#anti Edelstans

[emblemofthequeen]

Edelstans: “Edelgard detractors completely miss the nuances and morally grayness of her character! Fandoms can’t handle complex characters!”

Me: Oh I agree…

Same Edelstans: *Remove all the nuances and moral grayness from Rhea and make posts about how she shouldn’t have been an ally on any routes or even that there should’ve been a golden ending where all houses team up to defeat her* Me: You know what, forget it, I can’t sympathize with you anymore

#Look in a mirror you don’t get to complain about removing moral grayness from characters if you do that to Rhea #Lady Rhea #rhea fire emblem #saint seiros #Seiros #Rhea fe #Fire emblem Rhea #FE Rhea #Church of Seiros #Lady Rhea Fire Emblem #Lady Rhea FE #rhea fe3h #Not really but just in case gonna also tag #Edelcrit #Edelgard critical #edelstan crit #Edelstan critical #anti Edelstans #anti edelgard

[butwhatifidothis]

Genuinely can't understand how people can legitimately say "trying to argue that Crests are powerful and useful and writing Crests as being powerful and useful proves Edelgard right about how people wrongfully fixate on them" when Edelgard herself says she thinks she can only use her signature heavy armor because of Crests (study requests), and when she herself uses a Relic that was made specifically to be compatible with her twin Crests to use in fighting. Nearly her entire visual language as a character relies on her using her Crests, so the people trying to argue this just kinda point out how hypocritical she is lmao

#anti edelgard #anti-edelgard #edelgard critical #edelgard discourse #just to be safe #like we been knew she was but thanks for pointing out one of the biggest examples of that lmao #it's like. you can't simultaneously argue that Crests shouldn't be seen as important or valued to society and that no one needs them #and then go on to try to fundamentally change society by means only available through Crests #EDELGARD disproves her own (supposed) point about Crests being unnecessary more than anyone else does #she can't just turn off her Crests but she can control how she fights #she didn't need to specifically use heavy armor or specifically use Aymr. and yet she does. very readily #she fights in ways that SHE ADMITS are only possible for her because of Crests. but no one needs Crests. except for her. conveniently #like how is this flying over Edelstans' heads lmao. absolute experts at making Edelgard look morally worse than she already does I swear

[danzafila]

if anyone is curious about the quality of the r/3h subreddit, I just saw someone post a well thought out explanation detailing their discomfort with the agarthans' writing due to how it plays into anti-semitic conspiracy theories (something I too immediately noticed when I first played the game and is a big reason I really do not like their presence in the story)

and did it produce good discussion acknowledging the unfortunate unintended implications and all that? lol ofc not. OP was mostly met with people mockingly dismissing them as overreacting with a helping dose of accusing them of calling the creators anti-semitic (even though they explicitly included a disclaimer that they weren't!). aaand then mods responded by deleting the OP's post for daring to critique their game instead of moderating the shitty comments 🙃🙃🙃

#i already ranted on discord about how trash the responses were but omg seeing the post itself get nuked instead of the comments?? #literally wtf mods #clown subreddit #i mean it's not a shocker that sub in particular is trash #it's always been a haven for the most misogynistic and abelist edelstans in the fandom (bc mods are friends with them) #at least i was able to report the straight up anti-semitic comment i saw before the thread got nuked #so hopefully reddit will deal with that even if mods won't #3h talking tag #general fe blogging tag #sto parlando

[tiredandangryaboutit]

Alright, so, now I know of three people by name that were pushed out of the fandom by edelstans and a fourth that disappeared right after saying they didn't agree with her even tho they were a very active participant in the ferdibert fandom before that post. I know there are many more who went silently and anonymously, but this is yet another time I have a name to the victim. Listen. I don't care at this point who started it, if such a thing can even be said about a entity like a fandom. If you're not stopping it you are part of the problem. If you are actively searching for and harassing fans because they like a character you don't or vice versa, you're the problem. Fuck you. And for you "good" edelstans out there? If you are not taking a stance against this kind of behavior when you see it, fuck you.

#edelgard critical #edelgard discourse #anti edelgard #putting the tag here so you guys can see it #I want you to see it #fuck edelstans #you ruined the fandom

[emblemxeno]

I think the people who try to defend Edelgard don't even understand how the narrative portrays it. To HER view, the genocide was necessary because she view Rhea as a rat. You know rat ? we want to kill them and we have to in order to protect others, our home. Why am I making this analogy ? Because that's how an author portrayed the Shoah in the comic Mauss, with the nazi as cat and the jewish as mouse. That doesn't make Edelgard good look at all

Can't believe we have come to a point where we compare the suffering of people who have been really victim of those horrible stuff to a PEGI 12 year old game vulgarizing this for the sake of story telling without even trying, like what is wrong with those Edelstans ?

