#shipping them. Like other people this is destiel

[kilibaggins]

drowley is so good because i read a fic years ago and instantly fell in love and proceeded to imagine them getting together and getting married in my imagination/daydreaming and proceeded to have them as my favorite ship for years.

[s0undsinmyhead]

If I see one more “they’re platonic soulmates 🥹🥰” comment on a tagged Caryl post I’m gonna go Carol on these mfs.

If you don’t ship it move on. Creeps. Only thing worse is when they follow up with “she’s like his mother. They have a mother-son relationship.” