(1/?) First off, I want to say I really enjoyed scrolling through this blog and I think you do a really wonderful impression of Rau. You may have even opened me up to the idea of an AU Rau/Lacus pairing! lol Second, I was wondering your thoughts on where Rau stands on the pro-life/pro-choice argument. (Or you can do a post IC - either is fine with me!)
//Well, hi, there! Thanks for the read and the compliment and the question. Not sure what you mean by “AU” , though~
–In the show, there’s a very powerful moment with Rau and an apparently-pregnant Lacus, as it happens. (The show mostly tries to play it off as a joke, but that’s the sole solitary situation over two series where Rau actually listens to anyone. Why might that be…?)
Well, as someone with literally and biologically no mother, a pregnant woman is going to be a nearly-incomprehensible source of power and mystery for him. Headcanon, I don’t believe he’s capable of having children, and headcanon, I think he always intended to relinquish Lacus to Athrun (or whoever was going to marry her – like Durandal, but of his own volition and eons less of a dick) because she deserves to be a mother (like she never had…) and have a family. (The ‘rapidly dying’ part also helps.) At that moment, maybe, it’s like looking into a future where he’s gone.
Despite what amounts to a certain veneration of women bearing children, though, Rau is enough the historian to know that terrible things happen to women and teenage girls when their government forces them to carry a pregnancy to term, and forcing children into this world does not guarantee they’ll be cared for or loved, and between Al and Ulen he’s really had enough misogyny for one lifetime, thanks.
Rau’s much more fond of the opposite gender than his own, again, for fairly obvious reasons (people with XX chromosomes weren’t really part of Al’s Plan), and headcanon anyone who’d heard Via Hibiki sobbing and been told by her that he was “a good boy” probably would be. He’s somewhat helplessly fascinated by creatures in a world he has no part in; he supports women, he wants to protect their decisions, and if by some chance he didn’t, Lacus would probably convince him! (She’s got a good track record.)
[Please note: this is not a blanket thing. Ezalia and her genocide overrule sex and motherhood.]
