A cynic's FiM tier list · 11:00pm Apr 6th, 2021
“What’s this? An FLZ blog post that isn’t a rant? Who are you and what have you done to FinalLegendZero!?” Don’t be deceived; this is, in fact, a rant. It’s just one with a different structure from normal.
So, what brought this on, you might ask. Well, it all started with a certain recent contest here on FiMFiction that revolved around glorifying a certain villain that very nearly everyone sees as being not-so-bad at worst and that absolutely no one has ever called out in fanfic form. While I was debating whether to make a blog post ranting about this villain, I realized that, if I did, this would be my third blog specifically designed to tear into a character. With this realization came another – that there’s a good chance that I’d be tempted to make blogs against other characters in the future. So, in order to preempt that, and to collect the majority of my issues with FiM into one place, I decided to create one giant rant against everyone. Why the tier list format? Mostly to keep things focused and organized, though there’s also the advantage of showing how comparatively serious I find most issues.
Before I begin, however, I want to lay out what each tier represents, as well as establish some base assumptions regarding the tiering, to minimize any potential misunderstandings. First, the tiers.
Best Creature: Self-explanatory
S-Tier: These are characters who would otherwise be somewhere between A-tier and D-tier, but have had a significant wrong done to them, and their abuser neither faced any consequences for their actions nor did anything to make things right with the character. When I give my reasoning for each tier placement, I’ll also list where each S-Tier character would be otherwise and why.
A-Tier: Characters whose flaws are minor at worst, and who’ve meaningfully contributed to saving Equestria from some threat, make up this tier.
B-Tier: This is something of a catch-all tier. Characters here have either erred in some notable way but learned their lesson and made things right, or have only minor flaws but aren’t heroes.
Characters in the above tiers, minus some S-Tier characters that would otherwise be in C-Tier or D-Tier, I have an overall neutral-to-positive opinion of. Characters of the tiers below this line, I have an overall negative opinion of.
C-Tier: These characters have committed some offense that falls short of outright villainy but still warrants mentioning, and have never had to learn their lesson, pay for their mistakes, or make amends with their victim.
D-Tier: A.K.A. the hypocrite tier. What differentiates these characters from those in C-Tier is that their actions (especially their sins) either demonstrate a blatant double-standard or are directly and irreconcilably in conflict with their stated moral code.
E-Tier: These characters are villains, or have committed deeds that would be considered villainy if they weren’t the beneficiaries of Protagonist-Centered Morality
F-Tier: Characters in this tier are willing to cause the deaths of innocents that pose no threat to them.
Worst Creature: Self-explanatory
Untiered: This isn’t an official tier. Characters that are written so inconsistently that they can’t be ranked properly end up here.
Now, you’ve probably noticed by now that these tiers are organized more by morality than by how much I like the pony. There are two reasons for this. The first is that for me, these two things are closely linked. It’s not a perfect correlation (for example, I find the highest-ranked E-Tier character more likeable than any D-Tier character), but it’s close enough for you to get a general idea of my opinions of the characters. Plus, the rankings within each tier are mostly based on personal preference. The second reason is, again, this is a structured rant. Beyond that, there’s four major disclaimers I need to make.
First, this list is not exhaustive. It’s not even close, even. As the show’s degraded and my enthusiasm’s waned, my following the show has become more and more sporadic, especially in regards to EqG. That's the first reason. The second is that there’s many minor characters that I don’t feel a need to rant about. If, for some reason, you absolutely need to know my opinion on some character here, you can ask, but it’s probably a safe assumption that I’d rank them somewhere between C and E if they’re an antagonist, and either B or C if they’re not.
Second, this list only takes canon into account. In other words, unless it’s the show, the movies, one of the official EqG shorts, or a statement from a show writer that doesn’t directly contradict what’s seen in the above, it isn’t being considered. “But what about the comics?” They’re not written by the show writers, and they directly contradict the show on multiple points. They don’t count. “What about the physical Journal of the Two Sisters?” It contradicts the show and makes the setting’s workings even more nonsensical, so it’s out. And while this should go without saying, your headcanon and changes made for whatever AU you might have written have no power here, and if fanon is ever brought up, it will only be to point out how it goes against what we see in canon.
Third, this list is giving Harmony the benefit of the doubt regarding Luna and Sunset Shimmer. The show leaves it very ambiguous whether these two were in control of Nightmare Moon and Sunset Satan respectively. If they were, then given the total 180 these two made after being defeated, the only logical conclusion to make is that Harmony brainwashed them when they were defeated. If they weren’t, however, this isn’t necessarily the case; it’s entirely plausible that Harmony merely purged whatever corruption was influencing them and gave them control back. This list assumes the latter interpretation. Should it ever be revealed that this isn’t the case, then the entries for Sunset Shimmer and Luna are to be deleted (Nightmare Moon and Sunset Satan on in the list as placeholders for where those two would be if Luna and Sunset Shimmer were in control), and the top of S-Tier would take the Best Creature slot.
Fourth, the reason the writers made things the way they are is irrelevant to my points. What matters is what we’re left with.
