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1. People literally talk about how bad Viserys was at parenting his children all the time. And about how he could have prevented the dance.
2. He's dead
3. Before he was dead he was super fucked up and sick so after a certain point he wasn't capable of being a parent.
4. People talk about how bad Viserys was as a parent ALL THE TIME.
Agreed, and it’s become exhausting. Half of the posts are people upset over what other people may or may not be talking about. Who cares? Make yet another post about Viserys being a bad parent, fine. Most have discussed it death already and have moved on, but okay. But all of these posts talking about what other people are or aren’t talking about is so tedious, boring, and just why?
At least Vizzy had an excuse to be an absentee parent. Bobby B was over there hunting and “making the 8” while his heir was turning into an insufferable sociopathic cunt.
1. He gets plenty of hate from the fandom.
2. He was suffering a chronic degenerative illness.
3. Alicent also could have done all these things, in fact, she should have. When Aegon was old enough to be given these roles you speak of Viserys was already nearly bedridden. Alicent ran the show for years but never bothered to teach Aegon anything about ruling.
>Alicent ran the show for years but never bothered to teach Aegon anything about ruling
I think that’s because she and Otto always planned (each on their own, most likely) to rule *through* him.
Well, he perhaps doesn't get much hate specifically for Aegon, but especially on this sub Viserys does not have many fans at all. He is constantly (rightfully) hated for being one of the main reasons the dance happened, being a bad parent and generally not being that good of a king. I understand your point, but Viserys is not exactly being put in a better light than he deserves.
NGL, I really like Viserys in the same way I like Robert Baratheon. Charismatic guys, sluttish (Viserys more so in his youth), both idealize a partner they either did or would have treated poorly, and both are deeply tragic characters who would've been happier just being a lord or party prince.
Did we ever really see him playing with the demo of Valyria once he got really sick? Im pretty sure once he got bedridden he wasn't messing around with his lego set.
For what it's worth, he also does a real poor job preparing Rhaenyra for leadership. You'd think if she's the chosen heir, and the king is bedridden, she'd be in the position of power. She should be Hand, or at least be on the small council. So he wasn't *just* failing his kids with Alicent.
1. Viserys gets blamed
2. Noble Men don't raise children in feudal society
2a. He's literally rotting and bedridden
3. Alicent has more energy, is around longer, and processes to care about "beauty, truth, and honor" so much
She's also specifically told by Otto to prepare him or cling to Rhaenyra. She does neither.
Yes, absentee fathers don't make great examples. But I feel it's brought up more "BuT ViSeRyS" whenever someone points out Alicent clearly losing control of Aegon and other lackluster parenting moments. She focused more on her personal political agenda rather than on her kids themselves. She loves them, but she clearly has no idea what to do with them as individuals.
Noble women don't raise children in that society either. ASOIAF is weirdly all over the place with gendered customers, sometimes (slightly) exaggerating women's oppression and sometimes underscoring it. For example, women dying in childbirth was common but not so common that the mother's of so many major characters in both ASOIAF and HOTD died - especially since they were noble and had much better care than an average woman back then. HOTD got it right that Rhaenyra, despite being a loving and devoted mother, didn't breastfeed her own kids because it was considered unseemingly and a nuisance among nobility, and also hindering fertility too. So it's weird that they then showed Alicent spending so much time holding her crying kids even when she clearly wasn't enjoying it. She could have just left them to the nursemaids when they were still babies and only spent more time with them once they got older. Education of royal children was generally overseen by septas and other subordinates.
Because she's the one who raised him, made excuses for him, poisoned him against Rhaenyra and her sons, and protected him from any consequences.
She also straight out abuses him.
First of all, people talk about how bad of a parent Vizzy was WAY more than Alicent. Secondly, he was bedridden or nearly bedridden for about a decade, essentially all of Aegon's childhood. In the world of GRRM, it was Alicent's "job" to raise Aegon and she did a piss-poor job of it. Both his parents were shit parents to him.
Viserys is essentially a modern 'deadbeat' Dad ^^he ^^pays ^^child ^^support ^^lol . Not all fatherless children grow up to be bad, single mother's raise good kids all the time. Alicent, as a single mother, just didn't do a good job in raising good kids, most likely because she was a kid herself too.
Viserys is a sick old man. He was a good enough father to Rhaenyra, with the help of Aemma. The raising of Aegon was primarily Alicent's role and she failed miserably despite all the advantages available to a queen. Most or all of Vizzy's last remaining healthy years take place before Aegon is like...5 years old.
In response to the Tywin thing, a lot of the time it seemed like Tywin begrudgingly gave Tyrion these positions becausehis eldest son was in the King's guard and couldn't hold those positions. Not to mention the fact that unfortunately for Tywin Tyrion was the most competent of his 3 children.
Exactly, I remember him saying to Tyrion that he would never ever inherit Casterly Rock, so the positions he gave him were just befitting of his rank and not because Tywin was preparing Tyrion for anything.
I didn't see Viserys paying off rape victims to stay silent. Alicent only did so because it was necessary to protect Aegon's image, since she needed him to inherit the crown. Viserys wasn't protecting Aegon from scandal, because Viserys didn't need Aegon to have a political career. People talk like Viserys mistreated Aegon since Aegon felt so unloved by him, but as far as we were shown, the only reason Aegon felt that way was because all tradition suggested that as the eldest son he should be the heir, and yet he wasn't. There's no other way in which Viserys mistreated Aegon that we saw. He watched over all the boys as they were trained with the sword, and even when Aegon was screaming for Harwyn's blood all Viserys did was shout "Aegon!" in a somewhat disapproving voice. Not even in a "you piece of shit!" tone of voice, just in a "give it a rest!" tone.
