Cannibal posted:

I have a sneaking suspicion you didn't even read the whole book and are just basing your argument entirely off the leaked pages.

You wouldn't need to have any sneaking suspicions if you just read my posts with comprehension, you would know I'm only going off by what was said here. I would defend my side, but you misunderstood so many of my points, I don't feel like basically explaining everything to you again, in order for this conversation to even move forward.

Rosenakahara posted:

Now since everyone on here seems to have just skimmed over my main point, it'd make FAR more sense for the water tribe to have enforced something like this but no we cant do that, that'd show that the "good" tribe was actually kinda flawed and everything needs to be black and white.

Sorry, I didn't see your edit. Yes, you are right.

last edited at Sep 23, 2017 11:49AM

Copying a comment I saw somewhere else about Sozin being homophobic:

Was it really necessary for Sozin to be homophobic on top of everything else?

It's a common attitude among fascist governments. They try to stamp out any sort of difference or variation in the population. And they often try to strongly encourage their subjects to reproduce as quickly as possible to replace their wartime casualties. It wouldn't surprise me if he also banned most forms of birth control as well.

I do agree that the Northern Water Tribe being homophobic as well would make sense, though.

Norainhere that is much better argument than "obviously he would, because he was evil".

Firstly Her* I've stated this multiple times why do people keep assuming im a guy?

Because who cares? I'm a dude, someone calls me a girl online I don't give a shit.

Secondly did you actually watch ATLA at all? The fire nation under the sozin line of rule didn't give a shit whether you a man, woman, old, young, crippled all they cared about was: Are you willing to fight and die for the future of the nation?
If the answer was yes then great, that only started to change when Ozai took control of the nation because he was a self absorbed megalomaniacal monster who simply wanted the world for himself removed from sozins vision.

Again, how is this any different than Nazi Germany? Seriously, how is it any different? Sozin exterminated the air benders no matter who they were, you honestly think he wouldn't go after other minority groups?

Now consider: why would such a nation seek to alienate potential soldiers/scientists for no reason at all especially considering said nation is very far removed from things like traditions unlike the water tribe?
But please continue to assume I'm naive and know nothing of how the world works, see how that works out for ya.

Literally Nazi Germany, literally the US military up until the turn of the century. You're naive because even though you have real world examples to show that you are wrong you ignore it.

Now since everyone on here seems to have just skimmed over my main point, it'd make FAR more sense for the water tribe to have enforced something like this but no we cant do that, that'd show that the "good" tribe was actually kinda flawed and everything needs to be black and white.

DID YOU NOT READ THE FUCKING BOOK? The water tribe runs on "don't ask, don't tell", her parents telling her to keep her relationship private pissed Korra off and what leads to her finding out how other nations treat homosexuals. Socially, the water tribe is technically more oppressive than the fire nation since the fire nation was actually progressive up until the rise of Sozin.

You wouldn't need to have any sneaking suspicions if you just read my posts with comprehension, you would know I'm only going off by what was said here. I would defend my side, but you misunderstood so many of my points, I don't feel like basically explaining everything to you again, in order for this conversation to even move forward.

There is no defending your side. Your points are based off misinformation. You didn't read the book, so why do you think you have a valid argument at all? A lot of your points don't make a damn lick of sense to anyone that actually read the book.

I wasn't going to respond to you anymore, since you arguments are so bad and you proved to not be able to read with comprehension, but after your text about using misinformation, I just had to.

Cannibal posted:
Sozin exterminated the air benders no matter who they were, you honestly think he wouldn't go after other minority groups?

Em, they didn't exterminate them because they were a "minority group", other culture or whatever. They exterminated them, because avatar was supposed to be reborn as airbender next so they wanted to kill him before he can complete his training and oppose them.

last edited at Sep 23, 2017 4:04PM

My arguments are bad? You didnt even read the book, you have no argument.

