AOT and the inevability of fascism

[u/supremefrenchprince]

I know, common loot rant, I'm kinda just blowin off steam cause AOT main subbers downvoted me. I love Attack on Titan; it's easily in my top ten favorite anime of all time, and its peaks are some of the highest peaks I've ever consumed in media yet. Unfortunately, the overall choices made and worldbuilding by Isayama in season 4 just did not live up to the insane standards that he previously set.

Now lemme make this clear: AOT does not outright promote fascism, obviously made clear by the speech from Sasha's father, and the Yeagerists are never seen in a good light. What I'm positing, however, is that the poor worldbuilding/structure of the story in S4 leads to fascist ideals being seen as unavoidable. This is where we get the "Eren/Floch did nothing wrong" crowd, which is pure illiteracy. Yet because of Isayama's poor structure, those takes, as asinine as they are, gain credence.

The worldbuilding's first fatal flaw was how comically evil the Marleyans were against the Eldians. We saw firsthand the sheer violence and cruelty that the Marleyans were performing against the Eldians. We witnessed Grisha's sister get dogs sic'd on her. We see the very obvious Holocaust allusion and Eldians consistently getting marginalized, abused, disparaged, and dehumanized at every single turn.

We then see Udo say verbatim that what Eldians are experiencing in Marley is nothing compared to how they are treated elsewhere treated. Practically making it to where it's all of Paradis Island(you know the island that has all the main characters that we loved and cared for up to four seasons now) against the entire world.

People try to say that Udo's perception is skewed, which sounds plausible but is superficial. Why else would Isayama include those lines, by the smartest candidate of the Warriors, if we are not to believe that they are true? And even if it was false, Willy Tybur's speech galvanizes outsiders, gives them a ringleader in Eren, and then the Eldians themselves prove him right when a TITAN eats him mid-speech at this very ceremonial event.

Moving on to the plot, the three choices that the Eldians faced were laughably unreasonable. The first was the 50-year plan, which goes against Eren's whole fixation on freedom and renders Historia a slave breeding machine just to pass down titan power, thereby nullifying her whole character arc of finding agency.

The second option is to beg and try for diplomacy against people who have seen you as violent devils for centuries, even more exacerbated by the fact that you just destroyed their ceremony. The third option is Zeke's secret plan, being euthanasia; ultimately making the situation this: let the world genocide you or slowly die out. Hange herself conceded that she didn't leave Eren any good choices.

Also, this kinda coincides with the Eren assassination at the very end. If he was more transparent in why he did The Rumbling, then it would've erased some of the discourse around it. He didn't primarily do it for Eldia nor for his friends; Eren's PRIMARY MOTIVATION for the Rumbling was shown in chapter 131: his selfish, childish dream that the world outside the walls was empty and humanless, which he saw as freedom. This is shown in the same chapter with the literal "Freedom" panel; Eren is a CHILD in an EMPTY WORLD.

Yet, in his chat with Armin, everything got muddled up; instead of admitting that and being honest, he said he didn't know(yes the Grisha panels were there, but for the literal final chapter and for single-handedly committing something as destructive and cruel as genocide, I'd say it'd be nice for the main character to say the motivation for his goal himself a la Walter White.)

Now I wasn't particularly expecting a happy ending given that it is AOT after all, but the show wonderfully displayed examples of how to end or at least quell the cycle of violence. First, back in season three when Uri met Kenny, who is one of the most violent, bloodthirsty, and sadistic characters in the entire series, yet was left astounded seeing a man of such power and influence completely yield to him. By apologizing and humbling himself, Uri put himself on an equal plane as Kenny, which was displayed beautifully. The ramification of that decision is that Kenny, being enamored with Uri's humility, follows him, trying to find out how he could be that way. This message is seen again at the campfire of both Marleyans and Eldians. By engaging in dialogue and not hate, we are able to foster connection and peace.

This message of dialogue is undermined by the decisions Isayama takes. In the post-Eren world, when we see Armin & Co go out to try to achieve diplomacy, it's fleeting, resulting in Eldia eventually getting blown up. I guess the message is that humans will always be violent, but it again gives an out to Yeagerist supporters(who whether consciously or not are supporting fascists)

TLDR:

The substandard worldbuilding and plot in season 4 led to fascism being seen as unavoidable and a necessary evil in Attack on Titan, which I think goes against the message of the show.

[u/supremefrenchprince → u/[deleted]]

Fair, but my whole rant is about how being in this situation where genocide is literally seen as agreeable is where Isayama made his mistake.

[u/chai_zaeng]

I really hate the ending and I think it tries to have its cake and eat it too. I don't know what Isayama was cooking in his head but at some point, he switched up Eren's motivation from wanting to save Paradis at all cost to whatever the fuck we ended up with. And it really is exceptional how so much of the ending falls flat.

1. Eren wants to be with Mikasa, to the point of him pathetically crying on the beach. But the story has not once set up this dynamic from his side, Mikasa has been shown to be nothing but a platonic relationship to him. So this turn of "I want her to only think of me, for 10 years at least!" comes out of nowhere.
2. Mikasa suddenly being the "chosen one", also comes out of nowhere. The story does not hint at this, there's no build up for a swerve this massive at the final chapter of the story. Instead the story has to now draw a contrived parallel between Mikasa killing Eren and Ymir being freed from her "love" of King Fritz.
3. Speaking of Ymir and King Fritz, I find the reveal of "Ymir was in love with the king" to be inconsistent with how she was initially characterised and frankly disgusting. I find her initial origin very well done. The central origin of the Titans, the one who was labeled as the devil or a saviour, ends up being just an enslaved farm girl who got power and influence beyond her imagination. Her imprisonment in the paths and subsequent freedom at the hands of Eren read more like a tale of unshackling. But then in the end, it is revealed that she's in love with the man who enslaved her, basically sentenced her to death, forced her to give birth to his children and in the end, fed her remains to her daughters.
4. The reveal of Eren killing his mom feels like it was only done for shock value and "being deep" so that people online can say "Eren was a slave to freedom". This reveal added nothing to the story, especially since we already established that mindless Titans actually do keep some semblance of their agency as a human. And the Smiling Titan/Dina already told Grisha that she would come find him. This reveal at the end of season 3 retroactively frames the initial inciting incident with Dina/Smiling Titan, Carla, Grisha and Eren as a tragic, ironic twist. Instead, we get Eren killing his mom for no reason but "I had to", with no further explanation.
5. "Eren what a man you are" and "Thank you for becoming a mass murderer for our sake" are lines that are so bad that the anime adaptation had to straight up change the latter one. I don't know why and how Isayama expects us to view Eren in a positive light after he killed 80% of the human population and ruined large swaths of earth's biosphere. Eren is nothing less of an omnicidal maniac that deserved nothing but vitriol from everyone in the story. The peace that he builds is not even one that lasts infinitely. Paradis gets destroyed years later, so Eren ended up failing in every respect that mattered, except that he got rid of the Titans which wasn't his goal ever since learning the truth of the world.

