Because nobody 𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟 suspects the butterfly...

Let’s take it as given that he wanted to honor Lyanna Stark for her deeds as the Knight of the Laughing Tree at the Tourney at Harrenhal. And also given that he felt he needed a third head of the dragon for the prophecy of the Prince That Was Promised (the Song of Ice and Fire), and that he really wanted Lyanna in particular to be the mother of his third child. He still went about it in a remarkably stupid fashion.

When he named Lyanna Queen of Love and Beauty instead of his wife Elia Martell, he:

publicly shamed his wife, leading to tension in the Targaryen-Martell alliance

angered Lyanna’s betrothed, the lord of the Stormlands

angered Lyanna’s family, the lords of the North

caused all the watching lords of Westeros to wonder if he was heading for the “madness” side of the Targaryen coin, and not any more suitable to rule than his mad father was

He could have done many other things to honor her (or declare his love, if you wish). But he did that, which was incredibly politically stupid. Romantic as hell. And goddamn stupid.

Now, Lyanna’s “kidnapping” was several months later. (Not immediately after the Tourney – Rhaegar’s son Aegon was born, the Starks returned home to Winterfell, Robert and Ned went back to the Eyrie, etc.) In that time, there was probably some effort by the Targaryens and their advisers to unruffle the feathers of the various lords. (Probably. God knows, with Aerys.) In that time, Rhaegar decided Elia could not bear a third child and chose Lyanna instead, and perhaps made efforts to court her in secret.

In that time, Rhaegar could have contacted Rickard Stark and asked for Lyanna to be his wife. He could have done something to deal with how his cousin Robert would handle this. (Paid him off somehow, offered some other pretty highborn maiden, who knows.) He could have made the concept of a Stark becoming a Targaryen princess a great honor. He could have made sure Elia would not be further shamed by this and that Dorne would not be angered. (A divorce or annulment might not be necessary, as Targaryens had had multiple wives before, even if it was rare.) And he could have waited to do this all after he called a Great Council to remove his mad father from the throne.

But instead, Lyanna disappeared, and somehow everyone knew Rhaegar was behind it. The assumption by her brother and her betrothed was that she had been kidnapped to be raped by a mad prince. And then after this, Rhaegar was out of touch and could not be found (not by his enemies, by his father and closest friend!) for months, while political chaos ensued and a war began. This was beyond stupid. There aren’t words for how politically dumb this was.

Rhaegar wanted to save the world. All he did was to prevent destruction, to create the savior he couldn’t be himself. But instead he caused a civil war, and destroyed his family, Westeros, and himself. He didn’t need to move so quickly, without thinking – even if the prophecy was true and necessary, there was no need for the third head of the dragon to be born right away. (If there was like 3 years between Rhaenys and Aegon, then surely the same amount of time would be no problem between Aegon and Rhaegar’s third child. And if he thought his infant son was the PTWP, then whatever great calamity Rhaegar thought he was preventing must have been decades away, when the boy would be an adult.) 

But he thought prophecy was more important than politics. He held songs higher than diplomacy. And he died for it, as did his son, his daughter, his wife, his father, and his lover. And Lyanna… even if she was in heedless love herself… she knew her father and brother died because of what she did and how she did it. A tragedy beyond measure.

And that’s the problem with Rhaegar. This is not “character hate”. This is his character.

*nod* And you can be critical of Rhaegar without participating in some false Rhaegar vs. Robert dichotomy. Yes, Robert was not exactly a prize. Yes, Robert was a serial cheater even before his marriage, and slept with tons of women during the war he was fighting over his betrothed. Yes, he was dismissive of the murder of innocents. But that has nothing to do with Rhaegar’s own known, textual problems.

Even if you remove the questions of his motivations and actions regarding Lyanna, even if you take away speculations of his thoughts regarding prophecy, Rhaegar still has two huge faults as a character:

through his actions and inactions, he sparked a war that led to the destruction of his family

what he did to his wife Elia.

