Pink Diamond (Steven Universe)

Pink Diamond (also known as Rose Quartz) is a character from the American animated series mh:besttvshows:Steven Universe. She was a Homeworld Gem and a member of the Great Diamond Authority turned Crystal Gem Leader, the former two of which continued to rule over the Gem race in their absence.

Why She Needs to Be Shattered

 * 1) For all of the series, she was painted as this flawlessly perfect and wise leader who fought for the equality of all gems. Later, it was revealed she "shattered" Pink Diamond in order to liberate the Earth, and bubbled Bismuth for trying to do the same thing. But this all traced back to how sometimes in life, tough decisions had to be made for the greater good. Then season 5 came along, and undid all of that by completely replacing her with Pink Diamond. Meaning that the development behind Rose's entire character (and that was also important to Steven's character development), never actually happened.
 * 2) Instead of starting off as a leader who believed that all life was worth protecting and fought for the equality for others against a Fascist Empire, she was just one of the fascists who also happened to be a spoiled, self-entitled brat who threw strops over wanting a colony and later decided to just trash it because she ''didn't want it anymore.
 * 3) Remember the war between the Earth and the Empire? That means she was 'deliberately tricking her own subjects into killing each other and saw nothing wrong with that.
 * 4) Hypocrisy: She said she was fighting for the equality of all gems, but remember those off-colors, the gems that were forced into hiding because they were deemed as defective and would be shattered otherwise? And how there's thousands of them? Did Pink just not care about them?!
 * 5) * She was also always telling others they had the right to be themselves and not what the Empire wanted, but considering she was one of them disguised as a rebel, she wasn't even being herself!
 * 6) * And to add icing to the unfortunate mix, the last thing she did before faking her shatter was ordering Pearl to keep it a secret and never tell anyone, meaning that despite saying she was fighting for the equality of all gems, she was still abusing her power over her Pearl.
 * 7) Yes, the Diamonds were genocidal tyrants who abused Pink if she messed up, but that didn't excuse Pink faking her death and traumatizing them. She knew them better than anyone and just how they would react, but she still did it anyway.
 * 8) Speaking of Pearl, well, to add salt to the wound, not only was her forcing the latter to bottle up her emotions clear hypocrisy, but you can clearly see just how badly Pearl was affected by that (something that Pink never considered for a second would happen when forcing her to keep what they did a secret). It's clear to see just how guilty Pearl felt for the war and all the gems who were shattered/corrupted during it (many of which being Crystal Gems, who originally fought alongside and were loyal to them), and on top of it, she isn't allowed to talk to anyone about it to anyone because it was a direct order from a Diamond, who's basically her master. Cause remember? Pink Diamond's actually the most human character of the show and she's really misunderstood and her actions are totally justifiable.
 * 9) * And in case that wasn't enough, the twist reveals that Pearl was a slave falling in one-sided love with her owner. And they're should seriously be no need to explain what's wrong with that.
 * 10) ** And as the cherry on top, the revelation that Rose was actually Pink, the person who Pearl was created to serve, completely ruins Pearl's arc about not belonging to or serving anyone, because she was still working for Pink until she gave birth to Steven, which was loooooong after the war ended and the Crystal Gems were formed in the first place.
 * 11) Idiot Move: After faking her shattering, she apparently didn't consider how likely the possibility of the Diamonds retaliating was. How did she think the other Diamonds wouldn't do anything in retaliation after she was supposedly killed by a member of the Rebellion for the Earth?
 * 12) She didn't even bother to help Amethyst with her insecurities about being a product of the homeworld gems using Earth's resources to create gems, despite the fact that she knew about it.
 * 13) Remember how she bubbled Bismuth away and lied to the other Gems about what happened to her? Well, now it wasn't because she was an extremist taking her rebellious nature too far. Now, she had her bubbled because it would've blown her cover.
 * 14) As the movie revealed, even before all this, she still abandoned her playmate Spinel in the floating garden for 6,000 years. Why? Because she simply outgrew her like a toy and, because she never considered anyone's feelings other than her own, just abandoned her. And no, this isn't excused by "she was never taught kindness, just selfishness", because if she was able to see that colonization was wrong, then she would definitely be able to see the problem with abandoning someone any lying to them about it being a game for what would've been forever if not for Steven's message. And even if she saw Spinel as a replacement for her Pearl after she was taken from her by White who simply tried to cheer her up all the time and didn't realize when she actually needed more than that none of this was Spinel's fault (she was only doing what she was created for, playing with Pink, she wasn't created for the purpose of actually sitting down and listening to her master's problems, and White was the one who took away Pink's Pearl). And it doesn't let her off the hook for her actions, because, as previously stated, if she could recognize that the other diamonds colonizing planets and ruling Homeworld with an iron fist were wrong, that she knew that abandoning Spinel was wrong too. And even if she genuinely did want to go back for Spinel after faking her shattering and creating a new identity for herself (which is unlikely), she still shouldn't have done it in the first place.
 * 15) Changing her identity didn't change this either. When Greg asked to fuse with her in a flashback, she simply laughed in his face. Meaning while she did like humans, she didn't respect them, so she was basically the equivalent of the other Diamonds.
 * 16) This also isn't excused by statements like "She's just flawed, and that makes her more human and interesting", or "It's the other Diamonds' Fault, cause they never taught her kindness, just meanness!" Because there's a BIG difference between being flawed, and being completely unlikable to the point of doing truly irredeemable things. Everyone makes mistakes, but the things Pink Diamond did are much more than mistakes. She was already flawed as Rose, but overall, still tried her best to make the right decisions for and protect the people around her. Then season 5 came along, and, you all already know.
 * 17) * Not to mention how having a crappy backstory doesn't justify her doing bad things. As it wasn't the fault of the people she wronged that she had a tragic backstory. And if she could see that what the other diamonds were doing was wrong, then she knew that her own actions were incorrect as well. Making her an even bigger hypocrite. Besides, she still continued her awful behavior even literally thousands of years after escaping the other Diamonds and removing herself from said bad environment. So that's in no way an excuse for her horrible actions.
 * 18) She'll never be held accountable for her actions or face any sort of repercussions since she was dead before the series even began. This is why she's a Karma Houdini.

Redeeming Qualities

 * 1) It can be negotiated that she did have good intentions with saving the Earth from colonization, but that doesn't change how unjustifiable her actions were.
 * 2) Her character design is creative and kinda cute.
 * 3) Her backstory of being abused and shunned by the other Diamonds somewhat sympathetic, but it still doesn't justify her actions.
 * 4) Susan Egan does an awesome job voicing Pink Diamond.

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