5 ms·

The author is expressing an opinion using cherry-picked details: an excerpt from an offhand LiveJournal comment and 2 sparse descriptions from the book. That pl

The author is expressing an opinion using cherry-picked details: an excerpt from an offhand LiveJournal comment and 2 sparse descriptions from the book. That plus loads of speculation presented as fact. "The Dothraki were based on demeaning stereotypes as evidenced by their clothing choices" is unconvincing Historically inaccurate: sure. Granted. Motte. Demeaning stereotype: Let's take an offhand comment, load it with unsupported meaning, link it with Historical Inaccuracy, call it demeaning. Boom. Bailey. Edit: responding to your edits > * "nomad cultures are nothing like this" * He cherry-picked ways that the Dothraki are different from horse-riding, raiding cultures and labeled this demeaning. Did he talk about ways that Dothraki culture is similar to horse-riding, raiding cultures? No, he did not. It's All Wrong and Bad > * Cancelling" refers to censorship. You cant cry censorship ... * You literally just redefined a word that I used and argued against this new, less defensible, dumb position. Don't do that. > * Also, author criticized other aspects of GoT a lot previously ... * Not sure what that has to do with this article being a motte and bailey. I'm sure his other articles are marvelous.

praestigiare 6y ago
The author spent significant time explaining why they chose to address that livejournal excerpt, and the context in which they were addressing it. They did not present speculation as fact, they presented facts (historical information, photographs, and quotes from the material) and suggested an interpretation of those facts.
- rendall 6y ago
  This is the motte. "It's just historical inaccuracy. Surely you cannot object to correcting the record can you?" Now defend that the historical inaccuracy is a demeaning stereotype.
  - jcranmer 6y ago
    Reducing a culture to a single point of reference should self-evidently be a demeaning stereotype. If you need more evidence, I'll point out that in the specific case of making the defining characteristic being bad-ass warriors, that implies that when the bad-ass warriors get their asses kicked (by modern militaries), you are implying that they no longer have any redeeming qualities worth caring about.
    - jessaustin 6y ago
      This is not logical. These characters are fictional, and they have been vaguely identified with roughly a third of the premodern cultures I've ever heard of. Emphasizing their prowess in war and also illustrating them facing difficulties in war is just a trope. "The Worf Effect", to be precise. [0] It doesn't say anything about the Huns or the Turks or the Sioux or anyone. Even telling a story about the actual Huns and how they were great at war but also they lost some wars wouldn't be demeaning. You might not have heard, but war is generally horrible for everyone involved. [0] https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheWorfEffect https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheWorfEffect
    - rendall 6y ago
      > Reducing a culture to a single point of reference should self-evidently be a demeaning stereotype. Let's grant that premise! You are correct! What does that have to do with the Dothraki, a fictional nation? Remember, the bailey is "The Dothraki is a demeaning stereotype" The motte is "The Dothraki is historically inaccurate." or "The Sioux have endured demeaning stereotypes." These are both true and uncontroversial. The essayist even seems to take umbrage that the Dothraki armor looks nothing like Sioux buckskin! Would he take umbrage if they looked alike? You betcha he would. The truth is, GRRM's throwaway comment notwithstanding, the Dothraki serve an analogous role to ASOIF narrative as the Huns, Vikings, Kazakhs, Barbary pirates and Mongol raiders did to European history. Are you and the essayist seriously arguing that these ancient peoples are somehow demeaned by the freaking Dothraki?
      - jcranmer 6y ago
