So if Kanaya represents, on some level, motherhood, then Karkat on that same level represents fatherhood.
Think about it. Echidna needed both of them for important hush-hush reasons, where Kanaya’s role was to tend to the matriorb and ensure it can create a new race of trolls (basically “be the most symbolic Mother you can be”), but Karkat’s role was much vaguer. Seemed to involve leading the new race of trolls, but not overtly. More like guiding. Raising. Helping.
Plus he’s the only troll whose lusus is ever referred to as “dad” (crabdad!). And, when he was a leader, others responded to him less like a leader and more like a dad who was on their case.
He and Kanaya are the Troll Adam and Eve for Earth C, basically.
I never did post this here, to Caliborns Wake. And people like the CW posts that are directly relevant to Homestuck.
I was supposed to write an essay about this, but I mean, all the points are already right there.
Karkat is the Good Father; he is the one who, in a society where fatherhood is irrelevant, naturally invents it.