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lagosbratzdoll · 7 months

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On Daenerys, Colonisation and Race Discourse within the ASOIAF Fandom

This has been on my mind for a good long while and honestly, as much as I would like to leave discourse in the pits, it has been bugging me intermittently over the past few weeks.

Far too many of you get on here and call people who like the fictional dragon-riding family, neo-Nazis and that sentiment is so prevalent, that white people feel comfortable telling me a black woman that I am a neo-Nazi for rooting for Daenerys Targaryen. I am upholding neo-Nazi power fantasies for wanting to see a little girl live at the end of a story. I am a neo-Nazi for wanting to see the rape survivor have the family she aches for and children with the man (or men) she loves.

Then, those same people go on spiels about how the systemic erasure of those who sing the song of the earth and other old races is not colonialism. That their removal from their home is not displacement but an agreement between two equal parties. The fact that the only place where those who sing the song of the earth exist in the present timeline is north of the wall, surrounded by the bones of their dead, is not a travesty. That the expulsion of the old races from their home isn't that bad and should not be condemned.

Instead, people argue, completely seriously, that the harm that the First Men and Andals have caused is centuries in the past, so essentially the slate has been wiped clean. The logical leaps that are required to arrive at such a boneheaded conclusion are truly mind-boggling, and those who make such arguments are not good people.

I am unsure how one could read those books and come away with the impression that the old races do not mourn the loss of their home. I am unsure how one could read The Last of the Giants[1] and Ygritte’s reaction to both the song and Jon’s dismissal of the ethnic cleansing of the giants then believe that the old races and the free folk have moved past their displacement.

In Westeros, from the Wall to the broken arm of Dorne, they all speak one language despite the fact they are all different ethnicities and they all landed on the shores at different times. That is not the case in Essos, we have been introduced to at least six languages and in A Dance with Dragons, Tyrion notes that the Valyrian spoken in the Free Cities has evolved into nine distinct dialects, and they are well on their way to becoming different languages.

How would a continent as large and diverse as Westeros maintain its hegemony over the people if not for forced assimilation, discriminatory practices and violence? The brutal repression required to keep one house in power for thousands of years is nothing to sniff at. The suppression required to keep the vast majority of Westeros worshipping one (or seven) gods. The systems in place ensure that language does not grow or evolve amongst the highborns at least.

Centuries before Aegon's Landing the maesters were the definitive educational authority and even now centuries after, nothing has changed. The grey rats still decide who learns what and when they learn it. There's one in every highborn home, all correspondence passes through them, they are the healers and the councillors.

The circular logic gets even more blockheaded when you factor in the fact that Daenerys is far from the only white character in the books. She is not the only character who wishes for home. She is not the only character who draws strength from her ancestors, her bloodline and her magical creatures.

Cersei draws strength from her family’s iconography, and the Stark children (Jon included) all draw strength from their direwolves, their home and their blood. Sansa, Arya and Bran wish to return home and their home was built on the indiscriminate murder and displacement of the indigenous peoples. Their home is built on centuries of rape, murder, exclusionary practices and sexual slavery.

However, if we give the nonsensical argument that time erases crimes air; the Starks, Lannisters and Tullys are warring to settle personal grievances in the present timeline. As a consequence of that war, thousands (a modest guesstimate) of small folk, minor nobles and even some major ones have been raped, tortured, maimed and killed.

Despite all this, no one writes meta after meta about how Sansa and her siblings must surely die for justice to be had for those who sing the song of the earth, the free folk, the giants and all the old races that fled beyond the wall.

People write meta about Cersei and how she must die, but those are typically more misogynistic nature. They typically argue that she must die not for the “crime” of being Lannister, but for the “crime” of being Cersei and “ruining” Jamie.

I would not mind criticisms of Dany and her peace-focused approach to ending slavery because the approach is naïve and she gives the slavers far too much ground. However, she is learning, growing and self-critiquing. At the end of A Dance with Dragons, she has decided to embrace fire and blood, her knight is breaking the false peace which is a necessary step forward.

What I find offensive is people saying that she should have planned better before she abolished slavery. And that the death, violence, and sickness that arises from her quest to eradicate slavery is somehow worse than the death, violence, and sickness that already existed in Slaver’s Bay.