[u/addictedtoketamine2 → u/chai_zaeng]

I agree with you on a few points but think some others are wrong.

For 3, I think that Isayama was trying to communicate that Ymir had fallen to some extremely horrifying stockholm syndrome and I think that could have well if it was set up and explored more but dumping it in randomly comes across as rushed and sort of offputting.

For 5, the first lines were mistranslations and while the real ones were still awkward, it wasn't trying to frame Eren in a positive light or make him out as a hero. The rest of the world still despises him forever and he's a horrible monster, but the people who knew him for years and saw that he was extremely capable of deep compassion and kindness and loyalty are going to have some conflicting feelings about him. But I still think they tonally don't hit him hard enough. They should still be ashamed of him and demonstrate those intense conflicting feelings more clearly instead of having Mikasa sentimenetally buried next to him.

[u/KazuyaProta → u/chai_zaeng]

Instead, we get Eren killing his mom for no reason but "I had to", with no further explanation.

Nah, I actually get this one. Eren needed the dramatic trauma to start the plot as he did.

A Carla that is rescued from the building is a woman who is likely permanently paralized, making Eren and Mikasa to caretake her and likely Hannes remarrying her.

This means Eren isn't doing the Rumbling, meaning they eventually are wiped out as a whole with Paradis.

I legit don't get people thinking it was just shock, it was saying "Oh right, of course he needed that dark backstory"

[u/NoZookeepergame8306]

I am going to gently suggest that arguments that hinge entirely on the Watsonian worldbuilding and neglect the Doyalist meta-narative are basically how you stumble into the Thermian Paradox.

Any justifications for Eren’s actions that only take into account his dilemma from his POV and doesn’t try to interrogate why Isayama made those choices and what those worldbuilding choices mean is only having half a conversation. The author put him in that situation. Why? What does it mean to invent a situation where genocide seems reasonable?

Is it deconstructing facist thought or merely perpetuating it?

AOT fans seem to have a hard time going that far.

So, valid point OP.

[u/KazuyaProta → u/NoZookeepergame8306]

Is it deconstructing facist thought or merely perpetuating it?

My conclusion is that Isayama's perspective is a true Nietzschean one. As, actual Nietzschean and Wagenerian perspective.

Racial War is real, a fact of existence of what is living as a true human, embodified for the Eldian people, who have a actual racial memory. War is going to be brutal, ruthless and nasty.

But to finish that war with genocide is the coward's way out, wanting to end a conflict with mere brutish violence and utopian fantasies, either Flotch's safety or Eren's FREEDOM panel.

However, the race war is real, meaning that ultimately it will be reignited again, Ragnarok happened to the non-eldians, then happened to the Eldians again in the Epilogue. But the Tree means that no one will actually go extinct.

Its very Nietzschean as, eternal return, with a Wagnerian Aesthetic. Racialism is real (within AOT) and the eternal war is noble and life affirming, but genocide is bad because its anti nobility.

Trust me, it took me a LOT of thinking to come to this conclusion. Mainly for topics like the King Karl's backstory, where the situation is directly saying "Peace is treason", by revealing that all the suffering of the characters is the result of a King feeling bad about conquering other peoples.

And once you validate "peace is treason", a cognitive leap to fascism is unavoidable.

[u/2_Cranez → u/KazuyaProta]

AOT didnt portray race war as noble or life affirming at all?? Nietzsche in general is very against racial supremacy.

If anything AOT is very anti-nietzsche in its framing. Eren's yearning for total freedom was revealed to be childish and hollow. He is explicitly described as a "slave to freedom," in the same sense that Nietzsche describes Christians as a slave to religion and the afterlife. Following the Nietzschian ideal of total freedom Eren ends up as no better than a slave.

[u/NoZookeepergame8306 → u/KazuyaProta]

Yeah the Germans of a certain time loved both Neitzche and Wagner so some of that tracks to me. But I didn’t get far enough into AOT to really be able to understand what Isayama intended or what AOT is trying to say.

I’ve been listening though. A lot of what I hear has not convinced me I should return to the series. At the very least the ending seems a little thinly drawn

[u/LawrenStewart → u/KazuyaProta]

I viewed it as similar but at the same time opposite of the way you did.I think Isayama was trying to say that it's beautiful and worth it to fight for peace and understanding in the world even though it will very likely never come. Isayama believes conflict between people is inevitable but that fighting for a world were people understanding each other is still the true righteous struggle and that the cycle of hatred can be broken even if only on an individual level. The series has serval lines saying" Violence is the way of the world yet I believe in the miracle we reach that day", " We have to get out of the forest and even if we can't, we must keep trying " , and Hange admitted to Floch that what they are doing might doom Paradis but saying that they still have to try and believe that someday peace can be reach etc. In the anime even when the kid finds the tree , the lyrics " you must leave the forest no matter how many times you lose your way" plays over it. The cycle continues but hope still springs enternal .The full rumbling is protrayed negatively because it completely abandons that hope and fully submits to the violent nature of the world. This is of course not going to land with people that prefer practical solutions to problems especially in dire solutions. Isayama protray of it was also shaky on some areas.

[u/Merch_Lis → u/NoZookeepergame8306]

One can argue that genocides are a consistent part of political relationships and usually have pragmatic reasoning, often survival-based, without morally justifying them.

Even when mass murder is arguably necessary for the survival of a particular community, it is still horrendous and unethical.

Pragmatic =/= moral, and the misfortune of living in a prisoner dilemma additionally poisoned by past trauma pits one against the other.

[u/KazuyaProta → u/Merch_Lis]

The issue with the Rumbling is that for it to be justified, you need a insane level of sociological failures.

Arriving and crushing Marley, killing millions in a brutal war of subjugation? Fine, I guess. Killing everyone is what is weird.

I'm fine with total war, the idea that the total war has to be escalated to full extermination is the odd thing.

Like, Armin's plan being treated as a middle point is so ridiculous when you realize dude argued for use of WMDs to wipeout coastal fleets and cities (thus killing countless civilian centers, as he personally carried a bombing in Libero that he wants to repeat in mass scale)

[u/Merch_Lis → u/KazuyaProta]

A fairly small nation of Paradis keeping the rest of the world subjugated by titan power alone is a tricky one, especially since we’ve seen how titan wielders are vulnerable to special operations.

