Daenerysstormreborn - Daenerys Storm(re)born

“Why is it always Rhaegar that fans talk about when it comes to what happened to Elia and not Tywin or Gregor?”

Because Tywin and Gregor are presented unambiguously as villains in the text. Gregor does not have any depth to him at all. He is cruel, violent, and evil. There is not much more to say about him. He did something absolutely horrific without remorse. Tywin is more interesting but still entirely unsympathetic and unambiguously evil. Even Cersei, who idolizes Tywin, thinks he went to hell. Plus we saw both of them alive on page, so there’s less speculation to be done. Meanwhile Rhaegar never appeared alive on page and we only have information from various characters. He’s more of a mystery to the reader, and he’s not presented as an unambiguous villain. Most characters think about him positively. The only one to really speak ill of him is Robert, who is awful. The kind of person Rhaegar was is more up to the readers to decide. There is simply more room for discussion.

Second, Tywin and Gregor are held accountable by characters in the narrative already for the death of Elia and her children. Their culpability is not something to be discussed. It’s obvious. And characters already find it vile. You could make the case that since we don’t get a lot of animosity towards Rhaegar in the Martell POV chapters, that Oberyn’s anger was directed at Gregor, that they don’t assign any blame to Rhaegar. But two things: 1. Rhaegar is dead and gone, whereas Gregor and Tywin were still living and able to be held accountable. For the readers, all three are fictional. And, now, dead. And 2. The characters not blaming Rhaegar isn’t an indication that he’s blameless. The readers are often invited to come to our own conclusions about what is wrong or right, evil or righteous. Jaehaerys is regarded in universe as a good man and great king. But we the readers know that he slaughtered his teenage daughter’s lover while she watched. We get to decide for ourselves if Jaehaerys was a good man regardless of the opinions of the characters.

Gregor and Tywin are undoubtedly the most culpable for the deaths of Elia and her kids. One ordered it and the other did it. This is known and nobody is going to contest it. It does not erase this fact to say that if Rhaegar had not absconded with Lyanna, leaving his wife and kids in King’s Landing, they may have survived. It was short-sighted of him. He didn’t know he would die. He didn’t know that his wife and kids would suffer—but he knew that what he was doing would cause political unrest, and he knew that his father had no love for his wife and kids. Perhaps Rhaegar truly believed that having a child with Lyanna was the key to saving the realm. Even if this is true, he still bears some responsibility for the deaths of Elia and her children. I’m sure he did not think they would be harmed—but therein lies the problem. He should have thought more of them, even if his intentions were noble, because he knew he was going to incite political unrest and he knew his father didn’t care for Elia and her kids.

Saying that Tywin Lannister, Amory Lorch, and Gregor Clegane are evil and culpable in the deaths of Elia, Aegon, and Rhaenys is just very “water is wet.” It’s preaching to the choir. We can all see this. The characters in the story see this. Trying to understand the kind of person Rhaegar was, including the BAD, since we’re given mostly positive views of him, is something to actually talk about. The only one really speaking ill of Rhaegar in universe is Robert and it’s most certainly NOT because he cared about Elia and the kids. Elia’s end was tragic and it echoes through the story just like Lyanna’s. Speculating about her relationship with her husband (which GRRM himself has said was complex) and what he could have done to protect her is just a matter of investigating a series of events that is still rather shrouded and thus is actually worthy of discussion

It was Aerys' fault. Dragonestone was the safest place for them. It was not him who brought them to kingslanding.

There is no one person at fault. To say it is Aerys’s fault alone is just as wrong as saying it is only Rhaegar’s, Tywin’s, or Gregor’s. The tragedy of Elia and her children may have been avoided if any one of these men had acted differently. Had Rhaegar acted differently he may have been able to prevent his family from being brought to King’s Landing. If Tywin hadn’t ordered the murders, they almost certainly wouldn’t have happened. Had Gregor and Amory not so being gleefully willing to kill an innocent woman and her small children, they may have been able to survive. Aerys created the situation; Tywin, Gregor, and Amory killed them; and Rhaegar failed to be there for them. Doesn’t mean that there is no honor in Rhaegar wanting to save the realm from the Others. He’s a fascinating character. It’s more worth talking about what Rhaegar could’ve done to protect them because, of all 5 of these men, he’s the only one who would have. His relationship with them was dysfunctional but I do believe he did care for them. That sets him apart from the other culpable characters. He cared enough to let Elia in on his council and even tell her about the prophecy to some extent. If rumors are to be believed, he cared enough to try to get rid of Aerys. He still could have acted with more caution to ensure the safety of his family. If he could hide Lyanna in the tower of joy, he could’ve hidden Elia and the kids. Being on Dragonstone is not hidden when you are married to the prince of Dragonstone.

“It’s a biological fact that fish do indeed change their sex to keep the male/female ratio balanced in their school population.” Dramatic generalization that is extremely misleading. Unlike other vertebrate clades (aside from frogs), hermaphroditism does occur in many bony fish species! But what’s described in the quote there is called bidirectional hermaphroditism, in which an individual can go back and forth. This is uncommon. Most hermaphroditic fishes are sequential in only one direction, starting out as male and switching to female (protandry, like clownfishes) or starting out female and switching to male (protogyny, like wrasses). This is irreversible. Bidirectionality as described there happens almost exclusively amongst gobies, but also occurs in one damselfish, four dottybacks, and nine other assorted perciforms. There are less than 500 species of fish that exhibit any type of hermaphroditism (and there are over 34,000 species of fishes).

Check out inverts if you want to get a bit wilder, fungi if you want to be confused, and some unicellular eukaryotes if you want to be confused and amazed. Not that fish hermaphroditism isn’t amazing and fascinating but it isn’t ubiquitous and isn’t fluid in most cases.

Ma, they’re out there misrepresenting fish hermaphroditism again

Probably a result of the Umineko tag being the smallest thus my post is more likely to be seen by people who track it thus getting a bunch of Beatopilled users

“Jon would set [girl] on fire to keep [other girl] warm” no he would not bestie he’d give other girl his cloak. I know it’s not meant to be taken literally but Jon has so much compassion in him that it seems like an affront to his character to talk about him like that. Must we speak so hatefully about characters just to spite fans of The Other Ship? The violent way some people on here talk about fictional teenage girls is so WEIRD