Amon and politics in LoK

(My point isn't that the bending world is bad because it's unfair. Wordlimit prevents me from saying that the inherent unfairness would ensure the continuation of an Equalist movement even in the case of Amon's fall. And for LoK's bad writing in just ignoring these glaring facts to make the Equalists look more evil)

>>88478745
it's just a reversal of the real world where intelligence gives you status instead of physical prowess.
hell they even reversed the real life trend of the physically gifted people being popular heroes. guys like sato and varrick seemed like the celebrities instead

>>88478745
>Do you think it's fair to have a world where someone has better access to higher ways of life simply because of something they got when they were born?

Like money? Like being born in a first-world country instead of a third-world rated one? Like having both parents with a job instead of one or none?

The Equalist movement wasn't about raising the standard of living for a group or equally making it so people don't slip through the cracks. It was about lowering people down out of hatred and demagoguery.
You put people in certain positions because of what they can bring to the table. There were non-benders in offices of politics. There were non-benders on the police force. Sato had non-benders working in his factory.

The URN changed it's form of government. But what other paths would you have everyone take now that Amon is no longer able to take peoples' bending away?

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>>88478745
>>88478794

>>88479474
>The URN changed it's form of government.
Not OP but I thought it was dumb how they changed from a council to literally just a president when the whole point was that representation was unequal

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>>88478745
i say we should just exterminate the non benders and keep the gene pool safe

>>88479474
>The Equalist movement wasn't about raising the standard of living for a group or equally making it so people don't slip through the cracks. It was about lowering people down out of hatred and demagoguery.

My point is that that's stupid

Contrary to popular liberal belief, people aren't bigots just because of ignorance. The ignorance is an embedded in a broader social background.

For example, racism against black people as inferior didn't arise until the growth of nationalism in Europe (which made everyone smug bastards) the dominance of Europe in the global stage, and the use of black slaves in the Americas. Besides, the Equalists aren't fascists anyways. Benders aren't Jews.

>Like money? Like being born in a first-world country instead of a third-world rated one? Like having both parents with a job instead of one or none?
Yes? My point isn't that these things are morally bad in-themselves (which I honestly don't want to argue over), it's that they produce movements that don't seem to be going away any time soon. To use your examples, even if some third-world demagogue gets assassinated or whatever, doesn't mean that the situation the third-world is in has gone away.

>But what other paths would you have everyone take now that Amon is no longer able to take peoples' bending away?
You got me there. But even then, Equalists would still exist. I find it a bit wonky if the Equalists' plan was for Amon to just take away peoples's bending. He's like one guy. I took it that Amon's show of removing peoples' bending was just a propaganda thing. Hell, that would make a good reason to posit them as 'bad guys' - because their plan is stupidly impractical.

>>88479650
And said president is essentially a king in terms of power.

They had the URN choose their own representative from their own land and not have the other nations (Water Tribe gets two despite Unalaq apparently having legit claim to do whatever he wants to the South the very next season) and Tenzin lead them.

>>88479474

>The URN changed it's form of government.
iirc the URN were originally Fire Nation colonies in the Earth Kingdom. The creation of the Republic was to ameliorate tensions between these two countries by establishing the area to be neutral ground since it would be incredibly difficult (and controversial) to just annex the territory for either country given the composition of the local population holding members of both nationalities.There was no intention of inclusiveness for non-benders.

>>88479650
iirc the air nomads have their own rep. To represent what? Three airbenders and like a hundred or so religious practitioners? A President would probably be seen as more representative t-b-h being that the council system is dumb and more rooted in religious tradition then electoral representaiton.

>>88479809
See this >>88479795
The President is basically a king, they should've just expanded the council to be more balanced
Tenzin being there is probably just symbolic

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>>88478745
the life of a non-bender is one of playing catch up century after century. they advance technology due to their lack of naturally gifted power, only for benders to be an essential necessity for its advancement. electricity needs power, and why would someone need to develop an efficient generator for electricity when there are so many people who have access to it with their fingertips? and for minimum wage at that? a once sacred art that only could be mastered by few, now even the lowest of firebender can use for cheap factory manual labor.

