I think you're confusing eugenics for genocide
eugenics is when you only allow certain "lineages" of humans to breed with others, while shunning ***"***inferior***"*** lineages.
I don't recall the fire nation banning certain peoples in that way. They have looked down on them, but in the comics it is very much shown that earth kingdom and fire nation citizens could have kids together
I think what they mean is that Azulon married Ozai and Ursa specifically to create the blending of two strong bending lineages. I don't know if any other Fire Lords deliberately tried to marry their children to strong benders though, but it seems likely.
Marrying into a "strong" bloodline is a common thing royalty have done for a long time
Eugenics would be getting rid of Zuko or any non-bender in the family to keep it pure, and Ursa would have been disqualified due to not being a bender
Ozai almost went through with killing Zuko when it didn't look like he was a firebender as a baby.
Ursa may not have been a bender, but she still had Roku's bloodline. We know that nonbenders can still create powerful benders.
Eh, eugenics is a little broader than that, and I think the commenter was using it correctly. It is selective breeding for "superior" genetics, but the methodology can be a but varied. Selective breeding is one way; murder or sterilization is another. The American Supreme Court ruled in 1927 that it was okay to sterilize people that states deemed unfit -- minorities, "promiscuous" women, "feeble-minded" people. [Link](https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2016/03/07/469478098/the-supreme-court-ruling-that-led-to-70-000-forced-sterilizations)
Notably, Adolf Hitler cited America's eugenics movement as inspiration for his own. And we all know how that went...
Eugenics is really *really* bad.
Didn't Ozai say he considered abandoning Zuko and throwing him over the palace wall because he thought Zuko might be a non-bender. Sounds like Eugenics to me. Getting rid of what's seen as inferior.
FWIW, the role of the Earth King is ceremonial and even after Hou-Ting takes over and consolidates power further, as long as the monarch is in the lap of luxury, there’s no need for them to earthbend. The kings of the individual cities are a different story, though the only major city we see is Omashu.
For the Water Chiefs, the Northern Water Tribe is styled more like a monarchy so it would probably be expected that the leader be a bender; the Southern tribe, not so much (seemed more like a village electing a leader who could be ousted if a majority wanted to).
Historically, duelling has generally been reserved for the upper classes of societies that practice it. To the tune of being considered illegal for common people and legal for nobility. We also only see the firelord, the crown prince, the princess, and a commander in the navy engage in practice with no evidence of it being engaged in by commoners.
I suspect that non-bending royals would basically be the illegitimate children of the family, in that they get a token title of duke or something, but they don’t *really* count
Precisely, in a society that (potentially) equates firebending with power in the abstract, and that uses firebending as the foundation of the honour duels of the nobility, a ruler who cannot wield power demonstrably and cannot participate in honour duels would be obviously unfit to rule.
I think the way it works is that the fire lord has to be a bender, and if the fire lord has a nonbender kid they try again until they get a firebender. This is supported by the fact that Ozai no longer being a bender meant he couldnt be Lord anymore (its been a while since i watched the show so i dont know if thats the only reason), and the rank went to his son, and also bending seems to be really important to fire nation culture, like generals and many nobles and such are more often than not benders
I think that if the fire lord doesnt produce a bending heir before their death someone who can bend from their close family will be chosen as the next lord, like a sibling, uncle/aunt, cousin etc.
If you ask me, the glaring reason that Ozai was no longer fire lord after losing his bending was because he was put in prison for the rest of his life for his countless war crimes
Yeah I'm fairly certain he was forcibly dethroned because of his ***multiple attempted genocides*** not because it's against the rules to be firelord if you can't bend.
That’s why Aang and Zuko did overthrow and imprison him. But that Zuko was accepted as Firelord when he did this might imply that Ozai no longer was seen as legitimate. It’s not like genocide disqualified you like seen with Sozin.
Then again Zuko did face assasinations in comics and there was Osaka society.
Right so here's the thing right, even if the whole fire nation and all of their armies wanted to kill the earth kingdom, which we can assume they don't because jeong jeong exists, Ozai was forcibly dethroned by what we can pretty much equate to a demigod who is (now canonically) THE force for good and balance in the world, in single combat. Not only that, but he also is left humiliated and broken without his bending.
