turtle-paced:

Yeah, that one’s going to be personal and it’s going to vary. In Tyrion’s case, I think, be prepared for the author himself to disagree with you. “Monster” is a loaded term, and GRRM does explore the effects of its use with Tyrion. So many people believe the worst of him for shitty reasons that he comes to believe that doing the right thing is futile. Most powerfully stated here:

He turned to face the hall, that sea of pale faces. “I wish I had enough poison for you all. You make me sorry that I am not the monster you would have me be, yet there it is. I am innocent, but I will get no justice here.”

- Tyrion X, ASoS

Jaime’s the same.

“Men shall name you Goldenhand from this day forth, my lord,” the armorer had assured him the first time he’d fitted it onto Jaime’s wrist. He was wrong. I shall be the Kingslayer till I die.

- Jaime III, AFFC

While it’s fair enough to condemn several of Jaime and Tyrion’s actions, the widespread belief in their monstrosity, as an inherent and unchangeable quality (keeping especially in mind that people believe this of Tyrion due to his disability), is a dehumanising one that feeds their respective spirals of bad behaviour. If you think I’m evil and can’t ever change that, then let me be evil. 

Evil’s not what these characters are, though, it’s what they do. It’s their choices and behaviour that’s the problem, and those can be changed going forwards. It doesn’t fix the harm already done, and it doesn’t mean people in-universe or readers are obliged to think well of them, but it avoids the trap of thinking that characters who do bad things are less than human.

nobodysuspectsthebutterfly:

Life sucks and then you die.

…No, sorry, but my gosh, this is such an innocent question. What is the meaning of suffering? Why do bad things happen to good people? The problem of evil has wracked philosophers throughout history, and you’re asking me?

And I bring up history because that’s GRRM’s point. He didn’t want to write a happy fantasy world, an idealized medieval world where everything turns out fine and nothing ever hurts, he wrote ASOIAF based on actual medieval history (or his ideas of actual medieval history). Where life sucks for most people (“nasty, brutish, and short”), the poor live in squalor and are the playthings of the uncaring rich, when peasants cross paths with nobility getting away with a scratch is the best they can hope for, where women in particular face a deep ingrained institutional misogyny and sexual violation or death in childbirth is right around the corner… Honestly, other than some modernizations it’s not that different from today (and in some parts of the world still, modernization doesn’t even apply), which is probably a reason ASOIAF resounds so much with people.

And the meaning? The meaning is that we shouldn’t take this uncaring hateful cold world lying down. You can’t let it get to you and make you cold and hateful and uncaring too, you need to fight against it with all your strength. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

“Our maester chuckled at me and told us that Prince Rhaegar was certain to defeat this rebel. That was when Stark said, ‘In this world only winter is certain. We may lose our heads, it’s true… but what if we prevail?’”

“Your Grace, you made me swear to give you honest counsel and swift obedience, to defend your realm against your foes, to protect your people. Is not Edric Storm one of your people? One of those I swore to protect? I kept my oath. How could that be treason?”
Stannis ground his teeth again. “I never asked for this crown. Gold is cold and heavy on the head, but so long as I am the king, I have a duty… If I must sacrifice one child to the flames to save a million from the dark… Sacrifice… is never easy, Davos. Or it is no true sacrifice. Tell him, my lady.”
[…] “Do you think you’ve saved this boy, Onion Knight? When the long night falls, Edric Storm shall die with the rest, wherever he is hidden. Your own sons as well. Darkness and cold will cover the earth. You meddle in matters you do not understand.”
“There’s much I don’t understand,” Davos admitted. “I have never pretended elsewise. I know the seas and rivers, the shapes of the coasts, where the rocks and shoals lie. I know hidden coves where a boat can land unseen. And I know that a king protects his people, or he is no king at all.”

Davos felt a stab of despair. His Grace should have sent another man, a lord or knight or maester, someone who could speak for him without tripping on his own tongue. “Death,” he heard himself say, “there will be death, aye. […] What does Stannis offer you? Vengeance. Vengeance for my sons and yours, for your husbands and your fathers and your brothers. Vengeance for your murdered lord, your murdered king, your butchered princes. Vengeance!”

“What could he have done, one man against so many?”
He could have tried, Brienne thought. He could have died. Old or young, a true knight is sworn to protect those who are weaker than himself, or die in the attempt.  

Seven, Brienne thought again, despairing. She had no chance against seven, she knew. No chance, and no choice.
She stepped out into the rain, Oathkeeper in hand. “Leave her be. If you want to rape someone, try me.” 

The world may be nihilistic, but we shouldn’t be. The point is that even in a life of suffering, in the face of an uncaring world, you need to emulate those who try, even if they think they’ll die, like Ned and Davos and Brienne and Dunk. When winter comes for you or your loved ones or even people you don’t know, you fight. “ARE THERE NO TRUE KNIGHTS AMONG YOU?”

As @poorquentyn said, the overarching thesis statement of ASOIAF is that “Men’s lives have meaning, not their deaths.” “What matters, what makes us who are, what means something, is how we live our lives knowing that in the end, the house always wins.” If you want to act as a true knight, to act as a true king who protects his people even the smallest, to act as a true hero (not a hero from the songs who always wins because he’s the hero, but those who selfless sacrifice for the good of all), you have to try. Even if you die. You have no choice. That’s the meaning. That’s the point.

(For more on this subject, please see @joannalannister’s incredibly excellent essays on the meaning of ASOIAF.)