Combining these!

Yep. It's the overt attempt to project real world philosophy onto this fantasy game (not helped by the game's attempt at serious aesops, but still).

Like, if we're gonna go by method by making the Church of Seiros out to be religious fanaticist faction akin to the darker branches of the Catholic church, then by that logic the other side should be able to play the same game by drudging up the copious amounts of dialogue that with very intolerant, racist, xenophobic, and anti-semitic undertones.

I myself generally don't like doing that because as anon 2 says, it's a video game with dragons and shit, but far too many people try to utilize 3H as a mouthpiece for commentary on IRL issues and it's sooooo fucking annoying and also insanely disrespectful cuz it's obviously done with intent to solidify their own biases in the video game and nothing else. Cuz if you actually gave a shit about real world problems beyond social media points, you'd have the brain power to know that maybe you shouldn't bring up a video game as an axis of your message.

But some people are immature and deliberately lacking in social grace. If I were a better person, I'd walk away, but meh. When people pull reality into discussion about anime bullshit in an attempt to discredit my opinions or feelings about certain things, at this point in my life I'm not the type to take the high road; when people go that low, I go to hell. Not one ounce of respect from my African American ass from that point forward towards people like that, no siree.

#queue #rant #fire emblem discourse #edelgardiscourse #tw nazi mention

[gascon-en-exil]

I guess Dolphin is going hammy with the New Orleans and gay stereotypes. Maybe she's very comfortable in her victimhood now and feels confident on attacking you now because you're lower in the victim hierarchy. Way to go edelstans! Continue proving how crazy and unhinged you guys are by spreading rumors to desperately make yourselves look good.

I doubt she knows all that much about New Orleans. The analogy to the protesters at Carnival seemed to go right over her head, both as an analogy and for its literal significance. Really, those types are every bit as anti-Muslim as they are anti...almost everything else you can think of.

Image taken from an article several years back about someone who tangled with these protesters.

That one on the left is practically a "tag yourself I'm X" Tumblr game waiting to happen. I'm at least a half dozen of them.

But anyway, I've known for a while that there's a public Discord tied to a particular subreddit that's acting as an echo chamber for this kind of wank. It's undoubtedly filled with all manner of self-victimization - and certainly the source of the game of telephone that's led to me being accused of fucking corpses and grooming...someone? My brother, maybe? I ought to tell him that the next time I see him; he'll get a laugh out of it.

#Pointless observation #We can't rely on drunk tourists to toss their leftover booze in their faces #So instead it's really best to ignore all this nonsense

[edelstan-discord]

The Edelstan Discord think anti-war sentiment is a bad thing and seems to like Western interventions as long as they are successful.

#edelgard discourse #edelstans are toxic

[dmclemblems]

Would make sense that Clyde/GW stans act exactly like Edelstans. The Venn Diagram of the two sects is a circle 🚶‍♀️

LOL YOU'RE RIGHT THO

The biggest things I've noticed between the two of them is that they're first and foremost going to defend Edelgard and/or Claude allying with her, and their next biggest similarity is being anti Faerghus and failing entirely to understand why they sheltered the Church (which isn't as simple as they make it out to be).

Like man, just once, can I see an Edelgard fan or GW Claude fan (or GW fan in general) who isn't like, hardcore anti Faerghus/Church of Seiros??? I don't like Edelgard but I'm not anti Adrestia. Don't know why it's so hard to just... not hate a whole country full of lovely and complex characters. When I see people who don't like Ferdinand, I get sad!

I also don't understand why it's so hard to understand Faerghus' situation, particularly Dimitri's as its king? What was he gonna do, ignore the request for the refugees and leave them on the streets? On top of that, after they had helped Faerghus in a prior civil war?

Anon is trying to argue that Claude doesn't like the Church leaders so he invades Faerghus so that Dimitri would give them up, but like... hello??? Did we miss the part where sending a letter and discussing things beforehand actually can exist? Like, the whole issue is that Claude's very first decision to handle the situation was violence? Was invading a country that did nothing to his country?