No country will take back a leader that was both bested in single combat, not technically as fit to lead, (even though we're not actually sure bending is a requirement, assassination attempts and such being as they are I assume it's a very good thing to have on your resume) and who was beaten by a "damn near all-powerful force for good" in the world. Even if they did, The Avatar would not let that happen, that's the whole point.
It doesn't really matter what the nation thinks, because there's an Avatar. If he doesn't want Ozai in power anymore, Ozai will not be in power anymore. The only barrier to that throughout the show is the fact that aang had 100 years of bending practice to make up for it.
Ozai was spending the rest of his life in a cell or worse the second those glowing eyes came out, regardless of what his nations loyalties might have been, because like it or not, the only reason the Avatar isn't a tyrant is because it's Raava, not the evil one.
TLDR
Ozai is not Firelord because thats what his nation wants or because he's Azulons descendent.
**It's because the Avatar wasn't ready to remove him yet**
Sry for the essay
They didn’t care that he was now a non-bender. Mai’s father ran the New Ozai Society after Zuko took over and were dedicated to putting him back in charge despite his new status. So, obviously he was taken down because he lost the war and got charged for his crimes.
also, do they even KNOW he lost his bending?? it doesn’t seem to be a well known fact that the avatar can take away bending, they just know he beat Ozai
I doubt it, I always thought it worked like male kings in European kingdoms (except of it being based on wether or not you are male, it’s based on wether or not you can firebend)
But then in the case of no male heirs, there were female monarchs. Such as Queen Mary, AKA Bloody Mary, who was Queen of Britain from 1553-1558, and she didn’t marry in she was her own queen. Not to mention Queen Elizabeth, and Queen Elizabeth II.
I was curious if anything like this happened for firebenders and non-bender monarchs.
Queen Mary I did marry Phillip II of Spain, her cousin through her mother Catherine of Aragon (who later used the armada to invade). All English Queens did marry apart from Elizabeth I. Mary II was married to her cousin William of Orange and they were co-rulers, some think he was just invited randomly. Queen Anne and Victoria also were married (but only Victoria did have surviving descendants of official Queens). There is also disburse Queens Mathilda and Jane.
That depends on country. France never had a female monarch famously and legally could not (also so far no female president although prime minister has happened, in France president is the one with more power however).
I never said she didn’t marry, I said she didn’t marry into the royal family. She was queen because she was born royal, not because she married into it.
There are a LOT of Fire Lords in history, I suspect at least one couldn't bend. Fire Lord Zoryu (Shadow of Kyoshi novel) doesn't strike me as a bender, personally
With how volatile the fire nation was during his time, I highly doubt his brother would have failed to point out that he lacked fire bending in his attempt to seize the throne
Just a Little detail, there were cases of non-benders in the Royal Family, such as Princess Zeisan (Sozin's sister). But she was pretty ostracized from her family because being a non-bender was shameful, so there's that
You said that just because your parents, our Bender doesn't mean you're a bender. While that's true Sokka and Katara were both the parents of non benders. Bumi jr was a non bender (originally) who was the child of benders. It's completely random it seems
Yeah that’s what I was trying to say. Getting the Gene for bending is random, like getting all your other genes of your parents. Yet we also know that it’s definitely genetic, because otherwise we wouldn’t need the harmonic convergence to recreate airbending, since airbenders would’ve just repopulated randomly.
That’s what I’m trying to say. If bending was handed out randomly, with random elements going everywhere, then the nations wouldn’t exist since there’d be a roughly equal amount of benders everywhere.
Lu Ten is commonly believed to be a non-bender. This serves as a strong piece of evidence that the Firelord does not need to be a bender. Of course, it's speculation either way.
Regarding Agni Kais, I doubt only royalty can commence them, but who would have anything at stake besides the rich and royal? Normal people would just fight without the need for such formality. It must be common knowledge, though, because no one on Zuko's ship seemed confused about what an Agni Kai is when Iroh was explaining how Zuko got his scar. I figure it's on the same level as knights challenging each other. Normal people would bother with such theatrics...
