“Yeah the Romans centered their society on cruelty and f*tishized every kind of abuse under the sun, but that was their society and you can’t judge them by modern standards!”
Actually I can and I am and you can die mad about it
the whole "every piece of media is abt love" nonsense falls into a category of lacking media anaylsis that i like to call "escapism theorying". people will often attribute themes like love or escapism to a work if it has themes that make them uncomfortable or challenge them – and, in an ironic twist, use the idea of love or escapism as a universal theme to avoid thinking about those other, more challenging themes. often times you'll get a super surface level reading of a work that skyrockets in online popularity because of this sort of thing and it lends to this extremely watered down textureless analysis
"it's either about love or the absense of love" is so silly also. i could just as easily say that everything is about violence or the absense of violence. everything is about hate or the absense of hate. everything is about life or the absense of life. nothing means anything.
"okay but everything IS about ___" no it isn't! there are no universal themes! i'm trying to say that there are no universal themes! even the ones you like. even the ones i like.
partingglances1986
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