        > The essayist even seems to take umbrage that the Dothraki armor looks nothing like Sioux buckskin! Would he take umbrage if they looked alike? You betcha he would. Most historians, and enthusiasts of history like myself, would not take umbrage; instead, they would effuse praise for bucking stereotype and actually doing their research into how these cultures would have dressed. I'll point out that the author actually has a lot of praise for CK3 for getting its history details right. > The truth is, GRRM's throwaway comment notwithstanding, the Dothraki serve an analogous role to ASOIF narrative as the Huns, Vikings, Kazakhs, Barbary pirates and Mongol raiders did to European history. Are you and the essayist seriously arguing that these ancient peoples are somehow demeaned by the freaking Dothraki? I think your first sentence is unwitting justification of the second sentence. Your understanding of the aforementioned cultures [1] appears to be limited to their raiding effects on "civilized" societies, ignoring other aspects of their society as at best uninteresting and at worst nonexistent. That steppe cultures are reduced in popular history to such a degree is perhaps understandable, but if you're taking a position of trying to assert historical accuracy, perpetuating popular history myths is pretty tasteless. [1] Although interesting that you chose to qualify only Barbary and Mongol with pirates and raiders, leaving no qualification for the Huns, Vikings, and Kazakhs. Am I to take away that you believe that the Huns, Vikings, and Kazakhs consist solely of entities predating on settled societies, and that you believe that the Berbers and Mongols had richer cultures with only a subset of these people consisting of such entities? Or should I infer that you are listing known predatory groups, and know the "Barbary pirates" only by that name and not their culture grouping (admittedly, this makes "Mongol raiders" harder to explain)?
watwut 6y ago
> The author is expressing an opinion using cherry-picked details: an excerpt from an offhand LiveJournal comment and 2 sparse descriptions from the book. That plus loads of speculation presented as fact. Can you please point to pages where opposite things are stated? If it is cherry picked, surely you can quote. > "The Dothraki were based on demeaning stereotypes as evidenced by their clothing choices" is unconvincing This article is about clothing. Next installment will be about culture. > Did he talk about ways that Dothraki culture is similar to horse-riding, raiding cultures? No, he did not. It's All Wrong and Bad Are there way in which they are similar? It is cherry picking only if you ignore opposing evidence. I am sure you can provide some? > You literally just redefined a word that I used and argued against this new, less defensible, dumb position. Don't do that. I literally did not. Cancelling is literally used in that context and is supposed to be bad.
- rendall 6y ago
  > I literally did not. ... and you doubled down. Cancelling is cancelling, a new, vaguely defined phenomena some people even deny exists but is a word the essay itself uses. Censorship is censorship, well-defined, milleniae old and nowhere near what I said. You can continue to argue this peripheral, distracting semantic point if you want but there's nothing more for me to say on this. > It is cherry picking only if you ignore opposing evidence. I am sure you can provide some? Given that there is nothing in the essay that acknowledges any similarity, I can point to that per se as demonstration of cherry-picking, since the Mongols, Turks, Huns, Alans were all horse-riding cultures that lived on extensive, flat land who were known to conduct raids on settled peoples, like the Dothraki. There. Met your ask.
  - watwut 6y ago
    > e Mongols, Turks, Huns, Alans were all horse-riding cultures that lived on extensive, flat land who were known to conduct raids on settled peoples, like the Dothraki. There. Met your ask. But ... they did not wore the cloth similar to Dothraki. Their culture had the word for "thank you". Elite used colors and comfortable clothing. Their military tactic was much different, much more smarter and much more organized. They did not charged unorganized on horses in disordered formation either. The argument is not that horse-riding cultures on flat land who conduct raids don't exist. Argument is that those cultures are nothing like Dothraki, because if they would, they would die quick. Mongols, Turks, Huns, Alans were not Dothraki at all. > Cancelling is cancelling, a new, vaguely defined phenomena some people even deny exists but is a word the essay itself uses. Censorship is censorship, well-defined, milleniae old and nowhere near what I said. Cancelling is just a new word for non state censorhip. That is just how it is used pretty much everywhere.

