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stardyng · 5 years

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I love your blog as a Sansa and Jonsa fan, and I can’t help but see your Harry x Sansa opinions while perusing. I didn’t read the books, so my question is - why isn’t the ship more popular if indeed Harry seems like a good match? I’ve read that Harry is an ass, does his character evolve to be a worthy match for Sansa? And finally, how important do you think his role is if he doesn’t even exist in the show? Please get back to me when you have free time! I’d really love to read your thoughts :)

There’s a multitude of reasons why Harry Hardyng, and the pairing itself aren’t popular, and I am painfully aware of the reasons. There are essentially two main reasons for this.

First of all, Harry is not only a book only character, but he and Sansa only had one conversation with each other in a unpublished chapter that you can find online. In order to read that chapter, you have to have read the five other books. This makes the pairing itself quite inaccessible compared to a lot of her other pairings. Therefore, the people who even know that Harry The Heir exist are already low enough, with many of them already wanting her to be paired off with another character by the time they read the latest Sansa chapter.

Second of all, and this is one is going to hurt me, but Harry The Heir is a explicitly flawed character…or at least that’s what people seem to think based on what we know about him thus far. People have made elaborated essays on how terrible he is based on the little we know from him. Our introduction to him is him not wanting to have a walk with Sansa because she’s ‘’Littlefinger’s bastard’’, and later we come to find out that he has a child and another girl pregnant. He then proceeds to fat-shame one of his earlier lovers. So…a lot of people end up finishing that chapter really disliking him. I don’t blame them for their feelings, but I just don’t agree.

However, I think that all of the characteristics and actions that people use in order to prove that he is a terrible person aren’t valid, because a lot of it ignores the fact that there is more to him, and the fact that he too was born and raised in the Westorosi society, and that the way he acts and the way he views certain things are impacted by that very fact. At the end of the day, a lot of Harry’s actions and thoughts can be understood if you acknowledge these two things.

For starters, I think his negative reaction about having a walk with Sansa is not justified but understandable if we look at things from his perspective. He is forced into a match with a stranger who’s the daughter of a man he doesn’t like, and so he’s angry and says something that isn’t very nice. While he did use the slur ‘’bastard’’, I think that we should consider that perhaps, his problem wasn’t the fact that she was a bastard necessarily, but that he didn’t want to be engaged to anyone in the first place (he’s a 17 year old boy!!!) or simply the fact that she was Littlefinger’s child. It could also be the bastard thing, but to shame him for classism, when a lot of everyone’s favorite characters did or said classist things is completely unfair. They live in a society that promotes classist point of views, and most characters are in environments suffusing in classism. Jon, Catelyn and Sansa among many other protagonists in the story have said or thought things that are rather classist.

Even when talking about the use of ‘’bastard’’ as a slur, we’ve seen a lot of sympathetic characters use it as well. Catelyn used it ( “I need none of your absolution, bastard.”), Tyrion used it numerous times, Arya used it (’’you’re nothing but a bastard boy!’’), Jaime used it, and Jon even used it as well (’’and we are coming for you, bastard.’’). To solely shame Harry for doing something that the majority of people in Westoros has done I think is rather unfair.

With that out of the way, the whole situation with Harry The Heir, his sex life, and his own set of ‘’bastards’’ turn a lot of other people off. I’ve seen some people blatantly shame Harry for having sex which is a pretty terrible thing to do. I mean sure he could have use a contraceptive method, but him having casual sex on it’s own isn’t really that bad a thing. However, more people judge Harry in reason of the fact that they think he’s negligent of the women he has had sex with, and I disagree completely with that idea.

Thing is that the women he has had sex with were not explicitly stated to be his lovers. They could very much just be people he has had casual sex with. This is what he has to say about the mother of his first child:

“Yes. Cissy was a pretty thing when I tumbled her, but childbirth left her as fat as a cow, so Lady Anya arranged for her to marry one of her men-at-arms. It is different with Saffron.” - Alayne I, TWOW

Well what I’m going to do is tell you had these things don’t mean. A lot of people like to say that he stopped being with Cissy because she was pregnant or became fat or some nonsense like that, when in reality, that isn’t stated anywhere. All that’s stated is that she became fat so Lady Anya arranged her to be with someone else. Harry The Heir wasn’t given a choice in any of this. He didn’t get to decide if we has going to stay with her or not. Shaming Harry for something that he didn’t get to decide is rather unfair. Plus, he knows what’s going on with the mother of his child, and the text implies that she is in a financially stable situation and is going to marry a man who will help her take care of the child. She’s completely fine and she doesn’t need him.