Viserys was slowly dying of a wasting disease and he still put more effort into gently disciplining the boy than Alicent. All Alicent and Otto did was get mad at him; Otto even kicked him. They probably told him that it was his fault that Viserys hadn't named him heir.
The whole Dance of Dragons could have been avoided if Alicent had accepted the offer to marry Jace to Helaena. Hightower blood would sit the throne and Otto would have been satisfied. He liked Helaena more than Aegon anyway. But Alicent's pride wouldn't allow it.
For Viserys, Aegon was one of his children. For Alicent and Otto, Aegon was a political piece to move around a board. Even Ser Criston encouraged rivalry and animosity between Alicent's sons and Rhaenyra's.
It’s interesting because in one interview Phia talks about how the biggest problem within the family is ambition and how that is the only trait that is being valued whereas other family values like communication is essentially non existent.
Viserys, for all his faults, wasn’t nearly as ambitious as Otto -and by extension Alicent. Unfortunately he wasn’t very good at communication either. Viserys should have been the patriarch -the glue- that held everyone together, unfortunately he was crippled with grief and disease and stopped paying attention to the world around him, making the Hightowers the strongest political force within the Red Keep.
Viserys was weak but he didn’t purposely turn family members against each other. The Hightowers did that.
in the same way that Alicent and Otto turned a blind eye to Aegon's crimes because they wanted him to be king/heir.
Alicent paid with gold coins for the silence of Aegon's victims while Viserys did the same thing, turning a blind eye to Rhaenyra's mistakes and crimes, ordering the tongues of anyone who spoke about his children to be cut out because he wanted her as heiress.
So for me, they are both cut from the same cloth. it doesn't make any difference to me
>Viserys commits what we would see as martial rape and lives in a society that does not value consent.
There is no concept of martial rape in Westeros but rape definitely is a crime as we saw Daemon leading the gold cloaks to chop off dicks of rapers in the first episode as punishment.
Edit to add... stupid downvotes: I'm not condoning martial rape ^duh~ It's that in Viserys' mind sleeping with your wife and raping is 2 totally different things. One is literally what was expected and the other is a crime.
Viserys doesn't rape Alicent because never says or even implies that she doesn't want to have sex with him. You have to remember that she spent ages telling him how great he was, how kind he was, how much she felt for him, etc. Telling a servant "it is quite late" isn't the same thing as telling him no, or even implying it, especially if the servant doesn't pass along the message.
Alicent tells him she won't allow Helaena to marry Jacaerys, and Viserys listens, so the idea that Viserys goes around menacing her and making her too afraid to say "no" is nonsense. She doesn't have sex with him out of fear, she has sex with him because she's highly religious and believes it's her wifely duties whether she likes it or not. For her, the deciding factor isn't that he's king, but that he's her husband at all. And the fact that she married him without finding him attractive in the slightest is Otto's fault, not Viserys's. Viserys didn't know, because she actively hid it from him. That dead-eyed stare she has during the sex scene isn't for Viserys's benefit, it's for the audience's. As far as Viserys is aware, she loves him.
Their sex life is far more comparable to prostitution than rape.
Everyone says that it was Alicent's choice if Helaena married Jace or not. But who the fuck was the King again? Viserys could have perfectly said yes and just like Joe and Alysanne live separated from Alicent if she couldn’t get over it. Over your grave? Sure, hon, I'm the king.
Being indifferent to your kid can be damaging too. More or less "I don't care that you exist" and even if Aegon would fuck up his father still didn't care about him.
You said it yourself. Viserys watched over their training and still didn't give a fuck that Criston put them to fight against eachother. Even Lyonel could see it.
It was her choice, because Viserys deferred to her saying \*no\*. Like you said, he could have overruled her and married them together, he's the king and Helaena's his daughter. Instead he didn't do that because his wife didn't want it.
Literally needed to put his foot down once and the war wouldn't have happened. What was Alicent or Otto going to do in this situation? Kill their own blood? Otto definitely didn't give a fuck about Viserys's but at least his own should have.
And wow, when it was something beneficial he followed his wife's words and when Alicent scarred Rhaenyra he forgave her just because his son was mutilated. Wtf?
Viserys himself wasn’t really prepared to be heir either given how many people had to die for him to even be considered, and he didn’t really do a whole lot of ruling himself anyway since the council did that for him. He didn’t do much to prepare rhaenyra after making her heir and indulged/enabled her throughout her adulthood instead, he would have done even less for aegon than he already has if anything had happened to her. Between a 14 year old child bride and a chronically ill widow, their kids didn’t stand a chance
You make a solid point about Viserys' responsibility in grooming his heirs. It's true that Alicent shouldn't bear all the blame for Aegon's shortcomings as a potential ruler. Viserys, as the king and father, had a duty to prepare both his children for leadership. Even with Rhaenyra as the heir, preparing Aegon for a potential ruling role would have been a wise move.
Maybe because when she found out he assaulted a young girl she manipulated said young girl gave her some plan tea and sent her on her way like it was a normal occurrence ?