praestigiare 6y ago

The author spent significant time explaining why they chose to address that livejournal excerpt, and the context in which they were addressing it. They did not present speculation as fact, they presented facts (historical information, photographs, and quotes from the material) and suggested an interpretation of those facts.

rendall 6y ago
This is the motte. "It's just historical inaccuracy. Surely you cannot object to correcting the record can you?" Now defend that the historical inaccuracy is a demeaning stereotype.
- jcranmer 6y ago
  Reducing a culture to a single point of reference should self-evidently be a demeaning stereotype. If you need more evidence, I'll point out that in the specific case of making the defining characteristic being bad-ass warriors, that implies that when the bad-ass warriors get their asses kicked (by modern militaries), you are implying that they no longer have any redeeming qualities worth caring about.
  - jessaustin 6y ago
    This is not logical. These characters are fictional, and they have been vaguely identified with roughly a third of the premodern cultures I've ever heard of. Emphasizing their prowess in war and also illustrating them facing difficulties in war is just a trope. "The Worf Effect", to be precise. [0] It doesn't say anything about the Huns or the Turks or the Sioux or anyone. Even telling a story about the actual Huns and how they were great at war but also they lost some wars wouldn't be demeaning. You might not have heard, but war is generally horrible for everyone involved. [0] https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheWorfEffect https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheWorfEffect
  - rendall 6y ago
    > Reducing a culture to a single point of reference should self-evidently be a demeaning stereotype. Let's grant that premise! You are correct! What does that have to do with the Dothraki, a fictional nation? Remember, the bailey is "The Dothraki is a demeaning stereotype" The motte is "The Dothraki is historically inaccurate." or "The Sioux have endured demeaning stereotypes." These are both true and uncontroversial. The essayist even seems to take umbrage that the Dothraki armor looks nothing like Sioux buckskin! Would he take umbrage if they looked alike? You betcha he would. The truth is, GRRM's throwaway comment notwithstanding, the Dothraki serve an analogous role to ASOIF narrative as the Huns, Vikings, Kazakhs, Barbary pirates and Mongol raiders did to European history. Are you and the essayist seriously arguing that these ancient peoples are somehow demeaned by the freaking Dothraki?
    - jcranmer 6y ago
      > The essayist even seems to take umbrage that the Dothraki armor looks nothing like Sioux buckskin! Would he take umbrage if they looked alike? You betcha he would. Most historians, and enthusiasts of history like myself, would not take umbrage; instead, they would effuse praise for bucking stereotype and actually doing their research into how these cultures would have dressed. I'll point out that the author actually has a lot of praise for CK3 for getting its history details right. > The truth is, GRRM's throwaway comment notwithstanding, the Dothraki serve an analogous role to ASOIF narrative as the Huns, Vikings, Kazakhs, Barbary pirates and Mongol raiders did to European history. Are you and the essayist seriously arguing that these ancient peoples are somehow demeaned by the freaking Dothraki? I think your first sentence is unwitting justification of the second sentence. Your understanding of the aforementioned cultures [1] appears to be limited to their raiding effects on "civilized" societies, ignoring other aspects of their society as at best uninteresting and at worst nonexistent. That steppe cultures are reduced in popular history to such a degree is perhaps understandable, but if you're taking a position of trying to assert historical accuracy, perpetuating popular history myths is pretty tasteless. [1] Although interesting that you chose to qualify only Barbary and Mongol with pirates and raiders, leaving no qualification for the Huns, Vikings, and Kazakhs. Am I to take away that you believe that the Huns, Vikings, and Kazakhs consist solely of entities predating on settled societies, and that you believe that the Berbers and Mongols had richer cultures with only a subset of these people consisting of such entities? Or should I infer that you are listing known predatory groups, and know the "Barbary pirates" only by that name and not their culture grouping (admittedly, this makes "Mongol raiders" harder to explain)?

watwut 6y ago

> The author is expressing an opinion using cherry-picked details: an excerpt from an offhand LiveJournal comment and 2 sparse descriptions from the book. That plus loads of speculation presented as fact. Can you please point to pages where opposite things are stated? If it is cherry picked, surely you can quote. > "The Dothraki were based on demeaning stereotypes as evidenced by their clothing choices" is unconvincing This article is about clothing. Next installment will be about culture. > Did he talk about ways that Dothraki culture is similar to horse-riding, raiding cultures? No, he did not. It's All Wrong and Bad Are there way in which they are similar? It is cherry picking only if you ignore opposing evidence. I am sure you can provide some? > You literally just redefined a word that I used and argued against this new, less defensible, dumb position. Don't do that. I literally did not. Cancelling is literally used in that context and is supposed to be bad.

rendall 6y ago
> I literally did not. ... and you doubled down. Cancelling is cancelling, a new, vaguely defined phenomena some people even deny exists but is a word the essay itself uses. Censorship is censorship, well-defined, milleniae old and nowhere near what I said. You can continue to argue this peripheral, distracting semantic point if you want but there's nothing more for me to say on this. > It is cherry picking only if you ignore opposing evidence. I am sure you can provide some? Given that there is nothing in the essay that acknowledges any similarity, I can point to that per se as demonstration of cherry-picking, since the Mongols, Turks, Huns, Alans were all horse-riding cultures that lived on extensive, flat land who were known to conduct raids on settled peoples, like the Dothraki. There. Met your ask.
- watwut 6y ago
  > e Mongols, Turks, Huns, Alans were all horse-riding cultures that lived on extensive, flat land who were known to conduct raids on settled peoples, like the Dothraki. There. Met your ask. But ... they did not wore the cloth similar to Dothraki. Their culture had the word for "thank you". Elite used colors and comfortable clothing. Their military tactic was much different, much more smarter and much more organized. They did not charged unorganized on horses in disordered formation either. The argument is not that horse-riding cultures on flat land who conduct raids don't exist. Argument is that those cultures are nothing like Dothraki, because if they would, they would die quick. Mongols, Turks, Huns, Alans were not Dothraki at all. > Cancelling is cancelling, a new, vaguely defined phenomena some people even deny exists but is a word the essay itself uses. Censorship is censorship, well-defined, milleniae old and nowhere near what I said. Cancelling is just a new word for non state censorhip. That is just how it is used pretty much everywhere.