ALSO GET THIS, THEY SAID "what innocent did Claude even kill? Just other soldiers." LAWWWWD apparently soldiers fighting for their country are not innocent! Apparently defending your country from invaders means you're no longer innocent and that if you die, it's not a problem because you weren't a civilian! Apparently if you're a soldier fighting for your country, you deny your right to innocence! If you're not a civilian, it's okay if you die!

It's always the same with these kind of arguments. It's always that Faerghus is in the wrong for defending against invasion. It's always Faerghus' fault that they fought back and thus deserve to die. It's never "I like GW Claude but yeah, he was in the wrong here". Like, is it really so wrong to disagree with someone for invading another country that hasn't harmed yours?

Why are literally all of these people so pro invasion? It's like, lowkey disturbing.

#I was gonna go back to bed but it didn't last long bc dinner happened lol #I've had ppl disagree with some of my thoughts before and that's fine! #I've discussed things with people who didn't share my opinions such as on what happened to Edelgard in AG #or how I view Erwin in Hopes versus who he supposedly is in Houses #but when I see the same argument over and over and over about Faerghus being wrong for defending themselves #it's tiring and just stupid and I really hope these people don't ACTUALLY think like that #DCE Ask

[dimiclaudeblaigan]

Do you feel that Edelstans are engaging in some sort of psychological warfare here? The amount of times they sealion and repeat the same talking points that have been discussed over 4 years be it about Edel's stance on nobility, her imperialism, her racism and desire to genocide an endangered race feels like it's repetitive on purpose; to make the mind vulnerable to believe anything even if there's factual evidence against it.

I don't know that they're thinking that far ahead about it nonnie lol, I just think they're trying to argue for the sake of it. They have to know by now that people have their opinions already and that arguing and telling us our opinions or discussions amongst ourselves are wrong or "strange" isn't going to make us like or even want to like their favorite. They just, for some reason, cannot stop reagitating the same old shit.

I mean, I think they're a combination of chronically online and can't handle that other people don't like their favorite. Whenever people are minding their business just talking amongst people they know with their shared interest, these people seem to butt in and argue with them. My post was almost entirely about Miklan and his influence on the story, and yet that last person was saying "Crests had nothing to do with it" and shit, but like... Sylvain and Dimitri's supports were literally about that?

Basically they ignored everything in my post regarding what it was actually about and just wanted to argue anti-Dimitri (and Rhea, who the overall post was very minimally about), because the overall post they responded to wasn't really that much about Dimitri, but Miklan's place in the story (which has to include Dimitri and what he's doing).

Generally, from everything I've seen across various Faerghus blogs/people who just like the Faerghus characters, the Edelgard stans do this to all of them or most of them (at least the ones who are actively discussing the games amongst each other). Basically if you're just any random user who likes Dimitri, they'll do this to you if you're posting about him in a positive light. That's what I meant by as soon as you start posting about Houses, that's it, you're immediately anyone's target for discourse even if you don't engage in that regularly (and only do so when it's thrown at you).

Like yeah, I give my opinions about what I don't like (such as the second half of GW and coming up, why I hate VW's treatment of Claude about as much but in a totally different way), but I'm doing it to just express my opinion on my blog to my followers in my own space without tags that aren't my own personal tags.

It's fine to talk about what you don't like, but they always come in to talk about what they don't like... on posts that already exist about liking those things these people don't like. Like... it's literally common courtesy not to go onto a post loving up about a character and being like "this character is bad and wrong".

Frankly, I think they just thrive on discourse. Why else would one of them come onto a post that had nothing to do with them, wasn't in the Edelgard tag (and was a reblog no less, from someone they don't even know and had never met), was only talking about Dimitri as a side effect of talking about Miklan, and ultimately had nothing to do with what they wanted to argue about it (i.e. they just seem to have picked a random post that was pro Dimitri to argue for Edelgard and reach as faaaar as they could to justify why they were on that post at all)?

Also yeah, it's been the same shit for four years now with some extra Hopes salt and pepper added in. It's tiring and I want no part in it. Like, my posts about why I believe the writing failed Edelgard as a character? It's my opinion on the overall writing, and while they haven't engaged with those posts at the time of this ask (I didn't tag them in the main tags specifically for that reason), I wound up tagging it as discourse in at least the first part (for followers who are worried about discourse and being found and targeted to be able to avoid that) because all the discourse that's happened ultimately ended up making anything negative about Edelgard discourse. You can't say anything bad about her without it essentially being discourse because of this bullshit.