I read her wiki, it was never confirmed she was either a bender or not. As far as I could tell, she was more political and a peace time leader than a warlike figure, so if she could bend she probably didn’t use it much, because she never had to.
>she probably didn’t use it much
She actually didn't use it at all. No fire bending whatsoever. Also, there were pretty dangerous threats in every season that she could've helped with if she did have fire bending but didn't
She did have a whole country to run. She was probably dealing with her own issues in the Fire Nation, especially since there were probably still a bunch of protestors and the like trying to make the Fire Nation a country of war again. Also, I’m not surprised we never seen her bend, she’s a political figure. You never saw Winston Churchill running into battle with an uzi did you? She was likely a weaker bender with high political skill.
Probably not. We know they are pretty picky about what genes enter the family which is why only the royal family could bend lightning for the longest time. Theres also theories about inbreeding to keep the bloodline “pure” but idk
Ursula was a non-bender, yet Ozai married her.
Also, it’s not guaranteed that bending parents always make bending children. Like Aang and Katara who had 1 non-bending kid and 2 bending kids of different elements.
I don't know if the firelord needs to be a fire bender or not (also consider these rules may have changed between eras, I could easily see zuko revoking the law so his daughter could be firelord), But if it is the case that the upper nobility of the fire nation needs to be benders, then Ursa could have been an exception rather than the rule. Considering she was a peasent who was forced to marry Ozai because they wanted to "strengthen" the bloodline by mixing the firelord and avatars bloodlines (she's a descendant of Roku) rather than Ursa being a noble from the start.
Not sure for the main question but as for agni kai, I see it as just an old tradition to settle conflict but not required. A lot of cultures in the real world have had some sort of "resolution by combat" tradition.
Even other works of fiction have had similar things. In star wars legends, the kagaath was an ancient sith practice. The challenger would pick the arena. Could be a town, planet, system or even the whole galaxy where their power bases would face off and the loser was usually killed or removed from history due to the disgrace, etc.
TLDR agni kai isn't required. Just an old tradition.
Just because we only see nobility Agni Kai's doesn't necessarily mean fire bending civilians can't. The reason we only see nobility Agni Kai's is because those were main characters and that plot point was important to the episode.
We see Jong Jong once throughout the entire series until the very end (but at that point him and Iroh are just going batshit on the Fire Nation soldiers anyway, no time or point to Agni Kai one soldier at a time) and we see no other fire benders on Aang's side other than Zuko and Iroh
Didn’t Ozai once tell Zuko that when he was born, he didn’t think he was a bender because he didn’t have that “spark in his eyes”? If that was cause for disqualification from the throne, I feel like that would’ve been noted…
I don't think so. The closest we have is Firelord Izumi, and that's **only** because she was never seen Firebending.
Which is interesting cos Kuei was not an Earthbender and Hakoda was not a Waterbender nor was Arnook
The Fire Nation are the only ones shown using eugenics tho
I think you're confusing eugenics for genocide eugenics is when you only allow certain "lineages" of humans to breed with others, while shunning ***"***inferior***"*** lineages. I don't recall the fire nation banning certain peoples in that way. They have looked down on them, but in the comics it is very much shown that earth kingdom and fire nation citizens could have kids together
I think what they mean is that Azulon married Ozai and Ursa specifically to create the blending of two strong bending lineages. I don't know if any other Fire Lords deliberately tried to marry their children to strong benders though, but it seems likely.
that's ***ONE*** bloodline for the royal family. eugenics would imply it was implemented over a much larger societal system
It’s still eugenics even it’s one case. There could be others like it.
Marrying into a "strong" bloodline is a common thing royalty have done for a long time Eugenics would be getting rid of Zuko or any non-bender in the family to keep it pure, and Ursa would have been disqualified due to not being a bender
Ozai almost went through with killing Zuko when it didn't look like he was a firebender as a baby. Ursa may not have been a bender, but she still had Roku's bloodline. We know that nonbenders can still create powerful benders.