Of course Sozin went after the air benders because he was trying to kill the Avatar. He still committed genocide to kill a specific child, but he's too nice of a guy to go after other minority groups? Do you not understand how asinine that sounds?

Cannibal posted:

My arguments are bad?

Yes.

He still committed genocide to kill a specific child, but he's too nice of a guy to go after other minority groups? Do you not understand how asinine that sounds?

I don't. Killing airbenders had a purpose. You gave none for him to randomly go for gays other than "because he is evil" or "because Hitler did it so of course he would too" and other assumptions like that. I'm done with you.

last edited at Sep 23, 2017 4:45PM

I pointed out the history of the oppression of homosexuality in reality in hope that you would use some critical thinking skills and draw some parrallels to help figure out why a fascist dictator would ban homosexuality. But I guess I expected too much from you.

Nevri, you havent even read the book. What makes you think you have any leg to stand on? You are willfully ignorant, your opinion means nothing.

Now run away, you got nothing contructive to say anyways.

The whole nazi ideology revolved around blood, race, purity, aryanism, etc... and homosexuality was viewed as something decadent, something inferior races would do. Their whole thing was "we are the best race, so everyone else should submit or disappear". So of course, they had reasons for criminalizing homosexuality.

From what I recall, the subject of homosexuality was never mentioned before in LoK, and I tend to agree with Nevri that Sozin wouldn't go after gays just because "that's what fascist dictators do".

He would have to have an interest in doing so. Either to please some influent religious group, or because it would be aligned with his propaganda. It takes resources to enforce a ban on something. No leader at war likes to waste resources on something useless.

So, unless it was explained why he would ban same-sex couples, i got the impression it was just that: lazy writing. Giving a reason to hate him more, even if it came from left-field and the author didn't bother to put it in context.

They could have written "The fire nation was tolerant too, but then Fire Lord Sozin took power. He decreed that wearing socks in sandals was criminal".

Ooooh... that bastard... wait... What? Why?

last edited at Sep 23, 2017 6:28PM

The whole nazi ideology revolved around blood, race, purity, aryanism, etc... and homosexuality was viewed as something decadent, something inferior races would do. Their whole thing was "we are the best race, so everyone else should submit or disappear". So of course, they had reasons for criminalizing homosexuality.

And how was the fire nation any different? The whole point was to spread their way of life, to spread their advanced technology. They believed themselves the superior nation that all others should submit to.

From what I recall, the subject of homosexuality was never mentioned before in LoK, and I tend to agree with Nevri that Sozin wouldn't go after gays just because "that's what fascist dictators do".

Homosexuality was never mentioned because the only nation that fully embraced LGBT went extinct.

Fascist dictators tend to go after minorities, the ones who don't fit into their ideal society. When it comes to homosexuality, they don't tend to prosper in their military ideals. Turf Wars alluded to it when explaining how Earth Kingdom didn't accept homosexuality.

He would have to have an interest in doing so. Either to please some influent religious group, or because it would be aligned with his propaganda. It takes resources to enforce a ban on something. No leader at war likes to waste resources on something useless.

You know that ain't true. Leaders during war time have no problem wasting resources on wasteful endeavors. You don't have to look far with the US military banning homosexuals until recently, as well as the recent attempt to ban transsexuals despite the opposition from top generals.

So, unless it was explained why he would ban same-sex couples, i got the impression it was just that: lazy writing. Giving a reason to hate him more, even if it came from left-field and the author didn't bother to put it in context.

The context is there, all you need to do is look at the parallels to the real world. Hell, just look at the other nation's stance on homosexuality.

They could have written "The fire nation was tolerant too, but then Fire Lord Sozin took power. He decreed that wearing socks in sandals was criminal".

Ooooh... that bastard... wait... What? Why?

Except you have no parallel to reality as to why a fascist dictator would ban socks with sandals. You might as well be asking yourself why Sozin would want to become an evil dictator in the first place. Why did he want to invade the other nations? That is never fully explained in the show either, but because we know real world counterparts of men just trying to grab a hold of as much power as they can get by any means necessary you don't really need a full explanation for Sozin's motivations.

