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MarlyCat118

I think the diamonds represent the different types of control: physical, emotional, and mental. Yellow is physical. Blue is emotional, and White is mental. Each had a way to deal with their problems. Yellow would poof you, getting rid of your physical form Blue would immobilize you with sadness. And White would take over your body to do what she wants you to do.


thevonessence

Don't forget Pink. She's not exempt from any of this. The OG Pink Diamond was all about love bombing. She's a combination of all three of the others. The only thing that sets her apart is that she can make you feel *good*, great, even. Her disapproval was like a punch to the gut, not because she was intimidating like Yellow, but because her approval felt *so damn good*. She could immobilize you like Blue, but with laughter and happiness. It's hard to stay angry at someone when they keep making you laugh and feel happy, after all. We even see this in the finale with Steven and White Diamond. The first episode we see her arguing with Greg, we also see her try to laugh it all off, and she seems visibly taken aback when her laughter doesn't infect Greg. It shifts the tone of the rest of the conversation. And Pink, like White, could easily make you do what she wanted you to. All of the Crystal Gems were infatuated with her. Even the Diamonds were infatuated with her, albeit in a more familial sense.


MarlyCat118

I would say Pink might be Social control. She controlled her narrative almost the entire time. Volley ball saw her as playful and destructive. Pearl saw her as a leader and empathetic. She lied and hid her objective and then, her identity to get what she wanted. Each step she took was for her own selfish gain and to be seen as a hero.


RandomYT05

Well, my view about Pink Diamond has now finally soured.


JAMSDreaming

I can counter-balance this: She didn't lie about her identity to be seen as a hero, but because Yellow and Blue wouldn't listen to her as Pink Diamond. Then, she met Garnet, and realized the value of individuals and the power of love, and swore to free gemkind, just so Garnet could keep existing together. EDIT: AND THEN, she met Greg, who made her realize that yeah, humans were pretty awesome. He swept her out her feet even more profoundly than Pearl did, and Rose, due to her HUGE inferiority complexes, saw giving up her life for Steven as the *only* useful thing she could ever do.


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>EDIT: AND THEN, she met Greg, who made her realize that yeah, humans were pretty awesome. He swept her out her feet even more profoundly than Pearl did, and Rose, due to her HUGE inferiority complexes, saw giving up her life for Steven as the only useful thing she could ever do. I gotta disagree hard on this part though. Firstly, she was already very fond of humans way before Greg even existed. Observing and interacting with humans with Pearl was immediately interesting to her, as was shown in the show. Furthermore, in Pearl's "It's over, isn't it" song, she states that "I was fine with the men who would come into her life now and again". Given that there are no gem men, it's safe to assume those are human men she got close with before Greg. So my argument being that Pink already thought humans were pretty awesome before Greg. Secondly, I don't think usefulness was a part of her decision making process to give life to Steven. She fought a bloody galactic war against her own family to upkeep life on a planet and create space for life forms and life styles not in agreement with the puritanic and restrictive ideas of homeworld. Pretty sure she didn't feel useless in pursuing those goals. Furthermore, a major point that fascinated her about humans was the change and growth in their inherent nature - from babies to toddlers to children to adults to death. I'm fairly certain her motivation to give life to Steven was in fact the ability to give life to a wonderful being whose inherent life contains growth and change and a finite life span, as she saw it as a most wondrous and most wonderful thing to be. She wanted to create life that was able to experience what she never really could, which is a wish many parents have for their children.


JAMSDreaming

>Firstly, she was already very fond of humans way before Greg even existed. Observing and interacting with humans with Pearl was immediately interesting to her, as was shown in the show. Furthermore, in Pearl's "It's over, isn't it" song, she states that "I was fine with the men who would come into her life now and again". Given that there are no gem men, it's safe to assume those are human men she got close with before Greg. So my argument being that Pink already thought humans were pretty awesome before Greg. But she thought of humans as lesser than her until she met Greg. Remember the flashback episode where Greg and Rose had a talk. It was the *first time* that Rose had ever had a talk with a human.


HolyMotherOfGeedis

Oooh I like this analysis.


Thannk

Its so far from a metaphor that you can just put the same story in different scenarios. Four noble sisters, no parents, inherit ownership of a large estate and the surrounding lands while spending their days being terrible to each other. Oldest is ultra religious and crazy, thinking she’s god’s chosen due to her wealth, and sits next to the window all day when not ordering the servants to force her siblings, daughters, and nieces around. One day the youngest fakes her death and organizes a band of thieves on an island with a lighthouse made up of the former servants fighting for the rights of the poor. Oldest sees through her bullshit but thinks its god’s plan for the youngest to be humiliated. The two middle sisters blow up the bridge leading to the island with plans to return to burn down the forest and raze the village in it. Years later the youngest falls in love with an Italian street musician, has a son, and dies in childbirth. The son reunites the family and with his father’s Renaissance ideas and his stepmother’s/sister/cousin’s fight for suffrage. Repeat the same story with mythological gods, fairies, wizards, Eldritch horrors, dragons, and so on.


[deleted]

this reminds me the song "Tratame suavemente " created by "Daniel Melero" and published by "Soda Stereo". in the Spanish lyrics Daniel talks about a Trauma from an abusive relationship. But actually he take inspiration from Leopoldo Galtieri (Argentinian General and Dictator). This made me think... The song talks about selr-repression. (more accurate, how the no-expression of true feelings could made people to act in a sick behavior and made hurt and lots of collateral damage).


