OliveTapenade
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User ID: 1729
OliveTapenade
3d ago
I would say I mildly dislike it. A relatively subtle job, like a manicure, can look nice, but anything in bright colours I find a turn-off.
I'd hazard that it is among the many, many instances of fashion that are about either women competing among themselves, or women just amusing themselves, rather than anything to do with men.
OliveTapenade
3d ago
I think Tolkien's own thoughts on the necessity of arms-bearing are complicated. He accepts that it is at times necessary, as with the cases of the Ents, or the hobbits raising rebellion against Saruman's men.
But I would suggest that nobody who has read Meneldur's agonised wrestling with the issue in Aldarion and Erendis could suggest that Tolkien considers the question straightforward or uncomplicated.
‘When the Valar gave to us the Land of Gift they did not make us their vice-regents: we were given the Kingdom of Númenor, not of the world. They are the Lords. Here we were to put away hatred and war; for war was ended, and Morgoth thrust forth from Arda. So I deemed, and so was taught.
‘Yet if the world grows again dark, the Lords must know; and they have sent me no sign. Unless this be the sign. What then? Our fathers were rewarded for the aid they gave in the defeat of the Great Shadow. Shall their sons stand aloof, if evil finds a new head?
‘I am in too great doubt to rule. To prepare or to let be? To prepare for war, which is yet only guessed: train craftsmen and tillers in the midst of peace for bloodspilling and battle: put iron in the hands of greedy captains who will love only conquest, and count the slain as their glory? Will they say to Eru: At least your enemies were amongst them? Or to fold hands, while friends die unjustly: let men live in blind peace, until the ravisher is at the gate? What then will they do: match naked hands against iron and die in vain, or flee leaving the cries of women behind them? Will they say to Eru: At least I spilled no blood?
‘When either way may lead to evil, of what worth is choice? Let the Valar rule under Eru! I will resign the Sceptre to Aldarion. Yet that also is a choice, for I know well which road he will take. Unless Erendis...’
One of Meneldur's concerns, which I think is shared by Tolkien (as seen in the comparison between e.g. Boromir and Faramir), is that going to war means training men for war and habituating them in it. Such men will soon develop a taste for conquest, and an affection for wielding power over others. The corrupting nature of power is a constant refrain in Tolkien, and with the benefit of hindsight, looking back at Aldarion's choice, we can see that while aiding Gil-galad must have been the right choice in the short term, Aldarion's combative, martial nature, and the Numenorean intervention in Middle-earth, was an important step along the path that eventually led to Ar-Pharazon, the King's Men, and the Downfall.
Tolkien does believe that violence is sometimes lawful, sometimes necessary. His heroes fight rather than submit to evil. But he also believes that violence is a weighty matter, one that is inherently morally doubtful, and which habituates one to evil. His heroes therefore wield the sword only reluctantly, and with limited scope.
Characters or groups in Tolkien's writing that are sympathetic and war-loving exist, but this is usually presented as a moral flaw. Consider Faramir's description of the Rohirrim:
‘Yet now, if the Rohirrim are grown in some ways more like to us, enhanced in arts and gentleness, we too have become more like to them, and can scarce claim any longer the title High. We are become Middle Men, of the Twilight, but with memory of other things. For as the Rohirrim do, we now love war and valour as things good in themselves, both a sport and an end; and though we still hold that a warrior should have more skills and knowledge than only the craft of weapons and slaying, we esteem a warrior, nonetheless, above men of other crafts. Such is the need of our days. So even was my brother, Boromir: a man of prowess, and for that he was accounted the best man in Gondor. And very valiant indeed he was: no heir of Minas Tirith has for long years been so hardy in toil, so onward into battle, or blown a mightier note on the Great Horn.’ Faramir sighed and fell silent for a while.
The criticism I would make of Jackson's films is that I think they delight too much in war and violence. These are the films with Legolas' shield-surfing, or the mumak in RotK. Jackson's past career involves a lot of action comedy (he is the source of the "I kick ass for the Lord!" meme, for instance) and I think you can see that sneaking into his LotR. His depiction of Aragorn puts significantly less emphasis on his wisdom and good judgement, and more on his fighting skill.