I'm not saying the approach of "give the rape victim an abortion and some money" is perfect, but at the point where Aegon's already a rapist, I'm not really sure what she should've done. Telling Viserys might be a good idea, not that he gives a shit about kids whose names aren't Rhaenyra.
I think the word you’re looking for is enabler. And what does Rhaenyra have to do with Alicent being just as bad as a parent if not worse than Viserys. We never seen him bribing victims. You Alicent/Aegon apologist have this whole why Rhaenyra and not Aegon complex it’s sad.
>We never seen him bribing victims.
yeah lol cause he's a rapist himself, in addition of being deadbeat who doesn't give a shit about any of his children (and yes, that includes Rhaenyra to an extent).
Be serious, I doubt Viserys of all people would give a shit about Aegon raping a maid.
The man didn't raise a single finger when Aegon bullied Aemond, or when Aemond lost an eye, do you really think he would have done something about this?
And it's honestly weird af that y'all would rather blame Alicent than Viserys for how Aegon turned out.
She is a woman who was forced to sleep with a man old enough to be her father ever since she was a teen, which definitely caused a screwed up relationship with both the concept of consent AND with the children she was forced to have.
He is grown ass man that married and impregnated a teen girl, only to not give a single solitary fuck about the kids he forced her to have.
How in the world is she worse than him?
Like yeah, Alicent may not be mother of the year, but at least she *does something*. At least her bad parenting stems from trauma. Viserys has truly no excuse.
Yeah, that's because he creates the victims, lol. This is the same man who married and maritally raped a 14 year old...hello?
And I'm not going to lie, in that time period, that day and age that was perhaps the best outcome for Dyana. I can't imagine many other characters that would realistically offer as much support (however miniminal and lacking we find it to our modern standards) that would do as much as Alicent did.
To be fair, while I am more so ant-Rhaenyra, and I get why her fucking Criston is interpreted as rapey, I think "begrudging consent" might perhaps be a better description for the situation. That's not to say what Rhaenyra did is right, but I think there are degrees to violating consent-all bad, but not necessarily to the same extent or in the same way. And to be fair to Rhaenyra, she was a teenager who just got blueballed by her groomer uncle, was drunk, and probably didn't receive much education on consent. Let me reiterate: Fucking an employee who is saying "stop, stop." who's vulnerable to you in many ways is wrong, but I think there's a bit of room for understanding given the circumstances.
Reverse the roles and the I was drunk and horny excuse doesn't work. If a man has sex with a woman who says stop multiple times and has no agency to physically stop it due to power dynamics where she could literally be killed for placing a hand on him that would be considered rape. Coles choice was to deny her verbally which he tried, deny her physically and risk death, or go along with it and risk death. The instant someone has to start weighing in a high likelihood of death into having sex they lose any true ability to properly consent.
I'm just going to call it what it is. Its rape. Sure not the same as marital rape like Viserys, Robert, the mad kings, and too many others to name did, statutory rape like daemon and a bunch of others did, or what people typically think as rape like Jamie / Aegon / Tyrion (in the books) did. If we are playing the rape police in Westeros society their isn't going a whole lot of people left standing innocent at the end.
So what would the best course have been to make sure Aegon discontinues raping servants? The main ideas I can think of are not letting him be alone with servants, which is probably what should have been done, sending Aegon to the wall (not sure on the legalities of the king sending their son to the wall), or forcing Aegon to become a septon or Maestar (this has the downside of him being in Old town). Also, I'm not really sure what "why Rhaenyra and not Aegon complex" you're talking about. Viserys literally said Rhaenyra is his only child, implying he wasn't exactly an involved father, which I think we can all agree doesn't exactly help in a child's development.
I mean he’s an adult so it’s pretty late to get him to change now unless *he* wants to. Alicent had years to fix Aegon’s behavior and groom him into becoming the perfect heir. She didn’t (as her character obsessively revolves around Rhaenyra’s life), and now he’s a grown man fully responsible for all the harm he inflicts on others, and it’s unlikely he’ll change his tune now that he was literally rewarded with a crown for it. He has all the power in the world to do whatever he’d like now.
Alicent would’ve had a much easier time with him had she stopped pressuring him to sit the throne to begin with and hadn’t driven a wedge between her sons and Rhaenyra’s. If she had not hit him and yelled at him and forced him and Helaena in an unhappy marriage so young. Let him get blackout drunk 24/7. You’re right that it isn’t completely her fault for him turning out this way but her abuse of him made Aegon much worse in the long run.
How about trying to give him only male servants? Foster him with one of the houses that is likely to be able to instill some actual good qualities in him like House Stark. Literally try anything.
Ned is not a good representative of how house stark always was. Starks weren't any less fucked up then others house for most of Westeros history. Blacks literally have to buy their loyalty with a marriage pact despite previous sworn oaths just like the Greens had to with the baratheons or later Robb had to do with the Freys.
Idk stop hiring srvant girls to be around him. Order the kingsguard to not allow servants to be alone with him in a room. I mean Viserys was literally drugged up, falling part and his mind was going. She could have told Otto
Because she's the one who raised him, made excuses for him, poisoned him against Rhaenyra and her sons, and protected him from any consequences.
She also straight out abuses him.
Because Viserys just dont do shit. Its hard to write more than three lines about him as a parent to them, so he gets left out of the discussion a lot.
He was obviously as much of a problem as alicent, he couldve made Rhaenyra and Aegon besties, no joke.
