#like... idk we're all human we all have shitty emotional responses sometimes and need to vent sometimes.

[ratbastarddotfuck]

am I wrong? genuinely, I'm asking. would it not come off extremely condescending?

[angelsdean]

I understand it's not fair to compare fictional characters to real life situations in a 1:1...but I do find it quite icky how deancrits will look at a man who experienced such a terrible abusive childhood, has gone through so much trauma, and still label him a bad, awful person, and I'm like...so how do you think about real people who have gone through horrible, terrible childhood trauma and aren't all nicey-nice about it??? You think they're bad people, too? You think every mistake they make should be held and counted against them, regardless of how often it's a trauma response, and regardless if they've ever received any sort of help to have better coping mechanisms?

Like idk man I think of my angry shitty dad and how I'm angry now and I'm like...yeah I'm a lot like Dean these people would absolutely despise me for not reacting to trauma how they wish I would. Again, it's not a 1:1 and I understand that, but when I see them talk like that I really do wonder

sorry i didn't see this earlier but yea, i very much wonder this too. like obvs characters aren't real people and we can't always analyze and compare them to real life situations. but sometimes, sometimes the thing we're talking abt, the themes we're discussing (like abuse and trauma and dysfunctional families) are things rooted in the real world and things real people experience. and how we talk about those characters, how we judge them, does often say something abt how we view real people who act similarly.

fiction is often a way for us to expose ourselves to other life circumstances, to other experiences different from our own, to other cultures or lifestyles, and also other conflicts and scenarios we may not encounter in our own lives. and these fictional spaces are arenas for us to build empathy for others, to see different perspectives and try to understand them or figure out how we feel about certain topics and themes or consider how we might work though a similar scenario. it broadens our worldview and makes us question our own perspectives / opinions / what we'd do in a character's shoes. so sometimes when i see particularly harsh takes toward dean (or sam or cas) i wonder, is this how this person would feel toward a similar real life person? would they write someone off, someone who's been a victim of child abuse and additional years of compounding trauma, just because they are not being a "good" victim or suffering in a palatable way? of course we can judge characters to different standards than real life sometimes and there is often a divide, but a lot of times too the divide is very thin, esp when it's about stuff that translates easily to the real world. and so yea sometimes i do raise a brow in question, wondering if people really would be that cruel to a real life person who is suffering or in need of help or who just has emotional regulation issues or is just, idk, human and sometimes just lashes out because things get too much?