Whump Fiction

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“Surprisingly nice people, considering.”

“Except for the guy in the blue.”

Ruben's attitude towards queerness is demonstrated to us early on in the show with his usage of slurs and stereotypical "macho man" criticisms towards weakness in men which is often (though wrongly) aligned with femininity.

While one could argue that he's accepting of the relationship between Maura and Lori, this doesn't automatically equate to him being an "ally." There are tons of men in the world who are "okay" with lesbians but view gay men as weak and disgusting. Not saying that Ruben is that, it goes deeper, but just that his uncaring perspective towards Lori and Maura doesn't mean he's okay with Niall's sexuality.

But here's the thing — Ruben is an abusive manipulator who utilizes weakness and insecurities to maintain control over the people in his life. He keeps Mona financially and socially dependent on him so that she has no one else to turn to. He switches between the good son and the explosive one towards Maura to play on her trauma and love for him. And for Niall, Ruben has an exhaustive list of insecurities to prey on.

Ruben can switch between whatever behavior suits him: the good husband, the generous brother, the dutiful son, and the violent man. All this guarantees him control. How does this relate to Niall's sexuality and Ruben's (perhaps) acceptance of it?

It matters because Niall's sexuality IS his greatest insecurity. And Ruben knows this.

Even though Ruben "suspected" that Niall is gay, his closeted behavior was still something he could attack to keep Niall under his thumb. He suspected Niall was gay and still made him have sex with Mona. He suspected Niall was gay and still called him slurs and ribbed at him for it.

While this is all homophobic behavior, definitely on top of being abusive, I don't think we can say he only did this because he's disgusted by queerness. Ruben switches up to whatever suited him, and in this case what suited him was to keep Niall crippled by his insecurities and dose him with enough confidence after that Niall would feel like he can only feel truly strong by Ruben's side.