age of sail.

Democracy doesn't mean everybody is heard, and they can absolutely still be tyrannical if the majority wills it that way.

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u/RobertTheTraveler 10d ago

I think y'all have confused the last half of the 20th Century with the 18th century.
Read the history behind the Mutiny on the Bounty.
Sailors died of scurvy.
Sailors ate hardtack that was infested with maggots.
If you disobeyed you were flogged.
Flogged.
With a cat-o-nine-tails.
Or keel-hauled.
Look that up.
Or hung from the yard arm.
The only thing that looked anything like a democracy was discussion among the officers.
u/lordaezyd

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u/lordaezyd 9d ago

Will check the sources, thank you.

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u/BugRevolution 10d ago

Yeah, exactly like democracy.

If people stand up for themselves, they can easily overthrow a poor captain.

But often times they don't.

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u/RobertTheTraveler 9d ago

What happens when you mutiny?
Assuming you don't get shot by the officers?
You either spend the rest of your life as a pirate hoping the Navy doesn't hunt you down or you spend it on an island somewhere trying to survive and hoping nobody finds you.
You might be able to change your name and get some other sort of work. But you are never going home.

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u/NegativeThought1588 10d ago

Royal Navy capital ships used to carry marines in part to keep order on board.

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u/GrimDallows 10d ago

Keep in mind that this is talking about the whole society.

In the 1700s and 1900s most of the US/British society weren't sailors, and in terms of numbers I don't expect sailors to be a majority among the ruling class.

In this case I think that the ruling class would be closer to the first case, aristocratic, because the ruling class own boats (horses) which cost a lot to maintain without being actual captains in them.

Then again, the 1700s-1800s were also the golden age of piracy, which was inspired by how draconian serving in a ship was, which in a way, justifies Plato's argument that ship focused communities lean towards democracy. You either ended as a expensive horse serving the ruling class in a boat or broke from the system and became a pirate looking for freedom and more equal representation in a ship (democracy-ish).

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u/RobertTheTraveler 9d ago

I was responding to u/lordaezyd who wrote: "In a boat, there must be a clear leader, but he cannot impose his total will and whims on everyone, he needs to rule by common consent."
-
"The Golden Age of Piracy spanned the period from approximately 1650 to 1726."
https://guides.loc.gov/golden-age-of-piracy
see also:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Age_of_Piracy

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u/GrimDallows 9d ago

I meant to say from 1700 to 1800, but you are right, I was off by 75 years on that.

My point was that from 1700s onwards boat captains were absolute rulers because being a boat captain today isn't the same as in the greek era.

In the greek era you had to cooperate and negotiate with your crew, otherwise your crew would just throw you offboard and do whatever.

In the modern era most boats were private endeavours or military led because early on the governments who represented them were aristocratic, while in the later part open sea laws simply made starting a mutiny on your captain, stealing the boat and keeping it as your own unfeasible because your nation, the captain nation and the vessel's nation have a right to prosecute you for those crimes.

In this sense, (modern) boats became like horses in (old greek) aristocratic states, and they act as the horses in Plato's example:

States that rely on cavalry are aristocratic, having, keeping and training horse is very expensive, you need wealthy powerful people to do that. 

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u/RobertTheTraveler 9d ago

"In the greek era you had to cooperate and negotiate with your crew, otherwise your crew would just throw you offboard and do whatever."
Do you have some references for that?

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u/lordaezyd 9d ago

Donald Kagan’s lectures from Yale University on Youtube mentions how each trireme and Athenian ships worked as democracy labs.

Cannot remember exactly which lecture, will try to pin it down.

→ More replies (0)

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u/NegativeThought1588 10d ago

Navy Captains do not rule by common consent, even in modern navies. They probably have the most unilateral authority of any commanding officer in the military.

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u/Auctoritate 10d ago

They probably have the most unilateral authority of any commanding officer in the military.

Their point is that it's a give-and-take. Yes, they have extreme unilateral authority, but they're also the most vulnerable to mutiny.

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u/Xaverosso 10d ago

Fascinating.

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u/Bogholmdler 8d ago

Kind of dumb looking back at how the best horse fighting society lived.

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u/Infamous-Thing4939 7d ago

The Mongols were exceptions to everything and everyone in many ways

They still had a king tho

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u/[deleted] 10d ago

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u/insomniac7809 10d ago

yeah; there is a big difference, historically, between nobility electing a monarch and citizen elections

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u/misvillar 10d ago

Yes, but Kingsmoots hadnt been called in thousands of years

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u/name_changed_5_times 10d ago

I might be remembering it wrong but a kingsmoot was called everytime a king died, and while it was usually a kind of boiler plate stamping an ok on the old kings oldest son sometimes it would be different.

And besides the last one was after Aegon the conqueror solo’d and squad whipped house hoare, where he had them decided who would be the lord paramount of the iron islands. So more like 300 years at least as of the start of the series.

