You’re gonna be at this all day. Drahl is like a machine gun of poorly thought-out arguments. Once you swat down one, three more come whizzing out of nowhere.
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When the definition of “political” is going to be made that broad, the word has become useless save as a term to inflame…
Political has always been a broad term. Down to it’s etymology (lit. “pertaining to a city/community”)
How would you define “political”?
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A deliberate attempt to make a statement about society and/or politics. The original Godzilla is a classic example of a stealth political movie, especially after you remove the Raymond Burr additions to it as those were added for the American audience.
The “deliberate” part seems more of an addition you are making in this scenario.
Funnily enough, the addition of the Raymond Burr scenes is on itself a political statement by the localizers when they decided to bring Godzilla to the US market.
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Omg that’s such a good example.
You can’t escape it! Almost like we shouldn’t be afraid of it, and should address it like any other story decision.
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It was just the habit of making foreign movies popular to Americans by bringing in B List actors in additional footage.
I feel that’s refusing to see why that habit became a thing in the first place.
You don’t think that American localizers having the habit of including a white American actor in foreign movies doesn’t have some kind of connotation?
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I always find the “oh my god politics!!!” people so funny because like it’s fine if you don’t want to think and find value and meaning in stories, or how it can relate to you and how you can learn from those lessons, but then don’t act like people aren’t allowed to discuss and have conversations about it.
If you’re tired, then go to sleep.
That said, I finally did the rebellion quest, and I did find the premise of Dragonspawn/Drakonid fighting for independence and equality quite interesting, but I agree that there’s likely not going to be much pay off or expansion beyond that. In fact, the entire questline kinda felt like it a footnote rather than something integral to the expansions story. Which shouldn’t be the case.
I also think like there’s not much lore surrounding them. The origins are unclear, and what exactly were they up to while the dragons were missing? How can they be on their own for 10,000 years and they didn’t leave their own mark on the Isles? There’s a lot of pieces, experiences, and characters missing to fully understand and empathize with the storyline. Are they going to start forming their own cultures and towns? How will they organize themselves without dragons (for those who want to break away)?
I also wasn’t very satisfied with how Belaphon was treated. She is to be tried, of course, and as she should, but I felt like Alexstrasza basically went on a round-about way to ensure her servitude. Feels like nothing was learnt at all, and Alexstrasza’s ignorance on their plight wasn’t a good look.
Also there’s only so much “I didn’t know…” you can forgive until you come to the conclusion that she’s an incompetent leader. This is not me hating on her, I love her design and personality, but given how the story has been playing out, she really does seem incompetent and is completely reactive and relies on others to make decisions and deal with the fallout.
Granted, she’s also in a bad situation and the other leaders don’t seem to be engaging in the government and leadership of Valdrakken since they all have issues, so she can’t take 100% of the blame, but I do feel like it was unsatisfying for the Dragonspawn/Drakonid to not have a leader represent them or at least call the Aspects out for being so concerned with their own Flights and existential threats that they are completely inept as governing bodies.
In conclusion, it just seems like a wasted opportunity like always.
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Objectively incorrect
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Just to re-emphasize my OTHER issue with this dragonspawn stuff (namely, that it breaks pre-existing lore), there’s a quest in Outland where they directly say that drakonid come from mutated mortal followers, not from a single race that the dragons enslaved with “Order magic”, or whatever:
" Yeah, it’s a bunch of crap jobs but even the ascendants started out as peons."
-From the quest, “Enter the Taskmaster”
" Dragonmaw Ascendants are drakonid found on Netherwing Ledge"
-Wowpedia
Just wanted to put the nail in the coffin of this argument that it’s “just RPG lore”.
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Tolkien really despised most politics. In fact, he really thought of himself as very anti-political.
If we looked at him through a modern lens he was a non devout Conservative, and an unconstitutional monarchist. It’s funny that you are defending his work as political when he explicitly stated that it’s meant to be viewed apolitically.
You can scream its apolitical until you’re blue in the face but the farce of apolitcal is a political stance in an of itself
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you can project politics onto a story devoid of political interpretation, that still doesn’t make the work political.
Wasn’t Sylvanas one of your favorite characters because of the SA allegory and the themes of female empowerment and overcoming personal trauma that she used to represent?
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wern’t you one of the crowd who told me I was crazy for thinking that?
I used to get you confused with Skarm, and the only reason I could tell you apart was because I thought he was funny, I thought you were a bigot. So, you don’t have much moral highground to stand on despite your new found righteousness.
The last thing women want in the case of SA argument is a bigot siding with their abuser, trying to tell them they don’t care enough about fictional SA.
No? I think I’ve always been pretty consistent about seeing Sylvanas as a survivor. If anything, I usually worry about reading too deeply into WoW’s stories, given how preachy I get about the horde’s found family and prejudice themes that I found appealing. What bigotry have I displayed?
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Imagine making stuff up about sarm lmao
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Anyway, the reason why I brought up Sylvanas is because I’m surprised by what seems to be a sudden stance that stories shouldn’t be given political interpretations with the implication that readings are being projected on them. Not just because that’s how allegories are formed, but also because I think such a character (and her handling + mishandling) would itself be a reflection of one’s social and societal beliefs.
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…how is this conversation still happening?
Weither WoW is “political or not” who cares?