(thread)
Edelgard
The single most contentious character in the entire Fire Emblem series. One I believe is worthy of criticism, but also one whose actions and their context are distorted to fir a narrative. This will be long, but I hope this gives a clearer picture to who she is.

She should have talked to someone:
1.Her Siblings are all dead or insane
2.her father is powerless to stop corruption
3.TWSITD have raised her as a weapon
4.both the Kingdom and Alliance are incredibly corrupt
5. The Church historically has allowed the corruption to flourish

Lets elaborate. From a young age Edelgard was robbed of her family, tortured and turned into a pawn for someone else. Meanwhile the Kingdom was suppressing two sovereign nations and the Alliance assassinating nobles to perpetuate the Almyran conflicts.

Her Father lost all his power due to attempting to suppress the corruption of the nobles, leading to 6 nobles rising up against him taking all the power in the empire. Under this rule, Brigid was forced to comply under strict imperial rule.

The Crest system isn't that bad:
Hanneman lost his sister to Marital abuse
Dorothea was tossed out, declared as a bastard
Miklan was disinherited completely
Sylvain is seen as an object rather than a person
Mercedes and Ingrid are constantly being married off to opportunistic men

Linhardt is being forced into a line of work he is uninterested in
Mannuela is no longer seen as desirable and she has no crest to fall back on, meaning she lost the field of work she loved
Bernadetta was abused constantly by her father
Marianne is constantly shunned by rumors of

her heritage
Leonie has to work much harder than everyone else to afford the same privileges due to her lack of income
Lorenz is raised from a very young age to see others as lesser than himself
Lysithea was tortured and experimented upon and people still want to use her for

political gain
And that doesn't count the NPCs that mention assassinations, their villages being decimated by noble forces, and other horrid things. Saying "this system works" is dishonest and ignore the horrors within fodlan.
So what about the Kingdom? how is it corrupt?

Tradition: The Traditions of the Kingdom
1. View children with crests as bargaining chips
2. Views those without as lesser
3. holds men to an unwavering sense of loyalty based only on one's station
4. Holds men to an unrelenting honor system that tears apart families

5. Holds men to an honor system that allows for the justification of subjugating two sovereign nations based on minor squabbles our outright hearsay.
but What of the Alliance? how are they Corrupt?

The Alliance:
1. Has the same Noble superiority
2. has frequent power struggles leading to underhanded assassinations
3. Constantly reignites feuds with Almyra due to the unwillingness of many to see them as people
So what can we gather from all of this?

Why would Edelgard trust ANYONE with her thoughts on the world? Why would she tell anyone about them? With her powers stripped away, in the halls of the Church, with alliance, Kingdom, and Imperial representatives that ALL would have reasons to see you ousted?with TWSITD watching

her moves. She HAS to work in secret. Her Uncle essentially rules the Empire and she can't trust anyone aside from a VERY select few.
Ok but why start a war?
Simple. There is no way to eliminate such a system, rally the Empire against the nobility, retake power, and diminish the

influence the crests have on politics in a peaceful manner within her lifetime without having her intentions exposed and her disposed of, killing her goals.
But wouldn't the nobles have all their power still? No they were stripped of it and put under house arrest.

Wow she must be a tyrant for taking all that power. No, in each ending she uses her power to better the world she builds and steps down from power having the people elect a new one. "wouldn't the nobles just use their money and influence?" No because that was suppressed already.

"wow a meritocracy". That ignores the Constance support where she describes a democratically elected office.
What about Brigid? Sovereignty is restored and becomes a ally of the Empire.
What about Duscur, Sreng, and Almyra. All the Nobles who perpetuated the conflicts and

subjugation there were stripped of their power.
What about Sothis. Sothis never once sided against Byleth in CF, and assuming she would ignores how the Church of Seiros's religion was founded by Seiros not Sothis. She has not stake in the conflict one way or the other.

"She's Racist"
Literally the only times she ever speaks to someone who isnt her race it is either light hearted banter or reverence for their battle prowess,She never once focuses on Race being a way to judge a person and anyone who claims this is wrong from the game's standpoint

"She was Wrong about Nemesis"
Yeah, so? It's hard to get information correct when the main power in the land is actively barring it from you.
"She Committed Genocide"
WHEN, genuinely when?

"She set Bernadetta on Fire"
And I guess Gilbert is a zombie due to dying in the tower? Gameplay that is never acknowledged by the characters is hard to see as canonical, not only that, that's not really how Fire works in 3H, it's not instant death.