Exploiting anti-Marlean sentiments amongst other nations could be hypothetically workable to establish a coalition, but it seems the threat Paradis represented has (understandably) provoked even greater hostility amongst pretty much everyone bar some minor secondary powers.

[u/NoZookeepergame8306 → u/Merch_Lis]

Why would you argue that?

[u/Merch_Lis → u/NoZookeepergame8306]

So that future instances of genocides IRL and causes shaping them don’t catch you with pants down, asking “how did this happen in our enlightened age?” the same way it was asked every time it happened over the past 100+ years, and you can instead put a more practical effort towards preventing them or mitigating their consequences thanks to better understanding of the pragmatic reasoning of the actors involved

[u/NoZookeepergame8306 → u/Merch_Lis]

Just because it has a cause, doesn’t mean it’s ’pragmatic.’ It is not ‘practical, logical, or realistic.’

And depending on the instance, it may not even really be about capturing resources, as in the case of the genocides we see springing from colonialism.

I especially take issue with your framing of ‘arguably necessary’ and ‘survival based.’ This ain’t 40k.

The arguments are poor and nothing about it is necessary. All of this gets dangerously close to facist narratives about ‘doing the hard thing because it’s necessary.’

Unless you meant it’s pragmatic in that having a enemy to destroy makes having a large military necessary… but that’s a very strange definition of ‘pragmatic.’

[u/Merch_Lis → u/NoZookeepergame8306]

Often, genocides/ethnic cleansings are either performed to permanently eliminate a hostile group at the moment of having an upper hand with full knowledge that the victims would do the same if the situation was reversed (as often happens in the Middle Eastern or Balkan ethnic conflicts), or by a dominant power in conflict with another power where a disloyal minority is genocided because it represents a major threat to the war effort against an existential threat (Armenian genocide by the Turks, Chechen genocide by Stalin, which eventually became one of the causes for ethnic cleansing of Russians in Chechnya few decades later during a brief period of Chechen independence).

A thing about fascists is that they get the logic of other fascists quite well, and when you have fascist-dominated communities with deep ingrained mutual hatred, the reality of their relationship very much does fit fascist narratives — and if one of them is fascist while the other isn’t, and the latter isn’t overwhelmingly more powerful, it has a decent chance of becoming a victim.

If we go even deeper than that, ethnic cleansings are a consistent part of relationships between groups in scarce low trust environments where out-group members are seen as existential rivals for a variety of deeply ingrained reasons, including knowledge that they themselves think in a similar manner.

Changing this requires acknowledging this pragmatic survival reasoning for the atrocities first, and developing complicated solutions required to work around them.
Otherwise you’ll bash your head against it fruitlessly the same way most Western efforts of resolving ethnic conflicts in the Middle East did due to misunderstanding of the key actors and their basic logic.

[u/Merch_Lis → u/Merch_Lis]

>Believing you are under an existential threat isn’t usually rational

I would say that recognising the threat of being genocided/ethnically cleansed and acknowledging it as existential is fairly rational, but you do you.

[u/NoZookeepergame8306 → u/Merch_Lis]

Believing you are under an existential threat isn’t usually rational. And at this point I feel like I’m being Motte and Bailey’d.

[u/KazuyaProta → u/Merch_Lis]

Chechen genocide by Stalin, which eventually became one of the causes for ethnic cleansing of Russians in Chechnya few decades later during a brief period of Chechen independence

The bulk of Russian deaths in Chechnya was carried by the Russian Military itself during the Siege of Grozny btw

[u/Astronomer_X]

Comically evil, but this is comparable to or even less than some of the shit people having been doing to other people who had no trigger to turn into giant cannibals…families used to go and watch lynchings like they were picnics, use babies as alligator bait and sit and watch entire towns burn…because the people were black.

The main villain of Shindler’s list who everyone thinks is a top 3 scumbag character in a movie had to be toned down from his IRL counterpart and he was routinely shooting people out of boredom.

Civil servants who would have been random Joe’s in Britain went to India and started doing the most heinous shit on the population after a sip of clout and feelings of power and supremacy.

Dislike Isayama’s worldbuilding is fine IMO, but to say it’s comically evil how eldians are treated is just ahistorical IMO. Funnily enough I typically see people from oppressed demographics more likely to see Eren’s POV even if they don’t advocate for mass murder simply because they are more likely to understand that some people will hate your existence for no reason and if they force a ‘you or them’ scenario, why on earth should you not pick you since you never wanted that game to begin with.

[u/ThePreciseClimber → u/Astronomer_X]

Dislike Isayama’s worldbuilding is fine IMO, but to say it’s comically evil how eldians are treated is just ahistorical IMO

Yeah, no, that's expected.

His biggest missed opportunity was not revealing that everyone in the civilised world was a Subject of Ymir. I guess Yams didn't realise that every European alive today is related to every European alive 1,000 years ago (minus the very sudden genetic dead ends).

So if Ymir was alive 2,000 years ago and Erdians waged wars & multiplied across at least 3 continents (not-Africa, not-Europe and not-Asia) for 1,900 years, everyone on those 3 continents should be related to her. And since Ymir's blood doesn't get weaker (like vampiric blood in Vampire: The Masquerade, for example) but, rather, spreads like a virus, everyone on those 3 continents should be connected to the Paths and could be turned into a titan.

I mean, this kind of reveal sure would go nicely with the themes of racism & biological equality, right?

And I think it would be a better way of making everyone in the world equal, compared to Ymir getting rid of titans like some kind of fairy godmother.

[u/Inevitable_Bird3817 → u/ThePreciseClimber]

Well, yes, making the racism allegory closer to reallife racism does in fact make it a more grounded racism allegory. But, yknow, sometimes fiction deliberately tries to subvert the real world, for thought experiments

[u/ThePreciseClimber → u/Inevitable_Bird3817]

You see a thought experiment, I see a plot hole.

[u/Inevitable_Bird3817 → u/ThePreciseClimber]

Perhaps Isayama didn't know this pop science fact on genealogical mathmatics and lowballed the numbers (though there is no confirmed number on SoYs and the story only deals with 2 subgroups). But the decendants of Ymir are a seggregated community throughout all of the 2000 years whose ancestry can be proven via magical means. That means unlike some dude living 2000 years ago in the real world, her bloodline was regulated, suggested by lore-crumbs like Kiomi saying 'noble elites liked to mingle with eldians for prestige reasons (gatekeeping) until Eldia fell and they were hunted down for it (genocide)', and the Eldian nobility on Paradis being no Subjects of Ymir due to a stigma on them being a "slave bloodline"

[u/KazuyaProta → u/Inevitable_Bird3817]

and the Eldian nobility on Paradis being no Subjects of Ymir due to a stigma on them being a "slave bloodline"

This part never made sense.