I enjoy discussing things with my followers and mutuals and seeing their perspectives, and it's good because we realize things from each other! But the important difference is that we're on the same page with each other/understand that it's harmless discussion, just giving our thoughts to each other and we understand that we're all trying to be respectful and not drag discourse into it. We don't have to agree on everything. I've had people disagree with me to some extents regarding Edelgard, and like... that's fine if you're not an absolute dick about it?

Me and R (if you know who that is you know who that is lol, just to not specifically name drop in case?) don't agree on Ike at all but we've been mutuals for years (and that's looking at my favorite lord, one of my favorite FE characters overall, and my second and third favorite FE games in the franchise). Difference being, we can have a solid and respectful conversation about it, or even about Claude who I like and R doesn't really like all that much).

It's one thing to have a discussion, but they only want to be completely right with no contest. They also come in, instead of having a good faith conversation, saying outright that we're wrong and strange, which is an antagonistic manner of starting a conversation. They're not polite; they're demeaning right from the get go, and they can't fathom how anyone could like Dimitri.

So, to sum this up... it would appear to be a case of chronically online, people unable to handle anyone having differing opinions, and thriving on arguing and pulling people into discourse. I don't know that they're trying to wear people down, because people who like Dimitri already are set in that they like Dimitri. They're not going to magically change their minds no matter how hard Edelstans argue at them. It just seems like they want to argue and hate other people.

Sadly this is why I have to be cautious when interacting with FE fans at all (of any game), because if they like Edelgard I'm automatically wary because of shit like this.

When talking to someone who isn't in the fandom, I expressed worry about their Edelgard loving friends knowing about me (because said person was playing Houses for the first time) because I love Dimitri and because of experiences from Edelgard fans and how they target Dimitri fans.

You know what they told me in response? That Dimitri fans are the ones attacking Edelgard fans (on Twitter) just for liking Edelgard. That is to say, the Edelgard lovers already told and convinced their friend this was true before I even expressed my worry. Was I surprised? No. Disgusted? Yeah. It tells me that when Edelgard fans get their friends into the game (and have them play CF first), they "warn" them about Dimitri fans before they even start playing.

Mind you, this person has now played CF and is an Edelgard fan now, just like her friends. When I started trying to explain to this person why I'm not comfortable discussing politics from this game (because of all the discourse) she got mad because it was "too much fandom drama" for her... but she didn't care when her Edelgard loving friends "warned" her about Dimitri fans? Said person also said "her friends will filter for her", and she told her friends (which I saw from a screenshot from her) that she leans more toward Edelgard's viewpoint politically, so uh... suffice to say someone I once was a friendly acquaintance with because of another fandom I'm very uncomfortable around now.

Ironic, isn't it, how the Edelgard fan has Edelgard loving friends and they get mad when a Dimitri fan tries to explain why they're uncomfortable with the game's politics, but the Edelgard fans can actively talk shit about actual real life people for being fans of an opposing character and that's not too much fandom drama. I've felt sick to my stomach that a potential friendship has a tear in it now because of fucking Edelgard discourse, and frankly I don't know if it can mended because of how uncomfortable I feel around her now.

While I'd like it to, I don't have high expectations considering she was more than happy to listen to her friends talk about fandom drama/tell her about it but got mad at me for trying to explain why that exact drama is why I'm uncomfortable discussing the game's politics.

Like, it really is always the Edelgard fans and I've seen plenty of people who originally were on the fence about her decide they don't like her now because the stans made them hate her or actively dislike her.

#DCB Ask #I talk abt Fodlan with my followers/mutuals bc I like the games but... #I also feel genuinely SAFER discussing other games in the franchise bc none of those games #have stans running around attacking anyone and everyone they can get their hands on #who doesn't love their favorite as much as they do. not even Fates had discourse even remotely like this

[demoiselledefortune]

I’m bothering you, mutual! What’s an opinion on media you are burning to share with someone, but haven’t had reason to talk about here? (If you can’t pick a media, then I’m asking specifically about Fire Emblem.)