This argument often downplays the horrific conditions and suffering that exist(ed) under the slave system in Slaver's Bay. Such arguments are often in poor taste and prioritise the lives and comforts of the slavers more than the people they have enslaved.

I would not mind criticisms of Dany if people applied that same critique even-handedly. The same people who believe that Jon and Bran have done much to rectify the evil that their ancestors perpetuated believe that Dany has not done anything to right the wrongs of her ethnic kin. They praise them for the non-existent steps that they have taken, but in the same breath, they condemn Dany for not being able to immediately end the plague that is slavery.

It is perfectly alright to not like fictional characters, no law requires you to like certain fictional characters over others. However, what is not right is making broad accusations about those who do, it is beyond the pale. It is disgusting, and annoying, and trivialises real-world issues to score cheap points against fictional characters.

Equating the survival of a teenage survivor to the restoration of a fascist house or neo-Nazi power fantasy when such designations do not exist in the world of ice and fire is strange behaviour. Saying that the teenage survivor will eventually be manipulated and raped (again) before ending up dead on her manipulator's blade is also strange behaviour.

Dismissing the horrors of colonialism, especially when the text shows you that the involved parties are still affected by it, is not normal and often veers into real-world imperialism apologia. While criticism and analysis of characters and their actions are valid and even encouraged, it is essential that we do not resort to sweeping generalisations about other people and that we keep criticisms of characters grounded in the text.

[1]

Ooooooh, I am the last of the giants, my people are gone from the earth.

The last of the great mountain giants, who ruled all the world at my birth

Oh, the smallfolk have stolen my forests, they’ve stolen my rivers and hills.

And they’ve built a great wall through my valleys, and fished all the fish from my rills

In stone halls they burn their great fires, in stone halls they forge their sharp spears.

Whilst I walk alone in the mountains, with no true companion but tears.

They hunt me with dogs in the daylight, they hunt me with torches by night.

For these men who are small can never stand tall, whilst giants still walk in the light.

Oooooooh, I am the LAST of the giants, so learn well the words of my song.

For when I am gone the singing will fade, and the silence shall last long and long.

#I do not like most of y’all.#Do not call people of colour you do not know neonazis to win points against a fictional character.#It is not my fault that most of your faves are boring and do nothing to drive the plot forward #take it up with george rr martin and stop villifying dany and her (mid) family.#The insistence that we must mind fandom etiqutte is tired as hell too especially because people use it as silencing tools.#“Yes I called you a neonazi but you are the real weirdo for finding my post so really it’s on you that you saw that.”#that’s how y’all sound.#If I see another post that equates enjoying dany to being a neonazi #i will make it everybodys problem.#Took a long break from this fandom because the rancid takes were overshadowing the good takes #and i’ve been back less than a year and the takes are even more rancid than before.#hotd opened an evil door that should’ve remained shut.#Cause why the fuck are there criston cole apologists? Why are there aemond and aegon ii apologists? It is a dark world we live in.#put the last giant at the bottom for my homies who have not read the books which if we're speaking real is more than half of y'all #now that i have gotten this out of my system #it is time to get back to demon slayer #daenerys targaryen #asoiaf #asoiaf thoughts #asoiaf nonsense #if you saw the typos in the first version #no you didn't #edited this to add some thoughts I originally put in the tags because I felt it worked better there.

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daenystheedreamer · 1 year

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Sometimes i get so confused when i see the general asoiaf fans agree with the ‘targaryens are inhumanly beautiful, they r like a different race above everyone else’ im like babes thats their blood purism propoganda, its a lie they tell themselves and everyone else to justify their incest and position of power.

exactly. all you dumb motherfuckers are the halfwit peasants who swallowed targraryen exceptionalism propaganda hook line and sinker. me however i was the drunk failed maester at the tavern ranting about targ eugenics and valyrian ethnic supremacy and how the reptilian government is trying to brainwash you. and they silenced me! the septons (PAID FOR BY THE TARGARYENS!!) burned me at the damn stake.

