I think what many don't get about Armand and submission is that it's not manipulative, or a lie, in that he's using it as some kind of act to have his upper hand of control go unnoticed. Submission is a deep part of who he is, and what he desires, and this is true to him, and so a part of him does want to not have so much power or say or control. To not submit in the same manner as he was made to be coven leader, right. It is just that he can't articulate he has any other kind of want, does not believe he can have, or think he has them, doesn't know what those are. And so then because he believes he's not to have control of want for anything, or doesn't believe, or know, he has any other wants, that articulating them is bad for love - and so can't - it makes this a situation where he cleverly works around having said wants which exist outside this, often still under a premise of submitting as to be good, and often under the perception of him doing the right thing, a service as to revere them, of being what the other wants of him, of what's expected. Or, in other instances, it's a resentment in having all these unnamed wants unmet building to a point he gets angry, and this anger fights in inappropriate ways for what is lacking. Because again, how he perceives submission, it is totalizing, he can't articulate his own needs, his needs need to be articulated for him. But that's not how that works, he can't expect himself or another to give it 100 all the time, and it's not what he really needs or wants either all the time. It's not therefore manipulative, per se, even if he manipulates within this framework, its core is it being a mental trap he is in - rooted in trauma. He also doesn't know exactly what he wants more than this, because this is all he's ever had, and all he's ever known to be what is good, and expected, and what is to be in love. It's just easier to see Armand as submitting through the lens of it being for Marius, than it is to think he thinks he's ever in a position to have this control, unless control is something he is expected to have, is something he's been articulated by someone else he needs to do, or which can only make sense for survival of himself or the other or both. The way he has been able to survive is rendered abusive from the cruelty of what it meant to be able to do so.