Oh thank you for bothering me ^^

I'm not sure I have opinion on media I'm burning to share unfortunately. I'm excited about Three Hopes because it looks like it's going to further elements of plot and world building of Fodlan pretty well; but at the same time sad because the gameplay is really not my jam so I don't think I'll be able to play it. Also the problem with revival of Fodlan discussion is the revival of discourse where it's endless bashing of characters and fans for liking the characters. It's become very trite and boring and I hate how self righteous people get about it. Especially since given my own mutuals I only ever see one side of the discussion really (the pro-Dimitri and anti Edelstans) so like... I'm willing to believe that the other side is awful and deserve all that hatred because that would be hardly surprising but all I see on my dash is the people I like acting being smugly judgemental and I'm actually really tired of it. It's decrease a lot of my enjoyment from the fandom in general even though I like the game a fair deal.

I've started a Black Eagle game actually; but I have a hard time motivating myself to continue it. This is partially because of the climate in the fandom tbh, because I feel like I'm not allowed to like Edelgard because of it; but a large part of that is simply that it's the third game and it's not that fun a game to replay because there's so many moving parts and the beginning takes forever. I tried playing on Maddening mode at first, I was hoping it would help me keeping focused but it was just too hard for me so the opposite happened; so I ended up re-starting again XD

I have a friend who's play Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn for the first time and it's been fun hearing about their impression of the game so far. Still have a lot of fondness for the Tellius games; especially Radiant Dawn.

One of the thing we were talking about Path of Radiance is how it's kind of odd how the heart of the story is what happens in Begnion, especially Serenes Forest and that's also what I think is the most interesting part of the story; yet it's really a detour to the main plot. Likewise I find that most of the characters who have the most interesting characterization and store weight to them are the characters you're unlikely to use as gameplay unit a lot. There are exceptions: Jill and Soren have two of the most interesting character arcs and are also pretty likely to be used as units. Reyson too is essential in play. But most of the Greil mercenaries and first recruits are cool characters but who don't have a lot of story relevance. I think even more than other Fire Emblem that is the case.

Hope i managed to do with Fire Emblem opinions...

#fire emblem #fodlan #tellius

[randomnameless]

I personally am GREATLY enjoying the edelstan salt over feh, and how they say that feh is being shitty by not only making a rhealeth summer duo that is extremely fanservicey by one of the biggest fanservice artists on feh’s payroll, but that the other duo includes sothis, the legendary alts are of their enlightened form, and that intsys lied to fans by making brave byleth dress in sothis’ regalia and constantly talk about faith and the goddess and saying war is bad. I lurked on an edeleth shipper’s page to see them fighting against an anti byleth edelstan who hates those alts just as much and the salt is absolutely GLORIOUS!

Tldr: sodium is very healthy!

You know,

Human beings need sodium to live.

OTOH, given how Nopes warps everyone and everything to fit Supreme Leader's narrative, I'd say the IS (and KT) in charge of the main games are drinking a lot of Hresvelg Blend, so Heroes dissing on it is like dropping a bucket of fresh water in the ocean.

Some people really didn't want to see Billy for the character they were, even if they are barebones, common sense would commend Billy on not joining Supreme Leader in Tru Piss, no matter how hard the game tries to sell Rhea BaD during WC.

I remember Corn was shat upon because people felt they couldn't "insert" in them, since they were a character with a pretty defined personality - Billy also has some crumbs of personality (in FE16, more in Nopes and even more in FEH) and even those crumbs painted someone who would... not fit a certain narrative.

Why it's almost as if Tru Piss is a power fantasy, where the player's wishes override everything (the plot, their avatar's wishes) to get a S Support with Hubert Supreme Leader.

#anon #replies #FE16 #3 nopes #FEH #FEh has been very consistent on Fodlan content #at least for the nabateans bar that wtf with Rhea's fallen alt but we can't have everything #Billy loves Jerry and can reach A support with Rhea pre TS would they really be okay with siding with Flamey to kill Rhea? #CF is a player power fantasy #and we were right it's almost like a fanfic lol

[butwhatifidothis]

"she feels a sense of duty for the people" yeah by murdering them. Her own and those of the other nations. How equal of her, what a queen amiright guys

#anti edelgard #anti-edelgard #edelgard critical #edelgard discourse #just to be safe #Edelgard: *violently conquers foreign sovereign nations in the name of butt-ass naked imperialism* #Edelgard: but like i liek the peepul tho :( #edelstans: SEE SHE’S SO NICE HOW COULD ANYONE DISLIKE HER #legit it's like these people have never heard of the idea of actions speaking louder than words i stg

[teaveetamer]

Ok so I'm not going to link the OP because y'all can find it if you want, but this happened like over a month ago and I'm sure OP just wants to move on. But holy god, this is peak incel behavior.