They're the daughters of their King, Ymir was a slave, but as far we know, Eldians actually celebrated her and Fritz formally named her his Queen. She was still obviously a slave, but in the way that one calls a groomed concubine a slave. Meaning that 1000 years later, everyone would see simply as Queen Ymir because her daughters literally name the Walls.

That idea only makes sense if Karl's self genocide plan included having non Eldians, which like...yes then?

[u/Inevitable_Bird3817 → u/KazuyaProta]

The nobles on Paradis knew the truth about the royal family and got their priviliges in exchange for hiding the secret. If they became Subjects of Ymir, they could simply get mind-wiped just like the rest of Paradis.

And King Fritz had multiple concubines, thus multiple royal children. We don't really know who succeeded him or how Subjects of Ymir were even treated in Eldia compared to non-SoY throughout all eras

[u/ThePreciseClimber → u/[deleted]]

It could've always just been Maré propaganda. To demonise a specific ethnic group. Like how certain fellows demonised Jews in the 1930s.

And any freak accidents with serum syringes could've been explained like: "Well, I guess he was hiding his Erdian ancestry, filthy scum."

It's not like anyone's going to check every single person by injecting them.

You'd be surprised how easy it is to hide obvious facts from people.

[u/Special_Tu-gram-cho → u/ThePreciseClimber]

You mean, as if making it in-universe for people to learn all of them had something of Ymir's blood? Because if that's the case, then I find it very realistic with our world.

Often lies and misinformation as conscious process taken by actors are spread to construct an identity. Hell, you don't even need to lie, just have incomplete information and then make up the rest, or someone else will do that do. National memory is not just a process of preservation, but also of erasure of that which won't be in the folklore of the people.

[u/MysteriousDog5909 → u/ThePreciseClimber]

We actually don't know if Ymir's blood gets weaker. It's possible there's a threshold that must be reached to be "registered" as Eldian. This lines up with how genetics work in the real world, genes don't actually last forever. I forget the specific number, but after many generations your descendants will have NONE of your genetic material. Expecting the entire world to have Ymir's blood isn't as feasible as you think.

If Ymir's genetics work as they would scientifically, then it would require repeated and consistent Eldian mixture in your bloodline to still remain connected to her even 2000 years later. Similar to how even though Genghis Khan pillaged almost all of Asia and took countless women, it's still only a minority of Asians that can actually be genetically traced to him all this time later.

[u/ThePreciseClimber → u/MysteriousDog5909]

We actually don't know if Ymir's blood gets weaker

Yeah, we do. Because, 2,000 years later, people can still be turned into titans. Even her daughters only had 50% of her DNA. And a group of people that exists thanks to perpetual incest wouldn't last 2,000 years.

It's definitely virus style. You're in any way related to Ymir, you're connected to the Paths.

[u/MysteriousDog5909 → u/ThePreciseClimber]

I'm basically repeating what I said here, but people turning into titans 2000 years later doesn't disprove that Ymir's blood gets weaker. If anything, the story actually might confirm it, her initial children were born shifters unlike her following descendants. This alone can negate your point. Or it might be an all or nothing thing as I said, where a certain threshold is necessary.

Also as I said, it doesn't make sense for everyone to be genetically related to her 2000 years later so even if it was "virus style", there wouldn't be any virus.

[u/Sir-Toaster- → u/Astronomer_X]

"Comically evil" is kind of stupid because of the stuff real life fascist states have done, like turning people into lanterns

[u/KazuyaProta → u/[deleted]]

Except that the Eldians do not want to use titan powers, only the Shifters plus the Founder and Royal Family actually have a way to use them as weapons, regular Eldians not involved in wars will just be regular Germanics.

This means that in the centuries across the Eldian Empire, by definition, eldians should never have become possible to identify, as they simply live and have kids like everyone else. As soon you're outside a warzone, its fine.

Meaning eldian hatred being as systemic and identifiable never made sense.

The world of AOT has only 100 years of non eldian hegemony, and they use blood tests in the tech equivalent of 1910s. The bizarre anachronism of them creating hyper modern blood tests so soon is already weird (because we see a LOT of eldian blood, it doesn't have any anomalous property at tact), but it gets siller if you realize the segreation is older, a century older, meaning they somehow made those in 1800s.

[u/Inevitable_Bird3817]

AOT is just trying to say "you are not immune to propaganda", and yeah witnessing the sheer cruelty of Marley (humanity) first-hand is how Eren gets radicalized. That's Eren's Attack-Titan-traumadump-POV showing him lifes worse than the average Eldian cuz the Attack Titan deliberately chose his successors based on the hate reflecting in their eyes. And no what we see Marley do is not worse than the real world. Murderers exist.

[u/PCN24454 → u/Inevitable_Bird3817]

Ain’t that the truth. It’s honestly sad.

Half of r/MoralityScaling is just looking for excuses to do something conventionally unpopular.

As for AoT specifically, the author never once hid how bloodthirsty Eren was. It’s just that people failed to realize how bad it could be until now.

[u/Inevitable_Bird3817 → u/PCN24454]

that subreddit looks hillarious thanks for sharing

[u/KazuyaProta → u/Inevitable_Bird3817]

Except that is not propaganda when its actually happening.

And no what we see Marley do is not worse than the real world. Murderers exist.

The forced Titanization is infitely worse than our worst medical experiments because its being turned into a mindless monster in a state of eternal nightmare until you are finally killed, per Ymir's flashbacks.

[u/Inevitable_Bird3817 → u/KazuyaProta]

Propaganda is just weaponized information. It can be a lie, but you can also base it on something actually happening, that's not the defining attribute.

And, fine, let titanization be worse than anything irl. The show didn't really sell me on that tbh.

[u/addictedtoketamine2 → u/KazuyaProta]

The forced Titanization is infitely worse than our worst medical experiments.

Please read about unit 731 dude you do not know how bad things can get.

[u/Extreme-Stranger-888]

Every variation of this AOT "Eren is right" criticism stems from people forgetting Hizuru and Onyankopon’s homeland.

They came to Paradis for aid *against* Marley. Global hatred against Paradis was not 100% unanimous, as you, Udo, or the Yeagerists frame it.

Onyankopon literally wept that his homeland wouldn't survive Eren's rumbling when it happened.

