On Themis [6.4 SPOILER]

[Lunaxia]

There are points where it feels...

I thought it was about to! Why is why I bowed out of the discussions when I reached a comfortable stopping point, but apparently I miscalculated and have until either the 8th or 9th (the particulars as to how the timing for that works still eludes me) and evidently means I could have played the patch... though I'm not particularly distraught over that, lol.

I think your take is... perhaps not wrong, but incredibly charitable, let's put it that way. You may be right, but a grown adult can distinguish between the two and surmise when it would be beneficial or futile to engage with a particular topic, and acknowledge when walking away is the better option instead of adamantly sticking to your guns and miring the discussion in pointless semantics and misrepresentations of what is actually being said. My patience with the latter has worn a little thin, I've got to say.

I think that's the thing though.

Yes, and I could counter this with several instances of players being subjected to disgusting levels of harassment outside of the forums merely for daring to be critical of Endwalker. I could say the levels of mockery and disdain that were shown from the outset towards anyone expressing a palpably negative view of the game were ridiculous and wholly unjustified, and that nothing warranted the nigh on constant attacks on everything from the players' intelligence and characters to their personal lives that continued unabated up until recently. I could counter that there have been trolls on both sides that have done nobody any favours and blatantly worked to fan the flames to the detriment of everyone, not just those who share your point of view, and I could say that even now, despite the best efforts of several posters who have done nothing but express themselves politely and articulately in even in the most obnoxious and trying of circumstances, holding a particular set of views still sets you up to be exposed to a very strange and potent sense of snobbery for choosing to engage critically with the game in a way others do not.

At some point you have to let go of the metaphorical boogeyman and stop using it as an excuse to further victimise yourself and undermine arguments that you disagree with and meaningfully engage with the discussion at hand, or not bother with it all.

Done with one, but now several more behind, lol. @.@

Will respond to this in a little bit when I've recovered some energy, I dozed off typing the rest, lol.

[Brinne]

I think your take is... perhaps not wrong, but incredibly charitable, let's put it that way. You may be right, but a grown adult can distinguish between the two and surmise when it would be beneficial or futile to engage with a particular topic, and acknowledge when walking away is the better option instead of adamantly sticking to your guns and miring the discussion in pointless semantics and misrepresentations of what is actually being said. My patience with the latter has worn a little thin, I've got to say.

Y-you keep calling my takes "charitable"! What can I do to convince you I'm not so soft and naive?

Obviously I am kidding. I totally understand where you're coming from, because being mired in so much bad faith (there is often going to be kneejerk defensiveness and hostility if you express criticism, however legitimate, of a piece of media someone likes in a dedicated way, unfortunately, and whatever psychology is behind that is a whole other can of worms in and of itself) and, at times, people bafflingly just wholesale seeming to make things up, whether about the text itself or about what other people are claiming, is exhausting. I dunno, though, in my experience, it doesn't even occur to a lot of people to distinguish the two modes of thinking about a story, perhaps even particularly when it comes to "nerd media," where there are so many cases where storytelling is treated more like solving a puzzle where there's a right answer and a wrong answer, and whatever is discerned to be "intended" is the end of the discussion.

Something I do want to add while I'm thinking about it as an addendum to my other thoughts, though, is that a "writing analysis" lens does not have to be critical or negative by default. See: my appreciation of my beautiful wife, Athena. There's tons of aspects of Pandaemonium I could express deep appreciation for how they went about things, let alone Shadowbringers itself setting my brain alight way back when. I think part of the language that easily gets misunderstood is also... how to put it, the often unspoken understanding in those types of discussions that a story is going to inherently be a part of a broader "conversation," and what can be appreciated or not appreciated about it is going to take place in context of the "conversation" surrounding the tropes, devices, and themes it employs, which is where a lot of the gushing about Athena, for example, comes from so far as the integrity and unapologetic nature of her writing vis a vis an unusual portrayal of a maternal figure in this kind of media. The appreciation for the Ancients and Amaurot--well, speaking for myself--also has roots in how it orients itself in a certain type of "conversation" about how plot devices of their sort are typically portrayed, and beyond just tropes, to me, the sorts of figures in stories that usually don't get their perspectives and humanity privileged or valued.

Obviously, I am still extremely critical of lots of Endwalker’s storytelling and writing, but I guess I wanted to make clear my position was not “my form of enjoyable discussion is just hating on and criticizing the game’s writing”.