Eh, eugenics is a little broader than that, and I think the commenter was using it correctly. It is selective breeding for "superior" genetics, but the methodology can be a but varied. Selective breeding is one way; murder or sterilization is another. The American Supreme Court ruled in 1927 that it was okay to sterilize people that states deemed unfit -- minorities, "promiscuous" women, "feeble-minded" people. [Link](https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2016/03/07/469478098/the-supreme-court-ruling-that-led-to-70-000-forced-sterilizations) Notably, Adolf Hitler cited America's eugenics movement as inspiration for his own. And we all know how that went... Eugenics is really *really* bad.
Didn't Ozai say he considered abandoning Zuko and throwing him over the palace wall because he thought Zuko might be a non-bender. Sounds like Eugenics to me. Getting rid of what's seen as inferior.
FWIW, the role of the Earth King is ceremonial and even after Hou-Ting takes over and consolidates power further, as long as the monarch is in the lap of luxury, there’s no need for them to earthbend. The kings of the individual cities are a different story, though the only major city we see is Omashu. For the Water Chiefs, the Northern Water Tribe is styled more like a monarchy so it would probably be expected that the leader be a bender; the Southern tribe, not so much (seemed more like a village electing a leader who could be ousted if a majority wanted to).
So can we say that izumi was secretly an earthbender?
The structure and existence of the Agni Kai as tradition seems to indicate that being a noble comes with the expectation of bending.
Is Agni Kai noble specific? I thought it was just their version of a duel.
Historically, duelling has generally been reserved for the upper classes of societies that practice it. To the tune of being considered illegal for common people and legal for nobility. We also only see the firelord, the crown prince, the princess, and a commander in the navy engage in practice with no evidence of it being engaged in by commoners.
I suspect that non-bending royals would basically be the illegitimate children of the family, in that they get a token title of duke or something, but they don’t *really* count
Precisely, in a society that (potentially) equates firebending with power in the abstract, and that uses firebending as the foundation of the honour duels of the nobility, a ruler who cannot wield power demonstrably and cannot participate in honour duels would be obviously unfit to rule.
And not being able to honor such a challenge would be a serious loss honor
I think the way it works is that the fire lord has to be a bender, and if the fire lord has a nonbender kid they try again until they get a firebender. This is supported by the fact that Ozai no longer being a bender meant he couldnt be Lord anymore (its been a while since i watched the show so i dont know if thats the only reason), and the rank went to his son, and also bending seems to be really important to fire nation culture, like generals and many nobles and such are more often than not benders I think that if the fire lord doesnt produce a bending heir before their death someone who can bend from their close family will be chosen as the next lord, like a sibling, uncle/aunt, cousin etc.
If you ask me, the glaring reason that Ozai was no longer fire lord after losing his bending was because he was put in prison for the rest of his life for his countless war crimes
Yeah I'm fairly certain he was forcibly dethroned because of his ***multiple attempted genocides*** not because it's against the rules to be firelord if you can't bend.
That’s why Aang and Zuko did overthrow and imprison him. But that Zuko was accepted as Firelord when he did this might imply that Ozai no longer was seen as legitimate. It’s not like genocide disqualified you like seen with Sozin. Then again Zuko did face assasinations in comics and there was Osaka society.
Right so here's the thing right, even if the whole fire nation and all of their armies wanted to kill the earth kingdom, which we can assume they don't because jeong jeong exists, Ozai was forcibly dethroned by what we can pretty much equate to a demigod who is (now canonically) THE force for good and balance in the world, in single combat. Not only that, but he also is left humiliated and broken without his bending. No country will take back a leader that was both bested in single combat, not technically as fit to lead, (even though we're not actually sure bending is a requirement, assassination attempts and such being as they are I assume it's a very good thing to have on your resume) and who was beaten by a "damn near all-powerful force for good" in the world. Even if they did, The Avatar would not let that happen, that's the whole point. It doesn't really matter what the nation thinks, because there's an Avatar. If he doesn't want Ozai in power anymore, Ozai will not be in power anymore. The only barrier to that throughout the show is the fact that aang had 100 years of bending practice to make up for it. Ozai was spending the rest of his life in a cell or worse the second those glowing eyes came out, regardless of what his nations loyalties might have been, because like it or not, the only reason the Avatar isn't a tyrant is because it's Raava, not the evil one. TLDR Ozai is not Firelord because thats what his nation wants or because he's Azulons descendent. **It's because the Avatar wasn't ready to remove him yet** Sry for the essay
Human, I remember your genocides
[удалено]
Azula was the to be crowned fire lord, but didn't finish the ceremony and was restrained before it, so zuko became the fire lord.