With that out of the way, let’s get to the tiering. First, the list itself:
Best Creature: Sunset Shimmer
S-Tier: Spike, Trixie
A-Tier: Shining Armor
B-Tier: Flash Sentry, Flurry Heart
C-Tier: Pinkie Pie
D-Tier: Applejack, Rarity
E-Tier: Fluttershy, Cadance, Wallflower Blush, Sombra, Nightmare Moon, Discord
F-Tier: Tirek, Cozy Glow, Sunset Satan, Chrysalis, the Sirens, Starlight Glimmer, Luna, Twilight Sparkle, Celestia, Harmony
Worst Creature: Star Swirl
Untiered: Rainbow Dash, Iron Will, Flim and Flam
Now, a detailed explanation for why each character was placed in each tier, starting with Untiered.
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Untiered
Rainbow Dash: It should be obvious what Dash is doing here. A pony that would drop out of Wonderbolts Academy because Lightning Dust’s recklessness and Spitfire’s negligence nearly got her friends killed wouldn’t screw her friends’ efforts to qualify for the Equestria Games simply because she can’t say no to Spitfire. A pony that readily agrees that Fluttershy should be off-limits as far as pranks go wouldn’t make Fluttershy fear for her life as a prank. A pony that knows so much about the Wonderbolts that Rarity can fake being part of their inner circle just by parroting what she’s overheard the pony say obviously knows more than next-to-nothing about them. And the Element of Loyalty certainly wouldn’t sell her best friend into slavery. Reviewers like to claim that Dash meeting Lightning Dust was S3 Dash having to look back at S1 Dash, but it would be far more accurate to say that the meeting was S1-3 Dash being given a preview of what the writers would be turning her into for S4-9. What might actually surprise you, however, is how close she came to being tiered anyway. The tier-overwriting properties of the S-Tier very nearly landed Dash there, due to how the rest of the bearers betrayed her by becoming Mare-Do-Well to shatter Dash’s sense of self-worth and ruin her reputation, laughing at the pain they were causing her with it, then browbeating her into seeing herself as the real villain of the story. The one incident that threatens the position is her sabotage of the Cloudsdale weather factory. I’m on the fence as to whether this incident can be considered worthy of an E-Tier placement, and am erring on the side of caution. “Well, assume it wasn’t. What would she rank if she wasn’t in S-Tier?” In that case, I’d put her in D-Tier; she condemned Trixie for her ego despite being eager for a chance to upstage her and being a massive egotist besides, and she was fine with Gabby Gums until she was in the metaphorical crosshairs.
Iron Will: Again, this one should be obvious. In his first appearance, he was a reasonable person underneath his volume and bluster. In his second, he was an utter slimeball.
Flim and Flam: Like with Rainbow Dash, these two very nearly got put in S-Tier, with only a single incident holding them back. Specifically, I’m not entirely sure whether they’d deserve an E-Tier or maybe even F-Tier rating for Leap of Faith, since letting Granny Smith dive was negligence rather than malice. “But shouldn’t they be rated low anyway? They were always con men, after all.” No, they weren’t. In their first appearance, they were legitimate inventors and entrepreneurs who got screwed. Their cider before turning off quality control was good enough to silence Granny Smith’s objections about whether their quality was up to par. Without the rest of the Mane Six bailing Sweet Apple Acres out, the SSCS6k was six times as fast as the Apples’ standard speed, and triple their absolute maximum. And the only reason they needed to turn off qc in the first place was because of Applejack bringing in the outside help. The one thing they did that was close to shady was offering such a crap deal at the beginning, but the fact that they readily admitted to being the ones who got the lion’s share of the profit heavily suggests that this wasn’t a scam attempt, but either a poor grasp of sound business practices or an expectation to haggle over the contract. Take away the protagonist-centered morality and familiarity with the characters on one side of the conflict, and the plot of The Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000 is a downer story about an incompetent but entrenched monopoly destroying its small but superior competitor via connections and loopholes. And because of that, if they didn’t get S-Tier, I’d still give them Untiered even if they weren’t E or F.
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Best Creature:
Sunset Shimmer: “You’d better have a good explanation for this.” It is odd, isn’t it. As lovable as post-EqG1 Sunset is, given that this tier list takes actions into account, you’d expect her to be B-Tier at best. But there’s one detail that, for me at least, catapults her to the top despite this. Namely, that she’s the only redeemed villain who’s been handled properly. Everyone else was rushed at best, often not having to really make amends, face consequences, or try to change (or in some cases, even acknowledge that they were wrong). But Sunset faced scorn for her past even after her Heel-Face Turn, and understandably so, and only started to break free of her reputation after saving everyone from the Sirens. Combine that with her legitimate effort to be a better person, and you have the series’ solitary instance of a satisfying, believable redemption arc.
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S-Tier:
Spike: I weep for this poor drake. His entire life he’s been forced to do everything – including writing – for Twilight while she either studies or otherwise does as she pleases, living on the crown’s dime. And when he and Twilight move to Ponyville at the series’ start, things only get worse, as Rarity strings him along to get free labor out of him. And Twilight does nothing to protect him from Rarity’s predations. His first birthday in Ponyville may very well have been the first time in his life that things were about him rather than those over him. And then what happened immediately after… I can only imagine the damage that must have caused his psyche. And thanks to the final episode, we know that this will never change. Were he not in S, Spike would be in A-Tier. Any misdeed he's done is minor and can be ascribed to him still being a kid, and he played a key role in stopping both Sombra and the Storm King.
