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[OB] Kaladin's Ideal Woman


Korbin

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3 minutes ago, Ailvara said:

More like, "Hi Kal, I'm glad you're not dead. / I know we didn't part on best  terms, but it's been a long time. / It's not cool to beat my husband, but he had it coming so let's leave it. / Are you going to help us with rebuilding?" sth of the sorts

Haha yes, any of those would have been great. I think she responded the way she did because from her point of view this shard bearer appeared and started challenging her authority. But I can understand why you aren't going to forgive her - that scene was handled poorly by pretty much everyone except the guard who told Roshone that it would be better just to forget the punch ever happened. That guy handled things super well.

Edited by Calyx
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2 minutes ago, aemetha said:

To be fair, if someone walked into my house and stabbed the floor with a super powerful sword, I'd also be very irritated about them damaging the floor.

Even if you knew you've done worse things to that person? Not to mention the co-owner of the house? I would feel guilty enough to swallow the comment about the floor. 

3 minutes ago, Calyx said:

But I can understand why you aren't going to forgive her - that scene was handled poorly by pretty much everyone except the guard who told Roshone that it would be better just to forget the punch ever happened. That guy handled things super well.

I have this character flaw, that I forgive anyone who sincerely apologises and rarely someone who doesn't :)

That guy was awesome, such a funny scene! 

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7 minutes ago, Ailvara said:

I have this character flaw, that I forgive anyone who sincerely apologises and rarely someone who doesn't :)

That isn't a character flaw, in fact I would argue that it is a key piece of the Christian doctrine that Sanderson is writing from. This is why characters like Dalinar or Szeth, who have committed atrocities but are sincerely repentant, can be redeemed but people like Amaram, who feel guilty but not sorry, can't be.

I think Laral can get there, especially if she is playing the role I suspect in protecting villagers - including Kaladin's new brother. At the moment, though, it isn't clear she feels anything - I just don't think we see enough of her to know.

Edited by Calyx
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Just now, Ailvara said:

Even if you knew you've done worse things to that person?

Okay, so here's the thing. You take starving people in a refugee crisis, and a few get depression as a result of it. Then you get African Americans in the us subjected to verbal taunts and other forms of non-violent racial discrimination, and a few get depression. Then you take holocaust survivors, and a few get depression. The rate of depression varies, but not by a huge amount. So, why do you have circumstances that are objectively far better than other circumstances resulting in the same trauma response in similar numbers? It's perspective. African Americans subjected to racism get depression in similar numbers to refugees and holocaust survivors because it matters less what the actual trauma is and more that there is a perception of disadvantage and things not working out for you by comparison to the immediate zone of influence.

So, from Laral's perspective, she wasn't especially cruel to Kaladin and his family. If she looks at what her peers do (other lighteyed rulers) she isn't behaving inconsistently with them. So from her perspective, she isn't being cruel, she's behaving normally. Now a darkeyed Knight Radiant flying into your house and stabbing the floor with a shardblade - that's not normal. So to Laral's mind she is entitled to be angry at her floor being stabbed, and Kaladin isn't entitled to be angry at all.

Now, I'm not being an apologist for what are clearly immoral actions, I am only seeking to explain how perspective alters the interpretation of events in circumstances like this.

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I don’t have a ton of time, but I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who answered my Laral/Syl question, because I find it very interesting with how that aligns with one’s personal views on Laral. One of the things I find so interesting about Brandon’s “bad” character is how devisive they are because he always builds in some redeeming attributes, but some people relate to the certain redeeming attributes for said character and others don’t (eg Moash, Amaram, Elhokar though the latter got so “good” most got behind him.) 

I find Laral pretty sympathetic (obviously from my previous posts), and I feel like Syl’s endorsement (in character and because it was told to us by the author) supports that, but I also love a childhood crush, long separation and reunited, lots of misunderstanding, true love romance, so that heavily colors me view too :) So if Shalladin sinks at sea... and Kadolin just can’t happen... it’s Laraladin all the way :D

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1 hour ago, Ailvara said:

What annoys me most about Laral, is that she not only doesn't even give a hint that she regrets anything. No, instead she goes straight on to judging Kal. I mean, seriously, she was so mean to him and now the first thing she can think of is that he ruined her floor? And she can suddenly forget everything Roshone did and instead concentrate on how terrible Kaladin is because he punched him once for good reason? How far can you go with double standards??

19 minutes ago, Calyx said:

That isn't a character flaw, in fact I would argue that it is a key piece of the Christian doctrine that Sanderson is writing from. This is why characters like Dalinar or Szeth, who have committed atrocities but are sincerely repentant, can be redeemed but people like Amaram, who feel guilty but not sorry, can't be.

I really like this connection. Laral hasn't internalized anything about herself. She hasn't reconsidered her life or position, she hasn't reevaluated some of her preconceived notions, and she still acts like she can do no wrong.

She wronged Kaladin but will never admit to it because he's below her.

13 minutes ago, aemetha said:

So, from Laral's perspective, she wasn't especially cruel to Kaladin and his family. If she looks at what her peers do (other lighteyed rulers) she isn't behaving inconsistently with them. So from her perspective, she isn't being cruel, she's behaving normally. Now a darkeyed Knight Radiant flying into your house and stabbing the floor with a shardblade - that's not normal. So to Laral's mind she is entitled to be angry at her floor being stabbed, and Kaladin isn't entitled to be angry at all.

