[ SECRET POST #5277 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5277 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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[Studio Ghibli]


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[Lucifer]


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 07 secrets from Secret Submission Post #755.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

02. https://i.imgur.com/AnCrJP0.jpg

[feotakahari]

One of several reasons I ditched My Hero Academia was that it looked like it was going this route. Midoriya was trying to be a good hero in all the ways Endeavor wasn’t, but only the murderous antagonists were trying to dismantle the social system that made Endeavor possible.

[(Anonymous)]

What books are examples of this?

[feotakahari]

They have a list at the bottom.

[(Anonymous)]

I mean, not to get all political, but this is very political, and I don't think it's a coincidence that, you know, Goodkind is right wing, Weber is right-ish. The politics of Goblin Emperor, insofar as I understand them at second hand, are center liberal. It's not really surprising that people with those politics would write this kind of plot because the idea that either moral good will, or personal charismatic magnetism, is able to fix broken systems is pretty common in those ideologies.

Although, that said, Goodkind is a bad enough writer that I feel like it's kind of useless to treat him as indicative of anything. It feels like he is an outlier no matter what context you're talking about.

[(Anonymous)]

If the scads of people who think communism is The Answer and can totally work this time around because people will behave and not become dictators you guys really!! are any indication, it's definitely not just a right-wing thing.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm not arguing for or against any ideology here, to be clear, I just think this particular failure mode is more closely associated with liberalism and conservatism for ideological reasons.

And, I mean, your example kind of makes my argument for me! Because that's a totally different kind of failure than the one OP is talking about. OP's objection is to thinking you can fix broken systems by putting new people in charge of them. When you're talking about making new systems from scratch, you're in a totally different realm.

[(Anonymous)]

Some of your examples I don't know, but others I know are pretty old, and I actually can't think of many new things where a bad system is acknowledged, if only indirectly, as the problem. It always ends with a system overhaul. It's like, a trope?

And then I think of the people who thought The Hunger Games should have ended with the first book, where the good guy wins the Game but the Games system is still in place. So there's definitely an audience that wants the kind of story you're put off by.

SA

[(Anonymous)]

Oops, used the opposite word. I meant I can't think of many new things where the system ISN'T acknowledged as the problem.

[meadowphoenix]

I don't mind books which are Obviously Political but I do mind the lack of nuance? Usually it means that the author cares less for depth of character and more for aggressively orienting their audience to their POV, and since I'm a character ho, this annoys me! I think we probably dislike the same things.

That said, TV does this A LOT, and it spans all genres. in the US, CBS tends to the be the public channel with the least nuance in its politics. Blue Bloods is the worst for this.

[philstar22]

This. I don't even always mind books that have a political POV I disagree with, even strongly disagree with. But when the politics get in the way of the story and the book is more a political screed than an actual book, most of the time I'm out. I want interesting characters and worldbuilding, and if a book doesn't give me that, I'm just not interested.

[(Anonymous)]

There’s one fantasy/sci-fi mashup comic I remember reading, Finder, where most characters are in one sort of clan or another. One story arc follows a character who is born into a wealthy, manipulative, competitive clan where they strongly prize conformity and hold literal beauty pageants to determine if that family can stay in that clan (and get major social and financial benefits).

I have some mixed feelings about the overall story, but a couple atypical things stuck with me. One was that the main character was not a 100% Good Person, and others (or just her to herself) call out her weaknesses or poor attempts at manipulation. The other was that even though the main character begins to question whether things really work in her clan or in all the clan systems, at the end she remains in it - she is just closer to defining herself individually and her relationships with others with a new sense of conviction.

[(Anonymous)]

It's been so long since I read Melanie Rawn's Dragon Prince series that I don't recall how it would fit this description.

[(Anonymous)]

This is probably my biggest complaint about the Vorkosigan series, which I love. In Shards of Honor/Barrayar, Barrayar's monarchy was warmongering nightmare constantly teetering on the verge of authoritarianism even under a good(ish) emperor, explicitly responsible for thousands of deaths just to make sure the next emperor was an out and out sadist, and implicitly responsible for the planet's low standard of living and bigotry. The heroes collaborated in the system with varying degrees of discomfort because overthrowing it would be even more bloody, and also they couldn't work to reform the system because of mmmmmmerhaewna. The tension gradually goes out of that balloon until by A Civil Campaign (if not earlier) having an absolute Monarchy is Fine Actually and no one complains except deliberate troublemakers and the representatives of democratic governments are slapstick minibosses.

[(Anonymous)]

Also they couldn't work to reform the system because "mmmmhhhwwwwwhhh" which translates to "most worldbuilding don't even have system reform cross their mind as an option", like let's not pretend there's any malice or even deliberately lazy handwaving here.

[(Anonymous)]

Yes! And I don't expect Aral and Cordelia and Miles or even Gregor to be able to reform all of that, but they just...don't bother. The author fell waaaaay too in love with that system.

[(Anonymous)]

To be honest, it's more difficult to write a stroy in which solution is the change of the system than just putting the right people in power, especially if you want to continue it as a series and couldn't avoid showing what needs to be done for the system to change. Readers like simple stories where victory solves everything.

[(Anonymous)]

For me part of the fantasy of fantasy is that a given individual or group can make a corrupt system work, because there is no perfect system out there that makes life fair and bearable, nevermind happy, for everyone without constant, backbreaking, often thankless work.

Changing or abolishing a system of government would also be constant, backbreaking, often thankless work, followed by more to set up a new system, or I guess for committed anarchists preventing a new centralized government from forming.

If I wanted to read about people doing normal government jobs I can read work meeting minutes or something.

Idk. I get that the real world implications of this stuff are shitty but I don't see any way for the real world to handle political corruption any better.