Sexism strikes again

I finally had the chance to try out the Persona franchise last month or so when I picked up Persona 5 from Gamestop. For a number of reasons I will probably never finish it, but one of the things that stood out very sharply to me as a grating factor was the treatment of Ann by the narrative.

The player character is male, as is the mascot, and your first friend/team member, Ryuji. Both boys are in high school, and the first girl recruited to the team is Ann, who joins almost entirely because she's being sexually pursued by one of the teachers, Kamoshida, who the boys are looking to expose as a predator and abuser of students. Ann is furious about how much Kamoshida's gotten away with and more than willing to put herself at risk as one of the Phantom Thieves to stop him from hurting anyone else.

And what outfit does the game put her in as soon as she joins the team? Skin-tight bright red body suit with cat ears and a tail.

Most of her battle poses have her standing with her chest and ass thrust out, often towards the viewer. Her knock-out pose has her face-down on the floor with her ass up in the air.

Both the PC and your companions have multiple chances to make sexual comments at her or about her. One of the mascot's repeat battle dialogues is a breathy line about how she's "so gorgeous!"

This very anime hypocrisy, where sexual harassment is gross if it's one of the bad guys doing it but funny or cute if it's one of the heroes doing it reminds me aggressively of the reasons I've distanced myself from anime since I was a teenager. The game has no real respect for Ann's feelings or the story it created for her. It pays lip service to the trauma of being a teenager pursued by an adult in a position of power when Ann feels like she can't refuse, but it jumps right from exclaiming about how terrible it is for Kamoshida to treat her like a sexual prize into the PC joking about what a sexual prize she is.

If I had any hope that this would be addressed later on--that Ann might call them out for being disrespectful, particularly in light of her trauma--I might feel differently, but I don't. Ann is a romance option for the PC and given how she's been treated so far, I can only imagine how cringe-worthy that path is.

Valinor Cell Block Tango

Tumblr post here.

Anonymous said:

Hey, were you the one who posted how Maglor himself thought the oath and kinslayings were such evil acts? If so, how come there are those who still believe the second and third kinslaying is justified when Maglor himself thought it to be such an evil deed? I really need like a solid reasoning cause I was talking to someone who still believes the kinslayings were justified/needed and doesn't take my "murder is wrong" thing as a reason lol

I said:

That was indeed my post! If we’re thinking of the same one. I’ve definitely made a post like that.

I mean I don’t really know what to say besides “murder is wrong” lol If we can’t agree on that um. I don’t really know where we go.

The argument in favor of the kinslayings that I’ve seen usually boils down to property rights. Because the Silmarils are the rightful (and that’s honestly debatable) property of the Feanorians, anyone who keeps the Silmarils from them deserves what they get, basically.

Which is. Kind of bonkers as a moral philosophy, even if you DO buy that the Feanorians have an uncontested right to the Silmarils. #1: We’re punishing theft or conversion with DEATH now? That’s acceptable to us? #2: The harm the Feanorians caused went far beyond the individual who possessed the Silmaril (Dior in the Second Kinslaying and Elwing in the Third). Even if Dior had taken that Silmaril right out of Maedhros’ hand and spit in his eye on the way out it wouldn’t justify the wholesale slaughter of an entire kingdom. They literally murdered children over things. Items. Stuff. Magical cool stuff yeah–but they valued it over lives. Does anyone honestly think Tolkien would have written a story agreeing with that as a moral view?

“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.” (Thorin’s final words, The Hobbit)

I don’t know how you look at Maedhros and Maglor–the ONLY two of SEVEN sons to survive through the Third Kinslaying–and think THEY think they did the right thing. Five of their brothers have now died in assaults on other Elves which they began. Maglor argues for breaking the oath there, he resists Maedhros’ drive to the Fourth Kinslaying (until he doesn’t), and at the end of it all, he throws his precious Silmaril into the sea. Maedhros kills himself over it. These are not the actions of people who feel GOOD about where their lives have gone and the actions they’ve taken. Tolkien is so blatantly obvious about the Feanorians being in the wrong it’s always a little wild to me that the KINSLAYINGS get defended.