Trixie: Like with Flim and Flam, the writers wanted us to hate Trixie and see her as a villain from her very first appearance, but also like the bros, she’s done nothing to earn that hate. The closest thing she’s done to something wrong was bragging about defeating an Ursa, but given that she was a street performer, it’s almost certain that she was merely trying to build hype and had no inkling that anyone would actually be stupid enough to take her seriously – especially seriously enough to actually bring an Ursa to town for her to fight. She humiliated Dash, AJ, and Rarity, true, but only because they tried to upstage her at her own show – and the only reason she issued the challenge to set it up was because the three were heckling her before the show even began. It was those three, not her, who were wrong there, and their humiliation was completely deserved. And after Twilight defeated the Ursa, it was Trixie, not the morons who actually brought the Ursa, who was blamed, leading to her having to flee town with nothing but the clothes on her back, despite doing nothing wrong. Yet despite being the victim here, the story was spun and spread in such a way that her reputation was utterly ruined across the entire nation. Yet despite this, much like with the bros, the writers decided to try and turn her into a villain for her second appearance. However, in this case they failed. All of Trixie’s actions can be attributed to the fact that the Alicorn Amulet drives its user insane. Trixie did seek the amulet out, true, but it’s entirely possible that she didn’t know about its mind-scrambling effects, or underestimated its effect, or most likely of all, was so desperate that she saw it as an acceptable risk if the reward was getting her life back. But whatever the case, in the end, she ended up exactly as she did at the end of her first appearance – destitute, universally hated, and with no hope for the future. All ultimately because of idiocy and cruelty of Ponyville. “But she got a redemption arc…” She didn’t need a redemption arc; what she needs is a vindication arc. Were it not for her S status, Trixie would be a B. Despite the circumstances around it, she did seek out the Alicorn Amulet.
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A-Tier:
Shining Armor: There’s not much to say here, really. His worst actions were done while Chrysalis’ thrall, and he actively participated in both her first defeat and Sombra’s.
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B-Tier:
Flash Sentry: Problem? Despite the near-universal hatred that he gets, the worst that Flash can be accused of is being boring. Seriously, get over his inclusion disproving your otp. Or, if you’re screaming over him “stealing” “your” mare, get professional help.
Flurry Heart: “Well duh. Flurry’s a baby. Of course she’d land in B. Why even bring it up?” Congratulations, you’re smarter than half the fanbase, which acts as if she’s the Antichrist. That’s half the reason I bring it up. The other half is to show that Flurry is Best Princess, by virtue of being the only not-bad princess.
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C-Tier:
Pinkie Pie: Pinkie means well. She really does. But that doesn’t change the fact that more often than not, her infantile view that her having fun means everyone else is having fun leads to her making others around her miserable – such as Luna during Nightmare Night, Cranky before Pinkie realized that he and Matilda were long-lost lovers, Maud when she moved to Ponyville, and so on. “But she always learns her lesson in the end…” First of all, not always. She was seen as the one who was right in Luna Eclipsed, after all. Second, if she truly learned her lesson, the lesson would have stuck. But it never does. If there’s any silver lining, though, it’s the fact that her misdeeds stemming from stupidity rather than malice precludes her from joining the others in D-Tier or lower over shared sins.
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D-Tier:
Applejack: Let’s be real, here. Applejack is a sham. All the way from the first episode, her honesty has been a completely informed attribute. Her supposed proof of honesty had nothing to do with the concept. She condemns Dash and Trixie for their egos despite being extremely prideful herself. She brags about not bragging during the Mare-Do-Well incident. She makes and brakes a promise she never had any intention of keeping to avoid admitting to why she fled Ponyville, and lied about her lie when confronted over it. She claims to have been right all along after Flim and Flam flee Ponyville even though she was wrong about everything. Like the others, she has no issues with Gabby Gums until she’s the target. She chastises the CMC for standing up to Babs instead of coming to her about it, even though Apple Bloom turned to her all the way back when Diamond Tiara first started bullying her and then continued doing nothing even when Diamond came to bully Bloom at her own home. In no way does Applejack deserve the Element of Honesty.
Rarity: Ugh. I can’t stand women like Rarity. Vain, self-absorbed, manipulative, sees men as nothing but mindless perverts to be used and discarded by her… But Rarity takes it to a whole new level with her stringing along a prepubescent for free labor. Frankly, her generosity is her only redeeming quality, and even that’s cast into doubt most of the time due to how much debt she should be in to Spike. But none of that is enough to land her in D-Tier. She’s here because she condemns Trixie and Dash for their egos despite her own, and her having no issue with Gabby Gums until they leak her diary.
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E-Tier:
Fluttershy: “What!? This has to be some sort of mistake!” As much as I may wish that were the case, it is not. The painful truth is, whenever an evil doesn’t directly threaten her, she takes its side more often than not. She participated in the Mare-Do-Well scheme. She browbeat Applejack into surrendering her orchard to a ravenous swarm of invasive, destructive vermin. She sided with Starlight Glimmer until she was equalized, imprisoned, and subjected to attempted brainwashing, and even then only when hearing Starlight’s crimes listed in her own voice. She tried to prevent Applejack from developing a cure for the Silencing until the kirin tried to Silence her. But by far her worst crime, and the one that lands her in E-Tier, is betraying the world to Discord. He had already broken his end of the bargain, and there was no logical reason to assume that Discord would just throw victory away over something that he demonstrates is of no value to him one season later. By all accounts, Fluttershy refusing to petrify Discord should have resulted in evil winning right then and there, and she had no reason to believe otherwise.
