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Aes Sedai: Everybody's Whipping Boy? (spoilers for all books)


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I like that they're so manipulative and shady. What pains me is when they often can't back it up...

 

Mmm, this bugs me too.

 

RJ often confuses everyday manipulation with political machinations. It's not quite the same in all ways. You could argue that a person who is not able to be regularly assertive (any oppressed person) has little choice but to behave in a manipulative way whereas in politics it's often the necessary and best way to behave if you want to get things done.

 

That's why good ol' boys some people would like to have a beer with don't make good politicians. However, instead of us getting to see AS being really successful at it we see them failing miserably.

 

It's that whole "setting them up to knock them down" thing.

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but they know they're sneaky. i think when people respect them it comes from the fact that they can use the Power, but the mistrust comes from how they want to manipulate and control. they themselves know that they invented Daes Daemar.

 

come on guys, do we like it or do we dislike it that they are manipulative and shady? :getcookie: i think we can't make up our minds :rant: i think i like it, but i don't know why. i just don't like it when they get too arrogant.

 

That's not exactly what I mean; that's besides the point. Speaking from a gender perspective, women with power have always been problematic in a patriarchal set-up, especially a power that is not "allowed" or "granted" by males. And maybe I'm completely off my head, but it seems to me that Jordan's lens is far from gender-neutral or feminist. The distrust and apprehension of Aes Sedai in that context seems just like an excuse to hide behind -- the world of WoT is clearly unable to deal with women being in control. This is not to say that Jordan cannot create the sort of world he wants, but really, it's just a mirror image of our current social context.

 

Being manipulative is the only option for them; there doesn't seem any space for them to be assertive. Note also how the Aes Sedai have repeatedly been knocked down a peg or two, maybe to bring them back in line with how women are supposed to behave and to familiarize them with their "place". Contrast this with how the Ashaman have been constructed. They are the "real thing" who can do serious bad-ass things with power, whereas the AS are just playing around, right hand not knowing what left hand is doing and having quaint little ceremonies that require them to take off their tops!

 

I like that they're so manipulative and shady. What pains me is when they often can't back it up...

 

Exactly! You hit the nail right on the head. It would be such fun if they were manipulative and able to hold their own ends up. Right now the message is that they're "just women" and they can't really get their heads around the concept of the greater good, and therefore must toss their braids over their shoulders and smooth down their skirts and zip their mouths and pretend they know what they are doing. Bah!

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hmmm, i never felt like the AS couldn't back it up as a whole. i just felt like some of them couldn't but others can (Mo, Verin, Caddy, Egwene).

 

i hate how jordan keeps making them get naked. especially for Rhuidean when Mat and Rand went clothed!

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Uuuugh the degredation of the Aes Sedai is something that really annoys me in WoT. I just finished FotH so it's fresh in my mind. I can really start to see their credibility slip in this book. For a group of probably the most educated people in Randland with an incredible reputation as manipulators.... they fall flat on their faces in front of wise ones, windfinders, kin, and two rivers idiots too often. Oh and you'd think that the one peice on knowledge that they'd keep through the breaking would be how to detect a man channeling. Though maybe it's Rand's purpose as a ta'veren to utterly destroy their reputation... I'm waiting (but not holding my breath) for them to actually show us why every other group of channeling women feared them for so long.

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Though maybe it's Rand's purpose as a Mary Sue to utterly destroy their reputation for RJ... I'm waiting (but not holding my breath) for them to actually show us why every other group of channeling women feared them for so long.

 

Fixed. :wha: I think you hit the nail on the head.

 

And I'm waiting with you. :P I hope that

they fight off the Seanchan invasion and don't become one big Damsel in Distress White Tower. I'm counting on you, Egwene.

 

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man if theres anyone in this book who really creeps me out its the Seanchan, even more than DFs. I just got to the part where theyre invading in tPoD. *shudders* (i wouldve hid that but i dont know how :wha:)

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I'm hoping when the Egwene plotline resolves itself Aes Sedai regain some honor. I'd really like the Yellow Ajah (I'm looking at you, Romanda) to return to its roots during the Last Battle and be some badass Healers.

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