#just fucking. reinventing race science #theyre doing eugenics eye colour charts! theyre gonna do skull bumps soon #guys actually being valyrian gives you a predisposition towards greatness :/ the first men brow bone shows theyre a melancholy race #ask #anonymous #asoiaf

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victoriadallonfan · 2 months

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If you were to SI Parian into A Song of Ice and Fire (a la Her's Is The Fury) how would you do so while keeping her ethnicity??

I admit, I think this is a bit of an odd question. There are non-white characters in ASOIAF, even in Westeros (unless you listen to the “fans” who have issues with the Dornish and Velaryons having darker skin)

If you’re asking how I’d handle her identity issues and such, as close to her canon trigger event as possible, I’d probably make her family be smallfolk who had grandparents that immigrated from the Free Cities or elsewhere across the sea. Or just make her come from a Dorne family. Lots of other options from other cities and nations.

Parian is a neat character for ASOIAF though. She isn’t like Victoria or Brian, who involve themselves in conflict out of moral/pragmatic reasons. Parian is very much someone who just wants to get by and not have her boat rocked, so to speak, but found herself forced into the role of fighter and protector in Worm.

In ASOIAF, she’d probably discover her power and become a street magician for extra coin, practicing her sewing arts like in canon. I could see an amusing instance of her being called to Kings Landing because of her skill.

Kind of funny to imagine naive, business centric Parian, hoping to strike it big in King’s Landing while all the schemes and machinations play out around her

#parahumans #wildbow #ward #ward web serial #worm #wardblr #worm web serial #wormblr #Parian #ASOIAF #a song of ice and fire #crossover #fanfiction #fanfic #crossover fanfiction

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agentrouka-blog · 3 months

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I am unfollowing you, but it's not because of your Hazbin Hotel posts. I'm unfollowing because you have reblogged from posters who, whether intentionally or not, continue to conflate the ongoing criticism of Israel with antisemitism. As if it is antisemitism alone that drives criticism of a nation bombing civilians and openly discussing ethnic cleansing as the end goal of their campaign.

Acting like the flagrant abuse of human right is only not okay because of who is doing it is morally backwards. It ignores how deeply engrained and vocal our politics and politicians are in this abuse, and the difference between being witness and now being a forced participant effects our response.

While antisemitism certainly plays a part in the discourse around Israel and Gaza, white supremacists are just as capable of Islamophobia and antisemitism. Holocaust deniers will still stand up for Israel because of their own warped evangelical faith. Their support for Israel doesn't make them less bigoted.

Nationalistic movements that tie religious and ethnic identities to citizenship and civil rights do not become less abusive because the people behind them were once the persecuted.

I'm terribly sad my ASOIAF blog will no longer be able to provide you with the very best of Hazbin Hotel fandom content. 😬

As for the rest, you clearly haven't really engaged with the posts I have reblogged, and if you think my occasional reblogs of posts criticizing the very real rise in antisemitism worldwide (i.e. against Jewish people no matter where they live) are signaling some kind of approval of war crimes? Well, I can't help you there. I hope you get better. But clearly we're not a good match at this point.

#antisemitism #excellent copypaste skills #🙃

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rosaluxembae · 1 year

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One thing I want from TWOW and ADOS is more Sandy Dornishman rep. I like the design choice of an ethnically diverse Dorne but it feels a bit like it's mentioned and then forgotten about (the Orphans of the Greenblood are explored a bit which is cool tbf), especially Sandy Dornishmen who don't really turn up at all.

#asoiaf #grrm #dorne #twow #ados #sandy Dornishmen #ethnicity in asoiaf #dornishmen #dornish #orphans of the Greenblood

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diamondperfumes · 9 months

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Analysis on how Daenerys is the antithesis of Old Valyria, which somehow leads to the conclusion that her death is the rightful ending because it'll signify the "true end" of Valyria, is odd for two main reasons:

House Targaryen aren't the only ethnic Valyrians left in the world. In Westeros there is still House Velaryon and House Celtigar. In Essos there are countless ethnic Valyrians, a diaspora spread across Lys, Volantis, Myr, Tyrosh, Pentos, Qohor, and Lorath. Volantis fashions itself as the inheritor of the Valyrian legacy. And even if Dany defeats the Old Blood of Volantis (which I believe she will), ethnic Valyrians aren't going to drop dead just because Dany dies. (Whether the idea that all Valyrians should die is truly progressive is a question I leave up to fans––personally, I think GRRM depicts the Westerosi murdering Rego Draz after blaming him for the spread of The Shivers, during Jaehaerys I's reign, and the Westerosi alienating Larra Rogare of Lys, prompting her to leave her husband and children, as bad things––but even logistically and practically speaking, Dany is not the "last Valyrian.")