Cadance: “But why? Shouldn’t she be in A-Tier?” No. Her special talent is brainwashing, and as her introductory flashback shows, she has no qualms about using it. That willingness alone should mark her as a villain.
Wallflower Blush: No. Don’t even try to defend her. She erased everyone’s memories of Sunset’s repentance and heroism motivated entirely by envy and hatred, and not only received no punishment by the end, but was actually treated like the victim, with Sunset being seen as the villain and even having to apologize to her. There are no words to describe how ass-backwards this is. No, she didn’t learn her lesson; again, she walked away being seen as the victim and was even rewarded. No, she doesn’t love Sunset, no matter how much you screech that she does; her motivation was hatred, and her actions bear that out. “But she was corrupted by—” Oh really? Where does the show indicate that anywhere? Oh, that’s right, it doesn’t. She was seeking a way to make Sunset suffer already when she first stumbled on the Memory Stone; the stone just gave her the means to fulfil her desires. Wallflower wasn’t the victim, she isn’t Sunset’s girlfriend, and and she isn’t someone to feel pity for. She’s a villain who was rewarded for her evil acts by incompetent and/or depraved writers. Nothing more.
Sombra: He’s a generic fantasy-setting tyrant. The only noteworthy thing is that I cannot take him seriously with the voice they gave him in S9. Move along.
Nightmare Moon: “Not F-Tier?” That’s right. Despite Faust stating that she envisioned Night Eternal as a global extinction event, the S5 finale shows that it isn’t, which just leaves her as a would-be tyrant.
Discord: FiM’s original “villain that got away with it”. The only reason he “lost” in Keep Calm and Flutter On is because the script said he gives up, despite Twilight’s Kingdom showing that he values his freedom more than his friendship with Fluttershy. And no, he never learns his lesson. His actions are far more consistent with someone who’s still trying to make everyone around him miserable but just trying to keep the wool pulled over Fluttershy’s eyes. And let’s not forget that he’s the one that freed Tirek and Cozy Glow from Tartarus, restored Tirek and Chrysalis, and resurrected Sombra to form the Legion of Doom. Discord should have been sent back to stone multiple times over.
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F-Tier:
Tirek: A literally power-hungry monster that tried to bring about the end of the world. What more needs to be said?
Cozy Glow: Regardless of her age, she tried to destroy the world twice and has never shown a single shred of remorse.
Sunset Satan: A bloodthirsty, mind-raping would-be tyrant. Is there anyone who’d seriously question this ranking?
Chrysalis: See Tirek, but add mind rape to the mix.
The Sirens: Like Chrysalis, but competent. If I had to order them, I’d put Aria first (only because I dislike the others more), Sonata (while her idiocy is well-written enough to be funny, it would grate irl), and Adagio last (an even worse version of Rarity with none of the redeeming qualities)
Starlight Glimmer: In her initial appearance, Starlight is a chillingly accurate depiction of an SJW that gets her hands on power – a dictator that tears everyone down to the lowest common denominator “for their own good” while hoarding power for herself and forcing compliance from anyone within her reach, utterly convinced all the while that she’s the hero. She continues this trend in her second appearance, where she triggers the apocalypse multiple times while trying to rewrite history to make it comply with her twisted worldview. And then… she throws away her victory for no reason and is made Twilight’s student and the main character. Why?? As things are, she stands between Discord and Wallflower. Like both, she never actually learns her lesson. Like Discord, she only “loses” because she gives up after she’s already won, and only because the script says so. Like Wallflower, she’s rewarded for her evil. And like Discord, she can get away with anything after her “reformation” (Every Little Thing She Does, anyone?).
Luna: “Lower than Nightmare Moon!? Why? How?” I’ll get there in a minute. There’s something else I need to address first. Namely, her dreamwalking. Had this concept been handled carefully, it could have been interesting. But it wasn’t handled carefully. Luna’s established to be the only one that can use it, that she can use it to rip memories out of others’ heads without their knowledge or consent, and she’s shown that she’s willing to abuse it to compel others to follow a certain path of action. It’s been used to make her a tyrant. But that’s not what lands her in F. No, what lands her here is her complicity in the alicorns’ ongoing campaign of genocide against ponykind. “…WHAT!? Where do you get off—” Let me explain. In the final episodes, it’s established both that alicornhood is immortality (as seen by Twilight not aging while everyone else does) and that everyone can conceivably become an alicorn under the right circumstances (as seen by Cozy Glow’s ascension). In the first and last episodes of S3, it’s established that Celestia has access to at least one such method of ascension, and that she only grants it to those that she deems “worthy” – effectively condemning everypony else to death for not meeting her standards. Standards, by the way, that she doesn’t even give the vast majority of ponies the chance to meet, as she only tests for “worthiness” from her personal students. And given how she picks those, Earth Ponies and Pegasi are seen as “unworthy” by default. The first episodes of S3 establish that Luna’s aware of this. That makes her an accomplice. The only reason she ranks higher than her sister or Twilight is that she doesn’t approve of Celestia putting countless innocent lives on the line as part of her “tests”. Though considering that it still leaves her as a tyrant and accessory to genocide, that isn’t saying much.
Twilight Sparkle: The pawn of Celestia. Even to the end, she approves of all her mentor’s actions. And judging by the fact that none of her “friends” are alicorns, she’s clearly carrying on the campaign of genocide. Really, her propensity for mind rape is almost not even worth mentioning at this point. Almost.