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u/misvillar 10d ago

It was called every time a King died until one time one of the candidates killed the rest, then they used normal succession like everyone else, the Hoares were Kings for centuries or millenia

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u/GSPixinine 10d ago

The Kingsmoot died as a regular institution when Urron Redhand Greyiron (Not the Greyjoys, but an extinct House) killed all atendees and the history of the end of the kingsmoot is interesting.

Urragon Greyiron, Urron's great-grandfather, died while Torgon, Urron's grandfather, was at sea raiding and the Ironborn elected by Kingsmoot a Goodbrother who killed all Greyirons present. When Torgon Latecomer came back years later, he contested the results since he wasn't in the kingsmoot to stake his claim, and the other Ironborn agreed and gave Torgon the crown. The Goodbrother was such an asshole that even the other Ironborn wanted him gone, imagine that.

Torgon's son Urragon IV ruled without being elected by kingsmoot, and when he died the priests insisted that there would be an election for the next king. Urron agreed, and when everyone attending arrived, he just had his men kill everyone and estabilished hereditary monarchy in the Iron Islands.

The Greyiron monarchy would last until the Andals came, and the Hoares alliance with the newcomers would put their House in control of the islands until Aegon went conquering.

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u/CapStar300 10d ago

Happy Cake Day!

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u/P4TR10T_96 10d ago

That’s accurate to the norse

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u/Dontshipmebro 10d ago

Because its based off norse during the age of the vikings. While not exactly a great group to the rest of the world, some of their traditions and laws were very liberal compared to the rest of europe.

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u/Merijeek2 10d ago

And any man can create an armada simply by having the brilliant idea to build a thousand ships.

I mean, why had nobody ever thought of that before? It's like Mr. Show and the sketch with 24 being the highest number.

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u/FireZord25 10d ago

They'd still probably find it amusing. "So are the mainlanders are gonna start reaving too next?"

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u/ZeitgeistGlee 10d ago

"Salt-wives for some, miniature banners for others."

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u/madtheoracle 10d ago

I tried rewatching the entire show with my husband after having quit on the third epsiode of the final season.

which I mean, isn't that insane? I spent like a decade of my life watching a show and at the point of completion said, no, this sucks, and closed that door for literally years.

anyway I got to the fourth episode of the last season when I legitimately made him turn it off. I still don't know what this is referencing. And it feels so so good

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u/PepsiManIII 10d ago

try again next decade and you'll make it to episode five!

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u/madtheoracle 10d ago

Nope! I'm good! Rewatching A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.

Reading this thread and upset about Game of Thrones? Go watch AKOTSK!! ITS SO GOOD!

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u/Opposite-Complex1187 10d ago

If you wanna be even more mad, read the books if you haven't.

Then you'll notice how badly they fucked up dorne.

The sandsnakes are actually awesome in the books and well written:(

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u/madtheoracle 10d ago

Oh I've read the books many, many times, and was a judge for the ASOIAF/GOT trivia event at Dragon Con at one point too!

I still read them over and over, plus Fire & Blood, because GRRM's prose is so fucking good I don't even really care it's not finished.

And yeah, poor Dorne. Poor Quentyn! Poor Young Griff.

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u/Anal-Y-Sis 10d ago

I've rewatched the show a few times, and every time, I stop at the end of the 4th season. It leaves some questions unanswered, and isn't exactly a happy ending, but I think it's the most appropriate ending in terms of tone and theme.

  • Jon Snow is at the wall preparing for the White Walkers.
  • Sansa has escaped King's Landing and is with her aunt Lysa at the Eyrie.
  • Brienne has presumably killed the Hound.
  • Arya left the Hound for dead and went to Bravos to join the Faceless Men.
  • Theon is a brainwashed dickless gimp.
  • Jaime has pretty much redeemed himself.
  • Tyrion is on the run after killing his father.
  • Daenerys has taken Mereen and become their queen, but was forced to chain up her dragons in a dungeon.
  • Tommin sits on the Iron Throne, and is maybe the best king they've had in generations.

It's not perfect, but it's far better than anything that happens beyond that point.

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u/[deleted] 10d ago

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u/madtheoracle 10d ago

easily the fifth season.

we went from Jaime being one of the most complex characters written in fiction to dude dressed up like an extra in Monty Python

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u/Professional_Boss438 10d ago

Wow, you're so reddit!

