mark_asphodel (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mark_asphodel) wrote2012-08-03 08:50 pm
mark_asphodel) wrote2012-08-03 08:50 pm
Entry tags:
- au,
- fanfiction,
- fe11,
- fe4,
- fe8,
- fe9,
- fire emblem
Modern AUs: You'd Hate Your Favorite Character
I was gonna do that fanfic meme that's been going around but my answers are boring and evasive.
On an IM the other night, Ammie dropped a revelation: Soren, in an "our world" modern AU, would vote Republican.
You can agree or disagree or debate the merits of the label, but she had a point. At least in Fire Emblem fandom, many of the characters if transplanted to our own world and time would probably not be people that internet scribblers (who often hit the "progressive" label on one point or another) tend to associate with. A lot of 'em would vote Republican, or Tory, or Conservative... though perhaps they'd better fit the party labels of a previous generation than, say, anything to do with the Tea Party.
Who are these people? Nobles and those who serve them. The privileged. Representatives of and defenders of the social structure. Not being a racist, or not being in favor of child sacrifice, doesn't make one not a small-c conservative. But how many Fire Emblem playable characters even fit a small-d democrat or small-r republican label? Dude... these are monarchists, for the most part. Oligarchs. Theocrats. Like... no.
If anything, many of these playables are genuine conservative characters putting down a rebellion from fringe elements, and their victory is The Old Status Quo, But Better. And IMO, a modern AU that doesn't GET that is likely to be off-base if it tries to deal with the characters in any kind of political/ideological sense. C'mon, picture AU Seth-- he's a career military man. Maybe not the most religious guy around in an orthodox sense (re: Natasha supports), but otherwise he's all about orthodox values. Country. King. Law and Order. And, yes, God. He probably votes to keep cops on the streets and keep teenagers from getting out of hand. He probably votes to keep marijuana illegal and the penalties for trafficking stiff. He probably thinks "marriage" consists of man + woman and wouldn't see anything wrong with DADT. He's against animal abuse but not much concerned about animal rights. He eats meat and doesn't think much about where his produce is "sourced" or whether or not the stuff's organic (but GM crops sound suspicious to him). He wouldn't want his tax dollars going toward Piss Christ.
(I think the God part may be hard to incorporate unless a character is a pre-packaged cleric because many writers are not religiously orthodox-- or they're coming at faith from something other than the pseudo-Catholic structure of most Fire Emblem worlds. Ordinary characters in FE do not have personal relationships with their Savior; that's limited to the elite, the elect. And you're not it unless your name is Claude, or Micaiah, or some other Chosen specimen.)
I mean, I could see Pent as a fringe-progressive guy, but even so he's coming at the system from a position fairly high within it-- NOT from the outside. He's anything but disenfranchised. Levin... well, in his bard phase Levin strikes me someone who could be tweaked into 1950s/1960s radical, but even so it's all relative, given that you'd be comparing him to power-elite military types like Sigurd and Cuan. Seriously, if Jugdral were 1960s America, I'm pretty sure Sigurd and Friends would be hawks on 'Nam. Supporters of civil rights for 'colored people'? Yeah, maybe. But hawks on 'Nam. Likewise, Levin could be spun into a plausibly Jewish subversive (how appropriate to the era and its fears), compared to WASP-y Grandbellian elites and the oh-so-Irish Lenster crew, and all of those carry their own weight in the cultural context. Catholics then were not viewed as Catholics are now-- and that's just one detail.
(Alvis is the reformer who wants a world where people aren't persecuted for the circumstances of their birth and bloodline. Think about that one long and hard in the context of a modern-world AU. Ow.)
Stefan? Now, he's gonna mix stuff up. Oh yes. Tellius probably offers the widest range of slots to be adequately filled in an AU-- Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, and Other. And then someone like Marth just kind of doesn't work at all IMO in a modern AU, unless you make him something as exalted and untouchable in the bubble of the AU world as he is in his own. Paul McCartney or Yuri Gagarin, take your pick.
But if he could exist in 1960s America, Marth would probably also be a hawk on 'Nam. And maybe support bombing Cambodia. Just sayin'.
On an IM the other night, Ammie dropped a revelation: Soren, in an "our world" modern AU, would vote Republican.
You can agree or disagree or debate the merits of the label, but she had a point. At least in Fire Emblem fandom, many of the characters if transplanted to our own world and time would probably not be people that internet scribblers (who often hit the "progressive" label on one point or another) tend to associate with. A lot of 'em would vote Republican, or Tory, or Conservative... though perhaps they'd better fit the party labels of a previous generation than, say, anything to do with the Tea Party.
