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indigovigilance · 7 months

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This has been eating at my brain for 5 minutes, but why does aziraphale wear reading glasses sometimes. Is it for aesthetic? Is it their eyesight? Help

Hi @electronicturtlepaper, thanks for the ask! I gave this some thought, and I propose four reasons that Aziraphale wears reading glasses:

Aziraphale imagines himself having a 50-year old human body

He likes doing things the human way

They are integral to his enjoyment of art

He uses them to communicate with Crowley

Expanded arguments and evidence, as always, below the cut:

Aziraphale likes to imagine that he is a 50-year old human.

I think there's a little bit of a tendency to think of the ineffables as being superhuman. They are, but not the way Superman or Wonderwoman are. We get the best illustration of this in S1E6 when Crowley is driving through the M-25 inferno:

Crowley has something no other demons have, an imagination. Right now, he's imagining that he is just fine, and that a ton of burning metal, rubber and leather is a fully functioning car.

We know from this Season 1 scene that Crowley's imagination manifests reality; in this particular instance, it is to defy the laws of physics, to keep his body from discorporating and his car from falling apart.

Even though the way it's being used feels "super," we can see how the mechanic of "imagination manifests reality" could be used in the exact opposite way by someone who likes to think of themselves as a homely, affable pillar of the community that has owned the bookshop on the corner for as long as anyone can remember. We see other ways this manifests, like not being able to keep up with Gabriel while jogging:

He could think of himself as a battle-ready soldier, but he doesn't. He thinks of himself as someone who likes culture, good food, and fine clothes; cardio doesn't really play into that, so his corporeal form manifests accordingly. By the same token, he's an avid reader, and as far as his Whickber Street neighbors are concerned, has spent all day, every day reading books for the past no-one-knows-how-long; how would he not need reading glasses?

By sheer power of imagination, Aziraphale has manifested himself into needing corrected vision.

Aziraphale Likes Doing Things the Human Way

Keep in mind that this is the angel who absolutely did not fool Nefertiti with a single caraway seed and three cowrie shells, but he sure did put his whole entire soul into learning prestidigitation from the best human magicians of their day, and took French lessons so that he could ask his aunt's gardener for a pen.

Wearing reading glasses to read is part and parcel to a 50-year-old man running a bookshop. Miracling himself some Lasik eye surgery would be cheating, just like using a miracle to make the farthing vanish in a sleight of hand trick. In order to do something the human way, all the normal human handicaps must apply, including myopia.

Aziraphale's Enjoyment of Art is Enhanced by Wearing Glasses

I also think that Aziraphale considers wearing eyeglasses to be an integral part of the human experience of the joy of literature; reading a novel without peering at the page through silica lenses framed by metal wire would be like eating sushi without dipping it in soy sauce. The experience would be incomplete.

But, then again, look at this dork:

He's wearing his glasses to listen to music. Clearly this isn't necessary or even helpful (but as someone who has taken off their glasses so they can listen better to somebody, I can assure you it's very human). So this tells us that Aziraphale's glasses are, among other things, his "I'm enjoying art right now" accessory.

This is further reinforced in the following beat, when he's opened the door, and he's not wearing his glasses anymore:

So sometime between turning off the gramophone and opening the door for Gabriel, he took off his glasses to signal that he has quit shastakovich.exe and is returning to "normal adult responsibilities" mode.

Aziraphale Uses His Glasses To Communicate

...and we know exactly who he learned this from: @goodomensgifs credited for this wonderful gifset, hereafter incorporated by reference because my computer is so mad at me rn and can't handle loading gifs.

Crowley uses his glasses to communicate his emotions a lot. He uses them to show vulnerability. He uses them to show contentment. He uses them to threaten. He uses them to show that he is wounded and defensive. He uses them to demonstrate that he is or is not willing to talk. Aziraphale has learned from the best.

