Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-26037921-20150309212855/@comment-26217701-20150423013629

Airbenderedacted wrote: Luis G Cx wrote: Airbenderedacted wrote: Biesaga wrote: If Pearl loves Rose romantically, does that mean... that.. she loves Steven romantically as well? She does watch him as he sleeps... :D Pedophilia aside, do you not see the obvious flaw in the logic behind someone being in love with their romantic interest's child, or...''? ? ? ? ?(Also, keeping an eye on a kid when they're asleep isn't abnormal behavior for a parent/guardian/older sibling whatsoever. Granted, this isn't something you'd do for hours or all night, but Pearl is an alien who doesn't sleep, doesn't fully grasp the concept of sleep, and is an extremely protective, motherly, and anxious individual. Why is anyone surprised that she used to do this? The fact that she asked Garnet and Amethyst if one of them could watch him for her basically confirms that she did it out of concern for Steven's well-being while he was asleep. She was probably scared that he could stop breathing or something and her fear was completely rational! Lion lied down on his FACE.'') But a parent/gaurdian/sibling wouldn't do it for the whole night, which is what she was doing. Also, other nights, when Lion probably wasn't trying to lay on him, she still watched him sleep even though there was no way anything could have sufficated him. Additionally, she admitted that she liked to watch him sleep, making her reason to watch him a non-prtective reason, but instead a self-seeking reason. About the thing if Pearl loved Rose, as you said, she seems to be an "anxious individual", which could  mean that she also cared and sometimes over-protected Rose, even though it seems that Rose took care of her most of time. I already addressed that. You can't really compare her, or any of the Gems', mannerisms too closely to ours because she's an alien being. Pearl doesn't have anything else to do on the nights that she watches Steven sleep because she doesn't have any basic needs like sleep to worry about, and thus watches him all night uninterrupted. In addition to that, the way the Gems percieve time is incredibly different from the way that us humans do (this is confirmed in Island Adventure, when Steven's missing for days and the Gems don't notice because they're off doing their own thing, and also in one of the SU comics, when Amethyst makes the effort to seperate the way humans conceptualize time from what time is ' really like,' the latter most likely being the way they see it) so "all night" isn't as long to a Gem as it is to us. It's a very, very small span of time to an ageless being, so an all night thing is probably the Gem equivalent of a couple of measley Earth minutes out of their infinite lifetime. I already addressed Pearl watching him on other nights, "even though there was no way anything could have sufficated him," too. Due to the fact that Gems don't sleep,   the need to sleep and the act of sleeping every night out of basic necessity is not a concept that any Gem can fully grasp since they don't experience either of those things. Pearl is a paranoid Gem, and we've seen her suffer from anxiety problems before. Anxiety is the fear that anything, something,  bad might happen. Couple that with her inability to fully conceptualize the human need for sleep, her mind at times is most likely a mess of,  "How does he keep breathing automatically while he's unconscious? What if he just stops? He's not conscious, what if he just stops breathing? How would he start breathing again!? What if he rolls face down over his pillow and it smothers him?! What if he falls out of bed and hurts himself!!? What is his Gem activates while he's asleep and makes something happen to him?!?!! What if something crawls into his ear?! What if he just goes to sleep and never wakes up again!? He's so vulnerable like this!!" So many people think that Pearl watching him sleep was weird for her or a creepy thing to do, but knowing what we know about her, the fact that she does this is extremely in character of her and her reason for doing so practically explains itself. Why people/characters do the things they do and act the way they act is extremely complex. These things are rarely for one singular, straightforward reason. So many different variables come into play. Just look at all the stuff I had to put together to explain Pearl simply watching over Steven when he sleeps. Things like this should just click for people who watch the show and interpret most ofit at least somewhat correctly. It's like solving an easy math problem without even needing to think about it: a lot of stuff goes into it- how numbers work, how those kinds of problems are solved, what methods you were taught, etc.- but you don't need to stop and think about any of that stuff because it's all automatic 'cause you already know it, so the answer comes you instantly.

Also, "like" has more than one meaning. "To take pleasure in," is the one you're thinking of, but the way Pearl used it meant, " to feel inclined; wish."'' She sometimes feels inclined to watch Steven sleep; sometimes she wishes to watch Steven sleep. It implies that one has their reason(s) for doing what they'd like to'', but use "because they like to" as their reason rather than specify it because it's not important, difficult or too complex to explain, or for some other reason (like simply not wanting to.)

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Back to the thread's topic, I don't think that Pearl is over protective of people that she knows are fully capable of taking care of themselves. She's this way towards Steven because he's still a kid and he's her family and she loves him immensely. She wouldn't have behaved this way towards Rose if she was in love with her because, while they're both forms of love, they're two different forms of love. The love she has for Steven makes her over protective, meanwhile being in love seems to make her devoted, blissful, and even more easily flustered, from what we've seen (and we haven't seen very much, so these are really general and could be off.) Thank you! This is the best explanation I've seen so far.