The question is not whether passivism is a preferable response to evil. It is not. But the question is about how war and military might are to be understood - whether they are things to delight in, or to regret, and resort to only in times of gravest necessity.
OliveTapenade
3d ago
Thanks! Maybe I’m a bit oblivious but I don’t detect that much hostility towards me personally, in fact many times I’ve been disappointed that I can’t seem to get into a proper argument with a gender critical person.
May I ask what you're looking for? The term 'gender critical' can cover a lot of ground - in general I read it as 'gender-critical feminist', and you're certainly not going to find many of those around here. But if you mean people critical of 'gender ideology' in the broad sense, we probably have a lot, though I fear maybe a bit too spittle-flecked for useful discussion.
If it would be interesting, I suppose I'm gender-critical in the sense that I think the broad category of 'gender ideology' is mistaken. I am sympathetic towards the desire to be compassionate to people who suffer gender-related pain or angst, but as an anthropology I think it's limited and probably has done a significant amount of harm. I suppose I think that trans, as an issue, is linked to a larger trend of rejecting any un-chosen identity in human life, and viewing people and identity as fundamentally malleable? Once you get away from the usual hot-spots like sports, prisons, toilets, etc., and start digging into the larger philosophical question about what it means to be human, I think the conversation gets fascinating.
OliveTapenade
5d ago
Oh, dangit, you're right.
Sorry, Martin Freeman was Bilbo in The Hobbit and Arthur Dent. Ian Holm was old-Bilbo and was never Arthur Dent.
Oops. That's embarrassing.
There are some castings I really like - Sean Astin's Sam, Christopher Lee's Saruman, and John Rhys-Davies' Gimli all stand out as inspired castings. (I think the films do Gimli dirty, but Rhys-Davies is not the reason why. Fantastic choice.) Sean Bean as Boromir is a good choice as well. Ian McKellen is quite serviceable as Gandalf, and I like Karl Urban's Eomer. Cate Blanchett is a fantastic choice for Galadriel, as is Ian Holm for Bilbo. Holm brings the role that hapless charm that he also brought to roles like Arthur Dent.Never mind I am a dummy.
There are a couple that I also reluctantly acknowledge as good but not to my tastes. Andy Serkis as Gollum is not how I pictured Gollum, or would have played him, but I acknowledge that Serkis knows what he is going for and does it extremely capably. I think that's just a reasonable difference of taste on my part. Miranda Otto's Eowyn is one that I can't quite make up my mind on - it's not how I would have portrayed Eowyn, I think, but I can see what they were going for.
At the same time, there are plenty that I think are bad. Elijah Wood as Frodo and Viggo Mortensen as Aragorn are just obviously not up to the role - Wood plays Frodo as a beatific victim and largely nothing else, while Mortensen is completely unable to evoke the majesty or nobility that Aragorn needs to. Orlando Bloom never manages to rise beyond the level of a handsome blank. David Wenham's Faramir and John Noble's Denethor are disappointing as well, which is a shame because I know Wenham has given good performances elsewhere (I liked him in Molokai). Hugo Weaving and Liv Tyler are just bad - the films in general just cannot do elves. Blanchett is probably the only elf role in the films that I have praise for, and even that is dragged down a bit by the temptation scene.
In general, I think the films lean too much into being heroic war films, in the face of Tolkien's reflections on the horror and futility of such things, and the theological substrate of the story is pretty much entirely lacking. I don't mind omitting the Scouring or Tom Bombadil, actually, and some choices like that are necessary, but Jackson generally favours bombast over silence, and inserts fake drama whenever he's getting bored. In the book, Faramir's temptation by the Ring takes only a few seconds; Jackson adds a whole sequence. In the book, Frodo and Sam's travel through Cirith Ungol is unnervingly silent; Jackson adds a whole bit where Sam abandons Frodo.
Meanwhile he also cuts many of the book's quiet moments, such as Aragorn looking out to see the dawn at Helm's Deep, or Sam reflecting on the stars. I feel like Jackson hates quiet, whether it's a chilling or terrifying quiet, as in Cirith Ungol, a tense anticipatory quiet, as at Helm's Deep, or even a consoling, reassuring quiet, as at other times.
