i totally agree with your opinions on jake and kankri as well as a lot a lot of the opinions in the replies, especially relating to jake.

personally, i really enjoyed seeing jake grapple with his identity as an aromantic person, and it helped me a lot to come to terms with my own aromanticity or however you call it. i didn't necessarily see it as something that was framed in a negative way; if anything, i considered it to be a really realistic depiction of how it feels, at least for me, to realize there is a part of you society has not yet adjusted to recognizing as normal. if that makes sense. it feels isolating and the framing of jake's whole arc of realizing he's aromantic (although i guess it's not canon that he is, but god damn he definitely is) worked a lot both due to being realistic to his character, especially during the whole shitshow everyone was going through during the dirkjake breakup, as well as being due to its actual depiction of. well. a queer character realizing they're queer in a way that isn't framed insanely positively.

with other queer characters like callie, their queerness is just shown through a simple "hey i go by they them now", but jake's was a lot more in depth and i really appreciated that display.

just wanted to add my 2 cents into this conversation. on another jake related note, i really dislike that he isn't able to explore his aromanticity unlike other queer characters. it feels like him being aromantic becomes sidelined and he just gets fucked over in every way possible by dirk and, later, jane. i wish that they would at least let someone be aromantic and just. not date people. :P