Celestia: “How dare you. How dare you put the most loving, benevolent pony if F-Tier?” Loving? The pony whose idea of a good time is ruining the biggest high society event for everyone involved? The pony whose modus operandi is manipulation? The pony who puts countless innocent lives on the line as a “test”? Benevolent? The leader of the alicorns’ genocide campaign? Celestia is not loving, benevolent, wise, or anything else the fandom ascribes to her. She’s a manipulative, genocidal sadist with delusions of godhood. “But she is a god!” No, she isn’t. “Yes she is! Lauren Faust stated that she originally intended to make her a god, but Hasbro forced her to change it. That proves she’s a god!” No, it proves the exact opposite. Though it’s rather convenient of you to leave out when Faust explicitly stated that neither the alicorns nor the draconequii were divine. Besides, the show confirms that Flurry Heart was the first alicorn to be born as such, and that both ponykind and the nation of Equestria predate Celestia. Plus, if Celestia’s a god, why is she weaker than every villain from S4 back? “She’s not, she was just holding back!” So you’re telling me that she deliberately let evil win in each of the bad futures in the S5 finale? If so, you only prove my point about her being evil further.
Harmony: Blame S8 establishing Harmony as sapient and autonomous for this ranking. Because of these data points, we know that Harmony would have let Tirek win had Twilight not surrendered to him, and that it just chose to not act during the Storm King’s invasion. Furthermore, the same episode that establishes that it’s sapient has it trying to kill children for not being close enough of friends to meet some arbitrary standard of oneness. Yet this monster is the ultimate power in the setting, capable of defeating any other power and able to regenerate itself from total destruction. Furthermore, it’s the only thing holding back the apocalypse. Harmony’s existence establishes that in Equestria, evil has already won.
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Worst Pony:
Star Swirl: Of course, a genocidal sadist and unstoppable, murderous A.I. pales in comparison to the bastard that taught the former and created the latter. Star Swirl created the two vilest evils in the setting, and given how vocal he is on his opinions, the fact that he doesn’t condemn either must be seen as approval of both. Ultimately, it’s his fault that Equestria is in the state it’s in. At this point, that his go-to method of solving crises is to make it humanity’s problem is just adding insult to injury.
And that concludes my tier list/rant.
...I am so very glad that I have you to keep me honest. And get me thinking about things.
I hope you don't mind me giving a few thoughts on this. Rather than going over the list and critiquing it in detail, I'm just going to touch on a few things.
Wallflower Blush. I despise the sunflower shipping myself but she isn't a villain. She was an immature child in possession of something that she didn't fully grasp the power of what it was capable of doing before it was way too late. If being an immature child makes someone a full-blown villain then the entire human race deserves to be treated likewise as there isn't a single human not guilty of the same behavior. "But the memory stone, wiping memories..." It doesn't matter. None of it does because she didn't know better. I will grant that what she did was out of malice and with intent but it wasn't done with the understanding of what was going to result from it. What she was doing at the end of the special wasn't premeditated. It was entirely reactionary to the situation at hand. She didn't know that she was going to effectively kill anyone before Sunset's last memory wipe until after the fact. You don't judge a child as equal in standing to a cold-blooded killer for doing something horrifically wrong when they aren't capable of comprehending just how dangerous something is beforehand. Yes, her lack of punishment is disturbing to see but I ask you what is the suitable punishment for an immature child that nearly kills someone with a proverbial magical gun?
Fluttershy. First, the vermin. If you are talking about the fruit bats Fluttershy pointed out that the ecological benefits of keeping them around were greater than the occasional loss of the apples that they consumed. This, of course, overlooks what the rest of the mane 6 did to Fluttershy. I guess trying to force nature to bend to your will is better than a healthy ecological balance.
Second, Discord. You are passing judgement based upon something that didn't happen. Do you have any idea how asinine that is and how hypocritical it makes this entire take? It doesn't matter how possible it was. It didn't happen. Does it make sense for anyone to judge you as a cold-blooded mass murderer because it is possible that you could have been? No! So why are you passing the same judgement here? Yes, Fluttershy took a great risk in not letting her friends stone Discord when he seemed to resort back to his old self. However, she did it believing that she had done enough with Discord that he had changed for the better. This was the moment of truth to see if she was right. Whenever you are dealing with someone that is a reformed bad person, real-life or fiction, you will eventually reach this moment. You have to eventually give the supposedly reformed person the chance to show that they are truly reformed. When you do this there will always be the chance that things will not go well because they haven't reformed.
When things don't go poorly you can't then pass judgement on the person that made the decision to give them the chance as if things did go poorly. It is illogical and incredibly stupid to do so. You pass judgement based upon how risky the decision was and if it needed to be made. How risky was it? Very as Equestria could have been lost. Did it have to be made? Yes, Discord forced a very tough decision on Fluttershy in that episode. So Fluttershy was put into a very difficult spot where she had to make a very difficult and risky decision. Hmm. This is starting to look something like Stanislav Petrov's unenviable position on the 26th of September 1983. Ultimately Fluttershy made the right decision in a very difficult position. Passing judgement on what could have been if she was wrong is quite daft, to say the least. It seems that you are trying to force such a judgement on her due to an unjustified bias rather than judging her fairly by her actual merits and deeds alone.
