#i simply could not let this rest. i'd've been thinking about this for weeks if i didn't write this

[redgoldblue]

I cannot deal with the levels of subtext and metaphor that the whole conversation at the start of Captain Dobey You’re Dead is on. like, going straight from Hutch being withdrawn from Starsky because of… something mysterious… that happened last night…. between the two of them….. to Hutch telling Starsky he needs to learn to hide a societally excluded part of himself better. 

First of all, I know left-handedness has historically been a trait discriminated against (fun fact: the English word ‘sinister’ comes from the same root as the Italian word for ‘left’) but I’m pretty sure that by the mid-70s it. maybe still was but not to the point where a grown adult would genuinely be expected to change it. Secondly, even if it was, “If your best friend can’t tell you, who can?” would still be a REALLY WEIRD thing to say about it - obviously Starsky knows he’s left-handed, and the ways in which it would actually be inconvenient for him day-to-day are all… physical things that only affect him (grips not quite working right, things being on the wrong side, etc) and wouldn’t even be hugely visible to anyone outside himself. Hutch would still see them, but wouldn’t be inconvenienced/annoyed by them, and Starsky definitely wouldn’t need to be informed of them. But, okay. Let’s just spell this out. 

(Under the cut bc this got long)

Having said that, I’m starting us off with another Fun Fact: left-handedness has been specifically associated with homosexuality to the point of multiple scientific studies being conducted on it. Those studies were mostly in the ‘80s and ‘90s, but if they were being conducted in the ‘80s, that definitely means the association was already floating around in the ‘70s. The scientific institution is not (usually) a fast-moving beast. Weirdly, more recent studies and meta-studies have actually suggested that the association might be valid, and that homosexual men or women ARE actually marginally more likely to be left-handed. I don’t know whether there’s any data on bisexual people, but I’d like to think we’re more likely to be ambidextrous, just for the symmetry of it all. (source)

But to the scene itself:

1. Starsky is worried that Hutch is mad at him about something that happened last night. We never get told what happened. Hutch denies being mad about whatever it is, but is clearly being withdrawn and evasive. 

2. Not to be discounted, Hutch asks about car colours and Starsky responds with ‘flamingo’, which, I don’t care what your ma’s ‘47 Studebaker was painted in, that’s not a straight thing to call a colour. Hutch looks vaguely annoyed by this, Starsky repeats the question about last night, and Hutch immediately-

3. Pulls out a book outlining voluntary left-handedness conversion therapy and tosses it to Starsky, who understandably looks more than a little baffled by it - strongly suggesting that whatever happened last night, it didn’t have anything to do with Starsky being left-handed, or the book would have made some kind of sense to him. 

4. When questioned on this, Hutch says, “If your best friend can’t tell you, who can?”, which, see above. Extremely weird to the point of nonsensical thing to say if you’re genuinely talking about left-handedness. 

5. “Sooner or later, you’ve got to realise that this whole world is designed for right-handed people. You’re just out of step.” Do I even need to expand? I’m going to anyway.                                                            

Hutch, who has known he’s queer for a long time, been very aware that this is something the world Does Not Like about him for even longer, and has buried himself deep in the closet because this is basically the only thing about him that the world doesn’t like, so he can (depressedly) adapt by squashing it.          

Talking to Starsky, who is Jewish and ADHD (even if he doesn’t have the term for that) (and left-handed) and is perfectly aware the world doesn’t really like these things about him but has his entire life taken the view that, well, he can’t repress 85% of who he is as a person so the world may as well put up with it. (side note: when I told my mother about the maybe-homosexuals-actually-are-more-likely-to-be-left-handed thing, entirely outside the context of why I was looking it up, her response was ‘maybe left-handed people are just more likely to be out, because they’re used to experiencing discrimination from being teased in school’ so. there’s that.)                                                                        

Talking about something (if we’re running with the most obvious metaphor here) which Starsky probably regards as much the same as all of these things, but which Hutch is starkly aware is different specifically in the sense that this is something which will directly affect him, above and beyond just having to watch Starsky’s back about it. Starsky knows he’s out of step, he’s out of step in a lot of things. He is, to expand the metaphor, doing a completely unstructured dance with his whole life, but the steps of this one are going to break directly into Hutch’s very controlled two-step.