Now, I'm not being an apologist for what are clearly immoral actions, I am only seeking to explain how perspective alters the interpretation of events in circumstances like this.

This is exactly what I'm talking about when I say Laral is the worst kind of lighteyes, and exactly what Kaladin hates about them as a class. The very fact that she doesn't see how awful she's been and is being is what makes her all the more awful.

Putting this in spoilers because it's super stupid:

Spoiler

 

11 minutes ago, Dreamstorm said:

So if Shalladin sinks at sea... and Kadolin just can’t happen... it’s Laraladin all the way :D

Of all the things that don't matter, this doesn't matter the most, but can Kal get in on the beginning of one of these names? Shalladin, Jasnadin, Laraladin, Syladin....

Give me the Kalaral, or the Kalphrena, or Kalasnah, or....well, Shalladin is still the best. 

 

 

Edited by Rainier
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1 hour ago, Calyx said:

That isn't a character flaw, in fact I would argue that it is a key piece of the Christian doctrine that Sanderson is writing from. This is why characters like Dalinar or Szeth, who have committed atrocities but are sincerely repentant, can be redeemed but people like Amaram, who feel guilty but not sorry, can't be.

1

On the God level, yes. On the human level, however, it is healthier not to hold the grudge even if it's justified (so forgive, though maybe not forget and be fooled twice). This is actually very interesting philosophically, but I don't want to go too offtopic. :) 

1 hour ago, Rainier said:

This is exactly what I'm talking about when I say Laral is the worst kind of lighteyes, and exactly what Kaladin hates about them as a class. The very fact that she doesn't see how awful she's been and is being is what makes her all the more awful.

2

Exactly. I can actually remember justifying another character(s) (from a different story) based on "this is the society they live in and they don't know any better". But maybe we've just had enough decent lighteyes' in SA to assume, that not being a jerk to darkeyes' is something that could cross her mind as well. And Laral was friends with Kaladin; if essentially growing up with him wasn't enough for her to see that the darkeyed are just as good people as she is, then I need to question either her good will or intelligence.

 

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10 minutes ago, USS bridge four said:

I probable misread when she treated Kaladin badly but it always came off to me she was doing something that Roshone's son wanted her to.

That was my understanding as well - in the kitchen scene, it could be interpreted as her being weak, not feeling superior to Kaladin. I also got the impression that after her father died, the people taking care of her had really strong opinions about associating with darkeyes. This doesn't excuse Laral, but it does somewhat confuse the issue.

And I think she can be blamed even less for not apologizing for Roshone. He also almost certainly abused her until she took control of the situation, and I doubt she really learned the truth of the Roshone/Lirin conflict. The main mark against her here is that she was present when Roshone sent Tien to war, so she knows for sure that Roshone did something genuinely horrible and undeserved. But again, that was Roshone and not Laral.

10 minutes ago, Ailvara said:

On the God level, yes. On the human level, however, it is healthier not to hold the grudge even if it's justified (so forgive, though maybe not forget and be fooled twice). This is actually very interesting philosophically, but I don't want to go too offtopic. :) 

The best thing is usually to forgive with suspicion, and I think Laral does deserve that. There are numerous potentially mitigating circumstances that we just don't know enough about to truly judge her - and she only did one truly bad thing to Kaladin personally (kitchen scene), the rest was Roshone.

Edited by Calyx
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Again, not being an apologist for things that are objectively wrong from a position as an impartial observer, but this behaviour has mirrors in real life in which there is far from agreement on the immorality of it.

Take for example white middle class workers in the US who object to taxes being spent on equal opportunity initiatives on the basis that they worked hard for their money, and disadvantaged minorities have the same opportunity to work hard for their money. The argument that they worked hard is true, but it misses the point. The white middle class have opportunity to earn more than disadvantaged minorities because they have to work less hard to get to a position where working hard earns them a good income - they begin from a position of more opportunity through better access to education, and less obstacles to success. Is it immoral for them to object to paying more taxes though on this basis, particularly when many of them have no real idea of the barriers faced by disadvantaged minorities?

Same situation with Laral. She has no idea that life is so hard for the darkeyed, or that she is particularly privileged. How could she? The argument that she is an immoral person for behaving in the way she has been taught to behave is tenuous at best. She has little life experience to make the judgement objectively. It might be more accurate to describe her as lacking imagination for not foreseeing a better way to administer things. Does a lack of imagination now constitute immorality? The relative good and evil of the darkeyes isn't really a factor as much as the relative positions of those involved in the interaction. Laral isn't malicious. She does what she is supposed to do. She has been trained to have an attitude of superiority to the darkeyes in exactly the same way as the darkeyes are trained to be subservient to the lighteyes.

Out POV characters stand out because they are differentiated from the norm. Nobody wants to read a book about people who just said "Okay" and carried on about their business. It's the changing of the status quo that makes them interesting players in the setting. It's probably not accurate to label those who don't step outside the norm immoral though, at least not until such a time as the dynamic shifts the norm.

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