>>88479777
>because their plan is stupidly impractical.
And that's all they had or wanted. No one brings up change in terms of job employment. The only thing they have is a fear that several peoples' parents were killed by benders and so they would rather blame bending instead of the bender.

It was a movement built on one guy scamming people because he wanted to feel in control. Which is in line with what Korra was going through: she wanted to be in control which is apparently not the way to handle airbending as you are supposed to be like a leaf in the wind and be at the mercy of the air currents (because there is only one way to approach air bending for some reason.)
"Amon" didn't have control in his youth so he lashed out and took people for a ride. Tarrlok responded in kind.

Their plan is stupid because if you remove bending that doesn't mean you suddenly are the most qualified to be a politician. Nor are you suddenly as wealthy as Hiroshi Sato who already got there without bending. Crime doesn't disappear by removing bending. You can curtail someone being killed by firebending by removing firebending from existence. But you still have other ways to hurt people as Amon's father showed by naturally being an adult figure to a child.

And you can't say that "those" people are bad guys because, as we see with Katara and Toph, that non-benders can have children who can bend.

>>88479865
Symbolic, while nonetheless still holding power? And probably has the same voting power as the other reps? That sounds like a horrible idea.

>>88480108
It was a horrible idea because he was terrible at his job. We see how during the court case that Aang sat in that someone else was acting rep. for the small island of Airbenders and Air Acolytes. There is no reason why Tenzin should be there when he should be teaching the Avatar and there is no reason why that position should be there since the Air part is already a part of the URN proper and not reporting to their parent nation (Fire, Earth, the two Water Tribes) about their influence and how things are going for their own benefit as the parent nation.

>>88480069
>"Amon" didn't have control in his youth so he lashed out and took people for a ride.
I took it that Amon helped create the Equalists because of the hatred he had to his father, who was a bender.

But anyways, i don't disagree with you analysis of Amon as a character. To be fair, I like the character arcs of the first season (beyond the way 'bad guys' are 'bad' after-the-fact) for the most part. My point however, is that politics isn't just entirely personal. Broad social movements don't just happen because one person is compensating for feelings of powerlessness in childhood.

Also, crime doesn't have anything to do with the discussion. Better legal representation won't get rid of the disparity of power and opportunity.

>And you can't say that "those" people are bad guys because, as we see with Katara and Toph, that non-benders can have children who can bend.
No, but you can have recessive genes. You can have mutations. It's still something largely genetic, something you're born with, or at the very least a product of circumstances beyond individual control.

>>88480301
>No, but you can have recessive genes. You can have mutations. It's still something largely genetic, something you're born with, or at the very least a product of circumstances beyond individual control.

To which removing bending, what Equalism was all about, can not keep up unless Amon teaches someone else how to bloodbend and they pinky swear to never tell anyone else except the successor to Amon's successor who is the successor etc...

You can not get rid of the disparity of power and opportunity in this fantasy world the same way you can't get rid of it in our world. You can only try to raise everyone up so life can be at least a little better and try to ensure people who get away with murder don't get away with murder. And you do not do that by giving people a chakra lobotomy against their will.

>>88480441
>You can not get rid of the disparity of power and opportunity in this fantasy world the same way you can't get rid of it in our world. You can only try to raise everyone up so life can be at least a little better and try to ensure people who get away with murder don't get away with murder. And you do not do that by giving people a chakra lobotomy against their will.

All of that is irrelevant. It doesn't matter if there isn't a readily seen solution, because underlying tension nonetheless still exists.

I'm not arguing whether or not it's right to have a world that has inequality imposed upon it. I'm arguing that in that case, there would be movements set to abolish or at the very least ameliorate the conditions which creates such inequalities.

I find it dumb that the Equalist movement died when Amon did. Republicanism (radical or reformist) didn't die with Robespierre. Communism (or Social-Democracy) didn't die with the Soviet Union. Et cetera.

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>>88478745
>>88478794
I agree with you on this and more. In fact this is the reason I don't like LoK in general- it has all these interesting characters, ideas, and set pieces and NEVER explores any of them in full.

Remember Pro-bending? That seemed like a good story line. Korra practicing her bending while the team grows together and develops camaraderie. Sponsorship with Future industries teaches us about the world and how it deals with finance and technolog-
>NOPE, DROPPED AND SEEN ONCE OR TWICE IN PASSING FOR THE REST OF THE SERIES.