[Cleretic]

Yes, and I could counter this with several instances of players being subjected to disgusting levels of harassment outside of the forums merely for daring to be critical of Endwalker. I could say the levels of mockery and disdain that were shown from the outset towards anyone expressing a palpably negative view of the game were ridiculous and wholly unjustified, and that nothing warranted the nigh on constant attacks on everything from the players' intelligence and characters to their personal lives that continued unabated up until recently. I could counter that there have been trolls on both sides that have done nobody any favours and blatantly worked to fan the flames to the detriment of everyone, not just those who share your point of view, and I could say that even now, despite the best efforts of several posters who have done nothing but express themselves politely and articulately in even in the most obnoxious and trying of circumstances, holding a particular set of views still sets you up to be exposed to a very strange and potent sense of snobbery for choosing to engage critically with the game in a way others do not.

At some point you have to let go of the metaphorical boogeyman and stop using it as an excuse to further victimise yourself and undermine arguments that you disagree with and meaningfully engage with the discussion at hand, or not bother with it all.

SannaR was literally describing the exact same thing as you from an opposing side, and I can say personally that I've been harassed on multiple platforms (part of which you're no doubt aware) for the crime of 'not particularly trusting Emet-Selch or agreeing with Team Zodiark'.

This argument gets virulently ugly because of people deciding their views on this are moral stances that they need to attack people for disagreeing with, and that's not okay. There's a lot of victims to this; don't blame them for voicing that.

[Lunaxia]

Y-you keep calling my takes "charitable"! What can I do to convince you I'm not so soft and naive?

I'm sorry! Perhaps "gracious" might more apt, and closer to what I'm trying to say. It's not a bad thing! It's a very healthy mindset to have. It enables you to offer a fresh understanding on a situation that others may miss or be unable to express, and sometimes even create a possible middle ground to meet on in the centre of what otherwise can feel like a considerably yawning chasm. It's an admirable quality, especially when I find myself struggling to take anything seriously after having to hear how Amaurot is a commentary on fascist states, or how the Convocation supposedly resembles an oligarchy, and I'm incapable of much more than [looks at an invisible camera like I'm on The Office.]

And likewise, there is actually a lot about FFXIV overall and yes, even parts of EW that I could enthuse about endlessly if invited (I did play the game this long for a reason, after all), and it's unfortunate how it gets lost in the mix of the endless controversial debates. Personally, my enthusiasm - as well as my criticism - revolves primarily around the game's approach to storytelling and its ability to establish tension, create atmosphere, induce (the appropriate) emotion in the player and organically develop the characters and the story in a subtle but skilful way (have I mentioned lately how much I loved In From the Cold?) which sometimes it does do so very well and other times, uh... well.) And in less stringent circles less focused on an us vs them narrative regarding the overall view of the story, perhaps I could express them, but there's not really much room here to do that.

SannaR was literally describing...

But it's so inanely repetitive by now it's become by and large redundant, and winds up used as little more than a shield to justify bad faith takes and encourage a hive-mind approach to interpreting the story rather than considering it from a personal and more nuanced perspective. Can we not just report these people and let it go once and for all?

Edit: You know, it's worth mentioning I have seen many instances of posters calling out their own and acknowledging the mistreatment of other users from the critical side, but rarely if ever have I seen even one poster acknowledge the hostility or attacks inflicted in the name of supposedly defending the story - it always has to circle back to making themselves the victim, somehow.

[Cleretic]

Can we not just report these people and let it go once and for all?

Edit: You know, it's worth mentioning I have seen many instances of posters calling out their own and acknowledging the mistreatment of other users from the critical side, but rarely if ever have I seen even one poster acknowledge the hostility or attacks inflicted in the name of supposedly defending the story - it always has to circle back to making themselves the victim, somehow.

Stop. You can't make the case of 'both sides should just let it go and move on', and then immediately attack people you see as being on the other side. Which you have now done multiple times here.

Also: we know moderation is woefully inadequate on this subject, especially when it comes to cross-platform harassment where, frankly, nothing Square-Enix moderation can do can stop someone harassing me for it on Twitter. When that's true, our only option is to self-moderate, and strive to provide a better standard of discussion than the one that's causing the problem. And that requires, sometimes, taking the L and being the better person rather than continuing to swing.

[Lunaxia]

Stop. You can't make the case of 'both sides should just let it go and move on', and then immediately attack people you see as being on the other side. Which you have now done multiple times here.