Anyway, re-doing LotR as just a war story is arguably viable, but there I think the films are undermined by, well, their war being total nonsense? They are full of logistically impossible movements (the elves at Helm's Deep! why?), or maneuvers that range from the physically impossible and suicidal (the relief charge at Helm's Deep) to the physically-possible-but-stupid (the Rohirrim at the Pelennor). I would be able to just enjoy the fighting more, I think, if the fighting were done well. I can suspend disbelief and ignore dodgy fight or battle choreography if the story and character writing are solid, but here they're not, and also Jackson spends so much time on the battles. Helm's Deep is a relatively short section of The Two Towers as a book, but it's half the film, and the Pelennor is inflated as well. If you're going to blow up the battles and spend so much more time on them, at least do them well?
OliveTapenade
5d ago
I first came across the idea of ressentiment in this 2009 blog post, which in hindsight feels quite prescient - the right-wing inferiority complex, Palin as proto-Trump, and so on. As it says, you can't provide a political solution to a psychological problem, though I would probably reframe that as you can't force a political solution to a cultural or social problem, much the same way that Donald Trump could ascend to the most powerful office in the world but he could not make New York elites stop feeling contempt for him.
The word doesn't appear in the Sanchez piece, or in your top level post, but I think one of the key issues here is envy. Ressentiment is hatred combined with envy - it is the despising of people for being in the place that you feel you ought to be, it is simultaneously craving their validation and seeking to destroy them. If you ask any right-winger, "Do you want New York Times readers to like you?", they'll answer "No, of course not!", and on the surface level that's probably correct, but in the big picture I think they want the sort of validation or felt authority or elite status that one associates with the New York Times.
If you've read Screwtape Proposes a Toast, I think there's something here of the "I'm as good as you" attitude. I sometimes run into works by culturally conservative writers that express, as Lewis puts it, "the itching, smarting, writhing awareness of an inferiority which the patient refuses to accept".
This does not have anything to do with actual inferiority - just the perception thereof. It is entirely possible for people to feel this kind of hateful envy toward their own intellectual inferiors, if those inferiors have the professorships and go on the television and in general enjoy an entitlement to respect that the resentful person does not.
I've singled out the right here, but let's be fair - what about the left? Almost no pathology, in politics, is restricted to a single tribe.
I have perhaps less to say here, because there is already a great deal of writing about the left and envy that is obvious enough. The socialist left feel ressentiment and envy toward the mainstream left. Many on the socialist or extreme left manage the impressive feat of feeling simultaneously that they are the true rebels and radicals speaking truth to power and that they are entitled to good jobs and comfortable offices and big incomes. But even within the hallowed halls of media and academia, I think there is a kind of ressentiment that goes something like, "I'm smarter than them, I'm morally better than them, I'm more compassionate than them, I have better taste than them, so why do they have all the money?" It's hardly the most original observation in the world to say that plenty of lefty commentators have this kind of envy-hatred of Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos. Just as the conservative ressentiment is feeling that cultural elites occupy a status or command a respect that they do not deserve, the progressive ressentiment is the same feeling about economic elites.
In both cases I notice, within the tribe, a kind of endless group therapy that consists of people reassuring each other, "Yes, you are better than them". Be it Fox News or Bluesky, affirmation or validation has become one of the core activities of politics.
Thus, from both the left and the right perspective, what you get is a kind of performative attempt to offend the other side, to prove how little you care about what they think. From the right, this is Palin and Trump and triggering the libs; from the left I think it's more to do with luxury beliefs. Drag queens doing blasphemous tableaux before the Olympics, to pick a recent example. From either direction, you publicly show how little you care for the sensibilities or the sacred values of the other side, even if, underneath, it's not hard to see the desire for validation.
OliveTapenade
5d ago
Sean Astin definitely does a good job, though I'll disagree with some of your other examples and characters. In general I think Jackson's films tend to emphasise martial achievement too much, while mis-casting or mis-portraying characters like Aragorn, Gimli, or even Denethor.