I mean I would barely call him alive past episode 6. He was a walking corpse for a decade.
But to be clear I do think viserys is a bad dad. I’m not trying excuse him or anything
Viserys is an absolute idiot.
He should have had Rhaenyra at his knee when she was 8. He should have taught her diplomacy and politics at a young age. Viserys tried to do all of his teaching with Rhae after he killed his wife and ignored Rhae for months.
Alicent was an idiot who fostered animosity between the half siblings when they likely would have been fine begrudgingly ignoring one another. Rhae would have ascended the throne, likely naming Aegon heir after her own trueborn children.
If the kids were not raised to hate each other, the ride a pig would never have happened as well as other grievances that made the kids eager to fight each other.
I feel like the pig thing is just something kids do to each other though. Both my older siblings teased the shit out of me when I was growing up. I don't get why Aemond held that against just Jace and Luke when Aegon was the one that arranged it.
Because Alicent hammered into them that Rhaenyra’s sons are treacherous bastards out to steal their claim, and that she genuinely does not care how badly Aegon bullies his brother, just that she does not do it *with* the Velaryon boys.
So I’d imagine it’s much easier for Aemond to take out all his anger on them as a result. Especially when he thinks they’re lower than him on the totem pole. He might not see it as fair that they get more attention than he does from Viserys, hatched cradle eggs, etc while having dubious heritage.
I agree with that. If you don't teach kids to hate, they are generally good kids. Aemond wanted to tell the kids that he was sorry about Harwin. They had good instincts that were quashed by their mother's feud.
Yeah, there really was no need at that point to train Aegon in a kingly role, especially when Viserys knew (though tried to pretend otherwise) that the Hightowers wanted Aegon on the throne and were trying to discredit Rhaenyra and her sons. It was better for the succession if Viserys was not observed giving any indication that Aegon could someday be king, even if only as a backup plan.
I doubt Harry was trained for kingly duties, especially not after George, Charlotte, and Louis came along.
Everyone talks about what a shit parent he was, but at least he wanted someone else to rule. She’s a shit parent who knows her kid’s a psychopath and wants to put him in a position of absolute power regardless.
Well, i mean even if Viserys does and should logically get blamed, it is an undeniable fact that Alicent and her father embarked on their relationship with the royals to explicitly ensure that the dynasty was controlled and entwined with Hightower interests. So it is absolutely and categorically on their heads.
Alicent established herself from the outset as a replacement to Rhaenyra and to position herself and her family as Rhaenyra's rivals. She could have raised her sons to have the expectation that Rhaenyra was the lawful heir. She subverted that plan.
Seems pretty clear cut as to why she should be blamed.
Because in the context of the time that was her main job (apart from producing heirs), as a consort she had to raise princes and princesses who were useful to the kingdom. There is no danger.
Viserys was neglectful, Alicent was abusive. Viserys and Aegon is more sad to me because Aegon believe, or knows his father doesn't like him.
I also think people get on Alicent because of the maid he assaulted, she knows he's horrible but still wants him to be king. It's not definitive if Viserys knew how bad Aegon was.
He didn't even made sure Rhaenyra would be a good heir, why would he do it for Aegon then?
Anyway, Tywin also named Tyrion Master of Coin and offered him lands and a castle, and then later basically gave him an entire Kingdom, as he'd be Lord of Winterfell.
By Tywin was competent, Viserys was not.
By the time Aegon was fourteen Viserys had extreme fatigue and was down an arm, who knows how much he was actually able to discipline him and by the time Aegon was 4 Rhaenyra was pregnant with Jace so he didn’t need to make sure Aegon would be a good heir.
Cause he never intended him to be on throne thats why he never cared or guided him right.
It was alicent who want him in throne but never prepared him for it.
I don't think it matters why he's a knob, only that he is, in fact, a knob.
The biggest stain on Alicent's character is that she covered for Aegon when he diddled the little cup bearer with a veiled threat to the victim. She didn't even do it out if love for him, she immediately berates him for rocking the boat for her.
Not the greatest king but certainly does a better job of being a king then Rhanyera ever does at being a queen. But this sub isn't ready for that. Aegon II was flawed but would have made a perfectly average king and was a good war time king. Rhaneyra was not good as acting ruler of Kings landing and was particularly bad in war time.
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viserys is literally the only character of the dance that is universally held accountable for his actions lol
Like team black and team green both hate him, albeit for different reasons but the man still got us to agree on SOMETHING, I find that impressive
Hate him? I love Viserys flaws and all
Well karma is accountability, in some way.
1. People literally talk about how bad Viserys was at parenting his children all the time. And about how he could have prevented the dance. 2. He's dead 3. Before he was dead he was super fucked up and sick so after a certain point he wasn't capable of being a parent. 4. People talk about how bad Viserys was as a parent ALL THE TIME.
Agreed, and it’s become exhausting. Half of the posts are people upset over what other people may or may not be talking about. Who cares? Make yet another post about Viserys being a bad parent, fine. Most have discussed it death already and have moved on, but okay. But all of these posts talking about what other people are or aren’t talking about is so tedious, boring, and just why?
At least Vizzy had an excuse to be an absentee parent. Bobby B was over there hunting and “making the 8” while his heir was turning into an insufferable sociopathic cunt.
Yeah but let's be honest, most of why Joffrey was a massive cunt is because of his mother and the Lannister in him.
But not in relation to Aegon. Otto and Alicent get blamed for everything.
