One thing I will never understand is why most mdzs fans are so pressed about Jin Guangyao. I understand disliking him if you’re a huge fan of the canon characters he’s hurt, but so many of the people who hate him are only here for wangxian. And like wtf did he do to wangxian? To me, his biggest offense is killing Nie Mingjue who was literally already dying. But if you see any discussion online from people who don’t like him it’s only about how he married his sister. And it drives me insane.
Lemme spell it out (I say arguing with the wall)
1) When he is introduced to Qin Su he has no idea and accepts the engagement because it's expected of him to marry.
2) His father is a horrible abusive man.
3) Jin Guangyao sleeps with her once for the sake of propriety before he knows.
4) He finds out right before the wedding meaning that calling it off would be suspicious.
5) If he called out his father the best that would happen is him getting thrown out and losing everything he’s worked towards and the worst is his father killing him and Qin Su and even maybe her mother.
6) He never touches her again.
Whether MXTX meant it or not Meng Yao’s struggle is a foil to Wei Wuxian’s. This idea of severe classism controlling who gets to survive and prosper in this world is integral to the story. Wei Wuxian is lucky because he happened to be brought into a sect due to connections he had before his birth. Meng Yao isn’t so lucky. His mother being a sex worker is so integral to his whole story. I don’t say this lightly but because of his mother Meng Yao suffers from this anti-sexwork rhetoric. And I don’t say this lightly but a lot of his struggles in life are rooted in the misogyny towards his mother. So when people pick on him for say marrying his sister something he was forced into and mock him for it… it feels tone-deaf. It’s the same way because real-life misogyny affects the way they hate Madame Yu, but that’s a whole other can of worms.
To be clear it is not misogynistic to dislike Jin Guangyao that would be a crazy thing to say. It’s the way people go about it. When factors of his birth, his mother, and classism, in general, get mixed in, is when the conversation goes sour.
Jin Guangyao’s actions are not excused because his life was hard but neither are Wei Wuxian’s. People get so wrapped up in the POV of the novel they forget it’s biased. If the story were from Jin Guangyao’s POV I bet people would not loathe him to this extent. Which is so frustrating. Blah Blah Blah reading comprehension buzzword.
Usually I stay out of any fandom discourse but wanted to add to this:
even Mingjue's death, in JGY's POV, makes sense. If JGY was the protagonist, Mingjue's death would be probably treated less severely, since this murder wasn't for the sake of killing (like for example, Xue Yang is shown to do). NMJ dies because he mistrusted JGY, could potentially break off JGY's only positive relationship (with Xichen), broke his promise as a martial brother by kicking JGY down the stairs (which he knows happened to jgy before at hands of his father, another figure jgy held in high regard at the moment of the kick), insulted JGY's mother, never made JGY a sect member, hell, he tried to kill JGY once. It wasn't a "you called me a bad word hence you die" murder. Of course, it was wrong, even for JGY himself (since he hurt LXC with it which he himself says he never wanted to do).
NMJ wasn't an angel either, burning everything Huaisang loved, killing his own sect members in fits of rage, attacking his martial brother.
Like, I feel like people forget Huaisang was 100% going to have juniors be murdered by Xue Yang to use that against JGY, and those kids lived only bcs wangxian happened to meet them.
None of these characters are "good" it feels like it's a point a lot of people are missing