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ihavelovednone · 3 years

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Emily & Miguel: Power & control

This post is long - REALLY LONG. I’ve tried to reduce it and separate it - but it’s not really working. So here goes. It’s centered around Emily and Miguel and the power imbalance between them and the abusiveness that he displays. I hope it’s somewhat interesting and not to hard to follow - if you read it in full that is.

The initial power imbalance There are several aspects in Miguel’s and Emily’s relationship that creates a power imbalance between them. First, and probably the one that relates to every other imbalance in their relationship, is the fact that she’s a woman. That doesn’t really need any further explaining. Women are generally seen as the weaker sex and there’s a long since decided role for women that still has deep roots in our society and in Emily’s life it’s very prominent. Dita displays dislike about Emily involving herself in the search for her child for instance. Devante uses a tone that reeks of aw, little girl and Miguel is somewhere in between wanting to be the sole provider and wanting her help.

One more obvious thing is the clear age difference between Miguel and Emily. It’s kinda like a spinn on the stereotypical old husband, young wife trope - except that Miguel, even though he’s no spring chicken, is still relatively young and very attractive. Kurt Sutter and Elgin James are so subtle in the way they decide use a stereotype without stereotyping that if you don’t look closely, you miss it.

I think they met when Emily was in her final years of college or in law school and Miguel was in the start of his business career - the legal business that is. I have this idea in my head that Miguel tried really hard to impress her and she just rolled her eyes at him. Emily’s smart and strong, opinionated and a fighter, we’ve seen that in season 1 when Emily’s delivered info to Miguel about LO, called Devante out on his misogynistic shit and when she didn’t let herself get intimidated by Potter. She also found the info about the murder of EZ’s mother and called out Miguel’s hypocrisy in season 2.

At the same time there’s an insecurity within Emily. She’s probably been told several times by her parents that she’s not good enough. When Emily meets Miguel the break-up from EZ is probably still lingering, even if it was awhile ago they ended in a way that never really gave them closure - she didn’t just loose her first love, she lost someone that was a security to her. On top of that she’d lost her baby (yes I say lost because I don’t think she’d have aborted it had the circumstances been different). This probably made Emily more susceptible to Miguel’s charm.

That insecurity is very apparent in season 2 when Miguel starts spending more time with Adelita. He used to worship the ground she walked on, she was his “touchstone” and all of a sudden his work is all about taking Potter down with the help of Adelita and Emily ends up being in the background. There’s a desperation in her actions in that season. She enters territories she’d never actually enter otherwise. She’s so desperate for the Agra Park thing to work because she never chose the cartel, she chose Miguel.

There’s also a duality with Emily in season 2 - The cartel is, up until the kidnapping of Cristobal, in the background of Emily’s life. She didn’t see, she didn’t hear. I think she stayed with Miguel in the hopes that he’d liquidate the cartel and go one hundred percent legit but now, he’s rising - he’s making more money and Emily’s spurring him on. Maybe because she wants to be more involved with him, close to him, move Adelita out of the way. She wants to feel needed. It’s a weird dynamic between them, like the abused wife that wants to please her man or something.

Never in control Miguel might’ve initially been a person she found to be what EZ once was - a safe harbor, a home, a lifeline. Not necessarily financial, more emotional. Emily sees Miguels way of treating her with loving words and gifts as affection, maybe she knows that there’s something else under the beautiful exterior, maybe she doesn’t. As Erin said, they choose men that are darkness personified, hinting that they seek it out, it comes naturally - almost as a way to punish themselves for not being good enough. Miguel’s affectionate behavior bleeds into darkness, or maybe his affectionate behavior is actually something sinister altogether - like he feeds on women wanting him, needing him, he uses it to get to them.

In the midst of her vulnerability Miguel displays behaviors of wanting for her to belong to him and no one else, and that’s dangerous and toxic. She doesn’t realize that behavior as problematic until season 2 - even though it starts in season 1 when he propagates to EZ that he need to leave Emily alone - because it complicates things.

