i actually really like the thought of satoru not knowing men typically wear white tank tops underneath their dress shirts and such and that even under his uniform jacket, he’s completely shirtless
Give us the spicy Ben takes. You know you want to. Like putting too much Sriracha on your eggs, you want to tempt this fandom. Tell me, Roo
You are either the worst influence, or the best. You are both. Both of those things.
Well shit, okay, it’s Spicy Ben Takes time!
So you know that thing in fandom where Ben gets credited as Klaus’ babysitter, the voice of reason that has managed to keep Klaus alive all these years? The viewpoint that Klaus is going to fall apart post-s2 without Ben there to help take care of him? I’m here to say that canon suggests the opposite is true.
Having someone watching you limits your freedom to make your own choices — or to put it another way, having someone watching you is an extra factor to weigh during the decision-making process. Unfortunately, people are complicated and messy and the Hargreeves are especially so, and so that extra factor is not always going to weigh in favor of making better choices.
And Ben and Klaus are siblings.
There might be nothing more powerful than sibling-induced stubbornness. There was some musical artist that my older sister liked that I said was bad, and then when I realized they were good actually, I kept pretending to hate them until some time after we’d both graduated high school. In turn, because I listened mostly to movie scores, my little brother declared that any music without lyrics was bad and all sounded the same. He had to listen to Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6 and the opening track to The Dark Knight and tell us that they sounded so alike that he couldn’t tell them apart.
He HAD TO do this. I don’t have a name as good as the Cain Instinct to describe it, but I submit that the inability to admit fault in front of a sibling runs as deep, if not deeper. It’s something to do with pride, probably, and more importantly the second part of this phrase: you can’t admit that you’re wrong or you’ll never hear the end of it. You aren’t going to fall out of touch when you graduate or whatever, this person will be around for the rest of your life reminding you of this fuckup whenever it benefits them, for forever.
(okay a read more because this is looooong sorrrrryyy)
So, to take a common fandom scenario, if Ben says Klaus should go to rehab and get clean? Klaus can’t just do that, especially if Ben has said it before and Klaus established that his side of issue was that he didn’t want to. If Klaus decides he does want to go to rehab after Ben has been on his case about it, then Ben can claim for the rest of forever that he’s the reason that Klaus is sober now, and that would be super fucking annoying when dealing with addiction is such deeply personal work. It’s a lose scenario however you slice it (which is very typical for sibling stupidity — it’s a fight that you lose as soon you decide it’s worth fighting over).
Now okay, let’s back up and be clear here. Klaus falling prey to sibling-induced stubbornness isn’t Ben’s fault. I’m not suggesting that Ben is actively standing in Klaus’ way, or that Klaus would have made the choice on his own to go to rehab had Ben not suggested it first. I’m saying that Ben’s presence simply makes it a harder thing to do, a larger mountain for Klaus to climb, on a journey that is already intimidating enough on its own.
And Ben is always there. There’s no space for Klaus to go off on his own and cool down and admit to himself that he is being stupid. Irritation can only build and build for years with no relief — irritation on both sides.
So, yeah. Very unintentionally, Ben advocating for Klaus’ sobriety may in fact be a hinderance to that sobriety being achieved in actuality. Klaus might have more motivation to make good choices and less inclination to make bad choices when he doesn’t have a brother constantly watching over his shoulder.
But don’t just take my word for it! There are a few spots in canon that bear this interpretation out. I first got this in my head when I compared the ending of s1 and s2 — instead of leaving Vanya alone, Klaus comes out to join her in s2, which prompts the others to come as well and seems to turn out better than s1. No moons are exploded in the making of s2. Of course Ben is not the only difference in the situation, and of course we don’t know if Klaus would have made a similar choice if Ben was there advocating for it. What we do know for sure is that Klaus is capable of making good choices on his own.
We also see a couple of times that following Ben’s advice is not always a great choice. In s2, telling the cult the truth doesn’t do anything useful, and going after Luther in 1x07 gets Klaus killed. It seems like the time that Klaus was living his most well-adjusted healthiest life was when he was in Vietnam, without Ben.
This is all to say that no, Klaus does not need Ben to be able to take care of himself. There’s more reasons to believe that Klaus will fare better without Ben’s constant presence. Surely there are aspects of his life that will be sadder, and emptier, without the brother that was such a fixture of his life for so long. But there will absolutely be parts of his life that are better, too. That’s one of those things that makes loss and grief so painful and guilty, isn’t it?
So actually maybe this is all to say, I would really love to see some more fandom takes that explore this complicated, flawed dynamic, and less of the one-dimensional ‘Babysitter Ben’ trope. Ben Is a Nuanced Individual With Flaws and Whose Actions Sometimes Cause Unintended and Unfortunate Consequences, and All of This Makes Him More Interesting and None of it Makes Him Evil 2k21!! (is that still a thing people do?)
Hello — just so you know, your blog has been flagged nsfw for me. I’m not sure why, but in case you weren’t aware, I figured I’d let you know!
I know.
Since tumblr hasn't notified me about any problematic content, and there's no way to dispute it, it's a bug on their end. Going to your Account Settings and turning off "Hide Sensitive Content" might fix it.
