Attack on Titan Marley and Eldias Relationship from a Sociological Point of View

Recently, anime lovers have been shocked by the release of the latest season premiere as well as being the last season of Attack on Titan. This anime is an adaptation of a manga with a similar title written and illustrated by Hajime Isayama. The anime, which was first broadcast on April 7, 2013, received various positive responses. Crunchyroll, an anime streaming site, listed AoT in the list of 100 best anime in the 2010s.

In short, this anime tells of human life that is threatened with extinction and must be confined within three walls consisting of Maria Wall which is the outer wall, Rose Wall, and Shina Wall which is the innermost part. This wall protects humanity from the attacks of the giants outside Wall Maria. Eren Yeager who lives in the Shiganshina District on Wall Maria witnessed the brutality of the giants who managed to break through the walls and prey on humanity. Eren witnessed himself a giant devouring his mother fiercely. Eren and his two friends, Mikasa Ackerman and Armin Arlett, are determined to enter the military and become part of the Reconnaissance Force with the intention of eliminating all the giants in the world.

However, as time went on it became known that the giants were just ordinary humans who lived across the ocean. The giants came from the Eldians who had for decades experienced discrimination by the Marleys. Eldians were obliged to live in a special shelter called Liberio, and were required to wear armbands bearing the nine-sided star.

Take it easy, this article will follow the storyline in the anime. So for those of you who don't read manga, don't worry about getting spoilers. Okay?
Before looking at the relationship between the Marley and the Eldians, let us try to understand the thinking of Zygmunt Bauman (1925-2017) regarding modern society. What really happened to modern society? According to Bauman, in a book written by Kevin Nobel Kurniawan entitled The Story of Sociology: Thoughts That Change the World and Human Relations , the life of modern society demands a life that prioritizes rationality in an effort to achieve goals. This rationality puts forward the consideration of profit and loss which aims to find the most efficient and effective efforts to achieve these goals. In Max Weber's terms, this rationality is called instrumental rationality. This rationality gave birth to various advances in science, technology, military, and other fields.

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Behind all kinds of positive impacts, this rationality also has hidden negative effects. Bauman explained that there will be groups of people who are marginalized, ignored, and unable to compete with other humans. This group is often considered as community trash and will only have a negative impact on people's lives. In real life, this marginalized group is often identified with refugees, homeless people, and various other groups who are also targets of discrimination.

Now let's see how the relationship between the Marleys and Eldia in AoT.
Eldia is a nation descended from Ymir Fritz who became the first to have giant power. After Ymir's death, the giant power then split into nine giants. These nine giants have advantages and are stronger than ordinary giants. 

In addition, Ymir's descendants also have the ability to turn into giants. Eldia Nation With the possession of gigantic power, the Eldia nation aims to dominate the world using giant power. In order to achieve this goal, the Eldians then tried to conquer other nations. The nations that were conquered by the Eldians were forced to give birth to Eldian races. One of these conquered nations was the Marley nation.

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When it had defeated all of its opponents, the Eldia nation was divided and a civil war broke out . The King of Eldia, Karl Fritz then decided to move the Eldia Empire. This is because King Fritz is sad because his people are killing each other. Then the King moved all of his people to Paradis Island. On the island, King Fritz then built the three walls mentioned earlier using giant power and erased his people's memories of the events before his move to Paradis Island and created a new memory that there is no life outside the walls.

Marley is a nation that lives on the main continent and is one of the nations that fell victim to the violence of the Eldians in the past. After the Eldia Empire's move to Paradis Island, Marley became one of the nations that became the rulers of the world and always tried to expand its influence throughout the world. In preparing for a military development that was increasingly modern and not left behind by other countries, the Marley nation then tried to take advantage of the giant power that had been captured by the Eldians. Marley then recruited the Eldians to become the army . Several Eldia warriors were made the heirs to the nine giantsowned by Marley. Even so, the Eldians were still considered a second class nation and Marley did not hesitate to send Eldia's army to death. In the battle with the Middle Eastern alliance , the Eldians were dropped from a height and then turned into a giant bomb to destroy the defenses of the Middle East alliance. As if Eldia's troops were only considered as biological tools and weapons for Marley's benefit.

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The Eldians who were still stuck in the main continent had to experience discrimination by the Marley people. The Eldians were considered descendants of demons because they were able to turn into giants. As mentioned earlier, Eldians were required to wear an identification badge in the form of an armband bearing a nine-pointed star. If caught not using these marks, Marley's party doesn't hesitate to kill them. Apart from that, Eldians were also obliged to live in the holding district called Liberio and were not allowed to leave the district without Marley's permission.

The relationship between the Marley and the Eldians can be said to represent our world. As we already know, in the era of World War II, Nazi Germany had the ambition to rule the world. They considered the Aryan race owned by the Germans to be a superior race . They seek to dominate the world and breed the Aryan race around the world. To achieve this then Nazi Germany had to defeat other nations and had to eliminate races which they considered to be lowly races , one of which was the Jewish race. The attempt to exterminate these races then created the Holocaust which was a blow to humanity. At least six million Jews were murdered in concentration camps, such as in Auschwitz, Dachau, Chelmno, Treblinka and various other places. Many of us think that these events were the result of barbarianism and that the initiators of the Holocaust were either mentally ill or were psychopaths. However, this was wrong.

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Adolf Eichmann is one of the people responsible for the tragedy of the Holocaust. After Germany's defeat in World War II, Eichmann then fled to Argentina and took the pseudonym Ricardo Klement. The Mossad, Israeli intelligence, managed to kidnap Eichmann in 1960 and bring him to Israel to stand trial. Unlike what we imagine, the figure of Eichman is someone who is still sane and is even a figure of "ideal husband and father who coveted" based on the psychological test that was carried out. So why was the figure of Eichmann who was still sane like a human being able to commit such a terrible crime?

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Bauman explained that this is the impact of the rationality of modern society which wants an ideal social order. In order to achieve this, many things were done and often had to get rid of groups that were considered to hinder the creation of an ideal order. For Nazi Germany, in order to achieve the purity of the Aryan race, races that were considered to be inferior, such as the Jewish race, had to be eliminated and eliminated from the face of the earth. For Marley, the Eldians were a nation of demon descendants who were considered second-class citizens and had to be removed from the world.

The new episodes of Attack on Titan that appear every week are highly anticipated by every fan. Maybe there are still many Attack on Titan connoisseurs who are still mourning the death of Sasha Blouse. The killing of Sasha, who is known to have a cheerful and cheerful character, is a sign that the future episodes of Attack on Titan will be even more tense. It's worth looking forward to the continuation of this anime. And please for those who have read manga, don't spoilers, please !