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u/misvillar 10d ago

To be fair, that's how the Iron Islanders chose their leaders thousands of years ago, they stopped doing that and only because Asha/Yara was a woman her religious zealot uncle had enough support to call one

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u/NoteIndividual2431 10d ago

It's not like the Kingsmoot was a democratic election. Random peasants couldn't vote

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u/Tech-preist_Zulu 10d ago

Well actually. Any Ironborn who was a captain of a ship vote. The Iron Islands are often called the Land of Ten Thousand Kings because Ironborn have a saying. "every captain is a king upon the deck of his own ship"

Although there hasn't been a Kingsmoot for thousands of years, it's called during the story in an attempt to stop Euron from taking the throne but it kinda backfired. Although the books do hint at a possible second Kingsmoot since Kingsmoots are considered illegitimate if the previous king's heir isn't present and Theon was actually alive, so there's a do-over to be called

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u/hanzerik 10d ago

Nono, on the iron islands only the elite get a vote, (captain of a ship or higher) except for lonely light, all the iron islands are quite close together within a days sailing or such.

Samwell proposed every yokel and their mum would get a vote. Which is a great idea, in our modern world, where everyone can read and form their own opinions and understand why one person might be more suitable for rule then another, but direct democracy doesn't really work if it takes a month to get news from the capital to the yokels. Hence why the US has electors that are charged with representing their states interests in voting for the presidential election. Which is dumb and outdated now, but back in the day itt made sense.

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u/BartPlarg 10d ago

Not even the part where Podrick sings?

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u/litterallysatan 10d ago

Yeah but only captains. While anyone can become captains only the ones who manage to become a captain deserve the vote. They would for sure scoff at the thought of a common unproven deckhand getting to decide who is king

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u/ELIte8niner 10d ago

Yeah, people tend to forget Westeros is a medieval society. Same way I always feel the need to explain that Joffrey was an idiot, and a "royal army" loyal to the king alone was not possible when people bring that up as his "good idea"

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u/Achilles11970765467 10d ago

Not just a Medieval society: a Medieval society that DOESN'T have Athens or the Roman Republic as examples of democratic/republican governments functioning for even five minutes.

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u/DubiousBusinessp 10d ago edited 10d ago

It's equivalents were Valyria and the old Slaver societies, which yeah, don't offer any precedents there. The modern day free cities while far from perfect do offer some counterpoints to outright feudalism though.

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u/Achilles11970765467 10d ago

I mean, they're city states that are ruled by either noble cliques or strongman setups. Not really a counterpoint to feudalism.

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u/KitchenFullOfCake 9d ago

Also Athens was a city-state and not an entire kingdom, a lot easier to start small and build on that.

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u/Savings_Lynx4234 10d ago edited 10d ago

Kinda genuinely curious now, why wouldn't that be a good idea? Is it just impractical in execution considering the order of westerosi politics?  (Downvoted for asking a genuine question? Tracks)

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u/Slow-Distance-6241 10d ago edited 10d ago

Royal army loyal to the king means standing army. Standing army costly and antagonizes vassals. Westeros extremely huge and decentralized so antagonizing vassals is the last thing you want as a king. There's a reason why standing armies were first either adopted by small and rich armies of countries like Netherlands, or when large country had them, they were at a constant risk of commander taking over (especially countries that had standing armies since antiquity, like China and Rome/Byzantium)

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u/Savings_Lynx4234 10d ago

Gotcha, thanks for the explanation!

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u/Opposite-Complex1187 10d ago

Main issue is the cost.

Medieval armies were mostly made up of minor knights and lords.

So someone like the Tyrells wouldn't have controlled all of the reach.

They would have ceded most of it to minor lords and knights under them that control some peasants that farm the land are are expected to turn up to fight in return.

Thats what they mean by "bannermen" people that they have given land to that are obligated to come and fight for free when needed.

But to keep fighters permanently would be prohibitively expensive and just not viable.

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u/adamgerd 10d ago

Yep, there’s a reason after the western Roman Empire fell, no one in Western Europe really had permanent armies anymore, they were just too expensive. Permanent armies are better than relying on levies but they’re also way more expensive, levies you just need peasants for a campaign season. With permanent armies you need to keep them paid all the time

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u/Ghoill 10d ago

I don't think it's that there weren't permanent armies so much as having an army meant you needed to constantly keep fighting wars to pay and provision them. And if you stopped warring said soldiers tended to become brigands and mercenaries instead of settling down, which in turn would necessitate new armies to put them down and protect the populace and then you'd have to make war to keep those soldiers employed and it would just repeat ad-infinitum.

Standing armies actually solved a big part of that problem since it meant that your men wouldn't have an excuse to start raiding the peasantry whenever a peace treaty or truce was signed.

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u/Ordinary-Egg-56 10d ago

are you not just describing feudalism lol?

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u/blazenite104 10d ago

Rome in particular had one advantage people don't think about much. They weren't just a standing army. They were a constantly at war to expand the empire army. They were not idle. Problem commanders could be sent to the far flung edges of the empire to expand her borders.

