52077
I'm not sure what the last part of this sentence means:

世界をこのようなみじめな状態にした責任は我々にあると言われても仕方がない。*

"About our responsibility in putting the world in this miserable state, we (?)
even if is said there is no way"

My grammar fails at にあると言われても, how does that work?

*This is from the FF7 movie.
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-08-07T12:45:31.780
52074
2017-08-07T13:11:00.347
13634
question
grammar
Meaning of にあると？
「世界をこのようなみじめな状態にした責任は我々にある」、と 言われても 仕方がない。

When we are said that it's our responsibility to put the world into such a
miserable state, we have no excuses.

If we are said, "the responsibility to put the world into such a miserable
state exists on us," we have no excuses.

我々にある＝exists on us

と＝that

言われても＝if we are said
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-08-07T13:08:45.577
52076
2017-08-07T13:08:45.577
52074
answer
I think you're breaking down the sentence a little wrong.

It breaks down more like:

[(世界をこのようなみじめな状態にした責任は)我々にある]と言われても仕方がない

which translates literally as

"It can't be helped if people say that [(the responsibility for putting the
world in such a miserable state) lies with us]."

In other words, にあると isn't really a unit here.

The に is marking 我々 as the indirect object of ある, in the standard construction
XはYにある "X is at/with Y". In this case X is 責任 (and the whole relative clause
preceding it) and Y is 我々, so it means "the responsibility is with us".

And the と is quoting everything preceding it as the content of what "people
are saying".

Hope that helps.
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-08-07T13:11:00.347
52077
2017-08-07T13:11:00.347
25107
52074
answer