#spoiler alert i think y'all be neglecting the nuances in a lot of the characters that aren't wei wuxian or lan wangji tbh | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

allmydokkuns · 10 months

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if there's anyone Mandarin-speaking bilingual active on here and still has spoons for MDZS, I have a bit of a linguistic question but not enough knowledge to find an answer myself that I'd appreciate some help with!

I know the fanon fix it courtesy name for Meng Yao being accepted into Lanling Jin is "Ziyao," as in the correct generational character "Zi-" to match Zixuan and Zixun, plus his birth name. Is there any reason he can't still have his birth name and a courtesy name specific to his generation? Same thing goes for Mo Xuanyu.

I've been trying to think of good names for them in a scenario where this does in fact happen but all I've found so far is

偿 cháng for MY bc JGS doesn't deserve paternal rights, which only makes sense if you're privy to the poly fixit that lives rent free in my head...

Unfortunately I've come up with nothing for MXY for now, mainly because there's a particular kind of resonance between character birth names, courtesy names and personal titles that's hard to balance correctly for anyone who doesn't have a lot of working knowledge of the original language.

Anyway if there's anyone out there who has some ideas, reblog/comment/tag me on this post because my brain ain't spitting up much rn. Much thanks. I also remember reading something by someone else talking about how Lanling Jin goes by generations when it comes to deciding names for male descendants and that the radicals in Lan Xichen's and Wangj's birth names seem to be aligning by design, but I don't have enough spoons to find characters that contain the "xu" sound while also having some kind of relevant meaning for both MY and MXY. So instead I tried to think of word characters with good connotations that would be used to name sons as if the two of them had been accepted into the family with good intentions, dunno if I succeeded. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯qq

((now the rest of this is just gonna be some thoughtvomit because what even is coherent sentences anymore, abrupt topic change bc my joints are too messed up to make a separate post))

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding traditional family dynamics, but there is no real reason for Lanling Jin to not accept both Meng Yao and Mo Xuanyu into Lanling Jin except for 1) as established, Jin Guangshan is a philandering rapist piece of shit that has absolutely no intentions of taking responsibility for his offspring and sexual proclivities, or 2) they're attempting to save face for the clan and trying to do the thing where if they do not acknowledge the existence of these children then the problem does not exist?

I understand that some people spin it as being Madame Jin's intolerance for these illegitimate sons given her abuse of Meng Yao after Zixuan's and Yanli's deaths in canon timeline, but that doesn't make a lot of sense to me given how little presence she has in the plot and sect since she married into Lanling Jin. Not saying her taking out negative emotions on someone who for all intents and purposes she should be treating kind of like her son is right, because abuse is still abuse, but other than that it seems her only purpose in the plot is to give Zixuan a mother, Yu Ziyuan a sworn sister, Jiang Yanli a mother-in-law, and Jin Guangyao someone else to hate in Lanling. She's not distinct enough to have a canonical name other than her title as Jin Guangshan's wife, and besides which, being the wife she has no real power to make any decisions regarding the family's heirs. Moxiang Tongxiu straight up set up Lanling Jin as the wealthiest sect after Qishan Wen falls and they just so happen to be the only sect with only one (1) child born of the sect leader and his wife? Sus. Legally everything would have been all well and good if JGS was forced somehow into legitimizing both his illegitimate sons (the sons specifically, since having an illegitimate daughter does your family no real good in a Confucian society unless you're going to marry her out for political purposes) and they were raised as they should have been, especially since both MY and MXY seem like intelligent people. Zixuan gets some backers, Madame Jin gets some more kids and JGS gets some concubines, everyone wins! Even the sect's line of succession is more secure if he suddenly gets two sons. In short, there were so many ways JGS could have taken control of this situation as the father and sect leader and spun it to somehow come out smelling more like roses BUT HE ACTIVELY? CHOSE to give absolutely no shits and just let his wife, kids and sect suffer the consequences of this particular paternal dysfunction. And we all know what happened because he gave too many unnecessary fucks where they were not needed :^) or consensual :^)))) fuck that guy honestly tbh.

Now granted that was a whole sidebar, and maybe I'm thinking about this too hard but does nobody else think it's weird that of the Great Sects, only the male characters in Yunmeng Jiang and Gusu Lan have both canonical birth and courtesy names? It's almost like MXTX gave only the male characters most relevant to the story one of each honestly, since the only two exceptions that are coming to mind now are Su She (Minshan) and Xue Yang (Chengmei). Of course there is the argument that Wen Ning also has a courtesy name, but does it really count when no one uses it to refer to him? The naming stuff in this story are all over the place actually -- Jiang Cheng is the only sect leader of his generation that is referred to primarily by his birth name, but bc WWX is an unreliable narrator it's probably because he always called him that and somehow conveniently forgot he no longer had a right to call him that after he voluntarily left Yunmeng Jiang, therefore we as the audience also call him that... The fact that JC and WWX both seem to have courtesy names when they're kind of young for them, but that also goes for Lan Wangji. Neither the Nie brothers or Jin Zixuan have canonical alternate names, so either it wasn't very important to the plot (though it kind of is in Lanling after the Campaign when JGY gets legitimized but not really since it's the wrong generational character), but what's going on with Qinghe Nie's naming choices? This kind of inconsistency is fine if you handwave the whole thing about degrees of intimacy and formality and stuff but it gets funky if you stare at it long enough.