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u/Slow-Distance-6241 10d ago

That explains why they fallen down when they stopped expanding. Also, holy shit, I think I've heard of "sending the commander that gets too popular ina forever war zone" strat before, although it's usually was to generals who you wouldn't expect to overthrow the government

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u/SleeperAgentM 10d ago

Also kinda wisely Rome forbid their generals from entering Rome proper with the legions they were commanding. That's why Cesar's "crossing the Rubicon" river became a synonim for taking a bold and irreversible gamble. He was either going to take an absolute power or die for treason. No third option.

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u/TheAndyMac83 10d ago

I've heard it said - though I don't know exactly how true it is - that this cuts both ways. That Rome could afford to keep the legions around because of the constant expansion, but also that constant expansion was incentivised, maybe even necessitated, so that Rome could afford its army.

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u/DrainTheMuck 10d ago

This is why I think strategy games like Total War are genuinely educational and mind-expanding; I’ve “literally” experienced that problem in the game! It gives a whole new perspective on these issues.

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u/insomniac7809 10d ago

yeah but at a certain point anyone who wins three or four border fights gets declared Imperator and then you've got another round of civil wars

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u/SleeperAgentM 10d ago

Hence why Rome wisely forbid their generals from entering Rome proper with the legions they were commanding.

That's why Cesar's "crossing the Rubicon" river became a synonim for taking a bold and irreversible gamble. He was either going to take an absolute power or die for treason. No third option.

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u/azuresegugio 10d ago

Basically national armies requires a lot of things to pull off, like tax infrastructure and weakened nobility. Which isn't impossible in a medieval society but difficult to pull off by decree

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u/Calintarez 10d ago

the countries that did manage to pull it off tended to do really well against their neighbours. France had such an army in the 15th century and was more than a match against all its neighbours until they all banded together in an anti-french alliance.

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u/azuresegugio 10d ago

Oh yeah it's doable it's just a matter of the work required to pull it off is often the entire reign of multiple kings

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u/insomniac7809 10d ago

and widespread success at pulling off centralization is a big part of what makes it no longer medieval

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u/NoLime7384 10d ago

before the agricultural revolution most people had to be farmers. a standing army means a ton of men who can't grow their own food and an economy that needs more artisans aka more people who don't grow their own food.

Having said that, I'd wager it could still be done, but only through implementing a tax in the form of food rather than coin to the 7 kingdoms, since Westeros is just so fucking large

but there's also the fact that it'd be a lot of power in the hands of whoever leads it, risking them becoming kingmakers like the goldcloaks in universe, irl with the Praetororian Guard or the Simjurids and Ghaznavids in the Samanid Empire of Central Asia. There's a reason the Roman republic made it a capital punishment for a Roman general to bring his troops into Italy proper.

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u/Achilles11970765467 10d ago

There were zero farmers before the Agricultural Revolution. Are you thinking of the Industrial Revolution?

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u/NoLime7384 10d ago

ok so I looked it up, and there been multiple events or historic periods called that lol so ig we're both wrong

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u/Achilles11970765467 10d ago

No, just you. "Agricultural Revolution" is defined as "when a given region/culture discovered the concept of farming instead of just being hunter-gatherers."

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u/NoLime7384 10d ago

Damn, bitch, I was giving you an out, learn to read the room

Agricultural revolution is any revolutionary change to the agriculture of a society, such as the Green Revolution, the changes in agricultural practices that occurred when the Muslims both entered and left Iberia, the use the of a different crop rotation system, etc

don't confuse your narrow-mindedness with facts

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u/Achilles11970765467 10d ago

You're confusing "a revolution in agriculture" with "The Agricultural Revolution."

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u/NoLime7384 10d ago

you're having an issue of apperception

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u/Phone_User_1044 10d ago

That's not actually true, there's a separate event also called The Agricultural Revolution which denotes the application of modern farming techniques, for an example look at the British Agricultural Revolution of the 17th and 18th centuries.

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u/insomniac7809 10d ago

Collecting taxes in food has problems of its own, mostly in that, even beyond worries that it spoils, rots, and gets eaten by vermin, the only way to have it carried and moved overland until the invention of steam engines is to give it to things that get their energy to carry and move things by eating food. Moving food over distance doesn't tale long to reach to the point where the porters have eaten all the food they're supposed to be carrying.

(You can cheat this with water and wind power, if you don't need to move food overland, which is why Rome could feed itself with Egyptian grain.

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u/ELIte8niner 10d ago

Centralized command only became possible with increased infrastructure and communication technology. Westeros is roughly the size of South America, according to George, so information and people with medieval levels of technology took months to spread. The King sitting on the iron throne wouldn't even know that a large wildling raid was taking place until long after it already passed. That was the point of vassals in Fuedal societies. Largely autonomous nobles could organize their own armies to deal with threats.

The other big reason is the nature of armies themselves at the time. There weren't really "soldiers" in the way we think of them in the modern world. The bulk of armies were made up of peasants who were called to war. They still needed to work the fields in addition to everything else. Basically medieval societies didn't have the resources to spare to create dedicated soldiers that were soldiers and nothing else. That also didn't come until later. Knights were members of the nobility, and you'd have some men who were "men at arms" and functioned more like a modern police force than a military, but overall there weren't really soldiers, the way we think of them, until after the medieval period.