"She is a Fascist"
No she flat out isn't. She reduces the powers of the nobility, spends her life to achieve her goal, then steps down when the people select a new governing body.

"She was going to kill her friends"
If you ignore her pleading with them to leave, yeah.
Also, She NEVER forces ANYONE to join her, not even Jeritza, as he reveals the two made a deal even after she gave him his hunting grounds.

Is edelgard responsible for Flayn's Kidnapping? No, TWSITD are. Remire? No, TWSITD. Duscure? No, she was a kid who knew nothing of it at the time. Jeralt? NO, she swore off working with TWSITD after Jeralt's death. People attribute these things to her, but it isn't true.

Is Edelgard perfect? no she is indeed the villain in 3/4 routes, but if you look at hers, her actions make sense and she can't really be called the villain in good faith. Is she better than the other 2? that's debatable, does her story address these criticisms? Yes.

Adendum 1: the Democracy point IS false, through misremembering. HOWEVER the Meritocracy point is still disingenuous. We assume Claude through Conquest 'solved' racism and that Dimitri through absolute Monarchy created peace for all, both impossible, so why do we call out only

one of the three for making an imperfect system that realistically wouldn't work when the other two do the same? Why do we just assume the ending is wrong for only one of them? Plus Meritocracy, while not good, DOES allow people to achieve more than Feudalism.

"She Hired Kostas to kill the other two"
Why did she not tell Kostas "Don't kill the red one, don't say you aren't killing her" You're telling me Edelgard is so planned out to assassinate, something that's a Hubert thing rather than her thing, but can't think ahead to say "Maybe

don't kill me".
So what IS going on here. For one we know that Kostas has a huge grudge against nobles. For two HE is the one to mention killing them, Flame Emperor does not legitimize this claim, merely stating he was too distracted to complete the goal. Now if I think that,what

other goal could he POSSIBLY have had? The third professor. The game alludes to this being part of the plan, and alludes that if Byleth wasn't there, Jeritza would be the third. This would allow more opportunities for Edelgard's plans. So is there any reason she wouldn't kill her

classmates? Yes. Edelgard is the daughter of a ruler stripped of his power due to his suppression of the nobility, killing the nobility,ESPECIALLY of a sovereign nation, establishes her as a threat and worth disposing of, even if they didn't know it was he it's a safe assumption

"Edelgard is lying about her siblings"
This also assumes the game is lying about her mother being a concubine, lying that an Emperor would have multiple children (they would, Dimitri is a bizarre outlier for a child of a ruler) and assumes that her supports that allude to it are

lies while every other support in the game IS NOT. It is selective at best and malicious at worst to assume a character is lying but every other character isn't. Her telling the truth shouldn't change your opinion of her, wether support or not.

So what actions WILL I place on Edelgard in part 1? Lonato, The Holy Tomb, Holy mausoleum and assault on Garreg mach. While TWSITD were aligned in the first two, It seems the idea was spearheaded by Edelgard and therefor the actions are hers,the other two are also entirely on her

since TWSITD were no longer allies and she'd only rejoin them due to the war stagnating. Most think TWSITD are involved, however, Thales only brought a personal squad that was away from the battlefield, secretly trying to dispose of Byleth himself.

it is flat out stated after Jeralt dies that Flame emperor didn't know of this, didn't support it, and left of their own will. Death Knight is going against his orders from Edelgard by kidnapping flayn as evidenced by Hubert's reaction and the Flame Emperor's scolding

Remire plain as day had nothing to do with the flame emperor and people who honestly think it does confuse me.

"Why did Edelgard not conquer Fodlan in the 5 year war in CF" Simple, Rhea was not captured and Dimitri was more outwardly stable giving the Kingdom someone to rally behind. That and TWSITD, like in all routes, were playing both powers. With the loss of a trusted tactician, she

wasn't able to make the same progress as the other routes, where she did capture Rhea, Dimitri was far more unstable, and TWSITD happened to act in her favor.

Also, a little tidbit, she has no qualms with Killing TWSITD after she leaves them, and they have no qualms killing her, as Thales said, she is a weapon. This line also isn't proof of a plan to kill the professor since not only does this chapter disprove that notion in its other

scenes, it also is disproven by the events that have already taken place, her rejecting TWSITD after Chapter 9's events.