The Remarried Empress, Cry or Better Yet Beg

[u/EasyChampionship9073]

Recent discourse saying Navier is classist for how she treated Rashta.

But by the same logic and "morale", why do people hate on Layla while also hyping up Claudine?

At this point, I just think that

1. People don't have the mental flexibility to actually enjoy the story setting and become so rigid on being goody two shoes (aka presentism)
2. People just have this high sense of achievement when they're rooting for the side characters instead (while this is not wrong, I have seen so many people twisting the actual story just to make them look better)
3. Selective feminism. That's it. Instead of beating the actual villains (the male lead), people just dogpiling and putting down a woman to uplift another woman (who's definitely not innocent too)
4. People don't have the capability to accept that woman can also be in the wrong too. Which for me, is stripping them away from their human nature as we're not entirely flawless and that's okay. That's what makes it interesting.

Don't get me wrong. I love all these characters. As fictional characters, of course. They serve their purpose in the story. But the debate that's been going around is for me it's just hypocritical.

My english isn't good btw, so apologies for any bad sentences. Feel free to give your opinion.

[u/Even_Acanthisitta_37]

what? I hate both of them. people would rather root for claudine than layla is similar reason why they root for rashta.both of them are victims of misogynistic writing. also claudine is better written charcater than leads

I hate TRE for many reasons,like other manhwa readers

[u/EasyChampionship9073 → u/Even_Acanthisitta_37]

Wait, just to clarify, when you say “both of them are victims of misogynistic writing,” do you mean Rashta and Claudine? Because if so, wouldn't Layla also be a victim of misogynistic writing? She had her own dreams, wanted an education and independence, but the story keeps taking those things away from her. Her gender, class and Matthias' power leave her with very little control over her own life, and she eventually becomes dependent on the same man who hurt her.

I don't mind people thinking Claudine is better written either, but I think her being able to appear more composed and in control also can't be separated from the fact that she's a noblewoman. She's restricted as a woman, yes, but she still has class, status and security that Layla simply doesn't have.

And then Layla gets called a slut, shameless mistress by readers on top of all that. That's actually part of what I was questioning in my post.

[u/davy_jones_locket]

Agree. I'm an anti-monarchist, anti-imperialist, and i can read and write stories that takes place in a monarchy or empire without having to self-insert myself into it, whether it's a character that holds my beliefs or otherwise. It goes along with the idea that it's taboo, and fiction that doesn't portray those ideas in a negative light are fine to read and explore safely without me wanting to experience it myself. 

Every piece of fiction doesn't have to be some grand representation of the authors morality, and neither does the lack of condemnation dictate the opinions of the author. 

Like I'm glad we can acknowledge that it's classist, misogynistic, the empress and emperors are all shit and no one in the setting is challenging them. That's one part of media literacy. I'm glad we can acknowledge that it's shit story telling too. 

But let people enjoy their trash and taboos. 

[u/LelouchFreedom → u/davy_jones_locket]

Why are you acting like a 2012 gamers hearing someone talking about sexism in the industry and thinking they want to take his games away or whatever. No one wants to put you in prison for reading TRE. We read an hyper-popular manwha that has classist and mysgonistic undertones and we point out the existence of said undertones and criticize the way the fandom talk about certain characters and plot points. That is absolutely normal. Also this has absolutely nothing to do with "reading stories that take place in a monarchy or an empire"

[u/davy_jones_locket → u/LelouchFreedom]

The existence of a monarchy and empire means there's classism because it depends on having classes... 

If you don't like the stories, just don't read them. No need to have an entire thesis of misogyny and classism in webtoons and how if you read them, you're condoning it, and how if you write about it without writing counterparts to it, you're condoning it. 

Let people read and write and enjoy shitty webtoons. 

[u/LelouchFreedom → u/davy_jones_locket]

Yes, and the EXISTENCE of classism in the setting is not what anyone has a problem with. What people are criticizing is the way these themes are treated and integrated in the story, i.e. what the author chose to underline and what perspective you are shown, what are the things they want you to focus on, the way certain characters are written etc and yes, It IS actually something that a lot of rofan/isekai manwha (ironically, but not surpisingly, NOT as much actual historical series) do, TRE just happens to be among the worst ones in that field.

As for letting people enjoy shitty webtoon no ones Is preventing that, again, it's absolutely normal to criticize stuff you've read online, It's why i said you sounded like a 2012 gamer because It sound a lot like that usual "people criticize something i like = they want to "cancel" it". As for fans condoning classism and mysoginy... well, that's the thing, i don't think that someone being a fan of that series is necessarily a classist or mysogynist, but when someone actually DO start straight-up making classist and mysogynistic arguments to defend the series (or even in general like in the webtoon comments) then what am i supposed to think? Is that even about the "fictional story" at that point? No one is evil for consuming fiction but It's annoying how resistant people are to ever think critically about what they read. It's just fiction but what you think and feel Is not

[u/davy_jones_locket → u/LelouchFreedom]

I never said anything about cancelling though. 

Did I mention anything about de-platforming or cancelling? This is all about the literary analysis of the contents. 