That, ultimately, is why I don't have much, if any, interest or desire to go over this take in detail. Just skimming through it there seems to be a not-insignificant amount of judgement by bias rather than judgement by merit. For another example, Star Swirl being the worst appears to be mostly due to bias stemming from the fact that he is painted as a good guy when most of the crimes against him that would be meaningful in a court of law don't go to the level of severity that a few full-on villains are guilty of. For the record, I myself think he is one of the worst characters of the show. Thus, while I don't think you are far off, your given reason for why he is the worst is superficial at best.
5500443
...I don't know how to open this without sounding like a jackass, so I'm just going to get right into it.
First, Wallflower:
And yet she kept willingly using it. If she really didn't mean to cause any harm, she would've stopped after her first usage. Instead, she decided to use it to ruin Sunset's life.
I don't know about you, but I've never deliberately erased others' memories. Nor would I ever have, even if I had the means to. There's a huge difference between, say, throwing some things around indiscriminately in a tantrum and deliberately ruining the life of someone you don't like via mass mind rape.
...She "didn't know better" than to deliberately delete others' memories?
Bull. She knew full well that she was going to make Sunset universally hated again. That's the entire reason why she did it!
And shooting cops that are trying to arrest you for a crime you did commit doesn't make you any less of a murderer.
And that's why I didn't put her in F-Tier. But that doesn't change anything she did before that.
Now to Fluttershy:
And Applejack already made it clear that the farm's history has proven that they don't provide an ecological benefit, because it's not just "occasional loss", it's widespread destruction that very nearly ended the farm in the past.
If you're talking about Twilight accidentally scrambling her mind, then that can only be blamed on Twilight, not the others. If you mean them siding with Applejack over her... oh no, they disagreed with her in order to protect their friend's livelihood. How terrible.</sarcasm>
Now, for Discord. First of all, when you say...
I'm going to assume what you mean is "Discord gave up after Fluttershy sided with him", because if you're trying to deny him allying with Tirek or forming the Legion of Doom, then there's no point in talking. Now, instead of repeating myself over and over with responding point-by-point to what is mostly a repeated argument, let me pose you a hypothetical scenario. You see someone you know is a dangerous criminal (say, it's the middle of a bank robbery) line up a bunch of hostages against a wall, pull out a gun, and press its barrel against the head of a hostage. You've somehow avoided detection up to this point, and you have a gun yourself. You pull it out, point it at the criminal, and shout "Drop the gun or I shoot!" Against all odds, instead of whipping around and shooting you the instant you opened your mouth, the would-be murderer raises his hands and says "Alright, alright, just drop your gun and I'll drop mine." You drop your gun. He shoots the hostage. Do you pick up your gun and shoot him before he kills anyone else, or do you just stand there, because "he hasn't shot the others yet, I can't hold what he might continue to do against him"? To be logically consistent with your defense of Discord, you must pick the latter. Because Fluttershy sided with him twice, and it's the second one I brought up and am condemning her for. If Discord had restored Sweet Apple Acres when it was flooded instead of frozen, you'd have an argument. But when Fluttershy promised to stand down if he fixed things, he made things worse instead. He was given a chance to prove he reformed and instead proved that he didn't! That the script says that, against what it just established, Discord stands down the second time doesn't mean Fluttershy made the right call in a tough position. It means that she lucked out when she made the wrong one in an easy position. Just because your bad decision ultimately works out doesn't mean it wasn't a bad decision. To use your analogy, I'm not condemning an innocent man for potentially killing someone at some point in the future. I'm calling for someone who just now committed murder to be taken down by any means necessary before he murders again.
As for Star Swirl:
That's not what I said at all. I don't even see how what I said can even be construed as such.
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In the same way immature children bully other children. It is because they end up with the desire to, find a target and then do so. A massive majority of children that bully others aren't doing so to deliberately cause harm if studies on the matter are to be believed. They do it not realizing any consequences to what they are doing. Wallflower didn't realize the consequences of what she was doing until at the very end. Once she realized the harm that she was doing she was horrified by her actions.
You are talking about a complete hypothetical. Something that can't be done in real life. The closest we can come is hypnosis. Also, no there isn't a difference when the ultimate result of ruining a life is the same.
... She didn't know better in terms of the consequences. I spelled that out for you. Multiple times now.
It isn't bull. What you are talking about is intent. It is not the same thing as knowing the consequences of the method she went about attempting it. Thus what I said is entirely true. Learn to recognize the difference between intent to do something and the consequences of how you go about doing something, please.
Not quite equivalent but I see the parallels that you are trying to make. What Wallflower did, if it were done with a weapon that could kill, would be second-degree attempted murder with the second state of malice. In your example, the cops would have been shot, killed, and then brought back to life as if they were never shot in the first place. So technically harm was done but then it wasn't. This isn't a no harm, no foul situation though. In this sense murder isn't an applicable comparison to be making. This is why I think your term of mind rape is a more appropriate term and what Wallflower did should be more compared to that than to murder.
The major problems with this example are that the victims weren't cops, it isn't comparable to murder for the reason above and what Wallflower did has no established law against it either here or apparently in Equestria. It is effectively a massive grey area like Wall Street is at the moment. Yes, what she did was wrong but there is no established precedent known to judge her by.
