system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
[Avatar: The Last Airbender] "In the era before the Avatar, we bent not the elements, but the energy within ourselves. To bend another's energy, your own spirit must be unbendable, or you will be corrupted and destroyed." Does this make Energybending is a more basic skill than elemental bending?

In other words, can this narrative be taken as the story of how civilization evolved to bend - 'we' meaning citizens at large, like they learned energybending first as a skill?

Is energybending a more basic skill for most benders (other than the Avatar)? Or am I misinterpreting something here?
gpt
So given the information in legend of korra, it makes more sense that the we in "we bent not the elements" refers to the dragon turtles, not humans. In legend of korra the dragon turtles give element bending to humans without them first having energy bending.