Other people like to discredit him due to his fat shaming in this line. I would just like these people to get off their high horse that they’ve just decided to climb on. Several main protagonists in the story have made fat-shaming jokes or comments. Arya was not happy that she had to sit next to Tommen, ‘’the little fat one’’ instead of the comely prince Joffrey, Ned and Catelyn made some fun of Robert’s weight in the show, Arya called people ‘’grossly fat’’ numerous times, Jon describes Sam as the ‘’fat boy’’ in his head for a lot of his earlier chapters, Tyrion describes the High Septon as being ‘’ as fat as a house.’’, Olenna Tyrell, everyone’s favorite comedian makes a lot of fat-shaming comments and you could find a lot of other fat-shaming comments made by a multitude of characters both major and minor, both protagonists and antagonists in the series. Yet the only one seem to have a problem with is Harry which is completely is unfair, especially when unlike what people say, his comment wasn’t about him leaving her because she was fat, it was about Lady Anya giving her to someone specific because she was fat.

Then, there’s the question of his second lover Saffron, who is also pregnant. The idea that he left his other lover because he’s negligent and is not willing to take care of his children is untrue not only because that was not the reason he was even separated from Cissy in the first place, but also because he is still around his second lover Saffron, who he has not said one negative thing about. He didn’t express any willingness to run away from her or anything. Therefore that bit of criticism is invalid as well.

Therefore, at the end of the day, I think none of the things that people use as proof that he is supposedly an ass is valid. I mean sure, one of the minor characters seem to have reached that conclusion, but basing off what he has done and how he has acted with Sansa in their only conversation, I just don’t see it. It’s like how many of the characters in the story seem convinced that Sansa is stupid even though reading her chapters, she comes off as rather intelligent, except this time it’s Harry, who has been extremely respectful of Sansa, yet is apparently an ass.

That brings me to the fact that Harry has treated Sansa far better than most of the characters in the story. Yes he initially dismissed her because she was Littlefinger’s daughter/bastard at first, but when they interacted later on, he was extremely courteous. He is her only possible love interest who not only apologized to her candidly for his previous actions (’’I was unforgivably rude to you in the yards…you must forgive me,’’), he actually changed his behavior after his apology unlike Tyrion or Ned, whose apology were simply justifications for their actions. Not only that but he called her pretty without being creepy about it, he has been completely honest with her even when she had asked extremely personal questions, he has absolutely no ulterior motives, he genuinely enjoy her as a person, laughs when she makes funny jokes and even complimented her intelligence. People act like he treats women like trash when he respected Sansa’s personal space and didn’t sexually harass her or objectify her in any manner, and even when he talked about his previous lover’s beauty, he was never objectifying or being creepy about it (“Saffron is very beautiful, I’ll have you know. Tall and slim, with big brown eyes and hair like honey.”)

I think their interaction was really wonderful, because unlike so many of Sansa’s love interests, he actually genuinely respects her. He never dismissed what she had to say at the basis of her sex or anything like that. There’s also more personal reasons as to why I enjoy this ship. I think their dynamic is really enjoyable because I enjoy seeing Sansa tease him and make him blush and bewildered, and it’s evident to me that she is in complete control of the situation when they interact. Most of the times we’ve seen Sansa interact with another character, it’s that other character who is in control, and often use that control to do horrible things to her. However, in this situation, she not only has the agency, but he lets her have it. When she asks personal questions about his life, he answers. When she teases him and plays with him, he genuinely enjoys it. Like when she said he’s bad at conversation, he could have been all insulted, yet instead he laughs at her making fun of him. When she makes a suggestive comment, he grins. I don’t know how so many people can just dismiss the pairing when it’s so refreshing to see Sansa have such freedom in her relationship with someone else.

So yeah, every criticism that people launch Harry’s way is invalid in my opinion. Some of them are blatantly false, a lot of them are baseless assumptions and others are things that so many of the other protagonists have done and said without as much criticism. I think that Harry has not been an ass to Sansa, and has been really courteous with her. Not only that, but he genuinely respects her and what she has to say unlike so many of the characters people want her to be with. To go even further, their dynamic is unlike every other Sansa dynamic that has some romantic vibes to them because she has a lot of freedom and agency in this particular relationship. I honestly can’t wait to see more of them together.

#stardyng #sansaxharry #harry the heir #harry hardyng #harrold hardyng #asoiaf meta #sort off #sansa stark #sansa #asoiaf #a song of ice and fire #i will elaborate on what I think will happen to him and his importance in another post #this post was already getting very long and that part of the question didn't fit with the rest #so i'll just be another post #anyways #stardyng rights y'all!!!#long post #asks

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