Talk:Ariel/@comment-24238780-20141211180549/@comment-1672596-20141218131338

"That's enough we all make mistakes and sometimes dumb choices, but that's what makes us special because we learn from them in the end other wise why is there a reason for us to be here."

I know, making mistakes and learning from them is what makes us human, but my main beef with Belle is that the kind of mistake she made in the climax is something even little kids would avoid precisely because it is something most people of even average intelligence and with decent deductive reasoning skills would fully realize is a horrible idea. That's why I get extremely irritated when people call Belle a "perfect role model" because the climax clearly shows she wasn't. A "perfect role model" wouldn't make mistakes, period, especially not of the caliber she made there. There's making mistakes, and then there's being extremely stupid in your choices, and what Belle did in the climax was of the latter. Like I asked with TRIMC 95 above, were you in Belle's situation, would you expose the Beast, especially with all of that knowledge and deductive reasoning skills realizing those factors? I wouldn't, not because I wouldn't want to save my father, but because I would fully realize that doing such a course of action has far too great of a risk in terms of probabilities that they'll just kill the Beast and the enchanted servants, making that plan not worth undertaking. And I'd know that those factors would have entered play because anyone who has good enough deductive reasoning skills to not only deduce a castle and its inhabitants were enchanted just from casual observation and without even being told beforehand, but also deduce easily a few seconds beforehand that Gaston orchestrated the mob to force Belle into marrying him, can most certainly deduce all of those factors and NOT be surprised when they don't turn out the way you hoped.

Plus, I'm not even sure if Belle ever actually learned from her mistakes. At least Ariel actually did try to avenge Triton when Ursula cursed him, and also told Eric to get out of there and save himself in the climax, which does point to learning from her mistakes. When Belle was saved by the Beast from the wolves (and then she saved the Beast due to his injuries), she continued to blame him for getting her into that mess and basically got the last word by saying "well, you should learn to control your temper", even though Beast's anger in the incident she was referring to was perfectly justified considering she not only directly, deliberately disobeyed his stipulation for her stay at the castle (ie, staying out of the West Wing), a decision strongly implied to be out of spite (based on her tone when she said "Ah, so that's the West Wing, huh?"), but then nearly destroyed Beast's literal chances of becoming human (granted, she didn't know what might happen if that rose was destroyed, but the fact that it was in a belljar should have been a pretty big hint, especially for someone with good deductive reasoning skills like her, that it was something NOT meant to be touched). Now, could Beast have handled the situation better? Yes, but his being angry with Belle was actually perfectly justified given the circumstances.

Sorry for being harsh, but I do genuinely get irritated when people claim someone is the smartest or very smart when all evidence points to the contrary, no matter how much said evidence is intended by the writers. It's the same as when people claim Sartre's one of the smartest people alive even though he basically acted as a political stooge for Communism and even Nazism, despite all evidence pointing towards them being extremely horrible ideologies. I also get irritated when Belle is said to be smarter than Ariel when, reading aside, there's extremely little to suggest she's even that smart. At least Ariel actually does try to go out and investigate her views and see whether they match up or not, and at least she has more than just reading, and her reluctance to go to Ursula and also her brief comment about sharks does indicate that she at least knew the risks as was available. Not to mention she doesn't make the kinds of mistakes that would have been especially obvious regarding the results (meaning, she doesn't do something like expose the Beast to a mob). Now, had it been Ariel and Rapunzel, I will concede Rapunzel's likely to be smarter.