For the most part I just don't like the Jackson films, and I feel somewhat vindicated in the Hobbit trilogy, which show the same flaws, only now it seems that the scales have fallen from the audience's eyes and they can see them.
In general I think there's a solid case that the Jackson films are, for the most part, competent Tolkien-inspired action films, but I do not think Tolkien himself would approve, or that they capture much of what he wanted to say. I think they are probably the most overrated films of the 21st century thus far, and there is a lot of competition for that title.
OliveTapenade
6d ago
Yes, and that's consistent where, though I see the anti-semitic or at least anti-Judaic reading of an evil deity who demands people make a 'House of the Lord', acknowledge him sole god of the world, and worship only him, I think in context Tolkien is plainly criticising idolatry in a manner consistent with biblical convictions. Morgoth, and later Sauron, set themselves up as false gods, appropriating and perverting the imagery associated with the true god.
I don't think Tolkien's refusal to depict any religion, even primitive religion, was wholly because of his setting being framed as prehistoric Earth. He says directly, in Letter #131, that he thinks that containing 'the Christian religion' is 'fatal' to a fairy-story. This was the reason for his dislike of Arthurian legend.
That said I do also think he has a paradox in his First Age writings that he never quite resolved, which is that, quite apart from being Christian or even Catholic works, Tolkien was also heavily inspired by what he called 'Northern' myth. Turin is a Germanic hero, and his story occurs in the atmosphere of Germanic or Anglo-Saxon (or to a lesser extent Scandinavian) mythology. That means, for instance, things like Fate or Doom as powerful forces in the text. These are, for lack of a better term, 'religious' concepts. Tolkien's chronology does not allow for Christian or Jewish characters - the closest he comes is a sort of ethical monotheism. However, it would allow for pagans, but he does not allow himself to have pagan protagonists, even when the whole story he's writing is derivative of a fatalistic pagan spirituality.
To an extent Lewis has a similar issue, except that Lewis is more of a classicist and his great pagan loves are Greek. Even so Lewis allows himself to speak about Christianity and our world's religions more explicitly, so he does a bit more explicit work in trying to find points of harmony.
OliveTapenade
6d ago
In that case I'd suggest that high-flown philosophy is probably not what you're looking for. People can often be very output-focused, and will project consciousness on to anything they like, from children acting like a teddy bear is alive, to adults talking to their car. I agree that a strong social norm against treating chatbots like people is a good idea, but it will not be established by just winning the argument about consciousness.
I'd also recommend maybe trying to find a less misanthropic tone? That usually does not help with trying to convince people of something for their own best interest.
OliveTapenade
6d ago
My point is that your response makes you one of the self-destructive, because if some significant sub-50% chunk of the population all die, even if you picked Red, you will get to sit there smugly assured of your intelligence while watching civilisation collapse.
OliveTapenade
6d ago
The empirical evidence seems to be that Blue wins anyway, but put it this way. If the vote is anywhere near close, then I think it is vitally important to get swing voters to pick Blue. A narrow win for Blue is fine; a narrow loss for Blue is the worst thing that has ever happened in human history, perhaps rivalled only by mass mortalities like the Black Death.
If the vote is not going to be close, then sure, pick Red. If it's a decisive win for Blue then whatever, we're all fine. If Blue cannot crest 30% or 35% or so, then you voting Blue would accomplish nothing but your own death.
However, judging from the Twitter poll, we seem to be in a world where Blue is winning with roughly 55-60% or so, and in that world... just keep Blue on top. Everything is fine as-is, and there is no reason to try to drag the Blue percentage down below that crucial 50% threshold.
OliveTapenade
6d ago
As a layman, I just want to put it out there: Anti AI consciousness people, you haven't lost me, but I wish you were making better arguments. Every time I hear about qualia my eyes start to glaze over. Unfalsifiable philosophical constructs and arbitrary opinion on where they might "exist" are not the kind of reassurance I'm looking for when machines are getting this convincing.
I suppose the question I'd ask is what kind of reassurance you're looking for.
