WeAreHereWeAreHere

Wei Wuxian, a coreless 17 year old with a death wish, a stick, and a magical hunk of iron: *kicks door open*

Gotta admit, it’s funny that it took lwj one look at WWX to understand that he was up to start some bullshit

Gancho, Doug, my brother in Adonalsium (Highly), I'm going to hold your hand when I say this:

Not knowing what's going on is the default state for Cosmere protagonists.

Even Wit, who's whole deal is standing over there in the corner smirking like he knows what's going on, doesn't have a single rusting clue.

maybe THE honor moment of all time?

And I think it would be so funny the moment that some mission goes south and Wei Ying has to take control of the situation in order to save them and be actually fights for the first time in front of them.

These kids would be like bro tf as the silly guy they all these suddenly exploded with resentful energy - like we know he can control the energy itself in a combative way (eg. He spears wen chao and wen zhuliu in the show), so he’s like tearing these enemies apart and the juniors are just watching.

And then at the end he turns around and his eyes are still red and chenqing is in his hands and they’re all just staring at him in bewilderment. Ofc (being the idiot he is) Wei Ying immediately freaks outs and assumes they’re all disgusted by him.

That is until Jingyi crashes out and was like “THAT WAS SO COOL WHAT THE HELL” and Jin Ling is just mad that he always makes them fight when he can obviously hand himself. Wei Ying is dumbfounded for a sec but then he’s really happy because he was so scared for a sec there.

EXR, Chapter 56

So, I wanted to talk about this specific section.

Let's not delve too much into how the entire topic of conversation is inherently classist (because WWX is right: why does it matter if she's a servant? What's even wrong with being one?), and let's focus instead of what's, to me, one of the most damning pieces of dialogue proving that Jiang Cheng doesn't see Wei Wuxian as a brother.

At this moment, Wei Wuxian is defending his position as a servant, not a family member. He's very much aware of his own social status, and sees no issue with it. That's just how things are.

If Jiang Cheng did, genuinely, see Wei Wuxian as a brother (despite the very classist views he's proving to have here), this would be the moment to say so. To argue "you can't be just a servant when you're my brother in all but name."

But he doesn't do that. Instead, he uses Jiang Yanli's actual sibling-like relationship with Wei Wuxian as his argument… All while being dismissive about it and treating their dynamic with low-key disgust. He doesn't even argue "oh but my sister and you are so close", he argues "what kind of servant has the daughter of a sect leader take care of him like that?" Pretty much repeating Madam Yu's talking points. Jiang Cheng isn't framing it positively, he's mimicking WWX's foremost abuser!!

That's not a defense of WWX's "honor", but a recrimination of how WWX "benefits" from the ambiguity of his dynamic with the Jiangs at this point. The same thing Madam Yu does.

But, back to the whole point behind this post, there's no way Jiang Cheng would jump to use Yanli as an argument if he could use himself. If he felt that kind of connection himself. The fact that's where his mind goes (and the way he speaks about it) says everything.

The point isn't that JC did not care at all for WWX (he did, it was just toxic due to the entitlement and the jealousy he felt. Then that toxicity only grew and festered as the plot advanced, as he became the worst version of himself), but that saying he saw WWX as a brother when he didn't means ignoring the core issue behind WWX's treatment with the Jiangs: he wasn't allowed clear boundaries. He was too close to be "just a servant," but too distant to be "actual family."

We even see this in the fierce corpse extra, too! A servant was clearly being mistreated by his household’s young master—kicked out of school, accused of thievery and ungratefulness, physically assaulted which led to a disability which killed him—but the young master was able to escape condemnation from the community by pointing out that the servant was treated well by the previous madam of the house before her death, which afforded the servant privileges “above his station,” thus making it so that the master wasn’t at fault for rescinding these “privileges” later. The lack of clear boundaries and expectations is not a benefit to the servant but actually a cover for the master to get away with any abuse they want, all the while claiming that any decent treatment they give to the servant is proof of a “close bond” while any of the servant’s complaints become that of “ingratitude.”

EXR, Chapter 56

So, I wanted to talk about this specific section.

Let's not delve too much into how the entire topic of conversation is inherently classist (because WWX is right: why does it matter if she's a servant? What's even wrong with being one?), and let's focus instead of what's, to me, one of the most damning pieces of dialogue proving that Jiang Cheng doesn't see Wei Wuxian as a brother.

At this moment, Wei Wuxian is defending his position as a servant, not a family member. He's very much aware of his own social status, and sees no issue with it. That's just how things are.

If Jiang Cheng did, genuinely, see Wei Wuxian as a brother (despite the very classist views he's proving to have here), this would be the moment to say so. To argue "you can't be just a servant when you're my brother in all but name."

But he doesn't do that. Instead, he uses Jiang Yanli's actual sibling-like relationship with Wei Wuxian as his argument… All while being dismissive about it and treating their dynamic with low-key disgust. He doesn't even argue "oh but my sister and you are so close", he argues "what kind of servant has the daughter of a sect leader take care of him like that?" Pretty much repeating Madam Yu's talking points. Jiang Cheng isn't framing it positively, he's mimicking WWX's foremost abuser!!

That's not a defense of WWX's "honor", but a recrimination of how WWX "benefits" from the ambiguity of his dynamic with the Jiangs at this point. The same thing Madam Yu does.

But, back to the whole point behind this post, there's no way Jiang Cheng would jump to use Yanli as an argument if he could use himself. If he felt that kind of connection himself. The fact that's where his mind goes (and the way he speaks about it) says everything.

The point isn't that JC did not care at all for WWX (he did, it was just toxic due to the entitlement and the jealousy he felt. Then that toxicity only grew and festered as the plot advanced, as he became the worst version of himself), but that saying he saw WWX as a brother when he didn't means ignoring the core issue behind WWX's treatment with the Jiangs: he wasn't allowed clear boundaries. He was too close to be "just a servant," but too distant to be "actual family."