Reasons not to be a lighthouse
So, I want to talk about the lighthouse, and what it means for Stede to be the lighthouse.
I’ve seen fanart that frames the lighthouse/kraken imagery in a light vs dark, oppositional way. Like Stede is a light that needs to rescue Ed from the dark. And jarring with that use of the imagery made me realise that I see these symbols completely differently, not in opposition but in parallel. To me it follows that if the kraken is Ed at his worst, then the lighthouse is Stede at his worst.
It’s easy to see the negative attributes of a kraken (frightening, violent), but the negative attributes of a lighthouse are less straightforward (yes, you can get smashed on the rocks, but what exactly does that tell us about Stede?).
When I considered it, it brought to mind the apocryphal tale where two nations are in contact by radio at sea. They each demand the other divert to avoid collision, going back and forth until one country says “This is the biggest, most heavily armed warship in our country’s big and heavily armed fleet. We demand that you divert course or we will fire upon you,” at which point the other country says “This is a lighthouse. Your call.”
A lighthouse is not going to divert course to avoid a collision. It’s going to stay exactly where it is, and if you don’t divert course to accommodate for it, you’re fucked. A lighthouse is a perfect metaphor for obstinance, for inflexibility. Stede can be bad at taking other people’s perspectives into account and adjusting accordingly. At his worst, he can’t even take in that other people’s perspectives may differ from his in the first place.
We see this with his family. He wants to uproot their lives and go to sea. He presents his dream as a present to Mary, and assumes she will be just as thrilled as he is, because he’s too wrapped up in his own excitement to connect with Mary as a separate individual. The dialogue then explicitly tells us how Stede is unwilling/unable to hear Mary expressing her perspective/experience:
Mary: “You know I hate the ocean. I said so just the other day.”
Stede: “What? When?”
Mary: “When we were standing by the fucking ocean.”
Mary isn’t upset that Stede has an interest in sailing, she is upset that Stede has no interest in actually knowing her, merely trying to fit her into his own interests. The scene where Mary repeatedly tries to get Stede’s attention and he ‘Mmm’s without looking up from his book also show us how he does not respond to her attempts to communicate. It’s telling that when she presents her anniversary present to him, Stede does not know Mary paints. (Honestly, I would find it completely in character for Stede if she had mentioned her painting to him several times in the past, but he just hadn’t taken it in because it’s not what he’s interested in.)
Which takes us to the consequence of this inflexibility: the lighthouse is isolated. Stede is so inflexible at times that he cannot forge the back-and-forth communication required to actually connect with other humans.
We also see this at the start of the show with his crew. I think the underlying reason that the crew wants to mutiny is how Stede cannot see things from their perspectives or accomodate for them.
Stede went into piracy with no experience, and decided to impose his own views on how to do things on his crew, without seeking to first learn from them about an area in which he has no experience. Throughout the first few episodes we see Stede trying to push his crew into being the people he expects and wants them to be, rather than trying to get to know them.
In the first episode, in the ‘talk it through as crew’ call and response, we see Stede (frankly, quite patronisingly) trying to push the crew into adopting his perspective and participate the way he wants them to. We hear Stede narrate “I pay my crew a salary. Same wage, every week, no matter what. Course, it took them a while to come ‘round to the idea”, and while Stede probably thinks he’s doing what’s best for them and they just can’t understand that, consider what difference it makes to the power dynamics if the results of everyone’s work are shared versus if they are completely dependant on Stede. Consider how Stede is disbelieving when Lucius says he’s the only crew member who can read (“That’s not. Is that true?”), dismissing this input to the point that a couple of episodes later, when he tries to replace Lucius with Frenchie, he is surprised to discover Frenchie cannot write.
When Stede decides that the crew should vacation in episode two, he says explicitly “Your time is yours to do with as you please” and “There’s literally no way to mess this up.” He then almost immediately starts telling the crew what they can and can’t do, responding to their methods of unwinding with “That is NOT what I was talking about!”. You’re not allowed to spend your downtime roughhousing, becasue Stede does not enjoy roughhousing. Stede’s preconception of himself as a captain is that he is accepting and he listens, but the actuality of his captaining style is that he tries to push his crew into complying with his preferences.
In the third episode, Stede is completely unwilling to learn from his crew – most of whom have visited the Pirate Republic before – about how things work there. When Lucius tries to advise him (repeatedly) he dismisses it (repeatedly).
If the kraken represents a toxic masculinity aligned with aggressive and threatening behaviour, then the lighthouse represents a toxic masculinity aligned with is mansplaining, blind confidence and the assumption of authority.
In episode four, their meeting starts Stede and Ed’s arc of mutual character development. I think it’s a crucial moment in Stede’s development when he excitedly presents Ed with Stede’s preconception of who Ed is – a picture of Blackbeard from one of his pirate books – and Stede actually sees and takes in Ed’s response. Stede listens to Ed. And after having listened, Stede adjusts his course. While Stede’s perspective is firmly that being Blackbeard would be great (he says that he’d give up everything for just a day of being Blackbeard), what he says to Ed isn’t encouragement to keep going, insisting that surely Ed’s life is amazing. Instead, it’s: “Look. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but have you ever considered retirement?” This might be the first moment in the show where Stede is considering things from someone else’s perspective. And that’s the start of him being able to reach past his previous isolation and actually connect.
Stede still struggles at times with seeing past himself for the rest of the show, but episode four is a turning point. It introduces his capacity to change and a new willingness to learn.
For the rest of the show, we see Stede succeed when he stops trying to be the isolated beacon that gives detached direction, when he can see past his preconceptions, connect and adjust, and we see him fail when he can’t. In episode five his moment of triumph is rooted in a moment of connecting with and listening to Frenchie. When Frenchie expresses his experience – “I was in service for a minute so I now the lay of the land and trust me, servants, they see everything. This lot, they’re not so fancy” – Stede actually takes it in, and that gives him the idea to ask Abshir for the information that Stede builds into his passive aggression bomb. In episode six Stede comes pretty close to explicitly naming the problem and solution himself: “I’d like to apologise for my behaviour earlier. As total as my theatrical knowledge may be, I did forget the most important thing: company!”
I think what takes the crew from where they started at the brink of mutiny, to the intense loyalty they have by the end, is not a change of heart on their part, but Stede changing. Stede softening his dismissive streak, starting to genuinely rather than superficially listen to his crew and to respect their input.
When Stede feels he needs to be the lighthouse, he feels he must be the guiding light all on his own. He can’t have his guidance questioned, because then he’s failing in his role.
I think this sense that ‘knowing best’ is supposed to fall entirely to him is one of the reasons why he feels so guilty about leaving Mary: he is supposed to be her guiding light, so surely without him she must be lost? Surely, without his light, his family have been smashed up against the rocks? It is his sense that he has failed in his duties at being his family’s lighthouse that makes him falter at the crucial moment when he leaves Ed. Stede seeing that actually, his family are just fine at finding their own direction (and Stede finally, finally, listening to and allowing himself to be changed by Mary) is what shows him that he doesn’t have to be the lighthouse.
I don’t think he returns to his crew as a guiding light. I think he returns ready to adjust course as he goes, with his crew’s support and collaboration.
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