It seems to me that when we talk about AI consciousness, we are, fundamentally and inescapably, talking about qualia. We are talking about interiority - about what it is like to be something. We are talking about that ineffable quality of experience or inner-ness that I know for a fact that I have, which I am more certain of than I am of any conceivable empirical observation, which I attribute to other human beings by analogy to myself, and which cannot otherwise be observed. That's the question!
Anything else is not the question of consciousness. If you're bored by that, then that's fine, but it would then seem to me that you're not really interested in consciousness.
You're perfectly free to not care about whether chatbots have interiority, intentionality, subjectivity, quality, what-it-is-like-ness, or the like. But that just sounds like not caring about the question of consciousness. Very well. Can you reframe what it is that you care about, then?
OliveTapenade
6d ago
Well, Tolkien was Catholic, not Anglican...
In general he resisted too obvious readings. He once admitted to a reader (Letter #320), "I think it is true that I owe much of this character [Galadriel] to Christian and Catholic teaching and imagination about Mary", while clarifying that Galadriel is a penitent rather than direct analogue. Here's a bit more of Tolkien on the subject.
Letter #142:
I think I know exactly what you mean by the order of Grace; and of course by your references to Our Lady, upon which all my own small perception of beauty both in majesty and simplicity is founded. The Lord of the Rings is of course a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision. That is why I have not put in, or have cut out, practically all references to anything like 'religion', to cults or practices, in the imaginary world. For the religious element is absorbed into the story and the symbolism. However that is very clumsily put, and sounds more self-important than I feel. For as a matter of fact, I have consciously planned very little; and should chiefly be grateful for having been brought up (since I was eight) in a Faith that has nourished me and taught me all the little that I know; and that I owe to my mother, who clung to her conversion and died young, largely through the hardships of poverty resulting from it.
Letter #213:
Or more important, I am a Christian (which can be deduced from my stories), and in fact a Roman Catholic. The latter 'fact' perhaps cannot be deduced; though one critic (by letter) asserted that the invocations of Elbereth, and the character of Galadriel as directly described (or through the words of Gimli and Sam) were clearly related to Catholic devotion to Mary. Another saw in waybread (lembas)= viaticum and the reference to its feeding the will (vol. III, p. 213) and being more potent when fasting, a derivation from the Eucharist. (That is: far greater things may colour the mind in dealing with the lesser things of a fairy-story.)
That said there are definitely elements of LotR that can be read along other lines. Though it was Tolkien's intent to not depict any positive 'religion' in the text, because he thinks that a metaphor cannot include the very thing that it is a metaphor for within itself and still function, a Protestant or atheist might note that, when it does appear, organised religion in Tolkien's works is always evil. He removed most references from LotR, but in The Tale of Adanel the first demand Morgoth makes of humanity is that they build a temple to worship him:
'So be it!' he said. 'Now build Me a house upon a high place, and call it the House of the Lord. Thither I will come when I will. There ye shall call on Me and make your petitions to Me.'
And when we had built a great house, he came and stood before the high seat, and the house was lit as with fire. 'Now,' he said, 'come forth any who still listen to the Voice!'
There were some, but for fear they remained still and said naught. 'Then bow before Me and acknowledge Me!' he said. And all bowed to the ground before him, saying: 'Thou art the One Great, and we are Thine.'
Thereupon he went up as in a great flame and smoke, and we were scorched by the heat. But suddenly he was gone, and it was darker than night; and we fled from the House.
In the Akallabeth, Sauron also establishes a temple where sacrifices will be offered, which is contrasted with the simple, austere purity of earlier Numenorean worship:
But in the midst of the land was a mountain tall and steep, and it was named the Meneltarma, the Pillar of Heaven, and upon it was a high place that was hallowed to Eru Ilúvatar, and it was open and unroofed, and no other temple or fane was there in the land of the Númenóreans.
[...]
