it kinda bothers me that people harp on about az’s insensitivity in that infamous “especially not to you” scene? like, sure, he was being thoughtless, it should be obvious that crowley can feel love, but you have to consider the fact that crowley actively plays along, acts like he really can’t (“nope, can’t sense a thing”). even before that, he denies good actions repeatedly and tells az he’s being sensitive. idk, I agree that az’s oblivious, but cruel? It’s not like they don’t both have biases?

not-a-space-alien:

I think this is a fair observation.  Aziraphale isn’t cruel.  I think what he is is self-absorbed.  Consider the fact that Aziraphale was disappointed that the apocalypse was happening, but not entirely persuaded that the Earth was worth stepping out of line to save until Crowley pointed out how Aziraphale personally would suffer should the Earth disappear (No sushi, no bookshops).  He’s rude to customers because they threaten his personal hobby (taking his books).  I think the only really “nice” thing he does is at the very end when he decides to sacrifice himself for a random handful of humans.  But he doesn’t do it because he’s cruel.  He does it because he focuses on what’s around him to the extent that it affects him, and his ability to shut himself up in his shop where he wants to be.  I think this is a rather dramatic character development; Aziraphale goes from “bummer, I guess Earth is going to be destroyed, I wish it weren’t but oh well” to literally frantically body-hopping to get out of Heaven to try and stop it.

I think you’re right that Crowley’s own veiling of his feelings is partly responsible for Aziraphale’s failure to notice when he deviates from typical demonic behavior, such as feeling love.  Especially towards the beginning of the book, Aziraphale strikes me as being much less inclined to challenge the status quo than Crowley, and would put less critical thought into things that contradict his current worldview. So he would write off odd behavior rather than considering that it might be evidence of something he’s not aware of.  Again, he wouldn’t do it because he’s stupid or purposefully mean, but rather because he just sort of…doesn’t think he needs to analyze it all that much i guess?  So Crowley would have to do something really, bluntly irregular to get Aziraphale to take note of it.  Which he doesn’t want to do, because he’s trying to be a “proper” demon.