The Council is fighting the wrong war.

[MrBlack103]

Couldn't really think of anywhere else to stick this, so mods if it doesn't belong here feel free to move. Anyway:

It has occurred to me that the Republic City Council's only measures against Amon seem to be physical attacks against the Equalists.

What they really need to be doing is trying to compete with Amon's propaganda machine. So far, even Tarrlok hasn't provided any form of response to Amon's flyers going out everywhere, his radio broadcasts and the spectacular public appearances he manages to make.

If the Council isn't careful, soon every non-bender in the city will be an Equalist.

Thoughts?

[baaSHEEPbaa]

Yeah, that does make more sense. Kill the idea instead of the person. They probably would have a better response too. They are against benders using there fighting advantage against non-benders. I bet that's what happens in the end. They will probably try to keep the theme of violance isn't the answere from ATLA. Even though there was quite a bit of it...

[Sparkysparkyboomman]

i dont see every non bender becoming an equalist, amon uses terrorist type means to get his way. i can see that turning people off big time.

[MrBlack103]

Good point, but terror tactics can still scare the common people into complacency. The Council needs to actively encourage them not to let Amon push them around.

[Archsage]

Amon has the right balance of intellect and power to fuel his position. You guys remember how Hitler was before WW2? Time magazine's "Man of the Year"? What's going to happen, is that Amon might do something stupid and "bite off more than he can chew" like Napolean or Hitler did. But so far, Amon has been playing his cards right, even sparing the Avatar to make sure he doesn't bring on too much more than he can handle (the entire world being involved in Republic City).

With that said, I completely agree with MrBlack. You can't fight ideology with brute force. That's the reason why things like Christianity persisted throughout the first few centuries AD. In order to defeat Amon, you need to start teaching why Bending is great, and equality is not really an issue. That's what Korra is supposed to do, but, as was noted previously, Korra gets the physical side -- the brute force -- but completely ignores the spiritual side.

That's what I like about this series though. In TLA Aang had the spiritual side down. But he needed the physical. In LOK, it looks like Korra is pretty great physically, but lacks any real spiritual prowess.

[baaSHEEPbaa]

Like I said in my last post, they will probably try to fight the idea instead. Violence is never the answer in the avatar world. If they keep doing that though, it's true. Every non-bender will become an equalist. Who wouldn't? People with potentially life threatening power, you'd want them gone.

[MrBlack103]

"They warm your homes...
defend your city...
provide your entertainment..."

The Council needs to put up posters with messages like these plus illustrations.

[baaSHEEPbaa]

All this has made me realise that the council is really really dumb. For a bunch of fairly old people that should have even a little wisdom... They suck. Except Tenzin. He's cool.

[andi23]

You know what I noticed?

The council during the flashback with Yakone and Aang- The council had at least two non benders- Sokka and the un named Airben- uhh.. the air guy (Aang was still the last airbender at that time or at least the oldest if he had just got Tenzin by then, or ... ok whatever my point is the air guy was definitely not a bender!!)

Anyway- now the entire council is made up of benders and naturally seems to make decisions to protect/ regard/ favour benders. I think this is half the problem- which in second season can be fixed- Tenzin is the only original 'bender' councilman left.
Korra could become the watertribe spokesman (even though she is young- maybe by the end of the season she would be mature enough? meh idk). Asami would make a great choice as non bending representative of fire nation ( I mean she looks fire nation and they were robbed by fire nation peeps- I'm assuming only high class wealthy fire nation people- who wouldn't need to steal stayed in earth kingdom, so that's my basis for thinking the Sato's are originally fire nation). As upper class she would seem to know how politics and powerplays work (like Toph did). We would just need a non bending Earth kingdom representative to fill in the gap

[Qiang]

The Council's response was obviously McCarthyism with Tarlokk spreading the fear of the equalist i.e. communism. The fact that bending represented power and that they misused it was a strong and necessary boost to Amon gaining a stronger foothold among citizens in the city. It wasn't directly tackled as an issue in this first book but we did see the difficulties Tenzin faced with the other members being too easily swayed without much of their own input. They were essentially ineffectual sheep that were pretty spot on for most politicians. This could possibly be an issue tackled in the next season, although to be honest I'd prefer an adventure around the world ATLA style