Also: we know moderation is woefully inadequate on this subject, especially when it comes to cross-platform harassment. When that's true, our only option is to self-moderate, and strive to provide a better standard of discussion than the one that's causing the problem. And that requires, sometimes, taking the L and being the better person.

And you're doing it again. I added that edit because it occurred to me after posting how rather than even attempting to concede the bare minimum that both parties are capable of being at fault, once again it became an issue of deflecting any responsibility away from one side to the other without stopping to think how others outside of your own perspective have been affected. Do you know the extent to which those people have been harassed? The absolutely god awful things that have been said, the threats that have been made? No. You're not interested, and you refused to even entertain the notion, because like the others it ultimately doesn't favour the narrative you're trying to create, and I'm more than bored of the attempts to purport a sense of decorum and courtesy when it becomes more apparent that's the only thing that truly matters here. Do as you like, because I'm done.

[Cleretic]

ADo you know the extent to which those people have been harassed? The absolutely god awful things that have been said, the threats that have been made?

No, but I trusted that you were telling the truth, and I'm sorry that those things happened, and stand by none of the people who did it. I'm not tremendously inclined to ask for evidence or specifics, both because I believe you, and because that doesn't sound fun for either of us to search for or expose.

If that's what you needed as a show of good faith to stop this sort of attitude so we can move on and do better, then you have it.

[SannaR]

Snips

Should both sides first response to either a liking or or a disliking of something not be heavily loaded with dickishness? Yes. Yet I'd hope you'd agree that both sides should also not try to justify said dickishness with how they have been treated in the past or present from outside areas having the same discussions.

As that normally is how threads or forums quickly devolve into entrenched toxic mud flings where even those who try to trudge out into no man's land in hopes to find solid footing in hopes it can become a fresh starting place also get the diskishness. Should both sides also respond to any disagreement as said person doing the disagreement just shot your dog? Heck no. Yet we all know that's happened more times than there than most would care to count. Or that just because a person in either camp might like or dislike something it shouldn't mean that is how they feel about the whole meal.

Let's take Brinne's wife as an example. For me I was just glad that she didn't have to give up her womb when she sought out more power as what tend to happen to women in fiction who seek to gain powerful magic or whatever have to loose the ability to have kids or a family and have to grow ice cold, cruel and heartless. Or that she secretly was the good one but Lahabreha imprisoned or as we found out killed her cause she got in the way of his ambition or was going to whistle blow on the shady stuff he was doing. How she ended up just comes off as meh for me. I didn't see her as a bad or good character from a writing standpoint, I guess. Meanwhile I still don't know how I feel about Lahabreha. Did I learn more about him? Yeah but for me at least he still felt kinda the same as to the one we had already met. Did Themis being part of the in the present part of the 3rd act bother me? A little cause I don't know how Athena pulled off whatever it is she did to pop him into the setting. But that didn't kill my enjoyment of the story or the fights. I think that if he was left out with when they placed most of the setting in for the 3rd act it'd feel strange to do so. And now I'm pretty sure I'm just rambling.

[TowaIsBestGirl]

Let's take Brinne's wife as an example. For me I was just glad that she didn't have to give up her womb when she sought out more power as what tend to happen to women in fiction who seek to gain powerful magic or whatever have to loose the ability to have kids or a family and have to grow ice cold, cruel and heartless.

whistles

This sure went places, fast. Not sure how to feel about this one, all honesty.

[Brinne]

whistles

This sure went places, fast. Not sure how to feel about this one, all honesty.

I just noticed an opportunity I missed before for WIFECHAT, the only topic that truly matters, so:

I get what Sanna is saying broadly, I think - and it's true that, and a part of my appreciation reflects that, a lot of the times, the motives for an "evil mother" figure is going to be directly, intrinsically tied to her motherhood, always painted as the core of her identity, whether in a negative or positive way. But Athena's actual reasons and motives for being evil weren't actually tied up in Erich himself - her cruelty towards him is in purely treating him as a mere method, completely incidental, disposal, and irrelevant to her internal world one way or another, which is also linked to the lack of where you'd normally see things like, yes, "womb symbolism" and the like. (Instead, Athena gets poison/parasite symbolism in Abyssos, which is absolutely awesome and I could freak out about it in an absolutely embarrassing way.)

In other words: yes, indeed. My wife is, in fact, perfect.