It cannot be overstated how incompetent Mrs. Everdeen is as parent

And I don’t understand why she is given so much sympathy while other characters who have lived through equally as terrible, or even worse circumstances than her get bashed.

Gale for one. He was a child when he lost his father and had to become one of the providers of his home. He had the worst odds among his peers because of the amount of tesserae he had to take in order to keep his family fed. And yet, he’s one of the harshest judged characters in the series because of how he reacted to his trauma. Mind you, this isn’t to say anyone has to like him, but I find very hypocritical how this 19 years old is given less grace for his hurtful behavior than this grown adult.

Everyone on District 12 had it rough. Who is to say Mrs. Mellark didn't develop BPD from her trauma of living in poverty, or from having grown up terrified of the reaping? And that her violence towards her sons was her way of acting out as someone without the proper resources (after all this is what people say about Mrs. Everdeen). Yes, hitting your children is awful, but letting them starve to the point that your prepubescent daughter, who wasn’t even old enough to be reaped, starts to consider prostituting herself in order to feed herself (AND YOU) is infinitely worse.

There’s so much violence involving children in this series I feel the absolute horror of what happened to Katniss and Prim isn’t talked about as often as it should be. Katniss, as a little girl crying and begging her mom for help as her body eats itself. That’s one of the worst things I’ve ever read.

And even if you believe she had no responsibility over her daughters’ well being because of her depressed state, what is the excuse for her leaving at the end of Mockingjay? When Asterid lost the person she loved most, her child stood up and became their family’s caretaker despite suffering from a tremendous lost herself.

When Katniss lost the person she loved most, her grown mother left her behind in a destroyed district surrounded by ghosts.

I remember reading the part where Katniss talks about it and how upset I felt that she wasn’t even surprised by her mother leaving. How useless can you be as a parent when your depressed, suicidal child learns that you won’t be taking care of her and that is her reaction?

She reminds me a bit of Monica Gallagher from Shameless. Another pathetic woman whose children deserved much better than her. Katniss is a saint for even acknowledging her mother’s existence at the end of these books, and I find it sickening how children are expected to be “the bigger people” and try to mend relationships their parents ruined themselves.