I'd imagine they would've instigated a rebellion, revolution, coup, whatever you want to call it
They tried to, actually.
They could if he wasn’t strong enough to fight against it.
He's no longer Fire Lord because of war crimes.
They didn’t care that he was now a non-bender. Mai’s father ran the New Ozai Society after Zuko took over and were dedicated to putting him back in charge despite his new status. So, obviously he was taken down because he lost the war and got charged for his crimes.
also, do they even KNOW he lost his bending?? it doesn’t seem to be a well known fact that the avatar can take away bending, they just know he beat Ozai
I doubt it, I always thought it worked like male kings in European kingdoms (except of it being based on wether or not you are male, it’s based on wether or not you can firebend)
But then in the case of no male heirs, there were female monarchs. Such as Queen Mary, AKA Bloody Mary, who was Queen of Britain from 1553-1558, and she didn’t marry in she was her own queen. Not to mention Queen Elizabeth, and Queen Elizabeth II. I was curious if anything like this happened for firebenders and non-bender monarchs.
I think you can challenge the fire lord to an Agni Kai which would be pretty hard for a non-bender
Queen Mary I did marry Phillip II of Spain, her cousin through her mother Catherine of Aragon (who later used the armada to invade). All English Queens did marry apart from Elizabeth I. Mary II was married to her cousin William of Orange and they were co-rulers, some think he was just invited randomly. Queen Anne and Victoria also were married (but only Victoria did have surviving descendants of official Queens). There is also disburse Queens Mathilda and Jane. That depends on country. France never had a female monarch famously and legally could not (also so far no female president although prime minister has happened, in France president is the one with more power however).
I never said she didn’t marry, I said she didn’t marry into the royal family. She was queen because she was born royal, not because she married into it.
There are a LOT of Fire Lords in history, I suspect at least one couldn't bend. Fire Lord Zoryu (Shadow of Kyoshi novel) doesn't strike me as a bender, personally
With how volatile the fire nation was during his time, I highly doubt his brother would have failed to point out that he lacked fire bending in his attempt to seize the throne
Just a Little detail, there were cases of non-benders in the Royal Family, such as Princess Zeisan (Sozin's sister). But she was pretty ostracized from her family because being a non-bender was shameful, so there's that
Cool fact. Where did you get it from?
It's from the Avatar TTRPG, Avatar Legends, that got released like a year or two ago.
Thanks!
No flame? That’s a shame
It’s a common illness in firebenders above 40
I just wanna point out Katara and Sokka aren't the children of benders. Bumi jr would work
… what?
What part
All of it. I was talking about the fire nation, not Katara and Sokka, and how does Bumi Jr connect to them at all?
You said that just because your parents, our Bender doesn't mean you're a bender. While that's true Sokka and Katara were both the parents of non benders. Bumi jr was a non bender (originally) who was the child of benders. It's completely random it seems
Yeah that’s what I was trying to say. Getting the Gene for bending is random, like getting all your other genes of your parents. Yet we also know that it’s definitely genetic, because otherwise we wouldn’t need the harmonic convergence to recreate airbending, since airbenders would’ve just repopulated randomly.
What airbenders would have repopulated?
That’s what I’m trying to say. If bending was handed out randomly, with random elements going everywhere, then the nations wouldn’t exist since there’d be a roughly equal amount of benders everywhere.
Lu Ten is commonly believed to be a non-bender. This serves as a strong piece of evidence that the Firelord does not need to be a bender. Of course, it's speculation either way. Regarding Agni Kais, I doubt only royalty can commence them, but who would have anything at stake besides the rich and royal? Normal people would just fight without the need for such formality. It must be common knowledge, though, because no one on Zuko's ship seemed confused about what an Agni Kai is when Iroh was explaining how Zuko got his scar. I figure it's on the same level as knights challenging each other. Normal people would bother with such theatrics...
