God this subject’s been going around lately, and I’ve seen alot of people fall to the far side when considering pink as a character. rebecca stated when S.U was first being announced on CN that none of the characters are flawless; they’re characters with their own issues, problems and secrets, she was aiming for a morally grey especially so with pink.

Now I’m gonna need you to be open minded while reading this, hear me out and not immediately after this write a block about how wrong I am and how much you want steven to go to jail or whatever other grimdark fantasies some have. I don’t have time for it and there’s a point to this. (Lets move on)

And I’ve seen people make some outlandish claims, one person said the only non selfish thing she did was protect earth like that’s a small task on a bucket list.

Leaving steven with her mess to clean up and so many more zany things, they funniest part is these same people stan the diamonds people who wanted to blow the earth up, kept gems as slaves for pete sake, so it’s hypocritical to me that people are willing to stan them despite pink making steven universe possible, she was very much still a savior of many gems and this earth.

Let’s go down the line and see why pink was the way she was and try to put some rational behind some of this:

Pink on homeworld-

First Pink was raised and coddled by her diamonds, a child ruled over by three toxic mothers, it goes without saying that she would without bad intentions pick on on some of their bad habits on how they do things. Pink already wanted to do her own things and we have to remember spinel was presented as a toy to her, let’s real it back a bit.

Remember steven’s dream of playing with pink pearl? They had plenty of fun behind closed doors, P.P was her friend who laughed and played with her, and in the memory we see her slowly drift away, then an image of glass falling apart to reveal white standing over Pink. I assume they were caught at one point and her pearl was used as an example, I can picture white cracking her and beating it into pink that pearls are objects.

I mean look at what happened to steven when they went to homeworld, because he fused with connie and white pearl frowned Yellow and Blue went balsticia and started zapping and bubbling gems left and right and ended up putting them in a cage they almost STARVED in! (They asked for food and looking at them it was clear they were low on energy) Plus when they got to steven’s backpack they scarfed down that food.  

Who knows how long they put pink in there when she would act out.

So some time after pink pearl was taken, they gave Pink a garden and Spinel to keep her busy, Remember the other diamonds had no respect for pink as well; they didn’t listen to anything she had to say and as an impressionable kid she probably thought that spinel (again presented to her as a toy) was going to make them respect her less as a colony owner, Pink was very much a Diamond who wanted to grow up quickly because of the way she was treated. “You’re too young, you’re a child, your opinion doesn’t matter.” I mean it says as much when yellow and blue first starts accepting steven as pink and saying things like “you don’t know what you want.” I’ll be we all at one point heard that line.

But it’s also not that she was growing up why she left spinel, remember her last friend was cracked and had her mind taken over, spinel was clearly support to be similar to a court jester where if they failed to satisfy they get AXED and the diamonds would have done the same. “Oh pink doesn’t want her anymore?” Shattered.

Her transformation as Rose-

Pink never had all the answers, that was the point, she was a child making adult decisions, and when it came down to it she was both a genius and foolish. She was the only Diamond who saw what they were doing to other gems and gave up her status (if you could call it that) her rule and so on to protect earth’s life and the many gems so they could be who they want, she was a child vicariously living her freedom out through them.

And remember they also put a ban on traveling to homeworkd areas, the fight was never over, after a war, they had to collect the pieces, protect the humans, fight corrupted versions of her friends and family, fight her caretakers to the possible death to free gems she didn’t know, Humans she didn’t know “I know she saw beauty in everything, even in things like this, and jerks like you.”

And almost all of her choices were made because she didn’t have the right answer or the perfect one, we can all say we would but could we put it to the test and when it fails preach about how we thought what we were doing was right? Bismuth for example was a radical extremist who believed in shattering other gems and would not listen to reason, and she had better rallying power than she did, it’s stated in her episode that she could have gotten other crystal gems to agree, using a horrible enemy tactic a DIAMOND tactic at that.

Hell that could have been Lapis, could have been peridot or even amethyst imagine is bismuth was around when amethyst popped out, she would have killed her, it’s a possibility. Maybe rose didn’t have the answers for so like us she decided to set some aside.

Can’t reason with bismuth and her want to kill gems like spinel so she has to go, and the easy part is rose if she was a monster could have shattered both Bis and Spin, no one would find out, but she’s not a monster.

Our approaches to Spinel’s trauma-

At the end of the movie, I'm sure it was said to mask the pain for spinel but she jokes about how 6000 years she could have did that on her head and  Yellow states 6000 years is nothing in response to spinel, showing diamonds/gems perceive time differently, to rose it could have been a month or so and after the diamonds were gone they could have gone for her after said ban was lifted, but it’s stated early on in S.U that they were heavily outmatched, a small army vs an armada of constantly advancing tect and gems. so rose could have been fighting this forever and that was probably her plan, she didn’t have perfect answers, perfect solutions. It’s always easy to say “why couldn’t you do this or that.”

One of my favorites was “why didn’t she poof and bubble spinel?” this person listed this as a better alternative as if they problem would be erased because s he’d be floating in a bubble never to be found or rescued instead of the possibility of her coming back after the war. (Let’s be real innocent spinel wouldn’t survive the war.) Plus again we’re forgetting that because of her protecting the earth life exist; this I cannot stress enough.

I like that rose isn’t a pristine, perfect paragon that has all the answers.

The wrap up-

And lastly, people keep saying that she intentionally left steven with her problems, she didn’t!

She created steven out of love, love was very important to her, and while she kept her secrets she very much cared for everyone she interacted with, she just didn’t have the perfect solutions nor the perfect ways to fix and help them.

Heck the diamonds didn’t even touch the earth since they blasted it till peridot went down there and found out there was life on the planet; Yellow didn’t even know till peridot contacted her. “There’s still life on that planet?” “I want that planet to die.” Pink was the only good one out of the whole bunch at the time.

Does it mean she’s perfect like the crystal gems thought? No one's perfect.

Did she have all the answers? No but the life she made was able to give the answer she couldn't. Like hints on a wall from past passersby in a maze, they can offer you a solution to a puzzle or a way you yourself didn’t have and so on to the next person.

And I’m sure rose probably felt the same way about steven.

“I always thought I might be bad now I know that it;s true’ cause I think you’re so good and I’m nothing like you.” I could be reading too much into that line however, but Rebecca stated that none of these characters are flawless but they aren’t 100% evil either.

And her best decision was having steven, well all know that.

Thank you for reading this all out and I hope it makes people consider Pink diamond’s character, I’m not saying you have to like her, but understand what rebecca’s going for in her portrayal of her characters.