But Sauron caused to be built upon the hill in the midst of the city of the Númenóreans, Armenelos the Golden, a mighty temple; and it was in the form of a circle at the base, and there the walls were fifty feet in thickness, and the width of the base was five hundred feet across the centre, and the walls rose from the ground five hundred feet, and they were crowned with a mighty dome. And that dome was roofed all with silver, and rose glittering in the sun, so that the light of it could be seen afar off; but soon the light was darkened, and the silver became black. For there was an altar of fire in the midst of the temple, and in the topmost of the dome there was a louver, whence there issued a great smoke. And the first fire upon the altar Sauron kindled with the hewn wood of Nimloth, and it crackled and was consumed; but men marvelled at the reek that went up from it, so that the land lay under a cloud for seven days, until slowly it passed into the west.
Thereafter the fire and smoke went up without ceasing; for the power of Sauron daily increased, and in that temple, with spilling of blood and torment and great wickedness, men made sacrifice to Melkor that he should release them from Death.
Perhaps two instances are not enough to make a pattern, but one cannot help but notice that in Tolkien's world, the good guys never make temples or churches, and never have priests or monastics or any kinds of religious official. Nor do they even make prayer very often; perhaps the closest example in LotR is Faramir and his rangers taking a moment of silence to face west, towards lost Numenor, before a meal. In general it seems that heroic characters, though very much of aware of their dependence on providence and implicitly trusting in God, do not build mediating institutions. On the contrary, building a temple or establishing a religious hierarchy is an activity seen only among the villains. It is a form of idolatry, born of fear and showing a lack of genuine faith, and which only enslaves them.
Adanel again:
Ever after we went in great dread of the Dark; but he seldom appeared among us again in fair form, and he brought few gifts. If at great need we dared to go to the House and pray to him to help us, we heard his voice, and received his commands. But now he would always command us to do some deed, or to give him some gift, before he would listen to our prayer; and ever the deeds became worse, and the gifts harder to give up.
[...]
Then we yearned for our life as it was before our Master came; and we hated him, but feared him no less than the Dark. And we did his bidding, and more than his bidding; for anything that we thought would please him, however evil, we did, in the hope that he would lighten our afflictions, and at the least would not slay us.
For most of us this was in vain. But to some he began to show favour: to the strongest and cruellest, and to those who went most often to the House. He gave gifts to them, and knowledge that they kept secret; and they became powerful and proud, and they enslaved us, so that we had no rest from labour amidst our afflictions.
It's easy for a Protestant, especially an evangelical or someone descended from the Radical Reformation, to read this and say, "Aha! Idolatry! Rome!" For that matter one might be tempted to link it to the Temple in Jerusalem, perhaps echoing Jesus' criticisms of the Temple hierarchy. (Or one might take it in a more anti-semitic direction, but I see no need to encourage people like that.)
An author may end up sending messages he never intended, and this is one where I think there is a tension between Tolkien's writing and some of his own life and convictions.
I wonder sometimes about how this applies to Tolkien's very many atheist fans, to the extent of defacements like Palantir and Anduril. I suppose it's not fair to tar atheist fans of Tolkien with those abominations. Those are examples of a culture that simultaneously adores Tolkien's work, at least on the superficial level, while despising his ethics. But an atheist - perhaps indeed like Pratchett - might appreciate Tolkien's work and his ethics even while believing him to be, however understandably, in error about the existence of God or the truth of Catholicism.
OliveTapenade
6d ago
Narnia, even the heavily secularised film version, is obvious enough that I don't think you could miss it. Even before seeing the film itself, Narnia is famous as a Christian series of children's books, and C. S. Lewis is extremely widely beloved by everyone from Catholics to evangelicals, despite being neither. The first Narnia film was trying to imitate the Jackson LotR and go for mainstream appeal, but by the sequels my impression was that they had realised they were making films for a niche, mostly-Christian audience.
LotR hides it a bit better, especially the films, which tend to strip out Tolkien's ethics in favour of generic fantasy action. It was, of course, Tolkien's intent to be less direct, but in this case the films take out most of the moral worldview, and I'm skeptical much made it through to audiences.
My preferred example of this is Dragon Age 2, which deserves a longer post than I can make right now, but which I much prefer to read as a tragedy, and therefore is accentuated and heightened by 'bad' decisions.