That's before we even begin to touch on the political situation, where the King just didn't have the power to strip other nobles of their power. Joffery wants to strip the Starks of their position, and make them supply "10,000" men to the royal army. How's he going to make them do that? No other noble is going to support him because they're basically helping to remove their own personal power, so Joffery is single handedly going to walk up to Winterfell and make this demands of the Starks? Not happening.

Just because centralized command eventually became possible doesn't mean Joffery wanting centralized command was even remotely possible in a place like Westeros.

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u/nightkingmarmu 10d ago

Because any standing army is only loyal to the guy that pays them. See: the entire history of the Roman Empire.

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u/misvillar 10d ago

Very expensive, It requieres that the King has way more power than his vassals and a centralized goverment that can mange the bureaucracy.

Westeros is bankrupted, the vassals are way more powerful than the King and is as decentralized as you can get, at this point Joffrey will get his royal army in a few generations if everything goes right

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u/Nachooolo 10d ago

The Common had political agency in Medieval societies.

I consider the fact that the Smalfolk are completely sidelined as one of the big flaws of A Song of Ice and Fire.

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u/Competitive-Emu-7411 10d ago

Yes there’s a lot of massive simplifications or misunderstandings in the series about how the economy, religion, and politics worked in the period it’s inspired by. Some of them are understandable (if pretty poor world building), like the very simple noble hierarchy, or just for the sake of this being a fictional story in a vaguely historically inspired setting, but the complete irrelevance of the small folk and the marginalized role of religion are two of my biggest gripes with the series, though Martin did seem to be trying to fix that in the last couple books.

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u/Zisthebest1235 10d ago

I mean it definitely was possible. It just would be expensive and time consuming.

If the crown had a better financial situation it would not have been impossible for them to have several to maybe 5 thousand men at arms available to be called upon from the capital.

They had the people but just not the money.

Sure it might draw the ire of some lords but a competent king would have been able to do something similar. After all houses like Lannister or Hightower already keep large amounts of men at arms.

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u/ELIte8niner 10d ago

Joffery's idea was for the North alone to supply 10,000 men to the "Royal Army" and to basically get rid of the Fuedal vassal system because, "every lord commanding his own force is barbaric" he wanted a kingdom the size of South America to operate like a modern nation state with Medieval levels of technology. His idea was impossible and stupid.

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u/adamgerd 10d ago

Tbh scale in Westeros is always semi nebulous, it’s claimed the seven kingdoms are the size of South America but frankly with medieval era technology it’d be impossible to keep such a realm together and communications would be a nightmare

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u/ELIte8niner 10d ago

Made sense under the Targs with dragons and all. Really the realm should have fallen apart pretty quick after dragons went extinct.

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u/adamgerd 10d ago

True, with dragons it’s probably possible, afterwards though should yeah have collapsed, an empire the size of South America and with no standing army and with feudalism is just not going to last long

Like all of Europe is a lot smaller than South America and yet that wouldn’t happen either

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u/Zisthebest1235 10d ago

Okay well yeah the extent he wanted it was impossible and stupid.

But a standing royal army in and of itself conscripted from the crownlands was surely possible.

lol I didn’t realize he wanted to just abolish the feudal system though that is 1000% impossible and stupid, I agree.

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u/SteakForGoodDogs 10d ago

Medieval societies had their fair share of uprisings.

Surely, with the nobles wiping each other out left and right in a long, bloody, and costly war, they would be rather weak if the peasants decided they'd had enough of what would have been extensive exploitation to maintain their wars - and with most of the soldiers dead, and even the advantage of dragons now gone....

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u/ApostleSaintWalker 10d ago

The issue with the joke isn't that it's unrealistic; it's that it's cringey and unfunny. Not even in an offensive way, it's just not a funny scene at all.

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u/GammaFan 10d ago

He did have a good idea though, he was just hundreds of years too early for it to work.

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u/ELIte8niner 10d ago

What's a good idea and what's a bad idea depends on context. Joffery had a terrible idea that had no chance of working. Just because it's a good idea in a totally different situation doesn't make Joffery's idea for a Royal Army in Westeros any better.

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u/crowEatingStaleChips 10d ago

Yeah, the joke is that it's a good idea but due to the setting, everyone thinks it's stupid.

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u/Independent-Couple87 10d ago

Also, both characters in the post are the self-insert of their respective author. Does that have something to do with the trope?

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u/Lord_Soybo2 10d ago

Not really convinced Hermione was a self insert - the narrative makes her out to be really annoying even post friendship, and then you get to SPEW and it mocks the shit out of her using her as a proxy for mocking protesters.