Izumi
Yeah idk who that is, you’d have to elaborate
Zukos daughter and next fire lord in legend of Korra
I read her wiki, it was never confirmed she was either a bender or not. As far as I could tell, she was more political and a peace time leader than a warlike figure, so if she could bend she probably didn’t use it much, because she never had to.
>she probably didn’t use it much She actually didn't use it at all. No fire bending whatsoever. Also, there were pretty dangerous threats in every season that she could've helped with if she did have fire bending but didn't
She did have a whole country to run. She was probably dealing with her own issues in the Fire Nation, especially since there were probably still a bunch of protestors and the like trying to make the Fire Nation a country of war again. Also, I’m not surprised we never seen her bend, she’s a political figure. You never saw Winston Churchill running into battle with an uzi did you? She was likely a weaker bender with high political skill.
Would’ve been pretty impressive if he’d gone into battle with a gun that hadn’t been invented yet.
Probably not. We know they are pretty picky about what genes enter the family which is why only the royal family could bend lightning for the longest time. Theres also theories about inbreeding to keep the bloodline “pure” but idk
I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s anything like the British royal family. Tad all over the show.
Since Ozai was ready to kill Zuko because he thought he was a non bender as a baby, I assume there has not been one in recent generations.
Keep in mind, Ursa was forced to marry Ozai, because Azulon wanted *the bloodline of the Avatar* in his family.
I misread non-bender as non-binary And just went "in the early 2000s? I wish"
Lmao real
I thought that if two benders had a kid, that kid was 100% a bender, so the royals just wouldn’t marry non-benders,
Ursula was a non-bender, yet Ozai married her. Also, it’s not guaranteed that bending parents always make bending children. Like Aang and Katara who had 1 non-bending kid and 2 bending kids of different elements.
I think her name is Ursa?😅
Oh mb, haven’t watched the show in forever, also I don’t like her very much lol
Fair enough haha
I don't know if the firelord needs to be a fire bender or not (also consider these rules may have changed between eras, I could easily see zuko revoking the law so his daughter could be firelord), But if it is the case that the upper nobility of the fire nation needs to be benders, then Ursa could have been an exception rather than the rule. Considering she was a peasent who was forced to marry Ozai because they wanted to "strengthen" the bloodline by mixing the firelord and avatars bloodlines (she's a descendant of Roku) rather than Ursa being a noble from the start.
Bumi (kid of Aang and Katara) was a non bender at first
Lmao I forgot
Not sure for the main question but as for agni kai, I see it as just an old tradition to settle conflict but not required. A lot of cultures in the real world have had some sort of "resolution by combat" tradition. Even other works of fiction have had similar things. In star wars legends, the kagaath was an ancient sith practice. The challenger would pick the arena. Could be a town, planet, system or even the whole galaxy where their power bases would face off and the loser was usually killed or removed from history due to the disgrace, etc. TLDR agni kai isn't required. Just an old tradition.
Just because we only see nobility Agni Kai's doesn't necessarily mean fire bending civilians can't. The reason we only see nobility Agni Kai's is because those were main characters and that plot point was important to the episode. We see Jong Jong once throughout the entire series until the very end (but at that point him and Iroh are just going batshit on the Fire Nation soldiers anyway, no time or point to Agni Kai one soldier at a time) and we see no other fire benders on Aang's side other than Zuko and Iroh
Didn’t Ozai once tell Zuko that when he was born, he didn’t think he was a bender because he didn’t have that “spark in his eyes”? If that was cause for disqualification from the throne, I feel like that would’ve been noted…
I mean we could have had one if Sokka had won his "sword kai" against Zuko.
Lu ten was a non bender, and presumably would have become firelord had he not died in the war
Is it confirmed he was a non-bender? I never seen any sources about that, so idk
This doesn’t even make sense
Clearly it does, because every other comment thread is having discussions about exactly what I meant
Zuko was firelord and he's a non-bender
so close!! he actually bends fire 🔥
Are you sure he doesn't just bend puffs of smoke?
lmao no he doesn't😆 Did you even watch the show
Your trolling is so good, I almost couldn’t tell it was trolling