Oh, I totally agree and I think this is a problem that goes across fandoms and this specific game. Fandom is incredibly misogynist and male centric, which is something many women just as much participate in. It has been discussed in feminist circles and especially among sapphic fandoms in depth already. Women are across most fandoms treated less favorably and being judged more harshly than their male counterparts, being either accused of not being as deep as male characters, too good, too pure or too evil. Male characters get to be treated with nuance, while female characters are dismissed.

There is no question that if Edelgards and Dimitris genders would be reversed, the common talking points would be just as much reversed. A male Edelgard would be certainly praised for his moral grey writing, depth and nuances by fandom, while a female Dimitri would be treated as cruel and hysterical, probably even accused of being ableist for not being considerate of Eduards trauma while at the same time being called a Mary Sue or being accused of only being forgiven because she's a waifu after her redemption.

The issue with Edelgard is also not only that she suffered trauma, but that she is not expressive and vulnerable enough in terms of her trauma. Her trauma makes Edelgard very guarded, fierce, determined and angry at the world which is her motivation for changing it. Trauma in media, especially female trauma, is only accepted when it is expressed in a vulnerable and passive way, being the broken bird that needs to be picked up.

It is probably also the reason why Rhea is generally more accepted than Edelgard outside of Crimson Flower. Rhea is a more acceptable form of female character, while she is powerful, her power is never something that threatens or outshines male characters and for most of the routes players like her in, she is confined to be a Damsel in Distress to be saved. She represents a more traditional and socially acceptable maternal form of femininity in her default personality, while her Trauma is primarily expressed through vulnerability and a need for emotional support. Crimson Flower is another beast, where her trauma, pain and perceived betrayal is expressed in a very unhinged, furious and spiteful form and she lashes out to enemies. It is powerful and therefore, it is dismissed as out of character and a betrayal for what her supporters want to be her character, which is somebody who is described as strong enough so that especially male fans can feel like they are on an equal footing, while at the same time being both a nuturing maternal figure and a helpless broken bird that needs to be saved and protected. Rhea herself is only ever accepted inside the confines of the patriachal ideal of a woman.

oh BABY let's fucking go.

I gotta preface all of this with a quick reminder that the Crimson Flower-Silver Snow dyad is my favorite aspect of the whole game by a mile and it's SO CLOSE to being perfect (keeping in mind both the one notable suggested improvement to Silver Snow that ive talked about a million times and won't wax poetic about in this post* and the obvious travesty that is making TWSITD a postscript in CF rather than an actual fight). Neither is complete without the other, the tragedy they share is incredible, and no one appreciates how much Silver Snow adds to Crimson Flower and the complexity of the Beagles. I'm the only person who understands it everyone else is wrong and also morally corrupt (joke that's a joke I'm joking i'm making fun of myself im jokinggggg)

Anyway, Edelgard is an incredible character, I really like her and I really really REALLY wish her own route had done more to explore her complexities and parallels with Rhea - especially wrt how they both see Byleth - so that it wouldn't have relied so heavily on the player having played Silver Snow. However, this is Black Eagles hot takes, not Crimson Flower! So I will ignore that and just talk about this from a character oriented perspective.

*the notable suggestion for improvement is that we should have been able to fight Nemesis as a penultimate boss in Silver Snow

im not really qualified to talk about this issue. please check out some poc fe3h blogs if you wanna learn more about this.

Just remembered how common it was for white fans to state that any black person who wrote Dedue with realistic trauma and negative feelings about his situation was writing a "spite fic" and it upset me. It's ridiculous how common it was to accost black fans who wrote a Dedue-centric fic that had "mean things to say" about racist characters. Or didn't paint their emotional support white kids in the most flattering way (even if it wasn't making them racist). Simply writing Dedue in a one-sided or making a fic that shied AWAY from slash altogether had some of yall itching to fight people over the internet. Y'all really just disliked when black fans discussed black trauma altogether and made the massive overreach to call it "spiteful".

Any fic that didn't place white feelings and their romance first had some of yall freaking out like it was a crime against humanity. Fanfic that prioritizes racism as its main plot and not slash or white angst was considered a crime for black writers.

Writing angst and whump in the same category and subject that white characters were subjected to also made them mad. Because it was simply "framing Fodlan as too cruel". Still will never forget when someone was writing a legitimate non-fetishistic depiction of the horrors of Duscur genocide and someone who was beta editing their story cut in to condescend and say that it was "too dark". Despite the beta writer writing much more dark and borderline fetishistic depictions of the same exact thing happening to white characters on the regular.