Re the first: yes, much of the war’s cause, the tension in the the country, can be laid at his father Aerys’ feet. But again, it was what Rhaegar did specifically (be responsible for Lyanna’s disappearance, disappear himself when he was needed), and did not do (remove his father from power, use political strategy or diplomacy), that meant that the rebellion was against all Targaryens and not just Aerys.

Re the second: this is why a lot of fans actively hate Rhaegar and I honestly don’t blame them in the slightest. Even if – and this is a huge if, and probably wishful thinking on my part – Elia was aware of and convinced of the rightness of the prophecies, even if she accepted the “need” for another woman in her husband’s life and had privately worked out an agreement with him on the matter… still. She still faced public humiliation when it appeared her husband, the father of her children, favored another woman over her. She still faced even more public humiliation when her husband disappeared with that woman.

And even after all that, when he finally returned to King’s Landing, Rhaegar could have insisted that Elia and his children be sent to safety at Dragonstone, like his mother and little brother had been. But he did not, whether he agreed with his father that it was necessary to keep her in King’s Landing to assure the Martell loyalties, or whether he preferred not to argue the point. He still took three Kingsguard with him to the Battle of the Trident (including his wife’s uncle), and sent three to protect his (possibly pregnant) lover; but left only one Kingsguard, a 17-year-old boy with possible divided loyalties, to protect his father, his wife, and his children.

So, y'know, if you’re a Rhaegar stan or roleplay him or write him in fic, I think it’s necessary to keep these things in mind. You can’t just use these quotes alone:

“Rhaegar fought valiantly, Rhaegar fought nobly, Rhaegar fought honorably. And Rhaegar died.”

“The dragon prince sang a song so sad it made the wolf maid sniffle”

“When this battle’s done I mean to call a council. Changes will be made. I meant to do it long ago, but … well, it does no good to speak of roads not taken. We shall talk when I return.”

Many a night she had watched Prince Rhaegar in the hall, playing his silver-stringed harp with those long, elegant fingers of his. Had any man ever been so beautiful? He was more than a man, though. His blood was the blood of old Valyria, the blood of dragons and gods. […] Two of her uncles fell before his lance, along with a dozen of her father’s finest jousters, the flower of the west. By night the prince played his silver harp and made her weep. When she had been presented to him, [she] had almost drowned in the depths of his sad purple eyes. He has been wounded, she recalled thinking, but I will mend his hurt when we are wed.

• visible likes + rts + ratio

• character limit that facilitates quick, knee-jerk exchanges that r hostile

qrt function legitimately feels like a humiliation ritual tool. that shit can be the root of so much evil to me lmao

TL;DR Twitter is structured in a way that isn’t conducive to conversation but conducive to “dunking” rather than conversation because “dunking” actually drives up engagement more than having a serious conversation. People aren’t incentivized to seriously participate on topics they aren’t knowledgeable about, but rather encouraged to provide “commentary” via versus tumblr’s design being very discourse (the academic term) based…

Like an important difference is that tumblr has “linear discourse” in its design versus Twitter is “nonlinear” which encourages people to “dunk” and make snap decisions or responses…for example the concept of a quote retweet versus a reblog chain. Twitter allows someone to have commentary on something after they’ve read the OP’s statement, and the reader has to manually click to view OP’s whole chain, or click to read the whole thread. Most people don’t do that, and so the conversation is generally inflated by conversation happening around the subject rather than engaging with the subject. It’s comparatively labor-intensive to engage beyond a like or a QRT.

On tumblr a reblog chain allows for linear discussion (you read OP’s original statement, then keep scrolling to read how someone else responded) which allows for comprehensible conversation about the topic itself.

And of course all of this plays into the word count, algorithmic structure, bluecheck system (which is a whole other can of worms with the concept of monetized posting which just increases incentive for intentionally reactive conversation) etc.

Then there was Stannis, the middle brother, balding and glum, loved his pets and attacked the capital

The there was Renly, the handsome charismatic youngest brother who believed he should rule because of his unique charisma, rumored to be gay

Photos below: