Jim Short For Gabriel - Tumblr Posts
Why does Gabriel of all people/angels have an easier time ditching heaven than Aziraphale???
I have pondered over this for quite some time.
Why does it take Gabriel x Beelzebub only 4 years before they commit to each other once and for all? While Crowley and Aziraphale have been in love for thousands of years and still haven’t figured stuff out!?
Before dealing with Aziraphale and why he can’t or won’t ditch heaven while angel-golden-boy Gabriel is like: “So long, fuckers” - Let’s start off with something easier:
Beelzebub and Crowley both come from Hell’s side. They are both on Hell’s side because they were somehow part of the Angel revolution. So, they have questioned a system before. They have rebelled (although as we see in Crowley’s case, an active role in the rebellion was not necessary. But in a toxic system basically everything can be laid out as an “act of rebellion”, if you will, and everything can get sanctioned if it rubs the supreme cult leader off the wrong way). But it seems they have an easier starting point to leave their current system because it wouldn’t be the first time for them. You may attribute it to their somewhat antagonistic nature or simply to the life experience that leaving your old life doesn’t kill you. So, I think it makes sense that Crowley is the one who always suggests that Aziraphale and him should go off together.
But what allows Gabriel – supreme arch angel and dickhead – to ditch it all in such a short amount of consideration time (4-ish years against 6000???). I mean, maybe a lot of the other angels are hypocrites: they preach something but do they actually believe it with all their heart. I mean cult leaders are not as immersed in their own propaganda as the ones they influence, right? They are using it as a tool to control people. They just have to preach - the rest has to do the believing part. Also, the rules made by toxic leaders are not followed by toxic leaders as they see themselves above them.
BUT: but after getting to know Gabriel as Jim in Season 2, being all naïve and kind and cute do we really want to see Jim/Gabriel as the (former) toxic leader who was able to break free because he wasn’t brainwashed by Heaven’s propaganda because he was the one preaching it? Idk, maybe, but probably not.
Another (kind of hurtful) explanation is that Gabriel and Beelzebub don’t have the amount of trauma that Aziraphale and Crowley have.
Gabriel and Beelzebub both occupied leading positions in Heaven and Hell. They haven’t had to endure the amount and extent of mistreating that A&C had to endure. Gabriel & Beelzebub come from a situation of privilege and maybe, just maybe, this is also expressed by them being a “straighter”/more heteronormative looking couple – they are not, Beelzebub has they/them pronouns and angels are neither men nor women – but still.