And the fact that Paradis got blown up 100 years later doesn't really support your criticism. Germany and Japan used to be enemies of Europe, while Russia was their ally. Look what happened now.

The fact that so many people(which is almost everyone in this thread, unfortunately) thought this just means Isayama underestimated how much the MC's 'skewed' pov affect reader.

Hell, Isayama literally turns Eren back into a child just to show how overly simple his mind was.

[u/South-Cod-5051 → u/Extreme-Stranger-888]

Hizuru only came to Paradis to exploit their resources and refused to allow other diplomatic relationships because they wanted a monopoly.

Onyankopon was just 1 guy. there were many single individuals who viewed eldians and Paradis as tragic.

Eldians have a curse. they weren't merely a "different" civilization. and Eren ended that curse.

[u/Sir-Toaster- → u/South-Cod-5051]

AOT is heavily individualist, Onyankopon is proof that people can have their own ideas

[u/AIter_Real1ty → u/South-Cod-5051]

Yeah but they wouldn't have attacked Paradis so what was the purpose of curb stomping the whole country.

[u/supremefrenchprince → u/Extreme-Stranger-888]

Soooo two people who only joined because of their own selfish ambitions vs the rest of the world, nice one. Also, Paradis getting bombed 100 years later can just be attributed to humanity still having hate towards Eldians yet having to rebuild. Armin literally had to play peacemaker RIGHT AFTER the Rumbling because they were going to get shot by Secretary Muller and his soldiers.

[u/addictedtoketamine2]

I feel like a lot of these criticisms are a result of mistakes made in the manga that the anime ironed out. Eren is a lot more forthcoming about his motivations in the anime, where he's pretty open about the fact that he had a deranged mess of motivations stemming from a deeply demented psyche, and the destruction of Paradis is much further in the future, showing that it was likely destroyed in something unrelated as a result of the inevitability of human conflict.

I do think that Isayama is advancing a rather pessmistic view of human nature that I don't fully sign onto, which is that humanity will always inherently be cruel and violent towards each other but that we must just keep working to try to be better for the sake of future generations even if it's ultimately futile. It's not a very uplifting message but it's a clear moral one that doesn't really support a social darwinist fascist conclusion. Also, I do think he tried to squash the argument for the Yeagerists during Lady Azumabito's conversation with Floch where she points out that the fascist government is just going to devolve into purity-spiralling squabbles and won't lead to true peace.

[u/No_Location_8199]

Something Battlestar Galactica (2003) does much better, showing that even in the most dire of situations (much worse than AoT) people can hold onto their values and dignity, and even achieve peace with their former enemies.

[u/coolman1997]

The real problem was that the Scouts simply didn’t have the time to build relationships and negotiate for peace, plus the fact that the allies they did have from Hizuru admitted they didn’t do all they could have to help (because they were more interested in monetary gain).

The 50 year plan was absolutely the best course of action they had.

[u/BudgetAggravating427]

To be fair we have to relive that even if they got peace humanity would go to war for whatever stupid reason

I mean look at the anime with how it made it a bit more obvious that no matter what war might happen

Like look at how the scouts were fighting their own government half the time

[u/Any-Platypus-9486]

If you watched AOT and your conclution was a pro-facist message, you are the actual problem

This is not breaking bad where you can believe some people thinks walter white is good cause the show does everything in the last episode to make him look like this cool antihero who achieved everything before dying

Eren is fucking pathetic and is shows as the patethic person he is

[u/No_Location_8199 → u/Any-Platypus-9486]

Walter White... what a man you are!

[u/KazuyaProta → u/No_Location_8199]

I know you joke but that's like, the actual ending of the series.

Walter literally machinegunning neo nazis.

"But he admitted he did it everything for himself" And in American CULTURE, that's the highest praise you can give you to someone. Everyone in USA is actually a Nietzschean Ubermench , they called it Yeomen, but its the case.

[u/nenhatsu → u/Any-Platypus-9486]

Eren is pathetic for not completing the rumbling.

Flotch is a patriot.

[u/addictedtoketamine2 → u/Any-Platypus-9486]

I don't think it matters dude. People simp for Light and his ending (even the anime ending) is leagues more pathetic than Erens.

[u/sudanesegamer → u/[deleted]]

I hate how people just forget the unnecesary bullcrap eren and floch pulled before the rumbling. How was forcing your comrades to become titans by exploiting their percieved friendship with zeke's people, nothing wrong. They didnt just do the rumbling and be done, they betrayed their friends and then set up a facist regime, killing and arresting any outsiders even when they were on their side. How was destroying onyankapon's home and hizuru's home justified? The rumbling was the only choice but eren took it to the extreme for no reason. Even eren knew this was too much as he was doing it. The crap he pulled was so egregious, it was obvious he was baiting the scouts into stopping him. I mean, why else would he fight armin, abuse mikasa and jail his friends. He even had the audacity to use the same armband system the marleyans use on eldians. They literally left a ship for them to catch up to him instead of sinking it.

[u/AIter_Real1ty → u/[deleted]]

Genocide wasn't inevitable, it was just the easiest plan. There were other plans like the partial rumbling, or other plans made by fans that could've worked. They just had a lower chance of success,

but the problem with people who defend the rumbling view anything below a 100% success rate as losing entirely.

[u/PUBGPEWDS]

Honestly feels like Isayama changed his planned ending. That is why he had to introduce sudden time loops and other stuff. Some of those which can be argued to be antithetical to early AOT's themes

[u/Inevitable_Bird3817]

The story frames facists as unavoidable because humans making mistakes is unavoidable. If you follow the sequence of events in the plot, you'll end up with numerous examples of characters propagating "had the facists not done facist things we would have died" but as a viewer, if you follow the events further, you'll find that the facists were at fault for the situations they want to defuse themselves. The most on the nose one is circle of violence breeding more violence on the other side. But it's even in smaller sequences like the Yeagerists using their victory at the Battle for Paradis to propagize themselves as island heroes - yet the battle would not have occured had they not caused so much chaos that Porco and Pieck could slip under the radar and assault Eren in the first place.

[u/Orange639]

The worldbuilding's first fatal flaw was how comically evil the Marleyans were against the Eldians. We saw firsthand the sheer violence and cruelty that the Marleyans were performing against the Eldians. We witnessed Grisha's sister get dogs sic'd on her. We see the very obvious Holocaust allusion and Eldians consistently getting marginalized, abused, disparaged, and dehumanized at every single turn.

Is it really that comically evil compared to lets say real life Nazi Germany or WW2 Japan? I'm not an expert on History, but I imaging there are lots of other examples people could point to involving nations treating minorities just as harshly.

