#and wincesties or bronlies who pick at destiel shippers are just

[angelinthefire]

As someone who's been around the fandom longer than i, what do you think of the claim that destiel shippers were the reason female characters got killed or kicked off the show? This seems to be a really common narrative in gen fandom spaces like r/supernatural but there's never any mention of wincest shippers and idk I find it kind of dubious. I mean obviously when it's applied to characters like bela or ruby it makes no sense but what about others? Like the claim usually goes oh they could never keep around a love interest for either of them because the hellers would throw a fit but did that happen? Usually it's brought up with Jo, Lisa, Meg, and Hannah. I know that is not actually why Meg left the show, but what about the others? I also know Alona and Cindy Sampson in particular are cited as receiving harassment for their roles but did this actually have anything to do with destiel seeing as it wasn't that popular of a ship back then? I only started watching in 2014 when destiel was the biggest ship and it never seemed to me like they were trying to set up romances that were shot down by the fans. I mean did anyone actually expect hannah to be an endgame love interest? And no one really makes this claim about Amara either. And it also wouldn't apply to characters like Charlie or Missouri either who both still got killed off. Idk I've just been seeing a lot of narrative recently about fans being primarily responsible for the killing off of female characters but I feel like it's shifting blame a bit, even more so to apply it solely to destiel fans (I mean did destiel get Sarah Blake killed??)

Yeah blaming destiel shippers is ridiculous. Destiel shippers didn't even reach preponderance in the fandom until s8. The worst of the misogyny of the fandom was solidly concentrated in the first half of the shows life. Attitudes changed as societal attitudes changed, and as the show itself finally broke down and developed more of an ensemble cast.

The wincesties/bronlies were always far more venomous when it came to characters who threatened to get between the bros. No matter the gender. As can be seen from the segment that tried to keep Misha from coming back. Were there destiel shippers who hated on Meg or Anna or others? Yes, but to a degree that is pretty typical across fandoms, especially in the 2000s. Not to the degree that they actually tried to launch a campaign to get any actors fired. Which, again, is what bronlies did to Misha.

In general I think it's incorrect to blame the fans for female characters being killed off. If the writers are committed to a character and a vision and it's working for them they can make it work for the audience too. The thing with Jo and Bela is that, to my understanding, their existence is the result of network notes to try to include more female characters, so Kripke was never super committed to them in the first place.

You point out why Hannah and Meg don't make sense as examples. Alona's role was in s2, and in s5 she was basically brought back in order to be killed off. Same thing with Sarah Blake, which is a useful counter example. She was also brought back to die. Since neither of them had a recurring role when they were killed off, it doesn’t make sense to blame shippers. Again, it's the writers deciding that the most useful thing a female character can do is die to further the main characters' motivation.

Few people liked Lisa at the time s6 aired, she was seen as boring and as detracting attention from the brothers.

I think there's a relationship between the sexism of the writers and the fans. When the writers don't care about characters and see them as fridging material, fans can pick up on it. And then fan hatred of the character is cited as an excuse to write them off. This is a simplification, I do think there are parts of spn fandom that are particularly toxic, but I also think it's true that fan opinion is never the only reason why writing choices are made.

[bogunicorn]

I wish some bi!Dean/Destiel fans didn't feel the need to defend or "prove" that Dean has been purposely written as queer from the start, as if trying to convince people who will never be convinced is the gold standard of what's true in media. Because when you take that tack, you'll only ever be half right at best.

The homoerotic undertones were in SPN from Day 1 because Kripke likes that stuff, but Kripke certainly didn't intend Dean to actually be bisexual, just queercoded when it was either funny or when he felt like it.

Here's the thing though: straight people write or make queer art all the time without realizing it. Sexuality is SO much more fluid than cishets tend to realize, and the reason that you get these stories that have a really strong queer reading and creators who go "well I NEVER" is because those creators have the misconception that Straight Stuff and Gay Stuff really are two distinct categories. And they're just... not.

And it's super unfair that SPN specifically gets all this extra scrutiny when other things don't. Esp when there are so many queer writers in later seasons doing gay shit on purpose. And, hell, even if you assume that Jensen Ackles has a hardline "no I play Dean as straight" (which lol I doubt he has because I have eyes to see with), that... doesn't preclude Dean being queer. Because straight people create queer content by accident all the goddamn time.

Look, Diana Gabaldon might not think she wrote Jamie Fraser as bisexual, but she absolutely did. Charlotte Bronte might not have thought Jane Eyre is queer, but she's wrong. Any one of you can name a laundry list of obviously queer characters written by straight people who didn't mean to make them kinda gay. Dean Winchester is not that special in that regard.

In the end, yes, of course writer intent is a thing. The author is rarely truly dead. But often what makes it to screen is the definitive version of a thing, and if a creator's personal interpretation contradicts what makes it into the story, there's gray area that you have to interpret as the viewer.

And frankly what made it into the screen in SPN was gay as shit. There is no point in engaging with or "debating" people who choose not to see it or are too media illiterate to read any deeper than the thinnest surface level in the first place.