Yeah. Robert was a bad king and a worse man, but his biggest redeeming quality is that he tried to avoid war at all costs and his brothers (both by blood and bond) seemingly threw that away.
(I don’t know where this characterization of him itching for war comes from. He likes fighting, but all his actions push in the direction of peace and forgiveness, which is also why I don’t get when people act like Joffrey was mimicking ROBERT in his kingship. Again, he was a terrible person but well known for turning enemies into friends)
I don't if he was really such a bad king. I mean, he did keep the peace for about 15 years. And his people did like him.
He found ruling boring so he delegated everything. Part of ruling is also to learn to delegate.
Bad person... I don't know if I'd call it that way. He was a bad husband. He ignored his wife, insulted her in public and even hit her. But he definitely did not laugh a other people's misfortune or anything (nothing like what some people say about him relishing in Elia's and her children's fates).
I guess for the society they lived in, he was average. Better than most, not as good as others.
As King, he dispensed justice, he kept the realm together and the people happy. And he tried to deal with or eliminate the possible threats (Greyjoy Rebellion, the advent of a possible invasion by Daenerys and her Dothraki). But he paid no attention to finances...
If we compare all the other kings, wannabe kings and prospective kings we see (Balon, Renly, Stannis, Joffrey, Robb, Jon, Sansa, Daenerys, Bran), he was not that bad...
I will give you that he 100% kept the peace and was dedicated to keeping said peace. However, he was a bad king, a bad husband, a bad father, and a bad man.
Yes, delegating is important in leadership, something that I have had to learn myself the hard way, however there is a difference between "delegating" and throwing everything on other people which is 100% what he was doing. He was negligent and allowed the rampart corruption within his gov't. (seriously, over half of his small council (Renly, Vary, Littlefinger, Pycelle) was corrupt and that is on him. Especially when non-corrupt members attempted to remove or deal with corruption and he went out of his way to stop it. Almost every consequence of the WOT5K could be traced back to his apathy.
As for bad husband, even for the society he was bad. He regularly hit Cersei, he regularly RAPED Cersei, and that can't be explained away as a product of his society. We see in Ned and Cersei's POV that he knew what he was doing was wrong and he felt guilty about it, and yet he continued doing it. For bad father, he had NINTEEN children that he neglected or abandoned. As for bad person? Well he was the king. It does not matter that he did not laugh or smile at R/A/E death's (I truly don't think he did, I know it is a prevailing theory, even in-universe) he still had the ability AND responsibility to punish those who did the deed. He just didn't. And he was sleeping with a girl that was so young that Ned, his biggest supporter, did not even want to know how old she was out of disgust.
So yeah... the right man definately died at the Trident, but Robert was not a good man/king/husband/father. He was good at keeping the peace and turning friends to enemies, bt that is where his virtues end.
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