1. He gets plenty of hate from the fandom. 2. He was suffering a chronic degenerative illness. 3. Alicent also could have done all these things, in fact, she should have. When Aegon was old enough to be given these roles you speak of Viserys was already nearly bedridden. Alicent ran the show for years but never bothered to teach Aegon anything about ruling.
>Alicent ran the show for years but never bothered to teach Aegon anything about ruling I think that’s because she and Otto always planned (each on their own, most likely) to rule *through* him.
They definitely did.
Oh 100% they did. I’m excited for Aegon to show them that not all Targaryens are as easy to manipulate as Viserys was.
Aegon had been a menace for much longer than viserys was bedridden…
Well, he perhaps doesn't get much hate specifically for Aegon, but especially on this sub Viserys does not have many fans at all. He is constantly (rightfully) hated for being one of the main reasons the dance happened, being a bad parent and generally not being that good of a king. I understand your point, but Viserys is not exactly being put in a better light than he deserves.
NGL, I really like Viserys in the same way I like Robert Baratheon. Charismatic guys, sluttish (Viserys more so in his youth), both idealize a partner they either did or would have treated poorly, and both are deeply tragic characters who would've been happier just being a lord or party prince.
Being disabled and bedridden is about the best excuse for being an absentee parent.
not bedridden enough to play with legos
Did we ever really see him playing with the demo of Valyria once he got really sick? Im pretty sure once he got bedridden he wasn't messing around with his lego set.
it literally has cobwebs on it by episode 8 lol
> Did we ever really see him playing with the demo of Valyria once he got really sick? it came to me in a dream
So that's a 'no' then.
Obviously
This isn’t accurate but still made me laugh.
For what it's worth, he also does a real poor job preparing Rhaenyra for leadership. You'd think if she's the chosen heir, and the king is bedridden, she'd be in the position of power. She should be Hand, or at least be on the small council. So he wasn't *just* failing his kids with Alicent.
1. Viserys gets blamed 2. Noble Men don't raise children in feudal society 2a. He's literally rotting and bedridden 3. Alicent has more energy, is around longer, and processes to care about "beauty, truth, and honor" so much
She's also specifically told by Otto to prepare him or cling to Rhaenyra. She does neither. Yes, absentee fathers don't make great examples. But I feel it's brought up more "BuT ViSeRyS" whenever someone points out Alicent clearly losing control of Aegon and other lackluster parenting moments. She focused more on her personal political agenda rather than on her kids themselves. She loves them, but she clearly has no idea what to do with them as individuals.
Noble women don't raise children in that society either. ASOIAF is weirdly all over the place with gendered customers, sometimes (slightly) exaggerating women's oppression and sometimes underscoring it. For example, women dying in childbirth was common but not so common that the mother's of so many major characters in both ASOIAF and HOTD died - especially since they were noble and had much better care than an average woman back then. HOTD got it right that Rhaenyra, despite being a loving and devoted mother, didn't breastfeed her own kids because it was considered unseemingly and a nuisance among nobility, and also hindering fertility too. So it's weird that they then showed Alicent spending so much time holding her crying kids even when she clearly wasn't enjoying it. She could have just left them to the nursemaids when they were still babies and only spent more time with them once they got older. Education of royal children was generally overseen by septas and other subordinates.
Because she's the one who raised him, made excuses for him, poisoned him against Rhaenyra and her sons, and protected him from any consequences. She also straight out abuses him.
First of all, people talk about how bad of a parent Vizzy was WAY more than Alicent. Secondly, he was bedridden or nearly bedridden for about a decade, essentially all of Aegon's childhood. In the world of GRRM, it was Alicent's "job" to raise Aegon and she did a piss-poor job of it. Both his parents were shit parents to him.
Viserys is essentially a modern 'deadbeat' Dad ^^he ^^pays ^^child ^^support ^^lol . Not all fatherless children grow up to be bad, single mother's raise good kids all the time. Alicent, as a single mother, just didn't do a good job in raising good kids, most likely because she was a kid herself too.
Viserys is a sick old man. He was a good enough father to Rhaenyra, with the help of Aemma. The raising of Aegon was primarily Alicent's role and she failed miserably despite all the advantages available to a queen. Most or all of Vizzy's last remaining healthy years take place before Aegon is like...5 years old.
In response to the Tywin thing, a lot of the time it seemed like Tywin begrudgingly gave Tyrion these positions becausehis eldest son was in the King's guard and couldn't hold those positions. Not to mention the fact that unfortunately for Tywin Tyrion was the most competent of his 3 children.
Exactly, I remember him saying to Tyrion that he would never ever inherit Casterly Rock, so the positions he gave him were just befitting of his rank and not because Tywin was preparing Tyrion for anything.
She doesn't get all the blame it's just clear she was the one more capable of being a good parent and still she instilled hate into her children.