What is a "progressive" culture in Westeros? Braavos, a capitalist city, seems to be the only place that fits the ASOIAF fandom's standards of progressiveness. I suppose Dorne does too, if fans steadfastly ignore all the ways George problematizes that (which fans tend to, at least on here). Most, if not all, the cultures and ethnic groups depicted in Planetos have perpetuated a combination of slavery, conquest, genocide, mass murder, wars for dominion over the land, feudal casteism, exploitation of the commoners, and of course, patriarchy. Can fans even identify concrete "progressive" traits of the different Westerosi regions, from the North to the Iron Islands to the Westerlands to the Stormlands to the Riverlands to the Crownlands to the Vale? If the idea is that Daenerys has to die to put a rest to the oppression of Valyrian culture, which cultures are left that inherit a progressive mantle?

Again I don't have a grand conclusion to this post. Consider these as questions to ponder over.

#daenerys targaryen #asoiaf #my discourse

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ladyofthebears · 2 months

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Boundaries for my page:

PLEASE READ BEFORE FOLLOWING AND INTERACTING

ASOIAF:

I fully believe that the first men are meant to be representative of indigenous people. If you dont agree with my thoughts, thats fine but do not insult what i believe or come onto my page to say any form of racist comment about it. I will block you immediately.

I fancast my fic and cast in the same way that the Brandy Cinderella casting director operated meaning, if a characters race is important to that characters story and experience, they will specifically be that race, otherwise, I cast whomever i believe fits the image in my head, no matter what race or ethnic background they may have. If you say hateful things about this or who I cast due to their culture or background, you will be blocked.

I also think this fandom is horribly anti- black and I will call you on it and block you if i believe you are stating said hateful views. (I mean anti black as in anti black people and using characters like Laena, Baela, and Rhaena as torture porn or pawns because of their blackness and being women.)

I am team Black but I am anti abuser in everyway, meaning not only am I anti Aegon ii, Aemond, Daeron, Otto, and Viserys, I am also staunchly anti Daemon. I am willing to have civilised discourse about the dance, but will block you if you try to justify any abuse performed by any characters or celebrate said abuse. This includes people who rejoice at the “Bastard blood” line or think the Velayron boys death was justified. This includes people who fantasise about torturing or assualting any characters but specifically the children in HOTD. This ESPECIALLY includes people who rejoice at Blood and Cheese. You will be blocked and I will not be sorry for it.

I know a lot of asoif lore but have not read the books due to my own CPTSS diagnosis and due to the triggering material in said books. If i make a mistake lore wise, please kindly let me know and I will fix it post haste.

I am not here to fight with people on my take of the book or shows. I will tell you my opinion, and if you wish to discuss yours and why you think that way, and can do so kindly, i will gladly talk to you. But at the end of the day, when i post my opinion, I am merely doing so to have an outlet on which to voice my thoughts in a way I am not able to in real life due to my not having many irl friends who have seen hotd or got.

Not Fandom related:

I am pro Palestine and find the unneeded killing of any innocent life deplorable. I am not here to argue about my political views. If you post any kind of hateful, islamphobic, or palestinian phobic comments under my posts, I will block you.

Overall:

If you post or reply with any Homophobic, Racist, Misogynistic, or any generally hateful thing under my posts, I will block you.

This is not up for discussion. My views are my own and if you find them to be harsh and unreasonable, feel free to block me and never interact with me again. I am here on Tumblr to interact with people from the fandom and to get my fanfic out there. I am not here to validate that people deserve to live even if they are different because that should go without saying. If you cannot respect my outlined boundaries, if you cannot be respectful to other people under my posts, if you cannot allow others to have different opinions then you on such trivial things as a made up world- please do not interact with me.

