Stede's journey wasn't centered on finding (romantic) love at the beginning. He set out to find himself, to find a community. (And it's beautiful that he gets that.)
But along the way he finds not only a best friend, but the love of his life: in that same person. Stede's journey is a blatant queer allegory: a man who has never fit into society, who is treated poorly for not fitting into *pick your societal norm*, who finds himself through community, fixing some of his past relations, but also discovering his sexuality: gay and demisexual.
Ed's journey is also about finding himself. About leaving a life that doesn't make him happy anymore and he too along the ways finds the love of his life.
Their journey together is about finding that person who gets them down to their neurons, first as a friends, then as a lover. Their journey is of being in love for the first time and all that that entails.
I mentioned above that Stede's sexuality can be read as demisexual; there are many beats along the way in canon that I think make this a strong read.
But I want to talk about the read of Ed as demiromantic. And this is just an interpretation, not canon fact.
We see that sex on the ship is casual. "Non-stop knocking ship." And we see that Ed is no stranger to sex. The marks on his skin during the stabbing skin alluding to past "stabbings."
But there's also an underlying touch-starved intimacy; he wants to be held by Stede so badly, that he gets him to stab him.
We see in the next season, stabbing as sexual again between Mary and Anne. But we also see that underlying loving affection between them later. The stabbing is also tied to emotion with these two couples.
We see more of the emotional intimacy between Ed and Stede, their friendship leading to a more emotional connection with the bathtub scene. Ed opens up to someone for the first time and then gets intimate physical touch, even getting more of it by placing his forehead on Stede's hand.
In the gravy basket Ed asks for the most basic of things to survive. And it's honestly sad when you remember that he is fighting to live, he wants to live, but he only gives himself the basics of it. Warmth, good food, and intercourse — with orgasms. This qualifier makes it clear that Ed has had unsatisfying sex. Him looking for emotional connections fits into the reason, especially since his entire journey is about emotional intimacy.
This episode with Anne and Mary is what really started to cement the Ed is demiromantic reading for me (again not canon, just an interpretation.) Ed and Stede are very private about their romantic/sexual lives. (Can I also take a sidenote to talk about how it's a breath of fresh air that their relationship is based on friendship!)
I know it's prevalent to say that Ed fell at the on-start but I don't think that's quite true. He was fascinated by Stede. Someone new and interesting and they connected emotionally right away, two sides of the same coin. Their friendship is what truly ties them together before their romantic relationships and certainly before sexual.
They both push back when anyone tries to bring up the sexual side of their relationship. Ed states "our private lives are our private lives" to his old friends Anne and Mary, which yes is funny, but is also very telling that Ed doesn't want to talk about those things. Stede is special, Ed is older, this thing between them is more than just idle gossip about sex lives between friends. When Spanish Jackie brings up the Swede as a "jackhammer," Ed also has an opportunity to bring up Stede if he wanted to chat, but he doesn't cause "our private lives our private lives."
This happens a third time when Izzy unceremoniously opens the curtains the morning after. Stede responds as he normally does to Izzy: offended, Ed looks annoyed but not surprised, since this has been established — Izzy getting into personally spaces — from the beginning.
After Ed and Stede are reunited, under the moonlight, the biggest time in season one we really see Ed looking at Stede with pure emotional vulnerability on his face, they kiss again. And Ed stops it, wanting to take it slow. I think this moment also adds to demiromantic Ed! He gets to hold hands, cuddle, talk about his day, both their days with each other. Cuddles and talks, romance and intimacy over sexual at this stage in their relationship.
Overall, Ed and Stede's relationship is built on their friendship. They like each other. They love each other. And I think both can be read as ace: Stede as demisexual and Ed as demiromantic.
Ed wanting emotional connection, romance his entire life, but just like the fine things, not thinking it's for him, that he gets that, only to find out he does! He gets to have romance! He gets to hold hands just to hold hands. He gets to take it slow without judgement! He gets to have sex with romance! And that man is going to be romanced! Good for him!
Their connection and journeys about being emotionally vulnerable with each other, being able to grow close with one another is beautiful.
If you disagree with this reading, cool. The amazing thing about this show is that sexuality is left open. Is Ed gay or bi? You decide! Is Frenchie ace? That's my reading! It's all up to interpretation.
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I got upset that Nick's agency looked so rundown because RoboDad deserves better. So I fixed it up and decorated it with mods to give him a better place to live and work.
