I am thinking about how the way HY and XQC contracted “mental ebola” via RN-13 has something to do with how the process their emotions and accept their actual , non conventional sexuality?
On one level its the timing. Xie at least lived his childhood and start of puberty as a person who had no mental illness and trauma so he has a gage of what he has to strive for before everything changed after his parents died.
He was someone who wanted to serve the people so it reasons that contrary to what he believes what people think about him does matter. He wanted to be a police officer like his mother and father. Then he had to change his track to be a doctor inspired by his mentor and father figure.
This is why he has constructed this persona of patriarchal straight man cancer of a man to justify to himself why he cannot and should not even accept homosexuality and feminization.
Two things which are not considered average or normal in society he lives in. The kind of label he desperate wants for himself to be accepted and work for their betterment as much as he can. Otherwise it makes no sense for a man who defines himself as straight man patriarchal cancer to be the way he is , son of a woman who was a police officer, who never stopped her career and died in line of duty( whether its accepted or not) , who dotes on and respects his Aunty Li who was once a down in her luck prostitute that his own mother saved long ago. Or how he now doesn’t give a f*ck about CM or HY’s sexual orientation. This is as non patriarchal as one can get.
So it begs question why he insists on being defined as someone he clearly is not and how much of that definition is a lie.
Ofc we know him being straight is definitely a lie! its right in the tin! makes it easier to parse out the subtext of everything else. It also reminds me of how CWN was also once trapped in the expectations people and he himself has placed on himself and it took being forced to physically turn into a child to let go of some of the rigid expectations to realize he has desires and vulnerabilities too, that he wants it seen and soothed.
Contrast that with HY who was born with his mental illness and hence no real gage of what even him as “normal” even be like. He has still made considerable effort to to be accepted by his society. But unlike XQC he KNOWS what he is doing is a persona. He is not completely a refined, gentle and kind rich young master. He is not stoic and self sufficient in not needing love and warmth of a family. His own self awareness about his situation makes sure that he never is under this delusion that for all his desire and direction given by XQC to make bridges with society is there, he is and cannot be one of them. He is different. He can perhaps be accepted in society in his mind but he cannot and some part of him doesn’t want to be one of them.
It also solidified with discovery of his blood Gu and living essentially on his own steam post XQC abandoning him and his treatment till they meet again. There is no coming back from such change ever again.
This is why it took way less time for accept that like everything else about him, his sexuality is also not conventional and sometimes not accepted by society. XQC wants acceptance from society at THEIR terms. To the point he is willing to live a life of lie that destroys his selfhood every day to make it happen( self harm via self experiment, marrying his ex wife looking like he is about to fall over on his wedding day etc). HY wants acceptance from society but on his terms, especially the more he literally and figuratively grows up. Its when he tries to deny this is when he self harms like Xie the most.
He is more aware of his own feelings because he doesn’t want to loose touch with his own nature entirely unlike XQC who is still clinging to that half formed child personality of his before everything went wrong in his life. Its why they both have self harm in common. Xie’s just looks more functional because its so insidious and slow. This is why he is now dying the moment the faulty coping mechanisms he had in place were destroyed( his sham of a marriage which ended up with LR cheating and leaving, and Qi Ciyan dying)
Its honestly very fitting that XQC then has the Heroine’s journey monomyth model while HY has the Hero’s Journey one. XQC is the classic fairytale beauty who has to let go of his childhood totems otherwise he would die( hinted strongly by the fact he is terminally ill) whereas HY has to figuratively conquer and accept the dragons in his heart and surpass the flawed fathers/mothers to grow into a man.( how fitting that he starts the story at 19 , just a year away from ancient Chinese age of manhood. At 20 he has indeed conquered many milestones, from letting Xie Xue go, to getting Xie to accept his sincerity as a lover and surpassing Qi Ciyan in his eyes, letting the influence of his family go in terms of homophobia etc)
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