I think DA2 is a tragedy even if you play it 'optimally', for the best outcomes. Even in the best possible version, DA2 is a story about Hawke, the protagonist, seeking his/her fortune in a new city, rising from a penniless refugee to the height of political power, and none of it being worth a damn. No matter how good your decisions, or how diligent you are about sidequests and doing all the content, the city of Kirkwall is doomed to descend into anarchy and civil war. It does not matter how good your judgement is, or how canny a political operator, or even how skilled you are with a sword. The forces of social division and entropy tearing this city apart were set long before you ever arrived. Moreover, no matter your choices, you are going to lose friends and loved ones. This city will chew up and destroy everyone you ever cared for.
In some ways I see the game summarised well in the character of Gamlen. Gamlen is the player character's uncle, someone you were hoping to make contact with and ask for help in your desperate flight at the start of the game. Instead you discover that he is a washed-up drunk and a gambler, who has lost the family's wealth and even sold their estate to cover his debts. It is easy to feel contempt for him as you set about rebuilding the fortune and reclaiming your estate.
Even so, by the conclusion of DA2, well, at least one of your siblings has been killed by monsters, the other has either been killed by monsters or has been lost to you by joining/being-conscripted-into an isolated organisation of fanatics, your dead father's legacy is in disgrace, your mother has been murdered by a serial killer, and your friends have mostly fallen apart as well. By the end of the game I wanted to head down to Lowtown and say to Gamlen, "...I get it now. Pass me a bottle."
If you try your hardest to make optimal choices you can take the edge off the tragedy a little, but to me that always feels like missing the point of the game. Both your siblings should die. Merrill should end up killing her entire clan. Isabela should end up fleeing the city, feeling guilty and abandoned, while the qunari burn the city searching for a book that isn't even there. Anders should die on a bloody block, killed by someone he thought was a friend. This is miserable, but the game is about misery.
DA2 is a game about losing what you love, about betrayal, and entropy, and being the last one standing, hands covered in blood, amid the burning wreckage of everything you were trying to defend. The more strongly that theme comes through, the better and more affecting the game is, and that means that I think the 'good' choices, which let you salvage small bits of success from amid the wreckage, make the game weaker as a whole. DA2 is, unavoidably, a game where you the player lose. Kirkwall defeats you. The game is better if it leans into that.
Another point of comparison might be Rannoch in ME3, which I notice you didn't mention. I think the Rannoch section works vastly better if, in the end, only one race can survive. I have my objections to the actual writing of the Rannoch segment, which is mostly bad, but I like the final choice. The quarians will survive or the geth will survive. Choose. It is a genuinely difficult and even heartbreaking choice. Unfortunately, BioWare are cowards and give you an option to just save everyone, which I think is frankly pretty pathetic.
To an extent I have the same objection to Tuchanka. Both Tuchanka and Rannoch have more-or-less the same premise. You have two very sympathetic characters, Wrex/Mordin and Tali/Legion, both of whom are fan favourites, both of whom the player has probably come to really care about in previous games, and who are on opposite sides of a contentious, morally complicated issue. Wrex wants to cure the genophage; Mordin wants to preserve it. Tali wants the quarians to survive and prosper; Legion wants the geth to survive and prosper. They cannot both get what they want. The case for each side has been made to you at length by a sympathetic, emotionally compelling character. Now choose.
Unfortunately in both cases ME3 wimps out. For Tuchanka it just has Mordin change his mind and become anti-genophage despite that being the opposite of his position in ME2; and for Rannoch it just lets you convince the geth and the quarians to put a history of genocide behind them and make up. You can argue Mordin changing his mind is justified if you pushed him in that direction in ME2, but he changes his mind even if in ME2 you encouraged him to believe that what he did was right and justified. It reminds me of how Garrus in ME2 is always a rogue who's quit C-Sec to become a vigilante, even though his entire character arc in ME1 was about choosing whether to go rogue or play it straight and stay in C-Sec, and both options were supported there. There are a lot of places where BioWare handles player choice very well, but that just makes these failures all the more jarring, especially when they go against the ME series' promise to give you genuinely hard choices. What is the point of promising hard decisions if the games are always going to back out and give you a third option? The golden routes are BioWare losing their nerve and failing their own games.
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