What Happens Next: A Gallimaufry

melancholic romantic comic cynic. bi & genderqueer. fantasy writer. sysrae on ao3.

on steven universe

I’m new to watching Steven Universe, and I know there’s been a lot of ugliness in the fandom, but in light of the fact that it’s a kids’ show that’s also incredibly written and worldbuilt with some amazing representation, I want to say how happy I am that it exists. My son is nearly three and a half, and the first real song he’s learned to sing is the Steven Universe theme. He requests it from me and we sing it together - in the shops, walking through the park, at home - and joins in whenever it plays, gleefully yelling “AND SCHTEMEN!” at the end (he can’t quite pronounce Steven properly), which is adorable. 

The thing with little kids is, in public, other people judge them - and sometimes you - on the basis of what they see. And my son has always been big for his age, and strong, and he loves to play, so he gets a lot of comments from strangers - or rather, I get a lot of comments about him from strangers - that amount to, “Oh, he’s such a typical boy!”, or, if he’s behaving politely, “Oh, he’s such a gentleman!”. And I grit my teeth and smile in these moments, because I have rules about starting arguments with strangers in public, and such comments are always well-meaning; but I hate it, because it’s a judgement based on a gendered stereotype, and people only say it when he overtly conforms to their idea of what little boys should be. 

But even though he loves a lot of things that are coded as masculine (cars, blocks, trains), he also loves a great many feminine-coded things, too. There’s a lot of pink in his room, because he likes the colour, just as there’s also a lot of blue and red and green for the same reason. His favourite toys are two stuffed owls, whom he proffers for me to kiss, saying, “Awww, sweet owl!” And I love that Steven Universe is a show our whole family can watch and enjoy with him; I love how excited he gets when Lion comes on (”Sweet lion!”) and how he bounces along with the songs. I love that there’s a show where a little boy likes pink things, just like he does. 

My husband and I joke that I’m like Amethyst, whereas he (my husband, not my son) is like Pearl, but in some ways, those aren’t superficial comparisons. Often, we look at each other over our son’s head and smile, or laugh, or get choked up, because we both saw something in the story that he’s not yet old enough to understand, and we’re touched by it. As a genderqueer parent, I love that he can see Amethyst shifting back and forth between masculine and feminine forms; a character who is messy and disorganised and reactive in just the same ways as me. My husband is learning to manage his anxiety, and there are moments when he tears up watching Pearl, because something she says or does cuts close to his own experience; at other times, we both laugh. (”The asymmetry of this pile is really starting to bother me!” has now become a running joke between us.) But even though Pearl and Amethyst are different - even when they bicker - they both love Steven, and they still form Opal, the balanced sum of both their strengths, and on days when I feel like I’m struggling to be a good parent, I find that portrayal more than a little comforting. 

And meanwhile, my son loves the show. It’s something we’ll watch together again and again; a story whose layers will open to him the older he gets. I don’t know if he’ll still want to watch it with me when he’s five or eight or twelve, but right now, it’s something we share that helps us all to be who we are a little more happily. And for that, I’m grateful.   

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