Y’all need to cut Dana some slack!

Oh no, I was supporting you! Dana has no control. And most certainly not in that insane patriarchy of a place. I have been accused of crippling Dana with abuse.

Oh no, I was supporting you! Sorry it came off as anything else. I am just so surprised on how much victim blaming can happen all because of precious male leads. Dana suffered abuse. It does not disappear just because she is not getting the living shit beaten out of her at the moment.

This, all of this. Just like you said, you can't put levels on how abuse affects someone. Also wanting a strong female lead shouldn't blind anyone to the point of ignoring abuse all for the strong female lead.

What I would do is definitely NOT cheat on my husband, forced marriage or not.

I would have definitely showed some RESTRAINT and not throw myself and asked for a kiss from a man who is NOT my husband.

Because despite being abused, CHEATING doesn't have anything to do with it.

Is that so hard to have some decency?

Kissing a man who is NOT your husband, is not FIGHTING for your happiness. That's recklessness.

I will never give up on voicing my opinion regarding wrong representations of feminine strength.

And feminine strength does not include kissing a man who is NOT my husband.

That's moral decay on your part.

@Kou thanks for blocking me so I can't reply while you are pretending that you are open to a conversation.

Let me answer your BLOCKED thread;

'...they hurt the feelings of my precious male lead'

Eww.

Cheating is cheating, not JUST hurting feelings like accidentally stepping on someone's feet. Your belittling of Dana's immoral acts normalizes cheating behaviors.

You're basically perpetuating cheating as okay. THAT is the problem, not Dana's abuse.

She consented to marriage, you keep on saying it's forced when she agreed to join the contest.

Dana wasn't 'surviving abuse' while she's comfortably being cared for in the palace. You just say that so you can excuse Dana's cheating.

That's disgusting.

And no, the King is not the male lead in the story. Don't get it twisted because you can't defend Dana cheating on his husband.

Also, calling me 'beloved' doesn't make you sound mature. Makes you look like a try hard to sound like an adult.

Stick to the facts and stop using 'woe is Dana the abused survivor, so brave' cliché.

Dana is an abused woman, yes, but she's also a cheater.

Abuse is not an excuse to cheat.

@Kou since you blocked me I can't really reply to your questions, so I wonder why you're still asking knowing you blocked me?

And to answer your question in this thread;

Riddle you this, consent is not given because your analogy is that the person is HELD AT GUN POINT. Now, using your own analogy, was Dana HELD AT GUN POINT? Was she feeble minded during the events leading up to the ceremony?

Your 'forced marriage' is also not applicable, because Dana was not feeble minded, nor was she HELD AT GUN POINT like what you alluded to. She was in a situation where IMMINENT danger was not present so as to force her to a marriage contract, same with YOUR analogy that presented imminent danger what with a gun is pointed at them while writing a will.

I blocked you because I am beyond tired of this conversation. Pointless. I have however seen your argument. You believe in the strength of women. You admire it. That's okay. Even I cant stand weak women. Can't tell you how many shoujo's I have stopped reading because of the damsel in distress trope. Including one where the main character was supposedly a daughter of a king in a misogynistic world whereby women had next to zero rights. The fl spent most of her time appealing to the men in her life. I dropped. Damsel in distress is a tired trope. Women are not weak victims and are active in many cases in their problems.
My question though is why don't you think the fact that it is a forced marriage plays a part? You say she consented but did she really have a choice? I have seen your other comments about her running away and liberating herself. But even slavery lasted 400 years. Colonialism in Africa and a lot of the world lasted a long time. I know they are not true equivalents. I am however appealing to your sense in that there is systemic abuse and misogyny in this world. Dana is an abuse victim who loves her abuser. A common case with abuse victims. Which is why I was giving the example of women who go back their abusers 9-10 times and even end up dead sometimes. Would you call that weak?
Haven't studies established that manipulation is true.
One of the manga's you have given an example shows the rise out of the ashes situation Despite abuse, despite obstacles, she rose and stood tall. Is that the rule or the exception? For instance in real life, we are dealing with murder of women, abuse of women, among other atrocities because of the patriarchal nature of our world. We are struggling to overcome. Feminism and all activism. Yet sometimes we don't fault women who decide to follow the path laid for them. Strength is admirable. But lacking it when you have endured so much shouldn't be cause of blame. I believe in Dana we get to see a more real version of an abuse victim in a patriarchal world.
As for the beloved, my apologies. I wrote that late at night too tired or arguing.
However, I would like for you to stop dangling age over my head. I am turning 30 this month. You can browse through my recent comment on that 'Save Me' topic. I stated my age there.
I don't believe in black and white. I think people can be weak. I thin despite years and years of oppression, women can be weak. Because sometimes it can be too much.
But I disagree that admiration should only be reserved for the strong women who break out of their bonds and overcome it all. I don't accept putting all that responsibility on a woman. And especially not one still nursing the scars of abuse that a single hand lift has her trembling.
Just like you pointed out that my defense line is that Dana is an abuse victim, your entire criticism is that she cheated. In a forced marriage. It is right there in the Manga. They said her father married her off.