The first time we see Aziraphale leverage his lenses this way in Season 2 is when Crowley returns to the shop after their fight about Gabriel. When he's alone, waiting for Crowley to return, Aziraphale isn't wearing his glasses:

but quickly puts them on when Crowley walks in the door:

Quite a few analysts have published metas on equivocation (@cobragardens and @ao3cassandraic, maybe we should start using an #equivocation tag? Because this is becoming a recurring topic), which I incorporate here by reference. Crowley and Aziraphale have had to learn to communicate without saying a lot of things out loud, and glasses are playing a role in that.

By putting on his glasses, Aziraphale has just put up a big "I'm feeling hurt and defensive" sign; at the same time, Crowley takes his glasses off, to signal that he's ready to talk. Aziraphale peers through his glasses while he's pretending to ignore Crowley, reinforcing that his glasses are assisting him in demonstrating his umbrage.

Aziraphale finally takes his glasses off to tell Crowley that his "you were right" wasn't a good enough apology:

At this point in the conversation, the angel is allowing himself to be more vulnerable and show just how upset he is.

This evidence is taken from limited samples, but it fits with the general dynamic of the characters observed elsewhere.

Thanks for the great prompt, I never would have done this exploration otherwise but it was very rewarding.

Good Omentober!

~~~~~~

If you liked this, you may like:

Clothes + Equivocation = Romance by @cobragardens

The Colors of Crowley by @cobragardens

The Golden Lion by @cobragardens

Angel Pinky Rings by yours truly, @indigovigilance

...and any fan is welcome to drop an analysis request in my askbox!

#good omens #good omens 2 #good omens meta #aziraphale #crowley #ineffable husbands #glasses #equivocation #ivoc #indigovigilance answers asks

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religion-is-a-mental-illness · 6 months

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A "gotcha question" is also known as a follow-up question. Diabolical.

Particularly useful for testing someone's ability to tell the truth.

#gotcha questions #gotcha #obfuscation #equivocation #vagueness #dishonesty #inconsistency #contradiction #religion is a mental illness

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shea-writes · 2 years

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Update

Sorry for the long delay, but Equivocation is getting an update :)

The summary of changes:

Fixed some coding bugs

Added a bit of content

Made Julie and Hamish gender flippable after feedbacks from my friends, as they want to have more choices of ROs (hopefully it does not break anything)

Without further ado - Happy Adventuring!

#interactive fiction #if #Equivocation #equivocation update

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immaculatasknight · 19 days

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Everyone sees it except us

#Gaza genocide #equivocation #complicity #enabling #Israel #US #Canada #UK #ICJ ruling #Nicaragua

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1929crash · 2 months

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1971 Nixon Psychotropic Convention

Prohibitionism of the Demon Rum was joined by Chinese reaction against British opium smugglers, then metastasized into a War on Everything, which is the same as a War on Trade. The Panic of 1837 resulted in part from British liquidation of investment in America. The resulting increase in naval armaments and levies on nore docile mercantilist colonies made it possible to completely destroy the…

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#cartels #doublethink #equivocation #higher costs #immigration #legalese #neologisms #Newspeak #profits #prohibition #reefer madness #scarcity

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bqvzk0nu5jbfq · 1 year

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Nicole gangbanged by anonymous strangers at a rest area Lesbian with big tits gets her ass finger fucked Indian star hot threesome with lesbian teens big dick squirting on latina stepsisters Wife enjoying bbc husband filming Smalltit amateur model fucked after foreplay Hot lesbian fucking with stacked Alison Tyler and Ava Sex gay anal emo His licks his way down the bone as he moves it The Bully Macho do pau rosa gozando

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judasisgayriot · 6 months

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2004

#fobedit #fall out boy #peterick #pete wentz #patrick stump #fob #anni edits #very sure someone has gifed this before but. watched this 2004 interview #and it's so darn cute #pete is so endearing here lol #love how he was right. he really did never have another creative relationship like this. he knew!!#also sure pete whatever equivocate and qualify away. you're still adorable ;-;#love patrick joining in to be like 'yeah he takes good care of me :3' lmao #anyway they've always been like this i'm afraid #also important to add that this was like. unprompted lol. nobody asked pete. he just had to tell us this

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oneyearinblack · 2 years

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203 - Zweideutigkeit - Equivocation #art #artwork #artproject #black #blackandwhite #characters #design #icon #icons #logo #masterpiece #mystery #sign #symbol #Equivocation https://www.instagram.com/p/CdaBiPGIyYS/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

#art #artwork #artproject #black #blackandwhite #characters #design #icon #icons #logo #masterpiece #mystery #sign #symbol #equivocation

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stil-lindigo · 5 months

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the flippancy people use to acknowledge the horrific genocide happening in Gaza and the West Bank right now in their haste to label any critique of Israel as anti-semitism while Israeli officials will go on live tv to assert for the millionth time that yes, they do in fact want to ethnically cleanse Palestine is so infuriating.

#tell me you don’t consider Palestinians human beings without telling me you don’t consider them human beings #fucking ridiculous #some people would let their own mother be murdered if it meant they could get their Starbucks without criticism like fuck off #they’re literally salting the earth and you’re still equivocating on whether collective punishment is a war crime or not #it is you dumb fucks #palestine #free Palestine

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cobragardens · 7 months

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CORRECTED & UPDATED Clothes + Equivocation = Romance: The Husbands in 1793 (Part 2)

From Part 1:

Crowley and Aziraphale share clothes as a common interest. They don't have the same style, but they're both aware of current fashions, and Heaven and Hell aren't. You can't tell me Hastur or Uriel would recognize the significance of Crowley saying "Dressed like that, he's asking for trouble" about someone else while wearing black stockings and cravat and waistcoat himself. And that means Anything the husbands communicate to each other through clothing choices goes undetected by their masters.

SO. With all this in mind, let's go through the 1793 scene again and look at what the husbands communicate to each other without using words or actions to do it, and how their clothing choices help them do that.

Hello. I'm here and I know you're in a spot of trouble. I like you.

It's you! I'm so happy you're here!

Sheen's voice and face when Aziraphale says Crowley's name in this moment makes me think that Aziraphale is in love with Crowley--the demon Crowley, not the angel who became Crowley--long before he consciously realizes it in 1941. The way Sheen has Aziraphale say Crowley's name is so soft.

The way you're he way you're lounging there and what you're wearing are uncomfortably sexy and also incredibly inappropriate for the Bastille at this moment in history. I suppose this is very on-brand for you.

Crowley: I listen when you talk about your interests and goals and keep track of your general whereabouts and pursuits.

Either they've spoken with each other recently or Crowley has been keeping tabs on Aziraphale. Aziraphale isn't upset that Crowley knows what he's been up to, which suggests the former, which in turn suggests they're in semi-regular (every few years or decades) contact at this point.

Also we've now got a general idea for when Aziraphale opens his bookshop.

Okay, brief tangent while I point out two things here.

One, my favorite thing about Aziraphale is that he is a sensualist. This is libertine behavior, y'all. He 'popped across the Channel' during the Reign of Terror because he wanted a specific carnal experience of a specific really lovely food.

And two, even when Aziraphale does weird, frivolous, silly, ill-advised things like this, things that clearly baffle Crowley...Crowley never makes fun of him. He never laughs at him. He always has this look of disbelief on his face, like Am I hearing this?--

--but Crowley never, not once, shuts Aziraphale down.

Until Aziraphale asks him to go back to Heaven.

Anyway. Back to our scene.

Aziraphale: I am unwilling to abandon my sartorial sensibilities even when it threatens my corporation, and I am insane, so I think this is reasonable. At least I'm not wearing a Slutty Monarchist outfit.

You're happy to see me, aren't you. You're relieved to see a demon. Go on, say it.

Tennant's delivery of this line cracks me up. It is so gloating and flirtatious and smarmy and indulgent of Aziraphale.

I am very happy to see you and lucky you're here, and I am willing to say so sincerely even though you are gloating about it.

And then there's the exchange where Crowley very carefully doesn't answer Aziraphale's question about why Crowley's in the area but also reassures him that he didn't cause the French Revolution and Aziraphale can still like him.

We can't speak openly about this. It's dangerous for me.

Message received: I won't mention what you did again. But I want to show my gratitude and spend time with you; is it safe for us to get lunch together?

Yes, but one of us is going to have to change so we can walk the streets of Paris without getting arrested again, and I'm the one doing the rescuing here so it's not going to be me. Your 'standards' will have to take the hit.

Fine, you've got me over a barrel. But hey, if I have to wear the silly hat anyway I might as well go all the way and wear your colors. Except not monarchist. And not slutty.

Oh, I don't know, I thought you looked pretty slutty too. (Meaning 2) I'm having this guy killed for touching you, btw. I will kill anyone who tries to hurt you. Immediately. I see you are having the guy who assaulted you killed in a copy of the clothes he would have killed you for wearing. I wholeheartedly approve of this (Meaning 3), your sexiness in those clothes notwithstanding. The utter insouciance of Crowley's little sniff and the inquiry about what they'll have for lunch drive home hard that Crowley could not be more unbothered by Aziraphale having the man who tried to harm him beheaded.

What really tickles me about this line is not only that Crowley's joke has three distinct meanings, but that Meaning 1 (the meaning that exists without reference to Crowley's clothes) is the opposite of Meaning 3--Anybody wearing clothes like that deserves what they get (Meaning 1) versus It rocks how you just killed someone who tried to kill you for wearing those clothes (Meaning 3)--and yet because of the clothes he's wearing, both meanings come through with perfect clarity, dependent only on whether the listener(s) can see his clothing and know its significance. Aziraphale can, and does, so he receives Crowley's real meaning. Hell/Heaven can't, and don't, so they just hear Meaning 1.

And then we get Aziraphale's pleased little smile and look of tranquil interest as he watches Jean-Claude dragged off to his death. Its such an interesting facial expression for an angel watching a demon have someone killed having someone killed, isn't it?

Crowley has just told him they're probably being listened to by Hell. That means Aziraphale, Crowley, and the audience all know this is the most Aziraphale can safely react. Aziraphale can't show any overt approval of anything an agent of Hell does, because by definition anything a demon does is demonic and angels must be against That Sort of Thing. In light of the fact that Aziraphale is the one who causes Jean-Claude's death, I now argue that this responsibility not to react too positively to something the other side has done falls on Crowley, and that the reason he makes this joke is primarily to tell Aziraphale I see what you've just done, and I like it without identifying aloud what exactly has just happened for their presumed eavesdroppers because an angel arranging a human's murder is the sort of thing in which head offices might take undue interest.

The awareness that their conversation is not private means the audience and Aziraphale know they need to be watching and listening for multiple meanings from Crowley, and it also means the audience and Crowley know we need to be watching Aziraphale's face closely right now. And that little smile shows us that Aziraphale has received Meanings 2 and 3 of "he was asking for trouble."

Or, at minimum, Meaning 3; even if Aziraphale picks up on Meaning 2--You looked really sexy in your vintage clothes, you crazy weirdo--that's not a message he can afford to react to at all. But he does react to the other coded communication Crowley is sending when he says "Dressed like that, he was asking for trouble" while dressed for trouble himself: I will kill anyone who tries to hurt you. Immediately. People who think your clothes give them the right to hurt you can go to Hell, and I am delighted you just sent one of them there.

You just had someone beheaded for assaulting me, I acknowledge and am pleased by your delight at my cleverness. and I could not be happier. Would you like to come enjoy one of my very favorite sensual pleasures with me?

***

EDIT: To be honest I like this reading better than my original, incorrect understanding of the story despite the fact that it is slightly less romantic, both because I love the idea of Crowley as a thirsty witness to Aziraphale quietly being a vengeful badass, because it gives us a glimpse of something important about Aziraphale's character that we don't get to see elsewhere: Aziraphale doesn't have a problem with killing per se.

We learn from the business with the Antichrist that, like Crowley, Az. can't bring himself to kill children. We learn from his perturbation at the Flood and the Crucifixion that he doesn't hold with killing innocents. He gave away his flaming sword. But this scene establishes that Aziraphale will actively cause someone's death if he feels they deserve it. That seems like an important character note for him that may become relevant in Season 3 (feathers crossed that it happens).

And I think there's something else in there too, something about how Aziraphale kills Jean-Claude, not with outright violence but with a trick. One party thinks he's in control of the situation; with a wave of his hand, suddenly a turnip has turned into an inkwell an executioner has turned into the condemned--or at least it seems that way long enough to get the job done. It's a bait-and-switch, like stage magic, and it slots right in to the motif in Good Omens of sleight-of-hand, of characters wearing other characters' appearances (for more on this, see fan theories re: Maggie is possessed), of supplying false meanings to an audience to disguise the true actions going on behind the scenes.

#good omens #good omens 2 #good omens s2 #good omens analysis #good omens clothes #good omens costumes #ineffable husbands #aziracro #azcrow #azicrow #good omens equivocation #good omens 1984 #good omens clothing and equivocation #good omens 1793 #good omens clothes and equivocation 2

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miquellah · 2 months

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HUGE fan of morgott the omen king as a character. disabled son of god was thrown into the sewers to be left for dead with his twin brother, climbs out of the sewers, wants to still work hard and become god’s favorite and uphold the law, becomes king under the disguise that he’s abled, and then still upholds god’s law that all disabled undesirables just like him are thrown into the sewers. crazy

#txt #i do think closest real-world allegory to the omens is disability re:#they are born from ‘normal’ parents always. plus the horns #grow so large as to weigh them down/even poke out some eyes #+ historical equivocations of physical disability and blasphemy/sin #hes also literally upholding the nomads’ genocide too theres like at least two genocides there. horrific #but FASCINATING guy

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b0bs0ndugnutt · 4 months

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It really is so remarkable that a western cartoon was brave enough to frame desertion as the moral and heroic thing to do.

#i really dont think people realize how rare and stunning that is in western media #rwby gets deservedly criticized for the Faunus stuff #but Marrow / Atlas arc IS remarkable and they dont equivocate at all that authoritarianism and militarism are bad #the ‘Ironwood was right crowd’ are so obviously raised on the unquestioned jingoistic propaganda in American media #M watches rwby #Was just thinking about this other day and dont think rwby gets enough credit for this one

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religion-is-a-mental-illness · 2 years

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‘…and that shows that there are three hundred and sixty-four days when you might get un-birthday presents––' ‘Certainly,’ said Alice. ‘And only one for birthday presents, you know. There’s glory for you!’ ‘I don’t know what you mean by “glory”,’ Alice said. Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. ‘Of course you don’t–till I tell you. I meant “there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!”’ ‘But “glory” doesn’t mean “a nice knock-down argument”, Alice objected. ‘When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean–neither more nor less.’ ‘The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean different things–that’s all.’ ‘The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master–that’s all’ -- Lewis Carroll’s “Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There” (1871)

The point of language is to communicate and convey ideas and meaning. It's not "gatekeeping" or some kind of intolerance to ask for or expect precision or clarity in language. If you're using certain words or language, you've chosen it for a reason.

it's certainly true that some words have multiple meanings. The words "faith" and "theory," for example. But we can use qualifiers, context and clarifying language to remove ambiguity, such as "religious faith" and "scientific theory" so that people understand us. Because we want to be understood. Right?

The objection to clarity itself tells the story. Why, other than a desire for obfuscation and ambiguity, for the wiggle room to "mean just what I choose it to mean" and the control over others that this uncertainty affords, would this be objectionable? It's a blank check, and likely a Motte and Bailey tactic.

When you ask for clarity and precision and you're instead quizzed on why you would need it, and treated like it's a moral failing to do so, you're entitled to be suspicious.

#language #clarity #precision #words have meaning #ambiguity #obfuscation #Humpty Dumpty #through the looking glass #Lewis Carroll #equivocation #equivocation fallacy #religion is a mental illness

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