Friday, January 3, 2014

The Last Airbender Series: The Fortuneteller and the Expectation from Prophecy

People love to know about their future. Many people want to know if they will live prosperous lives or fall in love. Others want to know if something bad will happen to them. But regardless of what the future holds for us, we want to know our future primarily because we now have a means to change it. The power of foresight is knowing exactly what will happen so that we can avoid it. But by knowing the future, it seems that we actively try to pursue this expectation of our future. We see this in The Fortuneteller.

One instance of this phenomenon is a throwaway joke. Sokka meets a man who had met with the fortune teller about when he will meet the love of his life. The fortune teller tells him that he will meet the love of his life while he is wearing red shoes. He subsequently always wears red shoes. Sokka, already skeptical of the mystical power of the fortune teller, laments that the prophecy will certainly come true if you will it so. This person forces his expected future to become his reality, showing that he is seemingly in control of his destiny. But here, this control is an illusion as the person already knows his destiny and changes his life according to it. The other instance is when the fortune teller predicts that the town will be safe from harm. Aang and Sokka realize that the volcano is going to erupt and that the fortune teller was incorrect. So Aang, Sokka, and Katara take it upon themselves to change the fortune teller's prediction. By doing so, they are able to avoid any catastrophe from the volcano. But, as one of the townspeople notes, the fortune teller was correct in stating that the town would be safe from harm. Here, there is no illusion of control. The Gaang were in control of their destiny and the destiny of the town.

The fortune teller makes a strong point near the end of the episode that captures this nicely. She tells Aang that he can shape his own destiny, much like he changed the clouds (thus altering her prediction). We are in as much control as we choose. We can force our fate upon ourselves, or we can fight against it, even if it is later revealed to be all for naught.

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