It is not about feeble mindedness. More of lack of choice. How was imminent danger not present if she is being abused. I am soo confused. Why do you downplay the power of abuse?

@Kou she is abused, we have established that, but your downplaying of her cheating as 'acceptable' because she didn't want to be married anyway is morally wrong.

Just because you don't love someone, doesn't mean it absolves you of doing something wrong. If you're a man and a woman suddenly goes up to your doorstep and says you have a 5 year child she kept and now you need to take responsibility, you can't just abandon the child because you didn't consent to getting her pregnant since you wore a condom.

It's the same with Dana, she is a married woman. Whether she half-heartedly agreed to it or not, the fact still remains, she is not suppose to cheat.

And downplaying cheating is endorsing a morally corrupt action to be acceptable, when in reality it is not.

And don't even compare Dana to modern women who are abused because Dana was miles away from the abusive hands of this father in that entire contest, modern women who go through abuse are living in one household with their abuser, the proximity is not comparable.

To boot, Dana was never abused by her husband too. The King was anything but abusive, she gave Dana space, never even slept with her or forced her too, he was never angry to her, he never even tried to sleep with a concubine; he was a decent husband. And to betray your decent husband's trust by kissing another man and throwing words of weight like divorce?

She doesn't think of the political repercussions of her actions, a divorce will further the uprising of the rebels, and she gives no fucks at all if a war breaks out because God forbid she's endured enough safe space in the palace with great resources at her disposal.

Modern women who are abused do not have opportunities like Dana, they don't have power that Dana has at her disposal. That is why most of them have a hard time getting out, not only because they are mentally scarred, but also because the opportunity and power is stripped from their grasp. Dana has both.

'But even slavery lasted 400 years' ... to be blunt, the systemic oppression that Black people experienced is NOT comparable to the sufferings of Dana. What a heavy comparison to someone's woes which are not completely extrinsic in factor.

Dana chose to pursue Moon when she was engaged for the first time, she chose to sleep with him and consciously kept her engagement a secret to Moon up until the actual day of her engagement, she also chose to accept the empress selection and not wait for at least a day to confirm if Moon was dead, she also agreed to Ellin's deal, she also chose to kiss Moon when she is already a married woman.

These are Dana's choices, external factors be counted or not. Racism on the other hand, Black people didn't choose to become slaves, they were forcibly taken from their mother land. Systemic oppression is based from the color of their skin. Dana on the other hand wasn't oppressed or suppressed, she freakin sneaks away to have sex with a man! Is that an oppressed woman? Her gender doesn't have anything to do with her decision to cheat, whether she be a man or a woman, I'd still criticize her celebration as a strong man/woman whilst blatant disrespect to marriage is shown in his/her character.

She's a cheater. Nothing to do with her being a woman, systemic oppression, or abuse. Cheating is morally corrupt, no matter which way you look at it.

It's not about just hurting someone, it's the blatant disrespect for another person and the selfishness that shows.

Also, no one is celebrating her for being an abuse survivor. They're celebrating Dana because it's so romantic that she got back together with Moon after crying her heart out for months... that is a misconstrued idea of female empowerment. No one cares that she is cheating, it's romantic!

And that is disgusting.

So no, Dana is not awesome or inspiring for surviving her abuse, she's being celebrated for the wrong reasons and her abuse is just a cushion that readers fall back on to justify her corrupt behavior.

And I'm calling that bullshit out. Abuse doesn't justify cheating.

But your not understanding the underlying point Dana was forced into this marriage and she didn’t have a choice. To her that man is not her husband he is a person that she was forced to be with