my, what a lovely evening on the terrace

They want buckskin and face paint, drumming, songs in languages they can’t understand recorded for them but with English subtitles, of course. They want educated, well spoken, but not too smart. Christian, well behaved, never question. They want to learn the history of the people, but not the ones that are here now, waving signs in their faces, asking them for clean drinking water, asking them why their women are going missing, asking them why their land is being ruined.

They want fantastical stories of Indians that used to roam this land. They want my culture behind glass in a museum.

Nile Monitor (Varanus niloticus)

“but Ken only has a great day if Barbie looks at him.”

what would mike say if he saw ur messy room??

kid. listen to me for a second ‘ere…

you got cups on yer desk. clothes on the floor. I’m gonna be honest kid, it looks somebody lost a war in ‘ere.

ya know what? nobody’s gonna come fix it for you. so here’s what yer gonna do. don’t clean yer whole room at once. that’s how people end up sitting on the floor like an idiot and it never gets done.

yer gonna start with yer trash. real simple. get a bag. put the trash in the bag. amazing, right?

then yer gonna get ur blanket, or yer duvet, all yer little pillows and yer gonna bring them to yer washer…

then laundry. dirty clothes go in the hamper. clean clothes get folded. and if you gotta smell a shirt to figure that out, put it in the damn hamper for christ’s sake. ya hearin’ me?

then yer gonna make yer bed. no, it doesn’t matter if nobodies gonna see it. your a human being. make it tidy. and quit puttin’ things in those ‘temporary places’, alright? there’s no such thing. this is how we got er in the first place kid. if ya got something ya gotta put away, at least put it away right

then yer gonna wipe down all yer surfaces and push yer furniture back into place… are ya followin’ me or am I just wastin’ my oxygen ‘ere?

shiv of course does defend tom to some extent in both which side are you on and vaulter, though not necessarily in the way tom would like. deflecting that there's 'nothing wrong with his body' only to shift the focus to his suits (still an important part of tom's identity and self-expression, indicative of the fact he comes from a different background) and his gait (still an uncontrollable physical trait) doesn't feel much better. in kill list these are the things she comes for in her playground-level insults - your shoes are too white. you're wiry. (though it must be said, tom shifts the focus to physical traits first.)

but also, like. there's nothing wrong with his body/i used to think you were broad. a definite part of shiv's interest in tom is that she views him as nonthreatening because he is 'beneath her'. but i do feel there is this element of tom both in his personality and physicality being - in her perception at least - masculine in a way that is not just passively nonthreatening (partially because it is indicative of his unimpressive background) but actively comforting or offering a sense of protection, which is not how she feels about any other man in her life. it's also, like, physical protection or protection by virtue of maleness is the only protection shiv feels tom can actually provide when she's the one with the money and power.

her changing her mind about tom being broad isn't just about his betrayal - mapping the emotional comfort he provided onto a physical trait - but also related to the physical 'betrayal' shiv feels from tom getting her pregnant, in a sense asserting or imposing his masculinity in a way that she didn't expect and wasn't prepared for. and in this sense tom succeeded in embodying 'maleness' in a way connor, kendall, and roman couldn't, by actually continuing his own bloodline.

at the same time, i think tom's response in vaulter shows that he is insecure about his body, certainly in the sense that he's incredibly sensitive about how people perceive him as a whole. shiv's pregnancy is information she deliberately kept from him. the last episodes of the show are marked by tom's sense that his body is failing him with his constant complaints about physical exhaustion (which shiv takes pity on and offers him a reprieve from.)