Celestia the Butcher · 1:52pm Oct 28th, 2019
"Being a princess must be earned". According to the comics, Celestia disowned Sunset, with this sentence being the start of her dismissal speech. The writers saw her as correct for doing so, and want us to think Celestia is wise and good for it. In reality, these words damn Celestia.
Before we get into this, two things must be kept in mind - alicornhood and princesshood are considered one and the same in Equestria, shown explicitly in the comic but also so heavily implied in canon that no other explanation is feasable. And as per the final episode, alicornhood means at the very least immunity to aging past one's prime. In my previous blog entry, I had gone over the possibilities of how ascension is achieved, and the general implications for each. But there's something I overlooked there - namely, Cozy Glow's ascension. This eliminates the "reward for finishing Star Swirl's last spell" theory, as well as any other hypotheses involving it being a reward or given from some cosmic entity or force, and means that even if Star Swirl's spell was an ascension spell instead of being a complete unknown, it isn't the only means of ascension. Now, let's consider the implications of that. Many theorize that the ascension spell Sunset found and accused Celestia of hiding was the incomplete version of Star Swirl's spell. This is now entirely conjecture - it is entirely plausible that Sunset found an alternate ascension spell. This is further reinforced by Celestia's response to Sunset's demands - she didn't say that the spell was incomplete, but that Sunset didn't deserve it. But more importantly, it shows that regardless of whether Celestia already had an ascension spell or not, she wouldn't have ascended Sunset either way. And why not? Because "being a princess must be earned". Now, applying the two initial facts established above, this is the equivalent of "not dying of age must be earned". That means that, in her mind, everyone that hasn't "earned" ascension deserves to die. And who determines who's "earned" the right to live? In canon, after eliminating the theories rendered impossible by Cozy's ascension, and factoring in how Twilight got Star Swirl's last spell in the first place, we can conclude that the answer is the same as that demonstrated in the comics - that Celestia is the one who decides. When a pony dies of natural causes, it's because Celestia decided they aren't "good" enough to live. And who is she to decide who lives and who dies? Following her logic, what has she done to deserve to live*? There's no answer to this that could possibly justify it - her having that power, or her "deserving" to live when so many others supposedly don't. And what of Flurry Heart? She was born immortal - conceived immortal even, unless Celestia cast the ascension spell on Cadance's womb while she was pregnant. What qualifies her as deserving life? Having an alicorn for a parent? How very supremacist. "But what if she didn't have an ascension spell before Star Swirl's was completed?" you might ask. Well in that case, why wasn't the spell cast on everyone once it was completed? If Celestia wanted to save everyone (which requires assuming that she was constantly searching before and failed, which in light of the ease of Cozy's ascension is one hell of a stretch), she could've started right then and there. But she didn't. Why not? The only answer that comes to mind is the one she gave to Sunset - "Being a princess must be earned". And because everyone hasn't lived up to a standard that they don't even know exists, Celestia abandons them to age, wither, suffer, and die, despite the fact that she could save them all if they could. Because of this, the blood of every pony that's died of natural causes between the discovery of the means of ascension and now is on Celestia's hooves.
Now let's connect this back to Sunset being cast out. What was the crime that she committed that Celestia considers worthy of death? Was it breaking into the restricted section of the library? No, she initially tried to talk Sunset into standing down. Learning that Celestia's deified herself? No, Celestia again tried to talk Sunset down after she revealed she learned that. It was Sunset's demand to be made an alicorn that earned Sunset death in Celestia's eyes. Let that sink in. Celestia denied Sunset ascension - the very thing Celestia was training her for, as she herself admits - because Sunset wanted to ascend. Celestia was willing to murder Sunset for the "crime" of wanting to live. That is the conclusion of the mind of the self-appointed arbiter of life and death in Equestria. That is what we're supposed to see as benevolent and wise. And to those who suggest that Celestia wasn't really casting Sunset out, but was trying to set her straight - you're only proving my point. Already the message that would have sent was "I don't care about you, only for what you can do for me. Mindlessly follow all my commands, do what I tell you to do, think what I tell you to think, without question, without complaint, without expectation for payoff, like a good slave, or I'll throw you out like yesterday's trash". But with what we now know, in order to reach the message Celestia was giving there, we must replace "throw you out like yesterday's trash" in that summary with "kill you without hesitation".
"Being a princess must be earned". You must prove yourself worthy of living. Not measuring up to some unknown standard is a crime worthy of death. This is the stance that Celestia has taken. This is the law of the land in Equestria. And this is one of many reasons why I will never follow the fandom in dropping on their knees before her in worship. Already she was unworthy of such, but now she's shown to be just as vile a demon as Harmony - albeit a much weaker one.
And, judging by the withering of her "friends" (read: favored servants) and the apparent death of Granny Smith, Twilight's certainly made a good start in following in her mentor's blood-soaked hoofsteps, hasn't she?
*Remember, everything we know of that she's done was done after her ascension, so they can't count.
Let me start by repeating that I agree, the implications are horribly, horribly unpleasant, to put it mildly. I don't like them either, and I don't plan on changing my mind on that point anytime soon. Everything surrounding Twilight becoming an alicorn is just one bit of unfortunate implications the show has left us with, and it's one that we are stuck with. Alternate interpretations can only get us so far.
That being said, I want to play devil's advocate and say that this wasn't what the writers thought they were saying, or implying. They likely didn't think things through, or critically consider what they were doing...and I very much fear that the only writer on the show who ever did that with any regularity was M. A. Larson, and even he fell victim to meddling on an executive level from what we've been told of what could have been with episodes like Magical Mystery Cure and Fame and Misfortune. A tiny part of me wonders what the show could have been like had there not been as much meddling from on high.