There is a difference between reality and fiction. Reality isn't written or scenarized. It has no need for justification. It just happens. Explanations and rationalizations are manmade afterward.

Fiction needs to be coherent as a whole. In my opinion, a good author, while leaving some room for interpretation, should give their readers a framework of explanation for the world they are building. Usually using foreshadowing, to show they are in control of their story and the readers don't need to torture their mind to understand what's going on. They build a puzzle and the readers see the pieces falling into place as the story moves on. That's what Japanese authors often do, and it's very effective.

We know that the fact that Korra turned out to be gay wasn't planned by the authors. They just felt it to be in the flow of things. But there wasn't any foreshadowing because talking about same-sex relationships wasn't in the scope of that world originally.

So, I feel (and you can't fight my own feelings) that a sudden criminalization of gays by the Fire Nation, added like a second thought, was poorly introduced and the rationale behind it was weak.

There is a difference between reality and fiction. Reality isn't written or scenarized. It has no need for justification. It just happens. Explanations and rationalizations are manmade afterward.

No, there's not. A lot of fiction relies on the reader/viewer to have some sense of critical thinking skills. Not everything needs explaining and not every motivation needs justification. Some things we just know and understand because we know that it happens in the real world. We don't need to understand the psychology behind a serial killer in a murder mystery novel when we have murderers in real life who were just bored sociopaths. We didn't need to fully understand Hannibal Lector to know that he was a shitty person who did shitty things for shitty reasons.

Fiction needs to be coherent as a whole. In my opinion, a good author, while leaving some room for interpretation, should give their readers a framework of explanation for the world they are building. Usually using foreshadowing, to show they are in control of their story and the readers don't need to torture their mind to understand what's going on. They build a puzzle and the readers see the pieces falling into place as the story moves on. That's what Japanese authors often do, and it's very effective.

Except how is anything in this story not coherent? The fact that we have reality to refer back to makes it coherent. It allows an interpretation that doesn't require you too skim the show with a magnifying glass to find the details foreshadowing it. A fictional world with a fictional parallel to many real world fascist dictators that made similar decisions. The story isn't about Sozin, it's about the consequences of his actions almost a hundred years after he made them. The reason why he committed atrocities is not the main focus of the story.

We know that the fact that Korra turned out to be gay wasn't planned by the authors. They just felt it to be in the flow of things. But there wasn't any foreshadowing because talking about same-sex relationships wasn't in the scope of that world originally.

What are you on about? Because gays were never explicitly talked about means there was no foreshadowing? Come on, that's pretty damn weak. Why would the show have any reason to talk about girls loving girls before the girls are loving girls? They knew that in book 2 they were going to break up Korra and Mako permanently, the only reason they were together was because they wanted a quick romance in what was originally planned to be a single season series. In season 3 they made the decision to have Korra and Asami as end game and worked towards that. Season 3 had them become closer and then gave hints throughout season 4 before the "confession" at the end. That's more than we ever got from NanoFate.

So, I feel (and you can't fight my own feelings) that a sudden criminalization of gays by the Fire Nation, added like a second thought, was poorly introduced and the rationale behind it was weak.

Again, how does that make sense to you? How is it added like a second thought when they also gave the reasons for the other nations? Why is the Fire Nations weak while you have nothing to say about the Water Tribe, Air Nomads or Earth Kingdom? How is the rationale weak? It was literally the work of a genocide committing fascist dictator, and it doesn't make sense that he would ban homosexuality like many have done in reality? The comic literally explains that the Earth Kingdom was militaristically repressive, hence it's social opposition to homosexuality. Can the same not be applied to the Fire Nation's militaristic imperialism?

Again, it explains the stance of all four nations, there is no reason to harp on the reason for the Fire Nation when it has no actual relevance to the current characters. It was just a one panel history lesson.

last edited at Sep 24, 2017 5:12AM