#darshmallow

Yeah, probably. In the specific circumstance where Stan is the only one willing to hang with Cartman, I feel like Cartman would hang out with Stan then. Though, I don’t see that happening, because if even Kyle has had enough that he doesn’t want to hang out with Cartman (keeping in mind, Kyle already puts up with a lot of Cartman’s bullshit and even seems to seek it out most days for the sake of an argument), then Stan (who is pretty passive and has a zero-tolerance policy on anyone’s bullshit, except his own) is even less likely than Kyle to give Cartman a chance. Likewise if Kenny’s not giving his BFF the time of day either, even being as tolerant of Cartman as he is, then it’s not likely that Stan is. Like, just because Stan is the only person who can give Cartman any attention in a situation where everyone else is too mad at him to, it doesn’t mean Stan will. He’d only do that if he, too, had no one else to go to. So the scenario would have to be not only that Kyle and Kenny are both done with Cartman’s bullshit while Stan is not (which is already unlikely), but also that Kyle and Kenny (and probably Wendy, too) have fallen out with Stan at the same time as well (which is just even more unlikely). If it happens, it happens once in a blue moon. Saying that, an episode where Stan and Cartman only have each other because they’ve gone and pissed off all their other friends would be interesting to see. Kind of like when we got to see Butters and Cartman work together in S09E06 The Death of Eric Cartman.

I have to agree, Kenny doesn’t seem to affect Kyle one way or the other. Mostly because Kyle likes hearing himself talk, let’s be real, and Kenny’s just too quiet to bat a real, riveting conversation off. Not the kind of conversations Kyle likes to have, at least. As you said, it’s contrasting views. For example, Kyle likes to get at Stan for being too sensitive, or at Cartman for being too insensitive. And then there’s Kenny who’s just…there. A comfortable middle-ground. And Kyle doesn’t know what to throw at that. So, love him as he may, he just never knows what to say to Kenny. That’s how I feel about their relationship. So I agree when you say that Kyle - and Stan, too - don’t give quite the same efforts to Kenny as Cartman does. But I’ve always felt that Cartman can see more of himself in Kenny than the other two can. Kyle and Stan’s families are fractured, but whole. (See what I did there?) Still kind of fucked, with Kyle’s domineering mother and disingenuous father, and Stan’s unstable parents and bullying sister; but, I feel like they can at least still make it out okay. Cartman and Kenny’s families are just broken.

One has a struggling single mother who is naive and incompetent and probably pretty neglectful. The lack of structure or discipline in Cartman’s life tells us that. She’s got to leave him home alone a lot to go to work, I’d wager, so he must feel lonely and abandoned. And when she is home, she’s just pacifying him with food and toys, and letting him get away with saying and doing whatever he wants, so that he will stay with her and keep her loneliness at bay, her one and only friend. Even when she’s had enough, she can’t stop him. She’s stood up to him so little, she has no idea how to now. When she tries, he can easily turn it around on her. He rules his mother. And she ruins him. And Kenny, well. His parents drink and smoke and can’t keep a job and beat each other up as well as their children. He lives with little electricity, no heating, and barely any food, stuck in a crappy and cramped house that’s falling apart, with a family that already has. Kenny has no respect for his parents, and seems to tolerate them more than love them. He’s not close with his big brother, it doesn’t seem, and can’t rely on him. He has so little. And whatever he has, he gives everything away to Karen, because she is everything to him. Yet, try as he might, he knows he can’t protect her from that place, no matter how many capes he dons. She’s starving, and cold, and hears abuse every day. She doesn’t even have a window in her room to let the light in. And that’s worse than anything to him.