And that's not even scratching the surface of the weirdness surrounding the women in MDZS -- as few and shortlived as they are. Yu Ziyuan is the only wife of a sect leader in the named sects with a canonical name and title that isn't her married sect's clan + Madame, and the only one we see with any kind of sway both martially and in the everyday running of Yunmeng Jiang. Most importantly, she's the only woman in the series to have her own personal title! Also, again, sidebar, but Jiang Yanli choosing to go by Madame Jiang in fic instead of Young Madame Jin is a mood and a whole chef's kiss tbh. I think also in the kind of household I've been imagining her in after her marriage she could also be called "xiao-furen" (young Madame) where Madame Jin could also be properly called "lao-furen" (old Madame) to differentiate them according to subservient members of the household, in-house? That's a whole nother thing tho, in-group (household, sect, clan) versus outgroup (other sects or clans, and in some ways, your maiden clan if you married out).

Anyway. All of you writing Madame Yu as the root of all trouble in the Yunmeng Jiang family are being culturally insensitive and midkey misogynistic -- looping back to the discussion on JGS being a piece of shit father and sect leader, all his sect's family dysfunction is his inability to keep it in his pants and properly manage his paternal responsibility for the fruits thereof because in a Confucian setting, wives must obey husbands, sons must obey fathers, and both mother and son have therefore no power to override JGS's shitty parenting and leadership decisions re: powermongering and lack of legitimate heirs. Madame Yu's dissatisfaction with Jiang Fengmian's neglect of his only legitimate heir for some other person's son, even if that person's son is the current head disciple for the sect, is valid, because neglecting the next sect leader means neglecting the sect's future. Again, not saying her punishing WWX for stuff that he may or may not have done with Zidian was right. Wei Wuxian might be brilliant and talented and all that, but he doesn't have the right temperament to lead as a sect and clan must be led: with prudence, diplomacy and caution. Again, not WWX-bashing, but I think my favorite description of him goes something like "Wei Wuxian has never met a situation he didn't think couldn't be solved through escalation, and you all think Jiang Cheng is the emotional one?" Jiang Fengmian is an interesting contrast to both Jin Guangshan and Qingheng-jun in that he embodies the idea of physically there, but emotionally unavailable father, whereas JGS is maliciously neglectful and Qingheng-jun is practically non-existent. Granted we don't get a clear idea of how JFM is with JC outside of what that dynamic is like with WWX but I don't think very highly of a father who will scold the son that labored for who knows how many days to save his shixiong's life while praising said shixiong for something he didn't even accomplish alone in the same breath. It's the whole pattern of "ignore what Jiang Cheng accomplishes but lavish praise on Wei Wuxian who would have gotten into even bigger trouble if Jiang Cheng wasn't looking out for him too" that gets me with him. They're both children, you be the adult and sect leader they deserve and look past your biases against your wife (allegedly) and from your past (allegedly) to give them the tools they need to succeed together once you've kicked the bucket.

Is Madame Yu perfect? No, but I do think she loves her children and recognizes the responsibilities she has to Yunmeng Jiang, and she knows as a wife, mother, and fighter, that nothing she does or teaches or passes onto the children in her care means as much as the recognition and explicit support of her husband the sect leader. Jiang Fengmian's presence and legacy in the story is very faint. But Madame Yu? I see echoes of her in all three Yunmeng Jiang kids. But then I see her getting turned into the nagging wife stereotype and it makes me angry that the most developed female character in this story so often gets the short end of the stick in fanfic. Obviously I can't control what some of y'all write and there are some cultural/political nuances that exist in the story that a lot of the fan base may not be familiar with, so yeah I can understand why she gets watered down like that, like any other character in the story does and I'm not calling anybody out for it. But if some of y'all took one look at the so-called sect leaders in this story and immediately decided that it was their nagging, abusive hag of a wife that was the problem, I don't think we're reading/watching the same thing. Also, Wen Ruohan doesn't have a wife mentioned at all that I'm aware of and you could 100% argue that he's the root of most of the political BS that happens in the story, so do with that what you will.

Anyway I'm tired and my joints be protesting so I'm gonna call it a night. If you read this far, take a virtual cookie for making it all the way to here, thank you. If you're new to this hellsite and thought this was intriguing/interesting, reblog or comment and help a bitch out with some engagement, these posts take a lot out of me and if you'll remember, I did have some questions before the meta that I'd like to get out to the wider fan base. Likes don't do shit except make the OP feel like they're yelling into a vacuum. Y'all have a good one.

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