I know i have very few followers and most people rarely see my posts, but i do not care. These are things that are important to me and I feel if I am unable to speak them, I would be a hypocrite of the highest order. I hope to create a safe space on my page where peaceful and kind discussions can be had.

Much love

O’Leigh Fredericke

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sare11aa11eras · 1 year

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#asoiaf #valyrianscrolls #polls :)#asoiaf Discourse #how many examples of each of these can u find in official or wiki art: GO

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horizon-verizon · 1 year

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You are incredibly racist, GRRM himself has said that the closest equivalent of Dorne to the real world is the Moorish influences of Spain, and mentions PALESTINE and Wales as being two other influences. Literally his own words. Even in Game of Thrones, they filmed the Water Garden scenes in the Alcazar of Seville, a beautiful Moorish castle in Spain. That castle was literally built by Muslims and incorporates verses from the Quran and countless traditional Arabic and Islamic architectural elements. Fun fact: Alcázar comes from the Arabic word (al-qasr), meaning fort/castle/palace.

Dorne’s conquest by Nymeria parallels Spain’s conquest by the Moors. Nymeria Martell most obviously can be paralleled with Tariq Ibn Ziyyad, the Muslim Amazigh general hailing from Morocco that led the Muslim conquest of Spain on behalf of the Umayyad Caliphate, by crossing the Mediterranean sea and landing in Gibraltar. According to legend, Tariq Ibn Ziyyad burned his fleet before the Battle of Guadalete to prevent any of his troops from retreating back home. Who else burned their fleets to show commitment to their new conquest ? Nymeria Martell.

GRRM credits the “hot, dry” climate to being similar to that of Spain or Palestine’s, and that the mountains where the stony Dornishmen dwell being the equivalent to Wales. The Sandy Dornishmen are described to dwell in the deserts and along rivers, which is a descriptor that describes so many parts of West Asia (incorrectly called the “Middle East”) and North Africa. GRRM mentions Palestine, which has many streams and a very important river, the River of Jordan, as well as the Naqab region, a desert region of Palestine, therefore drawing parallels from the Sandy Dornishmen to the Palestinians is correct since Palestine is sandy, dusty, and dry. Finally, there’s a Stony Dornishmen, which GRRM equates to Wales.

*EDITED POST* (4/14/24)

I assume that this is the post you are responding to.

We must remember that the rules determining what racial group you are a part of is solely determined by the legal definitions of the created designations of "white", "mestizo", "Black", or whatever said society has created in their past and present. which is why when you travel, you sorta change race or have it "tweaked" to mean something else. In Westeros, there is not such legal, social, etc. concept of race that matches the modern U.S.A or any European definition. If you said Corlys was "Black", it would mean nothing to a Stark.

Race is also different from ethnicity or nationality: you can be Paelstinian Arab but or a Black American but be white passing enough to "become" white. You can be of East Asian descent and have monolids to be racialized as "Asian", but were born and partially raised in Germany (nationality) with the ethnicity of Uyghur.

Definitions of racism:

(Google) prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism by an individual, community, or institution against a person or people on the basis of their membership in a particular racial or ethnic group, typically one that is a minority or marginalized the belief that different races possess distinct characteristics, abilities, or qualities, especially so as to distinguish them as inferior or superior to one another (Merriam Webster) a belief that race is a fundamental determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race

This is from GRRM about "race" in ASoIaF and the Dornish:

Did GRRM ever actually say the words, "stony Dornish men are a completely different ethnic group from sandy or salty" or that "stony vs salty vs sandy Dornish people--apart from the nonDornish peoples' ways of categorizing them--are peoples with very different and maybe opposing customs the reflect in certain "laws" in Dorne"?

For the Martells and Dornishpeople to be PoCs exactly like the PoCs today in real life, there kinda has to be a history of a) the Dornish having been assimilated into Westerosi society/infrastructures and made subordinate to the "white" Westerosi b) actual systematic oppression against the Dornish from the nonDornish, and Dorne has been able to maintain its independence from Westeros pretty much since Westeros' inception. Even after Daeron II married Myriah Martell, the Martells and the Dornish still worked as their own principality rather than a region totally under the control of the Westerosi monarchy. There was no colonization or successful imperialist campaigns on Dorne. Like the Targs, Dorne is "queer" not for skin color nor religion so much as the Rhoynish traditions towards gender equity--at least regarding succession and leadership--and sexuality

I argued for how the Westerosi see the Dornish, which is not like how medieval EUs saw non-Christian Africans or Arabic-speaking Muslims. It is how Anglo Saxon Normans would have seen Spanish/Eu Mediterraneans. Watsonianly. This is a question of who are the people categorizing "race", and how is "race" categorized by those people.

