Spartan Sibling

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

You have a little sibling. Especially a sister. The kid is wronged somehow. What do you do?

Do you deal with the offender in a calm, civil manner?

Or failing that, perhaps you are a little upset, yet you keep control over your emotions, and keep yourself as restrained as you can?

Or do you congratulate the offender, the offender's friends, anyone connected to the offender for keeping your little sibling or son in line?

If you are the latter, then congratulations! You are a Spartan Family Member. Unlike the Knight Templar Big Brother or Parent, the Spartan Family Member has absolutely no regard for their young one's well being. For example, say the Spartan Sibling brother got hurt in a fight. Rather than tending to their wounds, they will be given a simple roll of bandages to patch himself up and let him heal himself or rub salt in their wounds by giving them verbal abuse stating how it wouldn't have happened if they were stronger. If anyone has mistreated their children, they will be glad to side with the other side over their child/sibling as they feel "The kid deserved every bit of your insult" and the only remedy they offer to their child is "Toughen up, the world's a harsh place".

The Spartan Family Member is also prevalent in stories where only one can survive or honor the family. This creates a dog eat dog style environment between almost every member of the family and anything that can get rid of their sibling's stake in the pot is perfectly acceptable.

They often see all forms of competition as a litmus test of survival (ranging from fighting to just cleaning the house), if you are weakest link. Your parents will treat you as an unwanted child, your siblings will mock your for your inferiority. Doing well will earn praise from your parents and a scorn from your siblings. This naturally builds up resentment and a begrudging respect by all sides.

Any punishment by them know that it is wrong and harmful but do it anyway because it gives them a harsh lesson in life, a fact that you are raising your kid or sibling The Spartan Way and that they need to be hardened against your idea of a cold hard world and that they don't need to like it or them. Just need prove they will not crumble under such pressures under any circumstances.

It is not to say however they will glad to see their family die in a horrible way. To them, their children didn't die because they are weak but because sometimes in life, there are just some thing one can not overcome by being the best in the family.

Examples of Spartan Sibling include:


Anime and Manga

  • In Code Geass, the Emperor of Brittania couldn't care less what happens to his children, so long as, when all is said and done, one of them is strong enough to rule in his stead. Ultimately, its his disregard for their well-being that set the entire plot in motion.
    • And subverted as it's revealed that he did care about his children...two of them, at any rate. Along with their mother, Marianne, whose brutal assassination he apparently laughed off. In truth, Emperor Charles and his wife-slash-accomplice Marianne are Knight Templar Parents and Well Intentioned Extremists who engineered everything so that Lelouch and his sister would be protected. Unfortunately, they never guessed that Lelouch would chafe and rebel against their idea of "protection", as well as their plan to create a utopia by eradicating free will.
    • Pretty obvious with the others in the family too. Lelouch's other sisters (not Euphie, Conellia or Nunnally) were pretty quick to sic the guards on him after Lelouch claims he killed Charles simply going by his words and Schneizel just use ( or tries to) Lelouch and Nunnally as means to an end for his own agenda.
  • Naruto: Several of the characters had Spartan family members, most notably Hinata.
  • Chifuyu does this with Ichika to make sure he isn't an meek man and was taught to stand up for himself.

Film

  • The Sith in Star Wars lives by this concept of training padawans, if it doesn't kill their students, then it makes them stronger, and if it kills them, they are too weak to be Sith anyways.
  • In The King's Speech, when Albert was young, his father encouraged his brothers to pick on him for his stuttering, thinking that it would make it go away.

Video Games

  • In the PlayStation 2 game Shinobi, Hotsuma and Moritsune became this after realizing that they have to fight each to the death one day.

Western Animation