On the note of the Fourth Kinslaying, let’s not forget that: That after everything, after the War of Wrath is over and everyone is ready to go home and see their families and be at peace, a whole group of Elves get murdered by Maglor and Maedhros again over the Silmarils. A group–Eonwe’s guard–of people who had survived a war with MORGOTH die because Maedhros and Maglor weren’t willing to break their oath.

An oath which Tolkien casts as wicked from the very start–something that was always likely to bring them to evil acts.

“Then Feanor swore a terrible oath. His seven sons leapt straightway to his side and took the selfsame vow together, and red as blood shone their drawn swords…and many quailed to hear the dread words.” (“Of the Flight of the Noldor,” The Silmarillion)

Furthermore, as Dior points out in some versions outside Silm proper, at the time the Second Kinslaying is committed, Melkor still has two of the Silmarils. Even if Dior had handed over Luthien’s Silmaril–to the people who had kidnapped and attempted to forcibly marry and presumably rape his mom; and also tried to murder her and his father later on–the oath is still not fulfilled, because Melkor has two.

The fact that the Feanorians choose to pursue Luthien’s Silmaril with violence and bloodshed rather than make a go at the two that Melkor has has always revealed their hypocrisy to me. They chose Luthien’s Silmaril because they knew it would be easier to get than the ones that Melkor has. Easier to kill other Elves if they don’t give you what you want, than to attack or infiltrate Angband. Even now, when they know it’s possible–because Beren and Luthien did it, and they had FAR fewer resources at hand than the Feanorians (and for the record, Fingon also successfully infiltrated Angband; Gwindor and others have successfully escaped from Angband)–they choose to slay other Elves instead. Say again the Second Kinslaying was “necessary”?

This is how Tolkien describes the attack on the Havens:

“And so there came to pass the last and cruelest of the slayings of Elf by Elf; and that was the third of the great wrongs achieved by the accursed oath.

For the sons of Feanor that yet lived came down suddenly upon the exiles of Gondolin and the remnant of Doriath, and destroyed them.” (“Of the Voyage of Earendil,” The Silmarillion)

Does this description sound like people taking justified action? And let’s not forget, in this battle, the Feanorians’ own troops are so horrified by their actions that they turn against them.

“In that battle some of their [the Feanorians’] people stood aside, and some few rebelled and were slain upon the other part aiding Elwing against their own lords…Too late the ships of Cirdan and Gil-galad the High King came hasting to the aid of the Elves of Sirion; and Elwing was gone, and her sons.” (“Of the Voyage of Earendil,” The Silmarillion)

Members of the Feanorians’ own people find their actions so terrible they cannot simply join those who stand by and refuse to attack the Havens, but they actively join the fight on the side of the Havens. Moreover, the heroic Gil-galad arrives intending to stop the Feanorians and aid the Havens. Sure, he arrives too late–but his intent is made clear: the Feanorians are the villains here, who need to be stopped.

And I don’t think it is uncontested that the Silmarils belong to the Feanorians. For one, they were created entirely and only by Feanor; none of his sons had anything to do with it. And for two, the universe itself has deemed by the end that the Feanorians no longer have a property right in them, when the Silmarils burn the hands of Maedhros and Maglor because of all the evil they’ve committed. The jewels themselves will not be touched by these people who have done so much wrong. Eonwe tries to warn them about this before they even commit the Fourth Kinslaying.

“And they [Maedhros and Maglor] sent a message therefore to Eonwe, bidding him yield up those jewels…But Eonwe answered that the right to the work of their father, which the sons of Feanor had formerly possessed, had now perished, because of their many and merciless deeds, being blinded by their oath, and most of all because of their slaying of Dior and the assault upon the Havens.” (“Of the Voyage of Earendil,” The Silmarillion [emphasis added])

Like…I don’t know how the book could be more clear that the Kinslayings were wrong and that Maedhros and Maglor were in the wrong.

I think fans are so invested in the Feanorians they’re willing to bend over backwards to find some view where they didn’t actually commit horrific war crimes and were in fact in the right. But that’s just not the story Tolkien wrote. Also, you can like them and still admit they did horrible things. You are allowed to like characters who are in the wrong!