How about the homeless camp the team stays in while hiding from the equalists? Asami is forced to confront the realities of economic disparity, Korra learns about humility and the consequences of collateral damage, while the brothers open up about their rough life growing up-
>NEVERMIND, THEY LEAVE AND NEVER MENTION REPUBLIC CITYS HOMELESS AGAIN.

Surely Kuvira started with good intentions and became a tyrant through a series of impossible choices and necessary moral compromises? Or maybe she crafted her philosophy as a calculated antithesis to the red lotus' failed anarchist ideals?
>NAW, SHE JUST WOKE UP ONE MORNING AND DECIDED TO BE HITLER

Who sired Toph's children?
>JUST A RANDOM EARTHBENDER NEVER SEEN ON SCREEN

How did Amon learn to energy bend?
>IGNORE THIS JUST GO WITH IT


So, I agree with your complaints, but
>THE EQUALISTS DISBANDED AND NO ONE EVER QUESTIONED BENDER/NONBENDER INEQUALITY AGAIN
is par for the course in this show.

>>88480734
The gist of what you just said was exactly what I was thinking when I was typing.
I agree with you completely. What really was the problem with LoK was the wasted potential.

>>88480145
>>88480301

Just wanted to point out that after the show ended one of the creators stated that Amon truly believed that what he was doing was right. I personally find this to be much more interesting than the intentional power hungry bigot. This probably helps back up the child sexual abuse vibe from his backstory.

Not really sure if this would change your argument at all but thought I would point it out

>>88480734

Every single thread, someone discovering korra is bad and there is no point trying to make sense of random shit. Much like WoW or Star Wars lore nerds like to argue about so much.

>>88478745
Essentially you're complaining about how different people have different skillsets...

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>>88479665
>Talking about eugenics and ethnic purity
>Posts slav commie girl
Wrong ideology and wrong people.

>>88481465
No. Skills can be developed even without talent, and talent rarely is everything. You can't be a bender unless you're born into it, period.

>>88481479
FYI: /pol/'s new hero is Putin because treason doesn't matter to them when they can cheer on hurting people.

>>88480734
>How did Amon learn to energy bend?

He didn't though. His ability to take people's bending away is just a combination of his freakish ability to bloodbend and a chi blocker's understanding of the human body.

>>88481814
Did they actually explain this or did you infer it yourself? Or maybe they explained it in one line of dialogue I missed? All I saw on the show was:
>Young Amon talks about how Aang taking away the firelords bending was "true power" and vows to gain it for himself
>SCENE MISSING
>Older Amon has the ability to take bending away from someone permanentl

>>88482390
How else do you explain it?

>>88482390
Season 1 artbook, page 118.

>Despite growing fascinated by this skill, he ultimately desired more, wanting to have the power to remove people's bending, just as Avatar Aang had done to his father with the use of energybending. He eventually succeeded in this goal by using his mastery of bloodbending to "sever" an individual's bending connection by blocking their active chi paths, effectively achieving the same result as energybending.

>>88482570
I still find it strange that Katara couldn't "cure" it since she also knows bloodbending and is supposedly the best healer in the world.

>>88483082
My headcanon is that she probably could have, given enough time. But Deus Ex Avatar did it for her, so she never got the chance to really study the damage Amon did.

>>88479777
>For example, racism against black people as inferior didn't arise until the growth of nationalism in Europe (which made everyone smug bastards) the dominance of Europe in the global stage, and the use of black slaves in the Americas. Besides, the Equalists aren't fascists anyways. Benders aren't Jews.

Chattel Slavery is much older than you imply, and Nationalism is younger than you're implying. Please don't spread bad history, anon.

>>88478745
>Do you think it's fair to have a world where someone has better access to higher ways of life simply because of something they got when they were born?

No. Amon was the only good villain in the series.

It's a pretty common refrain in history that a strongman will arise, promise to eliminate percieved inequities, and quickly become a dictator. The cycle is self-perpetuating, because that dictator then becomes a percieved problem that others appoint their own strongman to oppose.
The "I'll get rid of the kings" guy usually wants to make himself king.