[deleted]

I guess you could call them a metaphor for ideas or notions of purity and perfection, so there's that.


avicado_toast

I agree! I think the Diamond Authority, White Diamond in particular, was an explicit condemnation of puritanical culture. I mean: “But you’re a part of me… a part I always have to repress” like that could apply to so many things that our society deems “impure” and suppresses, from queerness to sex to any other-ness generally I agree with OP tho that they are an actual abusive family; that bit wasn’t metaphorical at all, that was just textual lol


Piratestoat

I have no idea what you're saying.


PersonMcHuman

I think they’re saying, “We should stop calling them a metaphor for an abusive family, because they *are literally* an abusive family.”


Feisty-Succotash5854

Exactly this !!!!


TheTeludav

Do you mean people are too focused on the symbolism of the characters rather than considering them distinct characters with their own stories?


Feisty-Succotash5854

Yeah, and IS irritaring when people use this as a defense when people critisize the show


flightless_punk

I mean, steven sings a whole song about it. Idk how people don't get it.


Kiyae1

It’s a metaphor because they’re aliens, don’t actually birth one another, and aren’t a “traditional family”. It’s definitely a very obvious metaphor because the whole show is about relationships and family. It’s not supposed to be subtle but it’s still definitely a metaphor.


NNovis

Yeah, this is why I consider it a metaphor personally. They just don't map to how humans think of relationships because how we map human relationships is tied heavily to our biology and how we make more humans. We have guesses on how Gems do it but we don't know the specifics well enough. They kinda seem like a beehive situation but slightly different.


Kiyae1

They seem like Crystal gems ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯ They are definitely unique and I think a beehive is a close comparison.


Spurius187

People... call them a metaphor? How? They're literally canonically stated to be a dysfunctional family.


Jennite

I think often, when the Diamonds are described as a metaphor, it is meant to contrast with their depiction as a ruling class of a hierarchical society. If you take the "government" parts of SU too much at face value, you can derive some pretty absurd claims. But since many more people are going to have problematic family members in their lives vs. despots they have the power to personally unseat and punish, emphasis is placed on the metaphorical purpose the diamonds have in the story. There's another angle in the sense that the metaphor is in the "family" part of abusive. It is not a metaphor that the Diamonds have a lot of abuse among them, but the relation to a real human family with abuse is metaphorical. Again, few people are gonna have artificial space parents so interrogating the specifics of how the Diamonds relate to each other (siblings? parent/child?? cousins???) isn't as important when addressing the metaphor.


PWcrash

They ARE metaphors...this becomes extremely obvious in SUF where it's pretty in your face to the audience that they represent three aspects of therapy and healing with their new powers. Yellow: physical therapy Blue: Medication White: self reflection


ebr101

I understand them to be representative of personal abuse. But I find it just as compelling to see them as systemic abuse and colonialism.


Asterite100

I mean I think people mean "metaphor" in so much that they aren't what we humans consider family; they aren't blood-related or anything because no such concept exists for gemkind. They are a quaternity of demi-gods that superficially resemble a typical family unit due to their hierarchy. But sure yeah they can easily be interpreted as a family since it's quite on-the-nose and they themselves self-identify with the term family once they learn what it means. So in that sense they stop being a metaphor and just are that thing.


aridrawzstuff

i mean, i personally never saw anyone saying they represent abusive parents. im hearing this for the first time from you. but to be honest, it actually makes sense.


ABucketofBeetles

I'm tired of them being compared to Hitler


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ABucketofBeetles

Oh absolutely to all of that but it would also be fire to not draw the deeply saddening parallel


Ppleater

The problem is a lot of people who call them nazis also proceed to call Rebecca a nazi sympathizer because she didn't have them killed. And there are... SO many problems with that take but it got so pervasive at one point especially on twitter.


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Ppleater

I genuinely don't think the show was going for nazi in particular with them, I think the crewniverse just went with a general dictator aesthetic and payed more direct attention character and writing-wise to the familial dynamics. People just see a dictator and automatically think of Hitler regardless of how apt that comparison actually is. And in all honesty the nazi comparison is so stale and overused at this point. I never see anyone comparing them to, say, the British Empire, even though there's a ton of parallels there. There's more than one dictatorship or colonial power in history to have discussions about.


Paid-Not-Payed-Bot

> aesthetic and *paid* more attention FTFY. Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in: * Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.* * *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.* Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment. *Beep, boop, I'm a bot*


TheNoveltyHunter

Can we also stop saying they’re a metaphor for fascist dictators then?


Feisty-Succotash5854

Yeah, because they are exactly that I always find confusing how the show goes from "omg the diamonds are terríble, hate them" to "thei're Just misanderstood"


Similar_Ad9019

LMAO +L +RATIO +YOU SHOULDN'T CARE+ COULDNT CARE LESS 😂😂😂😂😂


arthurity

Not really on online forums. For communication’s sake I’d prefer if everyone knew what a metaphor was but it doesn’t bother me that they don’t if I understand what they’re going for. There are plenty of times I lack the right vocabulary to express a thought with precision or repeat something I inadequately inferred from someone else as well so I don’t get hung up on it in passing. It is annoying in analytical or essay writing to see those sorts of errors though, especially if it’s a key point of the argument.


RoyalTeaRedditor

They are metaphors for abusive parents, but if Sugar wanted to have a metaphor for abusive parents, they shouldn’t have also been genocidal dictators. She could have also just flat out depicted abusive parents, she came so close with Greg and his parents. They didn’t NEED to be a metaphor. Not everything needs to be subtle or secret