this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2024
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askchapo

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I have a few:

  • Chosen ones, fate, destiny, &c. When you get down to it, a story with these themes is one where a single person or handful of people is ontologically, cosmically better and more important than everyone else. It's eerily similar to that right-wing meme about how "most people are just NPCs" (though I disliked the trope before that meme ever took off).
  • Way too much importance being given to bloodlines by the narrative (note, this is different from them being given importance by characters or societies in the story).
  • All of the good characters are handsome and beautiful, while all of the evil characters are ugly and disfigured (with the possible exception of a femme fatale or two).
  • Races that are inherently, unchangeably evil down to the last individual regardless of upbringing, society, or material circumstances.
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[–] [email protected] 20 points 6 months ago (2 children)

One of the reasons i liked Enders Game as a weird outsider kid was that Ender, the weird outsider kid, just straight up killed his bullies and then they never bullied him again and I thought that was a very sensible way to handle matters compared to the saccharine bullshit in the other kids books i was reading.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 6 months ago (1 children)

One of the things i like about wuxia is that they seldom bother with that nonsense. Wuxia morality is more of an eye for an eye.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I think one of the common sayings from that genre is "pay those who do right by you back tenfold, pay those who wrong you back a thousandfold"

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Man that almost sounds like philosophy from the trenches; break bread with the real ones, get it back in blood from the opps

[–] [email protected] 12 points 6 months ago

There's literally people who interpreted the "shower scene" as him just beating the kid up and them being kicked out of battle school.

I think the most recent movie adaptation takes this route (though it might still be vague enough to be interpreted as the adult trying to keep Ender from knowing he murdered a kid.)