Who are these people? Nobles and those who serve them. The privileged. Representatives of and defenders of the social structure. Not being a racist, or not being in favor of child sacrifice, doesn't make one not a small-c conservative. But how many Fire Emblem playable characters even fit a small-d democrat or small-r republican label? Dude... these are monarchists, for the most part. Oligarchs. Theocrats. Like... no.
If anything, many of these playables are genuine conservative characters putting down a rebellion from fringe elements, and their victory is The Old Status Quo, But Better. And IMO, a modern AU that doesn't GET that is likely to be off-base if it tries to deal with the characters in any kind of political/ideological sense. C'mon, picture AU Seth-- he's a career military man. Maybe not the most religious guy around in an orthodox sense (re: Natasha supports), but otherwise he's all about orthodox values. Country. King. Law and Order. And, yes, God. He probably votes to keep cops on the streets and keep teenagers from getting out of hand. He probably votes to keep marijuana illegal and the penalties for trafficking stiff. He probably thinks "marriage" consists of man + woman and wouldn't see anything wrong with DADT. He's against animal abuse but not much concerned about animal rights. He eats meat and doesn't think much about where his produce is "sourced" or whether or not the stuff's organic (but GM crops sound suspicious to him). He wouldn't want his tax dollars going toward Piss Christ.
(I think the God part may be hard to incorporate unless a character is a pre-packaged cleric because many writers are not religiously orthodox-- or they're coming at faith from something other than the pseudo-Catholic structure of most Fire Emblem worlds. Ordinary characters in FE do not have personal relationships with their Savior; that's limited to the elite, the elect. And you're not it unless your name is Claude, or Micaiah, or some other Chosen specimen.)
I mean, I could see Pent as a fringe-progressive guy, but even so he's coming at the system from a position fairly high within it-- NOT from the outside. He's anything but disenfranchised. Levin... well, in his bard phase Levin strikes me someone who could be tweaked into 1950s/1960s radical, but even so it's all relative, given that you'd be comparing him to power-elite military types like Sigurd and Cuan. Seriously, if Jugdral were 1960s America, I'm pretty sure Sigurd and Friends would be hawks on 'Nam. Supporters of civil rights for 'colored people'? Yeah, maybe. But hawks on 'Nam. Likewise, Levin could be spun into a plausibly Jewish subversive (how appropriate to the era and its fears), compared to WASP-y Grandbellian elites and the oh-so-Irish Lenster crew, and all of those carry their own weight in the cultural context. Catholics then were not viewed as Catholics are now-- and that's just one detail.
(Alvis is the reformer who wants a world where people aren't persecuted for the circumstances of their birth and bloodline. Think about that one long and hard in the context of a modern-world AU. Ow.)
Stefan? Now, he's gonna mix stuff up. Oh yes. Tellius probably offers the widest range of slots to be adequately filled in an AU-- Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, and Other. And then someone like Marth just kind of doesn't work at all IMO in a modern AU, unless you make him something as exalted and untouchable in the bubble of the AU world as he is in his own. Paul McCartney or Yuri Gagarin, take your pick.
But if he could exist in 1960s America, Marth would probably also be a hawk on 'Nam. And maybe support bombing Cambodia. Just sayin'.
no subject
Yeah, Seth gives us evidence of his belief in a higher power (I don't think he's playing Devil's Advocate/mind games with Natasha). And Finn strikes me as someone who'd be extremely orthodox no matter what the setting; other early-game knights not so much, but I don't see any one of them being godless. Michalis is godless. Michalis is portrayed as totally outside the norm. On the other hand, some of the monks-- Artur especially-- I could almost see as tweaked into the kind of priest/rabbi I've known personally who doesn't actually believe but sees their role as the best way to go about doing good in the world.
I can't see them being able to quote their religious book of choice, or being strict about going to services, or consulting a religious leader for their personal problems, but I do think logically most would have something there even in AU.
They might be able to quote from it as a sign of being a literate character in tune with their culture, though. Like Jagen dropping lines from the Raman Bible to illustrate his points in FE3. I don't see Jagen as super-devout, but place that man in a modern American AU and I bet he can recite from The Bible, Shakespeare, and the Declaration of Independence.
"Cultured" people used to do that as a matter of course. I know a few septuagenarian holdouts who can pull that sort of thing off, including the Latin and Greek quotations.