Cartman and Kenny both have it absolutely shit. So I feel like they can relate to each other, in that way - in a way that Stan and Kyle, with their full, cosy houses where mom and dad always come home to feed them and teach them right from wrong and tuck them safely into bed, can’t relate.  And maybe it’s why Cartman’s more willing to meet Kenny halfway, as quiet and tepid as he is. And I’m glad he does, because I don’t know if Kenny would’ve had anybody otherwise, if not the boys. And when he’s with the boys, he can spontaneously break into happy jigs at pan flute music on the street. He is that comfortable around them. And I’m happy he has that comfortable place in them that he can escape to, when the rest of his world is so bleak and confusing and scary. And I’m sure all the boys feel the same. Even if they don’t always get each other, or know what to say to each other, or want to hang out with each other. They’re friends. They’re family. They’re home.

I can’t even imagine it. Although they’re best friends, just like all of the main four, they seem that way more out of happenstance. Like, they wouldn’t hang out with each other unless Kyle and/or Kenny were there too. I mean, they hung out with just each other in S09E08 Two Days Before The Day After Tomorrow. Even then though, Cartman kind of pointed out the fact that Kyle wasn’t there, because that wasn’t a usual thing. They don’t hang out on their own. Even they acknowledge it. So their friendship is kind of odd. It’s like they’re friends without being friends. They know nearly everything about each other and they’d do almost anything for each other, but they just don’t…jam. Not like Stan and Kyle do. Not like Kyle and Cartman do. Not like Cartman and Kenny do.

(Sidenote: It doesn’t seem like Kyle and Kenny are particularly close either. Nor Stan and Kenny. And I don’t think this is uncommon in friend groups. Even with my own friend group, I recognise that although I love my childhood best friends to the moon and back and I think the world of them, if we have to meet one-on-one, or even three-at-a-time, it just gets super awkward. It has to be at least five of us if not all seven, or else we can’t find, like, a rhythm. Because I know them, but I don’t know them. If that makes any sense. The main four might be like that. Maybe these are thoughts for another day…)

Sorry it’s taken me so long to respond to this. Every time I saw it in my inbox I’d be like “Hm. :/ Hmmm…” and not know how to respond. I think it’s because I get where you’re coming from, Anon, but I don’t know if I 100% agree?

I think Stan and Kyle can fulfil each others’ wants and needs as boyfriends. And I think Stan and Kyle could also not fulfil their wants and needs as boyfriends. It all depends on how you, individually, interpret their relationship. As I always say, these boys are still, like, ten. There’s a lot of potential for growth and change yet.

The wants and needs they fulfil for each other may not be the same as those for other ships, like Kyman or Stenny or Kybe or Stendy, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t the right wants and needs. They’re just different.

Every characterisation of Stan and Kyle, and their relationship, is different (there is one characterisation for each and every person in this fandom - no two people will imagine Stan, or Kyle, or their relationship in exactly the same way). And so, their wants and needs that are met, and their wants and needs that are not met, and whether or not Stan and Kyle are happy or unhappy - because of or despite this - is entirely dependent on each individual’s personal, preferred interpretation of them.

One may say X wants are met but Y needs are not but they are happy. Another may say X wants are met but Y needs are not and they are unhappy. Yet others may say X wants are not met but Y needs are met so they are happy. And more may say X wants are not met and Y needs are met but they are unhappy. Even, maybe neither their wants nor needs will be met, but they will be happy anyway. Or all their wants and needs will be met, but they will be unhappy anyway. There are all these different ways that relationships can be characterised. And isn’t the variety wonderful?

Though, I’m not in the Style community, so, I don’t know, maybe most Stylists do characterise Stan and Kyle and their relationship the same, common way, where X wants are X and Y needs are Y, every time. But that is not the only way Style can be imagined, so I don’t think it’s fair to say, “Style is only this, where Kyle is only this and he wants only this and he needs only this, and where Stan is only this and he wants only this and he needs only this, so Style can only be this.”

Besides, you don’t need to like a ship because it fulfils all the characters’ wants and needs. Sometimes you may like a ship because it doesn’t do that. You can like ships whether they’re good or bad, whether they’re healthy or unhealthy, whether they’re realistic or unrealistic, simply because you think they have an interesting dynamic, or a chemistry, or potential, or heck, even just because you think the characters look good together. It don’t gotta be that deep.