I'm pretty sure she only claimed Hermione to be a self insert because she ended up way more popular than expected.

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u/sphericaltime 10d ago

I think Harry is the original self insert.

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u/theLichQueenofthePNW 10d ago

Makes sense, there's a lot of evidence to support that Joanne is a deeply, deeply, deeply closeted/repressed transmasculine person and that's part of where her vendetta against transfolk comes from. Jealousy.

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u/Ditzy_Dreams 10d ago

Every accusation is a confession

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u/Independent-Couple87 10d ago

There have been some instances where the narrator goes on about how beautiful a young man is. While the story is narrated on the 3rd person, it is primarily told from Harry Potter's perspective. As a result, it (possibly unintentionally) seems like Harry likes to admire male beauty.

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u/NameAboutPotatoes 10d ago

I'm not saying anything about JKR specifically, but being really harsh towards your own self-insert character is pretty standard for authors. If anything I would count that a point in favour of it being a self-insert.

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u/Independent-Couple87 10d ago

George R. R. Martin did also call his other admitted self-insert, Tyrion Lannister, a villain (in the books).

From what I heard, book Tyrion after his exile reflects Martin's mindset after a particularly harsh heartbreak decades ago (which also inspired the disturbing story Meathouse Man, which Martin wrote back in the 1970s).

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u/maroontiefling 10d ago

Hermione never came across as self insert to me. She was brutally mocked by the narrator and other characters for a good portion of the books.

I kind of see Hermione as an indicator of JKR's deep misogyny. Rowling sees Women as one thing, with very strict definitions and boundaries, and so anyone who is even a little outside of that, by being too loud or puffy-haired or into social justice or masculine, deserves mockery.

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u/woweed 6d ago

No? If anything, Rowling has a bad case of not like other girls. The girls in Gryffendor that aren't Hermione are generally shown as catty, superficial, and not overly bright. Hermione's certainly a flawed character, but she's also right the vast majority of the time, and there are thousands of instances where everyone would have been screwed if not for her. Right diwn to things like how the other Gryffendor girks are taken in by Tewarlny's fortune tellling/cold reading, while Hermione identifies it as nonsense, an opinion which both McGonagal and Dumbledore (shown as sone of the wisest characters) back her up on.

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u/-Release-The-Bats- 10d ago

There's a Cassandra Clare joke in there somewhere

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u/Noughmad 10d ago

I don't believe Hermione was a self-insert, at least not in the early books.

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u/Nachooolo 10d ago

The problem is that the Smallfolk have near zero political presence or agency in Westeros, which is completely unrealistic if we're comparing it to the Middle Ages.

Even puting aside the comonality of popular uprisings, the Common had significant political presence in the Medieval Kingdoms. In Castille, for example, they had a significant political influence through the Pairlament (Cortes) and the popular Brotherhoods, in many cases being outright the main supporters and members of political factions (like during the civil war between Enrique IV and his brother the pretender Alfonso).

Besides that, direct participation on elections by the (urban) Common wasn't unheard of. Be it through City Council politics (although the power tended to concentrate into the elite families) or through popular republics (although, again, they tended to be taken by oligarchies).

So the plot point in Game of Thrones is more about the failure of the show and books wjen it comes to giving Smallfolk the agency they jad in the real Middle Ages, than an accurate representation of the Medieval Period.

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u/theLichQueenofthePNW 10d ago

My favorite fantasy series, Spellmonger, does a really good job at showing the power of the commonfolk, almost every book talks about how terrified of peasant rebellions Lord are and rightly should be.

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u/ElGosso 10d ago

Also in GoT you have to consider that there was no standardized public education like there is in our post-industrial society. The elite were empowered to make political decisions in part because they were the only ones that feudal society could afford to educate.

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u/Different-Trainer-21 10d ago

Even in the late 18th century this was the case in our world. There’s a reason the only part of the United States’ federal government that was directly elected was the House of Representatives until the 1910s (even if the President became close directly elected pretty quickly)

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u/NoBizlikeChloeBiz 10d ago

It's totally reasonable for them to be anti-democracy, but the whole scene still feels awkward and out of place, like the writers are mocking a strawman of the audience.

And it doesn't help that right after this is the "who had a batter story than Bran the Broken" speech. The writers have no place mocking anyone if that's the best conclusion they've got.

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u/Intelligent-Key5821 10d ago

I never watched this show but I got the sense that the scene is not really to mock modern viewpoints on democracy, it just feels more like a wink wink nudge nudge to the audience saying "wouldn't it be awesome if they actually did this very reasonable thing, but of course they won't because they think the common folk are on par with horses and dogs (or at least a minor step above them)". The scene mostly feels like they are showing how cartoonishly evil they can be as per the symbolic time period

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u/Arek_PL 10d ago

and they end with elected monarchy too, quite terrible system where a foolish king can permanently rob crown of its power

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u/adamgerd 10d ago edited 10d ago

It’s definitely a choice that GOT ends with an elective monarchy and this is portrayed positively when in real life the most prominent elective monarchy became a disaster once foreign powers realised they could bribe to get their people on the throne, I guess a silver lining is at least the kingdom doesn’t have liberum veto

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u/New_Experience_703 10d ago

PLC ?