Emily’s very isolated. She has no friends, she’s got no one that’s just hers. Except for EZ when he gets out of prison, and even so, they’re not really friends either. They’re more in limbo than anything. And even though they’ve got a past - she’s got the right to spend time with whoever she wants. Or should have the right. Loyalty to a man does not derive from how few men you’re in contact with as a woman. Emily doesn’t need to go back to her man, or only stay by his side. She’s not Miguel’s property. She’s allowed to have relationships with other men - as long as she’s not actually cheating - and even if she wanted to - she’s could, it doesn’t warrant abuse of any kind.

His want for her to be a housewife - or work close by, offering her a job in his company - is toxic. Why? Well, she’s constantly under his watch, she’s doesn’t have the opportunity to make new acquaintances and friendships without those people having relations to Miguel. If Miguel were to demand information about what a person has spoken to his wife about - they’d tell him - in fear of loosing their job, or their life. Now, had Miguel not displayed other types of weird and controlling behaviors it probably wouldn’t have crossed my mind that she worked for him. It would’ve been fine.

Him having her ride with a platoon and not be left alone is, yeah, you guessed it: TOXIC. Freedom is not something that she has. You might think that Emily, just because she lives in an ocean of money and opportunity that she’s somehow free. She’s not. She has no privacy. And yeah, you could argue that Miguel’s cartel work is dangerous and therefore she needs to be protected - but at what cost? She’s constantly under the watchful eye of Miguel’s lackeys - which becomes more apparent in season 2 when Nestor’s following her every move without her knowing. They work for him - they abide to him. She doesn’t have the ability to do what ever she wants - and when she does, he abuses her, as seen in S01E05. As I said in a post that’s been deleted now: Miguel is, most of the time, abusive without actually doing it himself. He uses his staff to control her.

We’ve never actually seen Miguel give Emily any presents, probably because it’d be very stereotypical of him and Sutter and James want to avoid stereotypes. But I think he’d do something like that, considering his expensive taste in suits, cars and other things - I think he likes showing of how rich he is.

Miguel comes of as one of those people who’d use presents to stifle someone. The wife’s mad? Get her a meaningless expensive present to shut her up and simultaneously tell her you care for her without actually asking how she’s feeling. She thinks you don’t love her? Diamonds, get her some diamonds. Diamond equals love. Him throwing all kinds of materialistic shit at her is toxic and it doesn’t matter how much he loves her because his behavior ends up being manipulative and controlling every single time.

The comment you should be grateful feels like something that’d come out of his mouth to (and probably from people on the outside looking in). Not that many women get to live a life in luxury, he’d probably say. Like she should be grateful for something she never really asked for.

Conclusion This became a long post - probably longer than all my posts so far - combined. There are so many red flags with Miguel and Emily - some of them so subtle you hardly notice them. In the first episode I thought they’d go the whole sugar daddy route which might seem cool and fun in theory. But it’s in fact a very common way for young women to enter prostitution so I’m glad they didn’t go that way with it and display it like it’s no big deal - it’s all fun, look at all the pretty things I get for being a companion.

Miguel’s abusive behavior is subtle at times and yeah, he loves her and she love him, but it doesn’t matter when the relationship is so unhealthy. Writing this piece has given me a new perspective of the two as well. Emily’s desperate to not loose Miguel - why? Most likely because she’d be on her own otherwise and she’s not really ready for that and Miguel’s behavior is probably something he’s picked up from his childhood and I’m not sure he’s always aware of it. Miguel very insecure. Let’s be honest, no man comfortable within himself would ever restrain a woman’s social circle, career or freedom to roam.

#ihavelovednone writes #mayans mc #sarah bolger #emily galindo #emily thomas #danny pino #miguel galindo #jd pardo #ezekiel reyes #ez reyes

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