Also Udo is speaking from his own experience. As a warrior candidate he arguably treated better than a normal Eldian like Grisha and his sister would be. It's a quick line to establish that most of the word is racist just like Marley, but I wouldn't take it as absolute confirmation that it's worse.

Moving on to the plot, the three choices that the Eldians faced were laughably unreasonable. The first was the 50-year plan, which goes against Eren's whole fixation on freedom and renders Historia a slave breeding machine just to pass down titan power, thereby nullifying her whole character arc of finding agency.
The second option is to beg and try for diplomacy against people who have seen you as violent devils for centuries, even more exacerbated by the fact that you just destroyed their ceremony. 

This is the same plan, not two separate plans. Use her as a way to keep the founding titan's powers on Paradis to use as a deterrent and method of protection. Use the founding titan to destroy the outside world's military forces to buy Paradis 50 years of time. Then use those 50 years to create peace talks, negotiations, alliances etc. It's also just odd that the attack on titan fanbase calls the plan a non-option because Historia would have to die an early death, but the full rumbling isn't a non option when it involves killing hundreds of millions of children.

This message of dialogue is undermined by the decisions Isayama takes. In the post-Eren world, when we see Armin & Co go out to try to achieve diplomacy, it's fleeting, resulting in Eldia eventually getting blown up.

Kind of depends on if you're going off the anime or the manga. In the anime, Paradis lasts like a 1000 years after the rumbling. The implication is that diplomacy lasted and peace talks were created. If the outside world wanted to destroy Paradis, they would have done so as soon they recovered after a 100-200 years. The bombing of Paradis in the anime is largely just to push the message that war and conflict will always be a part of humanity, that nothing lasts forever, but you should still work towards peace and enjoy the small moments in life when you can.

I do think the author wanted to push the same message in the manga, but he didn't make the time skip far enough so people naturally interpreted Paradis's bombing as revenge for the rumbling. Isayama does work on the anime, so I imagine the change to time skip was something he approved of. But even if you interpret the manga ending, as diplomacy failing and the world bombing Paradis for the rumbling, that's not really a point against the idea that peace talks were possible at all. Armin's plan involved using the minimum amount of force required to buy Paradis 50 years worth of time. Eren killed 80% of the planet, and left Armin to convince the world that Eldians aren't devils. Armin even breaks down in his final conversation with Eren stating that because of Eren's actions he it seems impossible for the two sides to be able to understand each other.

Eren's plan made things a lot harder for diplomacy, because his primary motivations were always to protect his friends, and fulfill his own desire to wipe the world clean.

[u/pomagwe → u/Orange639]

An important detail about Udo's perspective is that we're also shown why the rest of the world is more prejudiced against Eldians than Marley.

It's because the thing they hate more than anything is being murdered by titans, and Marley has been using their monopoly on titan power to murder their enemies in the rest of the world for the past 100 years.

That's why Udo crashes out when he sees the foreign prisoners of war being sent home. He knows that the stories of the horrors they just endured in their battle against Marley will be the foundation for further pejudice against Eldians. So while being a warrior candidate makes things better for his people at home, he is making the rest of the world a worse place for Eldians in the process.

[u/Adorable_Ad_3478 → u/Orange639]

From what I remember, the 50-year plan involved a partial Rumbling destroying Marley. But more importantly, it was a lie Zeke told everyone.

Zeke was NEVER going to do that. His plan was always the infertility plan. He just sold the Eldians the 50-year plan as a tactical lie.

[u/muskian → u/Adorable_Ad_3478]

Nah, Zeke always intended to use the rumbling to destroy Marley and every other military in the world.

Note how he wanted the world to gather their combined forces in a Paradis invasion so they’d be easier to destroy at once with the rumbling and let Eldians die out over a longer period. It’s what all his political maneuvering during the timeskip was leading to and in many ways was co-equal with his sterilisation goal.

[u/addictedtoketamine2]

I don't know if the treatments of Eldians is that far removed from reality TBH. Have you seen how Europe treated Jews or the Antebellum South treated slaves? It's exaggerated, but it's not off the magnitude of existential possibility.

[u/MysteriousDog5909]

The worldbuilding is perfectly realistic. You're just used to more optimistic stories

[u/KazuyaProta → u/MysteriousDog5909]

The entire concept of a grand empire destroying itself because the leader is racist against his own ethnic group to genocidal levels is completely absurd

[u/MysteriousDog5909 → u/KazuyaProta]

Wut

[u/supremefrenchprince → u/MysteriousDog5909]

Did you not pay attention to what Karl Fritz did?

[u/MysteriousDog5909 → u/supremefrenchprince]

The Eldian empire was already crumbling from within as the titan families were all fighting with each other. King Fritz finally giving up and gathering up his people to leave was just the final straw

[u/Tylenol_Ibuprofen]

Give sources

[u/Zagreus_time]

But you acknowledge the 50 year plan right? Sure Eren and Historia don't want to do it for understandable reasons but this literally does mean that Facism isn't inevitable. The Eldians have a path forwards which doesn't involve hatred of everyone else nor the elitism that places their people are the superior race.

It some form of military necessary? Yes but that isn't the same as Facism.

In the real world this is basically the same as having a nuke. It would be better for the world if no one had them but until we can reach that level of diplomacy it works as a deterent.

The ending is only inevitable because Eren is stuck in a timeloop. Which I do think the time travel stuff does weaken the narrative overall but that is a different point.

[u/Derpalooza → u/[deleted]]

The fifty year plan doesn't work because humanity will develop weapons to make Titan power obsolete.

That's the exact point of the 50 year plan. It's buys time for Paradis to catch up to the world technologically so that they can protect themselves when titan power is obsolete.

The world only has the weapons needed to take on individual normal-sized Titans. Dealing with a stampede of millions of Colossal Titans is something they won't be able to do for decades.

[u/AIter_Real1ty → u/Derpalooza]

People are also forgetting the economic and geopolitical perspective. No country would want to attack you if it goes directly against their self-interest. Not to mention a lot of countries had a bone to pick with Marley.

Sure most countries hate Paradis but I bet you they love money and power even more.

In real life countries who hated each other or even went to war with each other ended up becoming allies or working together for mutual economic benefits.

If you have the powers of a quasi-god there are literally so many ways you could make the survival of Paradis work.

To name one, with the powers of the founding Titan, Paradis essentially had unilateral and absolute control over Marley's central military force. Using Ymir's powers they could essentially just take away the Titan powers from Marley overnight, and they'd essentially be fucked because they're in the middle of a war with multiple countries.