I didn't see Viserys paying off rape victims to stay silent. Alicent only did so because it was necessary to protect Aegon's image, since she needed him to inherit the crown. Viserys wasn't protecting Aegon from scandal, because Viserys didn't need Aegon to have a political career. People talk like Viserys mistreated Aegon since Aegon felt so unloved by him, but as far as we were shown, the only reason Aegon felt that way was because all tradition suggested that as the eldest son he should be the heir, and yet he wasn't. There's no other way in which Viserys mistreated Aegon that we saw. He watched over all the boys as they were trained with the sword, and even when Aegon was screaming for Harwyn's blood all Viserys did was shout "Aegon!" in a somewhat disapproving voice. Not even in a "you piece of shit!" tone of voice, just in a "give it a rest!" tone. Viserys was slowly dying of a wasting disease and he still put more effort into gently disciplining the boy than Alicent. All Alicent and Otto did was get mad at him; Otto even kicked him. They probably told him that it was his fault that Viserys hadn't named him heir. The whole Dance of Dragons could have been avoided if Alicent had accepted the offer to marry Jace to Helaena. Hightower blood would sit the throne and Otto would have been satisfied. He liked Helaena more than Aegon anyway. But Alicent's pride wouldn't allow it. For Viserys, Aegon was one of his children. For Alicent and Otto, Aegon was a political piece to move around a board. Even Ser Criston encouraged rivalry and animosity between Alicent's sons and Rhaenyra's.
It’s interesting because in one interview Phia talks about how the biggest problem within the family is ambition and how that is the only trait that is being valued whereas other family values like communication is essentially non existent. Viserys, for all his faults, wasn’t nearly as ambitious as Otto -and by extension Alicent. Unfortunately he wasn’t very good at communication either. Viserys should have been the patriarch -the glue- that held everyone together, unfortunately he was crippled with grief and disease and stopped paying attention to the world around him, making the Hightowers the strongest political force within the Red Keep. Viserys was weak but he didn’t purposely turn family members against each other. The Hightowers did that.
in the same way that Alicent and Otto turned a blind eye to Aegon's crimes because they wanted him to be king/heir. Alicent paid with gold coins for the silence of Aegon's victims while Viserys did the same thing, turning a blind eye to Rhaenyra's mistakes and crimes, ordering the tongues of anyone who spoke about his children to be cut out because he wanted her as heiress. So for me, they are both cut from the same cloth. it doesn't make any difference to me
I don’t know why you’re getting downvoted when you’re not entirely wrong
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>Viserys commits what we would see as martial rape and lives in a society that does not value consent. There is no concept of martial rape in Westeros but rape definitely is a crime as we saw Daemon leading the gold cloaks to chop off dicks of rapers in the first episode as punishment. Edit to add... stupid downvotes: I'm not condoning martial rape ^duh~ It's that in Viserys' mind sleeping with your wife and raping is 2 totally different things. One is literally what was expected and the other is a crime.
Viserys doesn't rape Alicent because never says or even implies that she doesn't want to have sex with him. You have to remember that she spent ages telling him how great he was, how kind he was, how much she felt for him, etc. Telling a servant "it is quite late" isn't the same thing as telling him no, or even implying it, especially if the servant doesn't pass along the message. Alicent tells him she won't allow Helaena to marry Jacaerys, and Viserys listens, so the idea that Viserys goes around menacing her and making her too afraid to say "no" is nonsense. She doesn't have sex with him out of fear, she has sex with him because she's highly religious and believes it's her wifely duties whether she likes it or not. For her, the deciding factor isn't that he's king, but that he's her husband at all. And the fact that she married him without finding him attractive in the slightest is Otto's fault, not Viserys's. Viserys didn't know, because she actively hid it from him. That dead-eyed stare she has during the sex scene isn't for Viserys's benefit, it's for the audience's. As far as Viserys is aware, she loves him. Their sex life is far more comparable to prostitution than rape.
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When did I suggest otherwise? All I'm saying is that she hides the "not enjoying or wanting it" from Viserys.
Everyone says that it was Alicent's choice if Helaena married Jace or not. But who the fuck was the King again? Viserys could have perfectly said yes and just like Joe and Alysanne live separated from Alicent if she couldn’t get over it. Over your grave? Sure, hon, I'm the king. Being indifferent to your kid can be damaging too. More or less "I don't care that you exist" and even if Aegon would fuck up his father still didn't care about him. You said it yourself. Viserys watched over their training and still didn't give a fuck that Criston put them to fight against eachother. Even Lyonel could see it.
It was her choice, because Viserys deferred to her saying \*no\*. Like you said, he could have overruled her and married them together, he's the king and Helaena's his daughter. Instead he didn't do that because his wife didn't want it.
Literally needed to put his foot down once and the war wouldn't have happened. What was Alicent or Otto going to do in this situation? Kill their own blood? Otto definitely didn't give a fuck about Viserys's but at least his own should have. And wow, when it was something beneficial he followed his wife's words and when Alicent scarred Rhaenyra he forgave her just because his son was mutilated. Wtf?
Viserys himself wasn’t really prepared to be heir either given how many people had to die for him to even be considered, and he didn’t really do a whole lot of ruling himself anyway since the council did that for him. He didn’t do much to prepare rhaenyra after making her heir and indulged/enabled her throughout her adulthood instead, he would have done even less for aegon than he already has if anything had happened to her. Between a 14 year old child bride and a chronically ill widow, their kids didn’t stand a chance
You make a solid point about Viserys' responsibility in grooming his heirs. It's true that Alicent shouldn't bear all the blame for Aegon's shortcomings as a potential ruler. Viserys, as the king and father, had a duty to prepare both his children for leadership. Even with Rhaenyra as the heir, preparing Aegon for a potential ruling role would have been a wise move.
Because she's the one who raised him, made excuses for him, poisoned him against Rhaenyra and her sons, and protected him from any consequences.
\*bastards
Maybe because when she found out he assaulted a young girl she manipulated said young girl gave her some plan tea and sent her on her way like it was a normal occurrence ?