His office is still messy and disorganized but there’s a lot more storage so that everything has a proper place, it just gets moved around a lot.
Nick’s desk area now has a bunch of pictures and notes taped to the wall to help him spell out his thoughts on recent cases.
There’s also a picture of Maggie on his desk to remind him of his lady love.
His guest room looks a lot more cozy with actual sheets on the bed and pillows.
I know it’s kinda implied that it’s actually Nicks bed and Ellie sleeps upstairs, but I like to think she has her own apartment elsewhere.
Nicks new room has a big and luscious bed because he deserves to have one and no one can tell be otherwise. Let Gramps have some comfort dang it.
And there are books everywhere because Valentine seems like the type who likes to read and write. Some of those he wrote himself.
That carved duck on the dresser was a gift from a grateful client. Actually, most of the stuff he has are gifts because so doubt he’ll buy much comforts for himself.
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i'm sure you know this already but:
COTL ISN’T DELETING THEIR GAME.
1) in terms profit they'd pretty much shoot themselves in the foot with that decision, and as protest it's not very effective to make unity listen.
2) if they were, there would've been a much bigger announcement than a twitter tweet.
3) they confirmed they're not in both the discord and the twitter. after the deletion tweet went viral. which...ok.
4) it's probably a scare tactic to take advantage of the unity news to get more people to buy their game.
5) it probably worked.
so many people are focused on the unity issue that i don't think it's often talked about how much of a shitty pr stunt that was by the social media manager. people are fearmongering, sure, but the initial seeds were planted by that twitter post that really should've gone through some extra foresight.
hope they enjoy their extra revenue.
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this weekend i met someone off bumble bff and she was one of the most gross homophobic bi women i've ever met. going on rants about how butch lesbians are just misogynistic men and copy-paste their whole personalities and looks from abusive men and abuse women the same way. i started leaving my body and felt so much rage. she just kept going on about how toxic lesbians and the lesbian community are in general and making homophobic comments knowing i'm a lesbian. you are insane if you think being gnc makes a woman manly or masculine. and that appearance makes a woman more abusive. my abusers were extremely feminine bisexual woman.
she said that bisexual men have it worse than lesbians because lesbians are "encouraged" to experiment and bi men are not. what kind of weird ass braindead comment is that?? she would imply lesbians are privileged and act like we are so big in numbers. she said lots of lesbians get into relationships with men and use them for material things and disrespect male partners. i of course knew that was a batshit insane and stupid thing to say and doesnt happen. so i said id never met lesbian who'd been with men and she said in a hostile tone "so you only know goldstars?" ofc she is a hardcore troon supporter and thinks terfs are a real thing and got offended when i said i don't like dick, i told her i was banned on tinder before because of trans women harassing me and reporting me for not wanting them, so she started checking me with questions like "okay so then would you date a trans man?" they think gotcha because self-loathing women. then she would complain about how lesbians would refuse to speak to her because she was bi....i wonder fucking why. you prove us right every time. you hate homosexuals and refuse to acknowledge you're homophobic oppressors pro conversion therapy and align with homophobic men who want to rape us.
like i cant even process how much homophobic misogynistic shit she said but thinks bi women have it the hardest and that lesbians are worse and bad to bi women, that the "hate" is the same...and whenever i tried to make a point she'd say it goes both ways???? it absolutely does not??? like when i said bi women don't think lesbians are real. and funny she would never call a trans "woman" a man lmao but has no issues calling us men. anyways i fucking hate bisexuals you homophobic conversion therapy rape supporting pieces of shit. if i had known she's bi i would have straight up not even bothered to talk to her. thank fuck i have wonderful normie straight friends who support me and agree with me on trans bullshit and these homophobic maidens
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I was laughing about reading your indignation over genres being too subjective when it comes to bookstore categorization because it made me realize I definitely unconsciously view my genre sorting as a Formal Complaint and Correction to the fools in the publishing industry who dictate (wrongly) how their publications are indexed
but also my categorization is more of vibes that all blend into each other, which imo is how genre SHOULD be 😤
The last 24 hours have been so eye-opening for me because I didn't even realize that I had such strong opinions about genres.
Really, if I branched out genre-wise, I would probably do something similar to what you do which is putting them in their Correct™ genres. I could make cute signs for my bookshelves to indicate genre and everything. However, it would look pretty sad to have my 2 biographies and 3 horror novels in their own sections lmao.
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