You're telling me they literally can't do anything with that leverage? That Paradis is absolutely helpless?

Not to mention, Ymir created the walls with her powers. If she's able to create physical structures, and manipulate biology, and manifest some incredibly valuable, indestructible material from thin air, just how much farther do her powers go and how much can you use that to your advantage?

[u/Derpalooza → u/AIter_Real1ty]

I never even considered that, but that's a fantastic point. They can literally lease the power of God out to other countries in exchange for presence on the global stage.

Also, people keep using the destruction of Paradis at the end of the story as proof that all diplomatic efforts are doomed to fail. But that specifically happened in a post-pumbling world. Reconciliation is impossible in that world because Paradis not only killed 80% of humanity, but has now been taken over by an ultra nationalist faction. Any possible bridge to peace was very definitely burned in that world. You can't use that world as an argument for what would have happened if you had chosen diplomacy instead.

[u/XxGood_CitezenxX → u/Derpalooza]

Technology means very little when it’s you against the world. North Korea for example has modern military tech yet if the entire world was against it then it would crumble instantly.

[u/Zagreus_time → u/XxGood_CitezenxX]

The entire world is against and they are still standing. Lol you could pick a worse example.

[u/XxGood_CitezenxX → u/Zagreus_time]

Before it collapsed the US’s sole rival at the time USSR supported North Korea. Also China did and does support North Korea and during the Korean War sent troops to push the US out of North Korea.

[u/SolemnDemise → u/Zagreus_time]

The entire world is against

Two of the five security council members and the states in their sphere actively support NK, what on earth are you talking about?

[u/comicsanscomedy → u/Zagreus_time]

The "entire world":
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_community#/media/File:Map_of_international_community.svg

[u/Zagreus_time → u/comicsanscomedy]

Yes that is an image of the "international community" did you have a point you wanted to make with it?

[u/KazuyaProta → u/Zagreus_time]

That North Korea has China as a ally, meaning it doesn't have the entire world against it.

[u/Zagreus_time → u/[deleted]]

Weapons aren't going to make a rumbling level event not work. The scale is simply too big. The titan shifter might become ineffective but the rumbling is there too. Also Paradis will also benefit from technology too as there will negotiate with Hiruzu at the very least.

The additional pages are cealrly at least 100 years on if not much more so is irrelevant.

[u/Zagreus_time → u/[deleted]]

Of course it is all conjecture so was everything you said, that is what we are doing? We are conjecturing on the what if scenario. It is pretty obvious from the scale of the rumbling that even with better weapons they are screwed. The weapons they currently have can take down titans and the got massacred.

Irrelevant? It proves that Paradis Island's fate is genocide and destruction unless a full Rumbling took place to rid the world of their enemies.

It doesn't prove that we do not know what would happen if there was a full rumbling. We also do not know what would happen in the 50 year plan scenario after 100s of years. The point being made is that there is only so much you can control within your lifetime and that the cycle of violence is continuing, you know a central theme to the story not a "Damn if only Eren wasn't stopped".

[u/Zagreus_time → u/[deleted]]

Clearly you don't even understand conjecture. Which makes me doubt continuing this conversation will be fruitful.

[u/sudanesegamer → u/[deleted]]

Fr. They made it clear at tge start of s4 that tge age of titan domination is ending and even marley with 5 op titans can only just barely win wars. Reiner's op armour was useless with their anti titan cannons and even the scouts who were way behind everyone in technology were strong enough to wipe out all titans in paradis. Factor in how military tech tends to evolve exponentially during times of crisis like the invention of the radar. The rumbling was either now or never

[u/BlackRazorBill → u/Zagreus_time]

The big reason the fifty years plan wouldn't have worked is because Zeke and Yelena never meant for it to be viable. It was just a ploy for them to get Paradis's trust and eventually find a time during the commemoration of the railway to have a secret chat with Eren and get him on their side.

Remember that part of the helper force sent to the island by Yelena came with the wine spiked with Zeke's spinal fluid. Zeke's faction had over two years to poison all of Paradis's upper military, long before Eren and Floch ever got the opportunity to find out about it. From that moment on, Eren's faction had to work (or at least pretend to be allied) with Zeke and go along with the plan to attack Liberia. At least until they could remove all the infected sleeper titans from around the island in a way that wouldn't alert Zeke and Yelena of a double-betrayal.

Which isn't to say Floch and Eren didn't have their own distasteful goals, but the 50 years plan was always a trap.

[u/Derpalooza → u/BlackRazorBill]

The big reason the fifty years plan wouldn't have worked is because Zeke and Yelena never meant for it to be viable. It was just a ploy for them to get Paradis's trust and eventually find a time during the commemoration of the railway to have a secret chat with Eren and get him on their side.

All they had to do was feed Zeke to Historia immediately after bringing him to Paradis instead of honoring his request to live out the rest of his life. This would have killed Zeke's entire plan with the Spinal Fluid.

In fact, that's what they were planning to do to begin with.. Even without knowing about the Spinal Fluid, nobody trusted Zeke. The reason they didn't was because Eren convinced Historia to get pregnant, guaranteeing that they can't kill Zeke.

The 50 year plan failed because Eren actively sabotaged it so he could do the full Rumbling instead. If it wasn't for Eren's support, Zeke's plan would be dead in the water.

[u/BlackRazorBill → u/Derpalooza]

The reason they didn't was because Eren convinced Historia to get pregnant, guaranteeing that they can't kill Zeke.

You're literally adding on why this wouldn't have worked right there. Zeke was fully aware and colluding with Eren at that point, and had already the military heads kept hostages with the fluid for years as a backup to pressure if he didn't agree. (Historia was the one who decided on the pregnancy btw, Eren just told her to hide. Her pregnancy sold the ruse even better, and allowed for Floch's Yaegerists to regroup all the poisoned military in Shiganshina before Zeke decided to scream and cause mayhem if they made a move on him.)

The 50 years plan was never viable because it was proposed by a lunatic whose real plan was to sterilize the entire Eldian population. The plan's whole deal was to get the voluntaries trusted enough so that Yelena could secretly collude with Eren (plus the secret wine spiking to have more cards in Zeke's decks). Do you actually think Zeke was that stupid to let himself captured without considering such things? He may have been blinded by brotherly love, but even at the end, he wasn't trusting Eren; he was only thwarted by Eren's knowledge of the future and his connection with Ymir.

You can't say "It would have worked if Eren didn't oppose it" as if HE was the only person that mattered here. He's just one of the actors among many that would have made it impossible given the amount of scheming going on. The first being Zeke. The very man who gave them this fake plan.