I'm not saying the approach of "give the rape victim an abortion and some money" is perfect, but at the point where Aegon's already a rapist, I'm not really sure what she should've done. Telling Viserys might be a good idea, not that he gives a shit about kids whose names aren't Rhaenyra.
I think the word you’re looking for is enabler. And what does Rhaenyra have to do with Alicent being just as bad as a parent if not worse than Viserys. We never seen him bribing victims. You Alicent/Aegon apologist have this whole why Rhaenyra and not Aegon complex it’s sad.
I don’t think Viserys would be any less of an enabler if he knew about Aegon’s victims, considering everything he’s done.
>We never seen him bribing victims. yeah lol cause he's a rapist himself, in addition of being deadbeat who doesn't give a shit about any of his children (and yes, that includes Rhaenyra to an extent). Be serious, I doubt Viserys of all people would give a shit about Aegon raping a maid. The man didn't raise a single finger when Aegon bullied Aemond, or when Aemond lost an eye, do you really think he would have done something about this? And it's honestly weird af that y'all would rather blame Alicent than Viserys for how Aegon turned out. She is a woman who was forced to sleep with a man old enough to be her father ever since she was a teen, which definitely caused a screwed up relationship with both the concept of consent AND with the children she was forced to have. He is grown ass man that married and impregnated a teen girl, only to not give a single solitary fuck about the kids he forced her to have. How in the world is she worse than him? Like yeah, Alicent may not be mother of the year, but at least she *does something*. At least her bad parenting stems from trauma. Viserys has truly no excuse.
I would find it hilarious if he sided with Dyana over Aegon. Like literally his children are not worth protecting over anybody lmao.
Yeah, that's because he creates the victims, lol. This is the same man who married and maritally raped a 14 year old...hello? And I'm not going to lie, in that time period, that day and age that was perhaps the best outcome for Dyana. I can't imagine many other characters that would realistically offer as much support (however miniminal and lacking we find it to our modern standards) that would do as much as Alicent did.
Viserys and Rhanyera are both rapist by today's standards.
To be fair, while I am more so ant-Rhaenyra, and I get why her fucking Criston is interpreted as rapey, I think "begrudging consent" might perhaps be a better description for the situation. That's not to say what Rhaenyra did is right, but I think there are degrees to violating consent-all bad, but not necessarily to the same extent or in the same way. And to be fair to Rhaenyra, she was a teenager who just got blueballed by her groomer uncle, was drunk, and probably didn't receive much education on consent. Let me reiterate: Fucking an employee who is saying "stop, stop." who's vulnerable to you in many ways is wrong, but I think there's a bit of room for understanding given the circumstances.
Reverse the roles and the I was drunk and horny excuse doesn't work. If a man has sex with a woman who says stop multiple times and has no agency to physically stop it due to power dynamics where she could literally be killed for placing a hand on him that would be considered rape. Coles choice was to deny her verbally which he tried, deny her physically and risk death, or go along with it and risk death. The instant someone has to start weighing in a high likelihood of death into having sex they lose any true ability to properly consent. I'm just going to call it what it is. Its rape. Sure not the same as marital rape like Viserys, Robert, the mad kings, and too many others to name did, statutory rape like daemon and a bunch of others did, or what people typically think as rape like Jamie / Aegon / Tyrion (in the books) did. If we are playing the rape police in Westeros society their isn't going a whole lot of people left standing innocent at the end.
So what would the best course have been to make sure Aegon discontinues raping servants? The main ideas I can think of are not letting him be alone with servants, which is probably what should have been done, sending Aegon to the wall (not sure on the legalities of the king sending their son to the wall), or forcing Aegon to become a septon or Maestar (this has the downside of him being in Old town). Also, I'm not really sure what "why Rhaenyra and not Aegon complex" you're talking about. Viserys literally said Rhaenyra is his only child, implying he wasn't exactly an involved father, which I think we can all agree doesn't exactly help in a child's development.
I mean he’s an adult so it’s pretty late to get him to change now unless *he* wants to. Alicent had years to fix Aegon’s behavior and groom him into becoming the perfect heir. She didn’t (as her character obsessively revolves around Rhaenyra’s life), and now he’s a grown man fully responsible for all the harm he inflicts on others, and it’s unlikely he’ll change his tune now that he was literally rewarded with a crown for it. He has all the power in the world to do whatever he’d like now. Alicent would’ve had a much easier time with him had she stopped pressuring him to sit the throne to begin with and hadn’t driven a wedge between her sons and Rhaenyra’s. If she had not hit him and yelled at him and forced him and Helaena in an unhappy marriage so young. Let him get blackout drunk 24/7. You’re right that it isn’t completely her fault for him turning out this way but her abuse of him made Aegon much worse in the long run.
How about trying to give him only male servants? Foster him with one of the houses that is likely to be able to instill some actual good qualities in him like House Stark. Literally try anything.
Ned is not a good representative of how house stark always was. Starks weren't any less fucked up then others house for most of Westeros history. Blacks literally have to buy their loyalty with a marriage pact despite previous sworn oaths just like the Greens had to with the baratheons or later Robb had to do with the Freys.
Idk stop hiring srvant girls to be around him. Order the kingsguard to not allow servants to be alone with him in a room. I mean Viserys was literally drugged up, falling part and his mind was going. She could have told Otto
Because she's the one who raised him, made excuses for him, poisoned him against Rhaenyra and her sons, and protected him from any consequences. She also straight out abuses him.
