YES YES YES.
Actually? They’re mocking him for being unmasculine. And okay, the beauty of Kylo Ren in the movies is that it takes souped-up hypermasculine rage and shows us that in reality, it’s not all badass and fearsome–in reality, it’s infantile and pathetic. So I love that! It’s what canon portrayals of MCU Loki really lacked. Whereas TFA went out of its way to show us stuff like the two Stormtroopers figuring out Kylo was having a tantrum and backing away slowly.
But you solve a problem like Kylo Ren by leaning more into his feelings, by helping him figure out what’s really bothering him and addressing it. Whereas I feel like if he just “manned up” and was all stoic and badass and had no moments of weakness, fandom wouldn’t be nearly so critical.
And okay okay I get that humour is how we deal with discomfort and problem spots and it’s a legit coping mechanism for people BUT WATCHING THEM DO IT DRIVES ME UP THE WALL.
Because everyone would like to say that he’s whiny and like a teenager who doesn’t appreciate his loving parents, but, well… we all KNOW the Jedi’s approach to emotion and attachment is fucking toxic! Luke could handle it, but Luke reached adulthood before he lost his loving and stable caretakers. And Han and Leia are great people but seriously, I grew up near an Army town and most of my friends were Army brats, it is a known fucking fact that even if great people are fighting for the noblest cause in the world, if they have to raise a child in an environment of chaos where parents are at frequent risk of disappearing or dying and nobody prioritizes the child’s emotional health, it will have consequences.
Tag: important
The best thing I ever got at a social justice conference was a dishtowel: Embroidered on it are the words “Everyone wants a revolution – no one wants to do the dishes.”
It’s easy to give someone glory and social cred for being an Internet personality or making a speech at a march. It’s easy to get lost in judging other folks’ value by how well they “speak feminist” or how many articles they’ve written.
It’s harder to recognize and celebrate the invisible and unglamorous work like child raising and cooking and cleaning that has always traditionally been done by women, particularly migrants and women of color.
This, however, is the work that makes any “movement” possible, and is equally important as speaking on a panel or teaching at a university.
We need to start recognizing and centering this work, and the people who do it, in order to build truly accountable social justice communities.
“What happened, Bojack?”
“Same thing that always happens – you didn’t know me, then you fell in love with me.”
My favorite part of this echo is the completely different meanings attributed to each exchange, like, people characterize Han Solo’s “I know” as him being ~cool~ but dang, no, I’m sorry you didn’t actually watch the film, but the emotional context for his saying “I know” is that this is the first time Leia—who has refused to express or even acknowledge the exact nature of her feelings for Han even after they get together—has told him she loves him, and Han is about to be literally frozen in carbonite, which, as they’re informed, is experimental and might result in his death, and even if he doesn’t die, he’s still being shipped to a nigh impenetrable fortress, so that Leia should tell him now—he can’t tell her he loves her, he can’t do it, because either way this carbonite thing goes, as he sees it, he’s dead, and the emotion is just too much; he has to throw up shields or else he’ll just straight up lose it and he’ll lose this one last moment with Leia with it.
And the echo in Return of the Jedi in which their positions are reversed has a very different context, but it’s also notable because it is Leia being cool. Yeah, Han loves her! She knows, and she knows why he first fell for her: because even if the odds are stacked against them, she’s still in charge. She’ll break into Jabba’s palace to save him, making her way past guards, conning the whole villainous lot of them. She’ll stone cold murder this dick who tries to enslave her. When Stormtroopers have her and her allies surrounded, she’ll shoot those assholes down. Of course Han loves her; she never doubted it. And Han is just overwhelmed with his love for her! Because damn, y’all, HE ALMOST DIED. AND SHE CAME TO RESCUE HIM. SHE FREED HIM FROM THE CARBONITE. SHE ISN’T LETTING HIS PUNK ASS ROT, AND SHE ISN’T LETTING SOME IMPERIAL DOUCHEBAGS SHOOT HIM UP.
~*~romance~*~
Always reblog.
HOW TO RELATIONSHIPS IN TWO GIFS. *____________*
The mirrored language is also telling him she understands him. That she heard what he meant when he said it, and far from being upset that he didn’t say ‘i love you’ back, she knows that in a way he did, and remembers it with affection. (not necessarily the surrounding scene, obviously, but how he communicated with her.) I can read your subtext, she’s telling him. I know what you mean when you can’t say things outright. You’re getting through.
There are a lot of other ways she could have responded that would still have gotten the “yes of course you love me” message across. By specifically replaying an exchange they’d had before, with the knowing smile that says she’s doing it on purpose, she’s also bringing the feelings from the earlier scene back to mind: yes, you love me. I know you do. and i knew that you loved me back then. it’s okay that it took you until now to be able to say the words.
Dear autistic parents of autistic kids:
If the special interest of one of you coincides with the aversions of another, this does not make you a bad parent!
It’s okay to communicate “I love you, but I need some space for a bit. I’m here if you need me.”
Keeping up with self-care is good for both you and your child.
Kimchi and Justice 