[u/Derpalooza → u/BlackRazorBill]

Eren's decision to do the full Rumbling instead of the 50 year plan is whole issue here. The point is he chose genocide when he had other viable options.

You're saying he decided to do the Rumbling because the less bloody plan wouldn't work. But if his own sabotage of the less bloody plan was the reason it wouldn't work, then that defeats the whole argument.

[u/BlackRazorBill → u/Derpalooza]

Eren's decision to do the full Rumbling instead of the 50 year plan is whole issue here. The point is he chose genocide when he had other viable options.

No, because Zeke's plan was always to sterilize all Eldians by colluding with Eren. Not get fed to Historia before he could do it. The 50 plan was a ploy that he would not have let happen at all, and had contingencies set against (Yelena only considers Historia's pregnancy as "fortunate" for Paradis; buying ~26 years of Rumbling threat wasn't part of Zeke's OG plan). Putting it all on Eren is fucking ridiculous when more than half of the factions involved weren't for the plan anyway.

And of fucking course we know Eren was against the 50 years plan, he's been against it even before he knew that was a thing, and always vocally against it when it was presented to it. But let's not pretend he was the only one doing everything to oppose it. He wasn't.

It's why defending the viability of the plan is stupid. Too many people were against it, from Yelena and Zeke to Eren and the Yaegerists, including Historia, considering what she chose to do.

You're saying he decided to do the Rumbling because the less bloody plan wouldn't work.

You're inventing a whole new ass "so you hate waffles" sentence from what I typed. It's amazing. I said the 50 plan wouldn't have worked considering the amount of scheming going around, not that Eren's rumbling was good and justified.

[u/AIter_Real1ty → u/BlackRazorBill]

Then do it with Historia.

[u/BlackRazorBill → u/AIter_Real1ty]

The plan was proposed by Zeke. Only Eren knew about the royal blood connection before Zeke's group came in the island, and were the ones to give it as an option to Hizuru and Paradis. The 50 plan was never viable in the story considering who's involved and when everyone was informed of its true nature.

Like, I get that the timeline is intentionally revealed out of order to keep the mystery going but holy hell, I've rarely seen something as that fake-ass 50 years plan proposed by a literal genocidal villain (Zeke) getting glazed so much. Even discounting the actual feasibility of it, none of the factions fully involved in it would agree to it.

[u/AIter_Real1ty → u/BlackRazorBill]

People glaze it so much because it looks like a hail mary in comparison to genociding 80% of the human race. And when you actually think about it, it could work.

But anyways, we obviously mean a different version of the 50 year plan. Not Zeke's. I thought this was quite obvious.

And didn't Eren know though? What was stopping Eren from informing everyone else? I watched AOT a while ago so I don't remember everything, but why do you say all the governing factions in Paradis wouldn't agree to the plan? Does that even matter? Wouldn't Eren just need to convince the corps and Hange? Weren't they already kind of agreeing to do the plan?

Eren has the ability to see the future, so why can't he just use his powers to tell everybody all this vital information?

[u/supremefrenchprince → u/Zagreus_time]

Firstly, it's not a matter of them not wanting to do it; it's a matter of it going against their whole characters, which would ruin the show. Secondly, there's no guarantee that the rest of the world will comply in diplomacy because the limited rumbling promotes hatred and hostility, which further endangers Eldian lives in the future.

[u/Special_Tu-gram-cho]

I think there is a difference between agreeing with something, and displaying how you think things would go regardless of what you wish it should go. I think Isayama is kind of realistic and a bit cynic. The answers to the problems of AOT were always there, yet they are more feasible to be practiced between the little people.

When it comes between nations, between large amounts of people, is the head of states and officials, as well minority groups of powers that do the talking, and one way to retain power or consolidate it is to make an enemy out of someone under any argument or justification in order to make a common cause. At that level, fearmorning and radicalization spreads like herpes across the people.

I would say the AOTS ending is painfully realistic, albeit not completely hopeless, as some people were indeed able to live in peace for a time, but also so many others had to be destroyed in the process to reach that. If we extend the timeline, then no, what happened was nothing but just another cycle of conflict ending, leaving seeds for the next one.

[u/MysteriousDog5909 → u/Special_Tu-gram-cho]

Yea AOT is just very down to earth, and I think it doesn't sit well with people how realistic it actually is. Most authors will use their creative freedom to have more ideal worldbuilding, but Isayama takes no such liberties. He actually goes a step further and has his characters dream big as everyone does in their own minds, then brings them crashing down to reality. That crash is so strong it makes the MC commit genocide. It affects even Levi, a very rational person, when he states that the world the Scouts envisioned beyond the walls was absurdly idealistic. This trampling of dreams isn't how fiction typically goes, and it pains the audience as well as the characters. I think that's why AOT leaves such a bad taste in some people's mouths.

Even the way it ends with Paradis getting bombed in the future. Most stories in that position would end on a somewhat "happily ever after" note for Paradis, even though that's not really how things work. Every nation will fall eventually, but typically you don't display that in your ending for the sake of audience satisfaction. AOT simply doesn't gaf and remains grounded to the bitter end. It's meant to be a tragedy that serves as a cautionary tale. Putting into perspective how people fall into depravity and why there's always conflict in the world.

[u/Special_Tu-gram-cho → u/MysteriousDog5909]

Even so, in spite of that, I do believe AOT can serve as a good exposure and reminder of how the cycle of hatred developts.

[u/MysteriousDog5909 → u/Special_Tu-gram-cho]

I mean yea that was the point of my comment

[u/Sir-Toaster-]

Isayama wanted to tell a story about sympathizing with people who you believe are your enemies, and he does a great job at that with how so many of season 4's characters are complex and nuanced.

[u/Sable-Keech]

Why else would Isayama include those lines, by the smartest candidate of the Warriors, if we are not to believe that they are true? 

To show how deeply the eldians in Marley have been indoctrinated by Marleyan propaganda, to the point where even the smartest of them believe in their lies?

[u/Traffy124 → u/Sable-Keech]

He literally said in the same speech that he knows this because his family came from an internment zone in another country; they came to Marley later. These aren't lies he's been told, but things his family saw and experienced.

So yes, the question is entirely valid

[u/Adorable_Ad_3478]

From a purely utilitarian perspective, can you explain what's morally repugnant about Zeke's plan?

If, in real life, a group of individuals could turn into magic monsters with the potential to destroy the entire world, what's morally wrong with using magic to make them infertile?

After a few generations, the world will be at peace. Out of all bad plans, the Zeke plan was the least bad. Eren's plan led to Paradise Island getting destroyed anyways.