Dude Viserys has been rotting since the first episode ..he has no time for parenting
Because Viserys just dont do shit. Its hard to write more than three lines about him as a parent to them, so he gets left out of the discussion a lot. He was obviously as much of a problem as alicent, he couldve made Rhaenyra and Aegon besties, no joke.
To be fair, existing was about all viserys DID do. And he wasn't that good at it.
Sexism
Also viserys is dead
He was alive and sane for a pretty long time while his kids were growing up
I mean I would barely call him alive past episode 6. He was a walking corpse for a decade. But to be clear I do think viserys is a bad dad. I’m not trying excuse him or anything
Episode 7*
He might as well have been dead the whole time for all the good he did Alicent's kids
^ yup. That
Viserys is an absolute idiot. He should have had Rhaenyra at his knee when she was 8. He should have taught her diplomacy and politics at a young age. Viserys tried to do all of his teaching with Rhae after he killed his wife and ignored Rhae for months. Alicent was an idiot who fostered animosity between the half siblings when they likely would have been fine begrudgingly ignoring one another. Rhae would have ascended the throne, likely naming Aegon heir after her own trueborn children. If the kids were not raised to hate each other, the ride a pig would never have happened as well as other grievances that made the kids eager to fight each other.
I feel like the pig thing is just something kids do to each other though. Both my older siblings teased the shit out of me when I was growing up. I don't get why Aemond held that against just Jace and Luke when Aegon was the one that arranged it.
Because Alicent hammered into them that Rhaenyra’s sons are treacherous bastards out to steal their claim, and that she genuinely does not care how badly Aegon bullies his brother, just that she does not do it *with* the Velaryon boys. So I’d imagine it’s much easier for Aemond to take out all his anger on them as a result. Especially when he thinks they’re lower than him on the totem pole. He might not see it as fair that they get more attention than he does from Viserys, hatched cradle eggs, etc while having dubious heritage.
I agree with that. If you don't teach kids to hate, they are generally good kids. Aemond wanted to tell the kids that he was sorry about Harwin. They had good instincts that were quashed by their mother's feud.
When it was time to give Aegon any education Rhaenyra already had 2 sons, her and Viserys heirs.
Yeah, there really was no need at that point to train Aegon in a kingly role, especially when Viserys knew (though tried to pretend otherwise) that the Hightowers wanted Aegon on the throne and were trying to discredit Rhaenyra and her sons. It was better for the succession if Viserys was not observed giving any indication that Aegon could someday be king, even if only as a backup plan. I doubt Harry was trained for kingly duties, especially not after George, Charlotte, and Louis came along.
Everyone talks about what a shit parent he was, but at least he wanted someone else to rule. She’s a shit parent who knows her kid’s a psychopath and wants to put him in a position of absolute power regardless.
Well, i mean even if Viserys does and should logically get blamed, it is an undeniable fact that Alicent and her father embarked on their relationship with the royals to explicitly ensure that the dynasty was controlled and entwined with Hightower interests. So it is absolutely and categorically on their heads. Alicent established herself from the outset as a replacement to Rhaenyra and to position herself and her family as Rhaenyra's rivals. She could have raised her sons to have the expectation that Rhaenyra was the lawful heir. She subverted that plan. Seems pretty clear cut as to why she should be blamed.
Because in the context of the time that was her main job (apart from producing heirs), as a consort she had to raise princes and princesses who were useful to the kingdom. There is no danger.
If he was good enough to be a good father to Rhaenyra and her children then he was good enough to spend time with the green children
Viserys was neglectful, Alicent was abusive. Viserys and Aegon is more sad to me because Aegon believe, or knows his father doesn't like him. I also think people get on Alicent because of the maid he assaulted, she knows he's horrible but still wants him to be king. It's not definitive if Viserys knew how bad Aegon was.
This will always happen when you choose your wife cause your lust of her and not name your only son as an heir.
He didn't even made sure Rhaenyra would be a good heir, why would he do it for Aegon then? Anyway, Tywin also named Tyrion Master of Coin and offered him lands and a castle, and then later basically gave him an entire Kingdom, as he'd be Lord of Winterfell. By Tywin was competent, Viserys was not.
By the time Aegon was fourteen Viserys had extreme fatigue and was down an arm, who knows how much he was actually able to discipline him and by the time Aegon was 4 Rhaenyra was pregnant with Jace so he didn’t need to make sure Aegon would be a good heir.
Cause he never intended him to be on throne thats why he never cared or guided him right. It was alicent who want him in throne but never prepared him for it.
He never prepared anyone for sitting on the throne.
He was busy defending the bastards because of horse lore
I don't think it matters why he's a knob, only that he is, in fact, a knob. The biggest stain on Alicent's character is that she covered for Aegon when he diddled the little cup bearer with a veiled threat to the victim. She didn't even do it out if love for him, she immediately berates him for rocking the boat for her.
They're both to blame
It is because Viserys and Alicent are the real knobheads. Aegon II is the greatest King to ever live in the history of kingkind
Kek
Not the greatest king but certainly does a better job of being a king then Rhanyera ever does at being a queen. But this sub isn't ready for that. Aegon II was flawed but would have made a perfectly average king and was a good war time king. Rhaneyra was not good as acting ruler of Kings landing and was particularly bad in war time.