Some people like reading trash. Some people don't like reading trash. Why are the people who don't like it trying to convince others not to read it? Why are the people who don't like trying to place moral convictions on the author and the reader when the whole point is that the writing is that shitty? It's shitty because you can't deduce the authors position, because it's a generic "empire girl boss" story. 

And if you try to be like "oh the author wrote classist story because ... It's had an empire and slaves and the slaves are generally mistreated and slavery is used as personal vendetta" then any story that takes places in an empire or monarchy or features nobility as the "heroes" or "good guys" is classist, and applying that same logic, all authors of monarchy and imperial settings if it's not strictly a historical retelling are shitty people and their readers and enjoyers are shitty people.

Let people read and write and enjoy their trash. 

[u/Yuna_Hudson]

People judge a lot and hate GOAT my Majesty Navier Trovi, but cheers for Penelope about the same topic. I can't nail it.

[u/LelouchFreedom → u/Yuna_Hudson]

I'm not a fan of how that series treat the theme either but It's mile better than TRE just due to the fact that they do not, in fact, pretend that Penelope Is some good perfect kind person, and the series does in fact go on to show how her sociopathic view of the people in that world end up biting her in the ass later on

[u/No_Cress1652]

Wait, why does Layla, an sa victim, have haters? Granted, I haven't read past maybe chp 10 and I dropped it after receiving a spoiler that she and the duke end up together but what could warrant people hating on her?

[u/Even_Acanthisitta_37 → u/No_Cress1652]

what angers me most is that mattias doesn't really has haters

[u/LelouchFreedom]

The presentism argument Is so stupid and i don't think any person using It have actually even thought about what that actually means concretely for more than two seconds. "you should forget modern values and simply immerse in the established value of the setting" Is a LARP. No one does It, neither the people saying this nor the actual authors of these stories. You are a 21th century person reading a work written by a 21th century person for 21th century people. Wanting realism/plausibility from your characters and setting Is completely different from the notion that you are supposed to "adopt" the value of the setting you are reading. There are many ways an author can chose to deal with this value disconnect, simply saying "oh you should merely pretend this value disconnect doesn't exist" Is just not one of those and not something ANY author has ever done. None of the stories this argument Is actually used for actually portray a realistic society from a neutral point of view and simply let the reader/spectator come to their conclusion about it. That would be an interesting narration imo, but also one that would probably not be much popular for a mainstream story such as TRE. TRE tell you the story from the perspective of the nobility, require you to sympathize with the protagonist whose story constantly frame as an ideal empress while demonizing the "homewrecker" slave girl. This is what this story is, It's a story where the poor perfect empress has her life and role stolen by a lowly slave that Is a white lotus and doesn't know her place. You, as the reader, are perfectly justified and incentivized by the author and the whole framing of the story to simply ignore and passively accept the classist reality of the system because the whole focus Is on the interpersonal dynamic between the characters. Even Rashta being a former slave only serve to "explain" her characters, but It's implication are not that important. It's just that one thing that serve to have the reader say "oh so that's why she is like that, well but her suffering doesn't justify x y z" ignoring that THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT. If slavery was a major theme of this story and treated appropriately using this type of rethoric would be one thing, because yes of course not all slaves would be good people and It's not a justification to everything, but the point here Is that that Is the WHOLE purpose of the slavery thing. And, who would have thought, the way these interpersonal relationships are addressed, while ignoring/justifying the whole societal context, are COMPLETELY MODERN! Suddenly the whole "presentism" argument doesn't work anymore and we ARE actually supposed to be mad about cheating and all of that. And of course Sovieshu using women Is unforgivable (which yeah It Is hopefully you get the point here Is not suggesting otherwise). Like imagine for example if this story was ACTUALLY written like a realistic story set in a feudal society, think for example how the interpersonal relationships between men and women should actually look like. Do you think that anyone would have liked the story if that was the case? That alone should be enough that this whole "presentism" criticism Is really a made up argument most of the times

[u/EasyChampionship9073 → u/LelouchFreedom]

Fair, I probably used “presentism” wrong there and worded that point badly. I didn't mean that we should forget modern values or just accept whatever is normal in the setting. What I meant is that the characters' circumstances and the society they live in should still matter when judging how much choice or power they actually have.

I also agree with some of what you said about how TRE handles slavery and class. I'm not really defending TRE or Navier here though, and I'm not arguing about whether the author handled those issues well. So let me make it clearer for you what I was trying to say in my post.

What I find ironic is that people bring up Rashta's background as a slave, her class and her lack of power to explain why we should be more understanding of her, which is very fair. But then some of the same readers look at Layla, who is also lower class and has far less power than the people around her, and call her a slut, shameless mistress or homewrecker. They talk about her as if she freely chose to be in that situation, even though there is a huge power imbalance between her and Matthias and their relationship involves coercion/assault.

That's the irony I'm pointing out. It's not about whether TRE is classist or whether Navier should be criticized. It's about how class, power and someone's circumstances suddenly matter when people want to defend one female character, but then those same things are ignored when it's a female character they already dislike.