sympathy for the wicked

rashta’s relationships with men is genuinely one of the most heartbreaking things in TRE. people hated rashta for knowing that she was beautiful and trying to use it to her advantage. people hated rashta for acting cute or being a “pick me” towards men. she was a slave with nothing to her name; no education, no friends, no family. the only thing she had ever been desired for was her beauty. the only people who have ever treated her “kindly” was those men who desired her beauty. everyone else (with a few exceptions being people that sovieshu employed to serve her) pretty much treated her like shit. the only way life has ever taught her to survive or receive better treatment is by appealing to her predators.

i’ve been seeing more people waking up to how the true villain in TRE have always been the men instead of rashta or krista and it’s so satisfying. also lots of people starting to notice how boring TRE is without rashta because she was the only character who experienced real struggles and had complex and interesting personality.

i’m sad because rashta is so sweet and cute. when she misunderstood and thought duke ergi was having an affair with heinrey, she was prepared to be supportive and kept their affair a secret. when navier first revealed her relationship with heinrey, rashta was immediately worried about ergi first because she thought they were in love. she really saw ergi as her only friend while he was using her and doing his best to harm her because..? he held a grudge against sovieshu. rashta didn’t even do anything to him yet she became his punching bag… sovieshu was still the king in the end, while rashta.. is dead. because she never had a friend before and didn’t know any better.

female characters shouldn’t have to be a “smart kind pretty queen girlboss” to be liked. let female characters have flaws. let female characters be mean or cowardly or vicious or have a terrible personality. let female characters kill people. let female characters be ugly or have scars or have terrible sense in fashion. let them show weakness and cry. forgive female characters. cry over their trauma and make excuses for their actions. praise female characters for the bare minimum. love female characters even at their worst.

to be honest i used to like navier when i first read TRE, but her character quickly became mary sue and the author justified many atrocities just bc they benefitted navier. meanwhile for any mistake rashta made (or even when it's NOT EVEN HER OWN MISTAKE, like her being unable to read or memorize quickly) rashta gets overly criticized and punished, which made me more and more sympathetic to her. in the end, rastha is a much more complex character, with both good sides (which are often overlooked) and bad sides (which are often exaggerated), she is a way more interesting character than navier but unfortunately is doomed for bad end bc she is treated as the antagonist by the misogynistic fandom.

it's 2024 and people still looks down on rashta for being a runaway slave. i thought we all agreed slavery is bad? but instead of feeling sympathetic towards rashta when it gets found out that she was enslaved, people treated it as a gotcha as if it was somehow her fault that she was enslaved. i've seen some says things like "ew the emperor is having affair with a slave", ARE U HEARING URSELF? i've even seen some people try to justify that they only enslaved criminals in that country so it's fine; NEWSFLASH: it is NEVER OKAY TO ENSLAVE A HUMAN BEING regardless of what they did, and it is even WORSE when the crime is something done out of lack of money. it's crazy how many people are willing to bend their morals and close their eyes on HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS just so they don't have to hold their oh-so-perfect empress navier responsible.