No, she didn't. She only said the equivalent that they were doing fine beforehand without them. Doing fine beforehand does not provide proof that there isn't an ecological benefit to having them around. As for the widespread destruction? Fluttershy said that they could be restricted to a small part of the orchard while still providing the universal overall ecological benefits. What we are talking about is very similar to the natural flooding of farmlands or the natural burning of forests. While you don't want either to do their thing freely as that causes massive overall damage you still want them to happen as there are massive benefits to them happening. Thus the answer is controlled flooding or fires. If done right you reap the overall ecological benefits while mitigating the damage. This is what Fluttershy was trying to get Applejack to realize.
The blame goes to all of them. They were all accomplices to the act as they all pressured Fluttershy into cooperating. Thus they are all as guilty as Twilight.
No. In terms of the latter two instances, you cannot point the finger at Fluttershy. She wasn't an accomplice as Discord acted on his own accord. She also can't be rejudged for her decision to not stone Discord for those actions either. They both are completely separate instances at a later time where Fluttershy didn't even have the option to turn Discord to stone. Or we can just be illogical revisionists that ignore time completely and the fact that Discord had shown to everyone that he had changed enough to be allowed to be free and say that everything was immediately sequential and Discord never actually showed enough to any other character that he had changed from who he was.
Your logic couldn't be more asinine. The scenarios aren't even comparable in the slightest either.
Clearly not. She refused to stone him once and only once. In Applejack's Orchard at the end of Keep Calm and Flutter On. The first part of Princess Twilight Sparkle doesn't count. Fluttershy didn't refuse to stone him outright. She argued that they shouldn't on the grounds that he may be telling the truth, which he technically was. That isn't an open refusal to stone him like you are claiming it is. She wasn't pushed and forced to make a decision not to. Also, everyone wasn't up in arms looking to stone him in that instance either as it was only three of the six that openly called for him to be stoned. Claiming that Fluttershy was the only one responsible for not stoning him is being quite presumptuous on the thoughts of the other two. For all we know both Twilight and Pinkie were against stoning him as much as Fluttershy was. Maybe even more so as Twilight may never have had it as an option on the table. The other two didn't voice their take so we will never truly know. Ultimately, Fluttershy isn't responsible in the slightest for not stoning Discord the second time as she was never forced to make a decision either way because it never actually got to that point.
Had they stoned him that moment they wouldn't have solved the problem as quickly as they did, if they would have at all, as it was Discord who told them whom they should turn to for help immediately after Fluttershy pointed out that he may have been telling the truth. While Zecora did come out of the forest at that moment as well it was Discord's prompting of them to ask Zecora to get them to ask the relevant question as it needed to be asked to get to the bottom of the matter as quickly as possible. As much as Discord was reverting to his old self during the two-part episode while being defiant to the Mane 6's inquiries he was the critical piece that started to get the ball rolling to solving the problem as quickly as possible. Yes, he was responsible for what happened but he was also the key turning point to getting the problem solved. In his own way Discord cleaned up his own mess that he created so long ago using the Mane 6 to do it. All while being his stuck up, high and mighty egotistical self the entire time while being able to proverbially thumb his nose at Twilight at the end.
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Ah, so you weren't arguing good faith. Time to take off the kid gloves, then.
Even if that were true, that doesn't make what they do any less wrong. Though congratulations on defending bullying in your effort to defend Wallflower.
That's not my point and you know it. The point is that there's a huge difference between accidentally hurting someone while not actually trying to hurt anyone and deliberately, premeditatively hurting someone.
Ah, so you think intent is pointless, then? That an accident is no different from deliberate and premeditated malice?
Intent: make everyone hate Sunset
Consequences: everyone hates Sunset
The consequences were that she got her intent. She knew what she was doing, and did it because she knew.
Quit trying to evade the argument. The point is that wicked acts committed to avoid the consequences of other wicked acts are no better.
Doesn't make what she did any less wrong.
LIAR! Applejack made it explicitly clear that the last time the bats came, Sweet Apple Acres very nearly didn't survive! That was the entire crux of her argument!
If you honestly believe the bats would just stay in that fenced-off area without author fiat overwriting realism, I have some prime beachfront property in Kansas to sell you.
Hypocrite. Your defense of Wallflower is that she didn't know she was deliberately doing, yet you condemn the mane 6 for not knowing what Twilight was doing when she herself didn't foresee unintended side effects?
Okay, here I'm willing to believe that you're honestly misreading me; looking back, that was poorly worded on my part. I wasn't trying to blame Fluttershy there. A better wording of my statement there would be "I assume you're still trying to defend Fluttershy via pointing out the writers made Discord forfeit after winning, not trying to defend Discord for anything he did afterwards".
FiM: Discord floods Sweet Apple Acres
Scenario: criminal prepares to shoot a hostage
FiM: Fluttershy tells Discord to fix things
Scenario: you tell the would-be murderer to drop the gun
FiM: Discord agrees, on the condition that Fluttershy abstain from using the Elements against him
Scenario: criminal agrees to drop his gun if you drop yours first
FiM: Fluttershy agrees to not use the Element
Scenario: you lay down your gun
FiM: Discord doesn't fix things, and instead freezes Sweet Apple Acres over
Scenario: criminal doesn't drop the gun, and instead goes through with his plan to murder the hostages
FiM: Fluttershy decides to let Discord get away with it
Scenario: ???