I had an incel stalker. For those of you who haven't been around awhile, I'm talking about the guy who looks uncannily like Raphael (y'know, like from 3H). He acted EXACTLY like this. If OP didn't drop that SigurdVII is 30 years old, I would actually think this was just my old stalker moved on to a new target because the behavior is EXACTLY the same.

And see, this is what we mean when we say "the way you act tells us something about you." I distinctly remember thinking this dude had problems with women. Just by the way he was talking to me, it was obvious he had problems with women. I don't know if I ever explicitly said it in so many words, because really you only see a small sliver of someone when you're arguing on Reddit over a fictional character (and unlike some groups in this fandom I'm not a huge fan of accusing people of heinous things I have no concrete proof of), but... my instincts are on point.

You can try to hide behind liking a female fictional character all you want, but y'all are so fucking transparent with the way you gleefully denigrate real life women to prop up a fictional one. With the way you invade real life women's spaces to try to "own" us or "correct" us. Because you don't like women, you like the idea of women. Specifically, you like the idea of women who will slavishly follow you to the ends of the earth, never questioning you, never rejecting you, never leaving you, because it makes you feel big and powerful.

If you wanna be a good ally, step number fucking one is to stop whinging about people having different opinions than you AND GET RID OF PEOPLE LIKE THIS FROM YOUR COMMUNITIES. I don't know if they knew about this guy while he was with the Edelstan community, god I fucking hope not, but if they did know it's just straight up insulting that they purport to be anti-sexism. You can't be anti-sexism or anti-misogyny while letting someone like this, someone causing pain to actual women, run wild in your community.

[lananiscorner]

If you had to guess, why are Edelstans so desperate in trying to defend their waifu's honor despite her being a fictional character and therefore won't respond let alone appreciate their defense? I know parasocial relationships are one hell of a drug but you'd think they would stop trying to double down and fulfill a self fulfilling prophecy of thinking they are racists who justify imperialism and genocide.

Thanks for your ask, anon. Please keep in mind that everything below the cut is just my own personal interpretation of what's happening here, based on my time in this fandom. There's a fair chance I might be wrong about the conclusions I'm drawing, but anyway, here's my 2 cents:

I think the parasocial relationship aspect is definitely a big part of it, but at least as far as the western parts of her stan base are concerned, it also feels a lot like there's a lot of personal baggage attached. I mean, from what I have seen in my year in this fandom so far:

Most Edel/Byleth art/fic involves female Byleth. Male Byleth might as well not exist, even though picking male Byleth rather than female Byleth changes absolutely nothing about their support line or ending and I'm not even sure if it changes any of their explore/event dialogue, but I don't recall any instance where it did during my playthroughs.

Her other supports and paired endings with male characters exist in-game only, apparently. I've seen maybe like... 5 pieces of Edel/Hubert art in the fe3h tag over the course of this year and that's it.

Stanning for Edel usually is accompanied by relentless bashing of Rhea and the church.

"She's sapphic and cute and she wants to hold your hand while obliterating the oppressive church--what's not to love?" is how I've seen multiple of her stans describe their reasons for liking her in a nutshell.

One of the common claims from Edel stans against her critics is that we are homophobic, hating on her for being wlw... which... the only time I ever see Edel's sexuality brought up in Edel critic circles, is annoyance at stans trying to erase her canonical bisexuality.

Some of the animosity against the church is definitely a problem of the localization (which actively made Rhea and the church look more sus in several instances), but a lot of it to me reads like it was written by people who were hurt in RL by assholes who wield religion as an oppressive tool (which it doesn't have to be--affirming churches do exist!), and for whom Edel with all her church smashing and queerness is just the ultimate, cathartic, projecting power fantasy.

And here's the problem with projecting: when you project onto another person or a character, any attack on them feels like an attack on you, personally. It's the fallacy of "they called Edel a racist imperialist + I stan Edel for being an anti-religion queer queen = they called me a racist imperialist = they called me a sinner = they are just like the people who hate me for being queer and having beef with religion", which... is not a great feeling. I've been there myself (not with Edel, but with other characters in other franchises) and learning how to take a step back from that line of thinking and looking at what people are actually saying rather than what you are hearing is one of the most important life skills you can learn in any context. I don't think I've ever seen any Edel critic call her stans racist/imperialist for liking her, but rather for trying to justify her actions, which... yeah, if you're trying to justify racism/imperialism, that is bound to happen. You can like (even love) a character without trying to rationalize away their flaws.