6. “I do alright.” “Aren’t you tired of doing just ‘alright’?” Again. Do I even need to expand? No. Am I going to anyway? Yes. Double meanings abound.            

Hutch’s view of this exchange: ‘Starsky: “I manage to live my life like this with minimal enough damage and discord that I’m not seriously harmed by it.” Hutch: “Don’t you want to be able to eliminate damage and discord? Don’t you want to not be harmed at all?”’                        

Starsky’s view of this exchange: ‘Starsky: “I can deal with the friction I get about this with very minimal hiding, and it’s far preferable to having to stop being who I am.” Hutch: “Aren’t you sick of even having to do that much hiding?”’                                                                                        

The completely objective third person view of this, as pointed out by @faorism​ (personal communication, 2021): this is a circumstance where Hutch’s ‘getting by alright’ is directly impacted by Starsky’s ‘getting by alright’. Maybe Hutch is tired of just getting by. 

7. I think Starsky’s expression and tiny little “Oh.” at the end of this exchange need to be acknowledged. 

 I actually AM going to leave that uncommented on, except that it’s a VERY serious ‘oh’ for the notoriously unserious Starsky. Way too serious for a conversation about left-handedness. 

8. Also, while we’re here, the next time we see them, Starsky is reading the book - in his right hand - while conspicuously and for seemingly no reason holding his gun and holster [phallic symbol but also symbol of being-a-cop, the biggest thing in his life that’s an open conflict with being queer] in his left hand, which is also the side Hutch is on. 

And then even later when they talk about Maxie Malone, they draw the connection straight from Starsk saying he was left-handed to him having been arrested for something Hutch’s mum ‘never let him read about’… 

I know the intended implication was probably (given the historical left-handedness = sexual perversion stereotypes) CSA, or at least something equally horrendous that a child actually shouldn’t be exposed to, but you know what else, associated with ‘sexual perversion’ and also left-handedness, a guy could have been arrested for in the ‘50s that a nice middle-class Minnesotan mother wouldn’t have wanted her son reading about? Yeah. 

The aunt exchange… does your left-handed aunt maybe live with… another left-handed woman, Hutch? Are you getting even more mysterious and circumspect about this topic because Dobey is now right there and you don’t want him to figure out what’s going on?

Also, after Starsky has been doing some things right-handed through the course of the episode (reading the book, picking up the pitcher when they’re having breakfast with weird old racist dude), after all these exchanges we get basically the only time they’re affectionately touchy this ep -

- where Starsky reaches out to grab Hutch’s arm with his left hand before they go in to interrogation, and Hutch reciprocates.

Anyway my hypothesis is, what happened ‘last night’ is that Starsky made a move on Hutch, probably in a semi-public space (Huggy’s? Familiar enough that Starsky would have felt safe to let his guard down but public enough that Hutch would have still rightfully felt exposed), and Hutch spends the entire episode trying to tell him in extremely unsubtle code that it’s too dangerous for them to (at least publicly) be together. To which Starsky responds by acknowledging it but also refusing to back down, and the episode ends with an affirmation of the naturalness and, notably, innocence of ‘left-handedness’ via Rosie. Starsky’s absolute delight upon finding out that she’s Like Him (…/them) combined with the turn to Hutch, the almost daring him to tell this kid they both love that she should hide a part of herself, and Hutch’s inability to do so.

 (Hutch’s ending comment (”one out of two isn’t bad”) as far as I can tell makes zero sense whatever you’re talking about, but that kind of makes sense with them having been talking in metaphor the entire time - there was nothing genuine about left-handedness he could say, but he also couldn’t really say anything about the actual thing they were talking about in front of Rosie and the rest of the Dobeys, so a completely meaningless statement is probably more or less the only reply he could have made). Also, we all know they didn’t really care about little things like ‘continuity’, but I’d like to note that (apart from the left-handed touching earlier), in the next episode they’re being very light-heartedly affectionate with each other and Hutch is taking Starsky to things which it really, really only makes sense to take a spouse to, so. they worked it out.