There is tension b/t Stormlanders/Reachmen and the Dornish people (mostly Stony Dornishmen of the north) but it's hardly equivalent to what is known as "race". Not yet. Daeron I's categorization is a beginning, A PRECURSOR. With how Daeron II's subjects rebelled with a strong anti-Dornish sentiment (not enough misogyny [succession rules] & and a persistent sense of having court & office positions "taken" from the "local" nobles) the Otherness indicates a xenophobia but here is no concept of "white" or "PoC" anywhere.

I have also already addressed the whole stony vs salty vs sandy thing HERE and HERE. In both of those posts, I acknowledge that there are Islamic and Arabic inspirations for the creation of Dorne and I still recognize them there. And the Rhoynish (mot the Martells or any Dornish people) are definitely PoC. It's pretty obvious. But Dornish people--including the Martells--while descended from the Rhoynish and Rhoynisheness definitely determine how nonDornish perceive and identify Dornish people, are not racialized as today's PoCs are. They are closer to how Jewish, Spaniards, Mediterranean Europeans, and Southern European Europeans are racialized by Northwestern Europeans.

Those monikers Daeron I gave distinguished them based on appearance alone, hence the beginning of skin-color-race in terms of how much Rhoynish culture and blood mixed with the previous Andal-only people's, more of the Rhoynish cultural influence the more you go south and less when you go north. If you called a Wyl (example of a Dornish house of the north) anything something other than Dornish and just called them a "stony" Dornishman, I think they'd take offense.

Once again, when we see how the concept of race developed from religion to skin color, in Spain, you see that religion was the first way for medieval people to differentiate themselves into "races"--and when they used the word "race", they meant just "people from that region/religion/history", not necessarily people with such looks--more than skin color (though color was sometimes mentioned alongside, to identify, so as to say that this African was "safer").

Then there is the fact that there were intermarriages between Arabic-speaking, Muslims, Africans to be called "Moors" (a word from Christian Europeans of the pale variety, not those peoples) and with Catholic Spaniards. Today, Spain is considered a white European country even with its numerous ethnicities and history of conquest by the Umayyad Caliphate. Dorne, in autonomy and a unit of territory, is like both Wales and Spain. Today, European regions that are considered, racially, white.

Doylistically, while the narrative gets its inspiration from real life PoCs architecture and figures, the fact that Dorne, wherever you go even with the different levels of Rhoynish influence, is an amalgamation of Andal and Rhoynish that still has that Andal Seven/Catholic religion, and the Common tongue (Rhoynish is not spoken by most people in Dorne except the Green blood bc the Red Princes outlawed it) set up universally despite equal primogeniture and tolerance of homosexuality/extramarital sex means that those things that precede race-by-face/skin and then set up the basis for race-of-skin/face (religion, language, customs) does exactly not resemble what happened for the same as real life (again, Spain is not a PoC country in spite of the Umayyad conquest and influence).

Again, to me it felt like they are socially Othered how Jewish and Welsh, Scot, Irish, etc. people are Othered in Europe...not in modern times but in the context of various medieval English regions temporally and geographically. Again, Watsonianly. But there's strong argument for the other. While they are definitely Othered and have PoC inspiration and but they aren't Othered in their world like PoCs are Othered.

Either way, I don't think GRRM is conveying that Rhaegar left Elia specifically because he thought she was racially inferior to himself or wasn't owed respect due to her Dornishness. Which I already argued was untrue in the linked post above for the history that Tags and Martells have. And which was the point of me even bringing up race and Elia, since that was the argument Elia-supporters-Rhaegar-bashers have.

#ASoIaF ethnicities #asoiaf asks to me #asoiaf race #Dorne #asoiaf

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