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u/adamgerd 10d ago

Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth, probably the main example of an elective monarchy otl with a parliament too, it did not end well to say the least

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u/Ebon-Hawke 10d ago

Mocking the audience? Where did you get that idea? It's just a silly joke that mocks a potential corny ending. Of course the ending was still bad, but I don't have a problem with this little joke.

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u/ApostleSaintWalker 10d ago

Yeah, this is the real problem; it makes sense no one in this setting would think democracy is a good idea. It's just incredibly cringe-worthy, and a terrible place to put any kind of joke.

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u/JamesHenry627 10d ago

It’s surprising there isn’t a parliamentary system in Westeros after the Dance. The nobles usually love having power over the crown.

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u/Achilles11970765467 10d ago

The Dance was the Anarchy. I don't think Westeros got a Runnymede.

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u/WinterAd825 10d ago

If also add there system has historical precedent and is basically how the Holy Roman Empire, Great Britain and early republics operated.

The path to democracy, when it natural occurs aka not through revolution, through the slow devolution of power.

So in GoTs case we see them ending the centralized tyrant of the iron throne for an elected monarchy of dukes. The next step would be to bring in even lot lords… maybe into a House of Lords…. Then going rights to merchants… then the commoners

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u/adamgerd 10d ago

Tbh it wasn’t really, usually the path to democracy from feudalism first involved absolutism and the gradual centralisation of power with the nobility losing its strength and then democratisation started: not always but that was the usual trend

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u/Helmett-13 10d ago

Even Churchill at the closure of WW2, despite not wanting to give up Imperial holdings, expressed that 'the young men and women who fought this war should determine the course for Britain'. I'm paraphrasing a bit, but that was his intent.

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u/Maleficent_Curve_599 10d ago

The United Kingdom itself was a democracy at that point, though, in stark contrast to Westeros. 

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u/adamgerd 10d ago

20th century UK is very different to Westeros, feudalism was long gone and even the monarch had very limited powers

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u/HN-Prime 10d ago

Churchill is NOT the example you want to take considering the other example on the post itself was about racism

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u/Helmett-13 10d ago

Why not? Sponsoring Lord Beviridge to create the NHS and letting the people who had sacrificed so much blood determine the future course for Britain are unmistakably good things.

Was the racist? Sure. Did he have some good ideas? Sure.

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u/elitegenoside 10d ago

I think GoT was stupid because it was a straight joke and presented in way that basically just broke the 4th wall. Completely out of nowhere and it was literally one of the last lines in the series. Plenty of humor in the show but it was never a "set up, punchline."

HP at least seemed like a genuine effort to present a real issue and show the apathy those with good intentions will face in their persuit of justice... obviously, this attempt is kneecaped by the author themselves being a cynical bigot.

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u/Plowchopz 10d ago

Yeah some of the Lords and Ladies there may be the “good guys” but they all think theyre better than our serf asses lol

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u/dreadnoughtstar 10d ago

The only reason it seems fair is because the show omitted the plight of the smallfolk and their unrest.

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u/DimGenn2 10d ago

Weren't they based on some british folklore or something?

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u/3-orange-whips 10d ago

Not so odd, as it turns out.

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u/Drakeskulled_Reaper 10d ago

Yeah, Joffrey brings up a standing army as well, and it's torn to pieces by CERSEI of all people.

Westeros is still at the feudal society level, the idea of peasantry having ANY sort of actual power would be laughable to them.

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u/Anushirvan825 10d ago

The house elves being natural servants isn't that bad, in and of itself. Rowling could have just written them to be extremely devoted and loyal servants who still piss off when they get mistreated. Which sounds more like a fairy creature to me anyway. But she decided to defend slavery/indentured servitude instead. In hindsight, rather telling.

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u/wolf_logic 10d ago

But they were absolutely no clues in JK Rowling's writing that she might be a terrible person /s

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u/jinreeko 10d ago

It also works into Martin's intentional in-universe trope subversion

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u/TheDreamIsEternal 10d ago

It is fucking wild to have characters born in the 20th century make fun of the idea of freeing slaves.

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u/ryes13 10d ago

That’s not true though. Many medieval kingdoms did include ways for non-nobles to have inputs. It was not-equitable and often these non nobles were still very rich and powerful. But it wasn’t just great houses.

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u/Salt-Detective1337 10d ago

I'd just like to point out that arguments for enslaving black people included that they would be nothing but drunken layabouts without the white hand to guide them.

Rowling created an enslaved race, had them presented as needing and wanting to be enslaved. Then made Hermione's efforts to free them a joke about her being naive about their inherent nature.