Two examples: Hubert is the best character on CF imo, but that doesn't mean I'm gonna go around saying "well actually he had no choice but to kill and bribe people behind Edelgard's back and they were trying to uphold an abusive system so they probably deserved it anyway". Man straight up bribed and murdered people so his queen could succeed--cool motive, flawless execution, still murder. Likewise, Felix is my second-favorite character in all of Azure Moon, but there'll be a cold day in Aillel before you see me trying to excuse his misoginy or his dehumanizing language towards Dimitri and Dedue. I understand and sympathize with the cause for his behavior, but I do not condone it or try to justify it away as something necessary or good.

And sadly, I don't think this fallacy thinking of some (most?) of Edel's stans will change, unless:

the RL people making the arguments change, and/or

their RL experiences change, and/or

IntSys gives us some unproblematic, unapologetically gay/lesbian representation.

It is hard to self-reflect when you are hurting and clinging to what litle representation you can find. In an ideal world, the next original FE game release would include unmistakably queer characters of multiple orientations, who are not also racist imperialists, so every Edel stan who gets really reactionary about criticism of her can look and those and go "oh hey, people don't hate on me for stanning Sappho FE--maybe the beef they had with me really wasn't about me being a sinner, but Edel being someone who invaded and forcibly annexed two sovereign nations and did her best to eradicate an entire race of sentient beings".

Maybe that day will come. Maybe it won't. In the meantime, I will happily keep blocking those of her stans, who try to justify racism, imperialism, and ableism, so that I can have a pleasant fandom experience that won't leave me bitter and exhausted every time I check the tags.

#asks #anon #Edelstans #not putting any franchise/character tags on this one lol #I cannot emphasize enough how much all of this is my own personal subjective interpretation of what's happening #based on my own experiences in this fandom over the last year #I may be wrong about some or all of this #and if this was work I might even be willing to engage #but I don't come to tumblr for work #I come here for entertainment and relaxation #so block block block it is

[faroreswinds]

As a /v and /vg frequenter, there used to be a few Edelstans in the Fire Emblem threads who would link posts to r/Edelgard and Edelgard-centric discords in order to sick people at posts critiquing Edelgard. It would lead to threads suddenly being mass-spammed with copy-pasted pro-Edelgard posts from Serenes and reddit. Wouldn't be suprised if some of the more obsessed stans keeps a list of antis on tumblr that they occassionally try to dogpile in the same way.

Urg. That's so sad. Honestly, it's so upsetting.

It's just a game....

#three houses discourse #anon asks

[gascon-en-exil]

Anon mentioned this to teaveetamer, but I'll say it here as well: the problem with Edelstans is that they lack "integrity". Integrity is the idea that whatever rules of morality or behavior we believe in, they must apply "just as strongly" to ourselves and those we admire as they apply to our enemies and those we hate. To make an analogy, if we get angry when "the opposing team cheats", we must also get angry when OUR team cheats. But Edelstans have no "rules of morality where Our Team Loses."

I do think that describing these groups as "teams" that all follow the same rules internally is already misleading. As it is I've been largely staying out of these recent back-and-forths because I don't believe my contributions would be helpful. I'm pretty well known for laughing off trolls; even when they're calling me a groomer or a necrophile or whatever else I can hardly be bothered to be insulted or to even care beyond a brief bit of humor at their expense sometimes. That's just not the sort of energy that would be very welcome for people who do feel hurt or insulted or unsafe in fandom because of trolling and harassment. Incidentally, this also doubles as an illustration about my point about us not all having the same reaction even if we happen to share some fandom opinions.

More to your point though, I have seen instances on their Discord of attempting to combat certain bad actors...typically not for the best reasons, but at least that's something. There's also been some pretty heated arguments from within their own group that don't seem to have resolved well at all - some of which have been remarked on by others here, in cases where Edelstans will turn their own logic on one another as soon as there's a drastic enough disagreement. (This is, coincidentally, also a commonly observed phenomenon among anti groups in various fandoms.) Some hypocrisy is to be expected, as in all in-group, out-group scenarios, because so long as it can be rationalized it won't register as hypocrisy except to those on the outside. I prefer though not to try diagnosing a bunch of strangers - many of whom have never even spoken to me - especially since they don't like or care about me in the slightest, and so I'll leave it at that.

#Fandom discourse