Oh sure, they aren't comparable.. except for the fact that in both instances an evildoer that promises to stand down in exchange for mercy doesn't actually stand down once mercy is extended. To be logically consistent, you must either replace the "???" with "allow the criminal to keep killing hostages", or condemn Fluttershy's decision to let Discord continue his cruelties unchecked. And since you're defending Fluttershy, there's only one logically consistent option open to you.
She refused to stone him twice there, as I said. Once in exchange for his cooperation, and again after he refused (thus proving he had no intent of reforming).
Never even factored into my argument.
Tl;dr: Your misdirections have no power here.
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I was. It was you who wasn't by trying to force words into my mouth with responses like this:
You painted a false narrative and then tried to say that I said x when I said nothing of the like. On the contrary, I have yet to do anything of the like to you.
I'm not defending bullying and I am not defending Wallflower. More bad faith arguing from you. No, it doesn't make it any less wrong. I never tried to say as much. I only tried to say that your argument was being overly heavy-handed because you aren't accurately judging Wallflower's behavior.
Hard to tell what your genuine point is when you hide everything behind a fictional hypothetical that allows you to shift your potential argument so don't do it. Yes, there is a massive difference. The problem is that Wallflower's biggest crime, by far, was not premeditated at all. It was completely reactionary. While getting Sunset's friends to forget who she was is by no means trivial it pales in comparison to what she tried to do the last time she used the memory stone. Also, we don't know to what degree any of Wallflower's actions were premeditated, or even if they were at all. For all we know the special doesn't show a particular interaction that set Wallflower off. If that is what happened then none of this was premeditated. The only thing we have to go by is Wallflower's admittance at the end as to why she did what she did. The problem is that there isn't enough there to give any sort of concrete timeline of events from Wallflower's perspective that lead to the events of the special taking place.
More bad faith arguing from you as you try to force more words in my mouth. No, I don't think that intent is pointless and that isn't what I was trying to say. What I was trying to say was that regardless of if there is intent or not it doesn't change the net result. A la it doesn't matter if person x intended to kill person y or not it does not change the net result of the fact that person y is dead. Again, that doesn't mean that I am saying intent doesn't matter. It just means that I am saying that intent doesn't change the net outcome.
This would not hold up in court because you don't know what consequences are. Due to this, you are completely missing what is what. I also genuinely don't know if anyone can get you to understand where you are falling wrong but I will try. Everyone hating Sunset isn't a consequence in the court of law in regards to Wallflower's actions. It is an intended result of Wallflower's actions. In court that is two different things. The consequence is people losing their memory of Sunset being good because Wallflower used the memory stone to get her intended result.
To reiterate: The intent was Wallflower getting everyone to hate Sunset. The method used was using the memory stone to wipe everyone's good memories of Sunset. The consequences were everyone losing their memory of Sunset being good. Everyone hating Sunset was the end result and not the consequence. That is how everything would fit in a case in the court of law.
I wasn't trying to evade the argument. I was making a relevant point. One you clearly missed. I was trying to get you to realize that looking at what Wallflower did as something akin to murder was the wrong way to look at it. Yes, your point is true. That is why I never tried to debate it. However, the perspective with which you are judging what Wallflower did, by comparing it to murder, is an ill-advised perspective to be looking at it from.
Correct. The same goes for a lot of what goes on on Wall Street, EA's loot boxes, or any number of "moral grey area" matters.
I am not lying. If you go back over the episode transcript you would see this to be true. Her response to Fluttershy's point about the bats being beneficial is to effectively say that they are making life harder for her. The closest she came to saying that Sweet Apple Acres "very nearly didn't survive!" is this: "You don't know what it was like the last time there was an infestation, but Granny Smith has told me enough stories about it that just the thought of it gives me nightmares! [narrating] Granny says we lost a huge section of orchard that year. They had to ration out apples all winter!" To be frank that is hardly Sweet Apple Acres "very nearly didn't survive!"
Fluttershy said that they could be limited to eating a certain section of the Orchard. This was confirmed to have been what happened when this episode was referenced in a later season in the show when the bats were brought up again. I'll take the show saying that it did happen over you saying that it is nonsense.
I'm not being a hypocrite. I didn't condemn the mane 6 for what happened to Fluttershy. I only said that they all equally should shoulder any blame for what happened because they all pressured Fluttershy into doing the stare which led to what happened to her as a response to you saying that only Twilight should take any blame for what happened.
They aren't remotely comparable. Murder is nowhere near the same as the destruction of property. Someone destroying a possession of yours is nowhere near the same ballpark of crime as them killing you. Until you can fathom this difference I will not continue to discuss this particular part of the discussion.
The two times in that episode count as one instance because the situation didn't ultimately change between the two particular examples. Thus the second refusal was a just continuation of the first and not its own example to go by. Also, if he did end up reforming can you really say that he had no intent of reforming?
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Tl;dr: a massive wall of more lies, distortions, denial of past points, and other bad-faith arguments while accusing me of the same.
The irony. It flows from you like water down a river. I get you. You aren't interested in talking about why you think what you do. You just want to get off on said thoughts. My apologies for interrupting.
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I'd be fine with talking, if the response to my talking wasn't lying, distorting, misdirecting, and changing arguments, all while accusing me of being the one to do so. But there's clearly no low you won't stoop to in order to be right. So good riddance.
5501795
Yet I never did such things so clearly not... As I said, the irony.