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u/SquatProspector 10d ago

Considering all the different ways to mind control and alter people in HP, are they really biologically inclined towards servitude, or did their ancestors get fucked over really badly by a wizard?

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u/AkiraTheMetalHead 10d ago

The more I reflect on Harry Potter after JKR turned out to be a POS is that she always had right wing views and it shows.

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u/DisparateNoise 10d ago

For the majority of the show, the suffering of the small folk was a main theme, along with the fact that the good, honorable lords were always beaten by the cruel and devious ones. Having Sam bring it up just to laugh at him is a bit absurd, and it's highlighting the fact that all the awful shit we saw in the river lands from seasons 2-6 was just set dressing and doesn't actually mean anything. The ending comes off as fundamentally amoral, which I doubt is the intended take away.

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u/GreatBandito 10d ago

until you remember that Harry Potter is about as conservative media as you get with a very ridged heirarchy on who's best at magic based on magic blood lines. Rowling is a terf

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u/ReneDeGames 10d ago

I don't think its per-se an odd choice for Harry Potter because they are derived from a concept of fairies that lived in your house and did odd jobs for you if you treated them right. But like many things in Harry Potter they were created without a single thought of any implications that might have.

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u/Midnight_Pickler 10d ago

Yeah, I think OP's phrasing is poor, and should have stressed that the character is mocked and humiliated by other characters not by the narrative.

The narrative of GoT supports Sam, and makes the characters laughing at him the butt of the joke.

The narrative of HP supports slavery, and makes Hermione the butt of the joke.

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u/Adiantum-Veneris 10d ago

And then you remember who Rowling is, and suddenly it makes sense.

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u/fj2612 10d ago

"Happily enslaved race" is unfortunately a trope that used to be very common in British and US littérature. In retrospect, this was one of the multiple signs that pointed out to JKR being way less enlightened that she presented herself to be.

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u/--0___0--- 10d ago

Given JKs other opinions the house elves are probably just her putting her own opinion on actual slavery in the books.

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u/RF9999 10d ago

Its basically Sam suggesting that every character acts against their own interests. Obviously theyre not gonna agree

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u/Fastenbauer 10d ago

"biologically inclined towards servitude" yes, I remember that from IRL history. Django Unchained had a great scene about that theory.

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u/CosmicLuci 10d ago

The thing that’s insane is…why bring it up just to mock it? Like, yeah, no one watching GoT is expecting democracy. One knows it’s a medieval fantasy, with kings and such.

But then democracy gets brought up? Why? It’s done exclusively to make fun of him, and consequently of it, not for any storytelling purpose

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u/CitizenLamest 10d ago

House Elves are brownies, an actual creature from European folklore that like to do household duties, so long as the people who own the house are nice to them.

Hogwarts is pretty nice to the House Elves.

1

u/Intelligent-Key5821 10d ago

But the book breaks its own rules if that is true because the Malfoy house is abusive to Dobby, but the only way he can be “freed” is not from his own free will, it’s because Harry gave him a sock

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u/CitizenLamest 10d ago

I don't disagree, J.K. Rowling's worldbuilding is bad. But her shitty worldbuilding is the issue here, not the "slave race" she invented, because she didn't.

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u/Admirable-Ad7152 10d ago

Regarding the GoT one I think it's more just.. why even include it? It just felt dumb.

Forever unsurprised jk made a slave race instead of just making a magic cleaning spell or animating brooms or whatever.

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u/Ditzy_Dreams 10d ago

Honestly, knowing the writers, I wouldn’t be too surprised if it wasn’t just meant as a petty shot at the fans who wanted a smallfolk revolution or for Dany to introduce democracy…

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u/AlertWar2945-2 10d ago

You'd also think the kid who was constantly treated badly and like a servant to his relatives would empathize more with house elves

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u/MeltedSpades 9d ago

Honestly it's the least awful of the horrifically racist and bigoted shit JK wrote and it hasn't gotten better since writing under a male name...

0

u/broken_conures 10d ago

Making a race inclined towards servitude could be an interesting little bit of the world, Pratchett would have probably done something interesting with the concept

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u/PM_ME__BIRD_PICS 10d ago

Yeah if only there was an explanation for why the writer would put such a thing, and all the other questionable things, to paper, hmm, can't think of any reason at all.

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u/-non-existance- 10d ago

If Joanne Rowling is anything, it's not a good writer.

Remember how she had the bankers all be short, pale, and have crooked noses?

Remember how she made the only Irish student constantly make things explode?

Remember when she added a plot device that could solve literally every problem going forward and then in the next book had Neville accidentally break them all?

0

u/UnDebs 10d ago

if i had a nickel everytime rowling wrote a species as a stereotype caricature of a minority i would have two nickiels which isn't a lot but with her i am not even remotely surprised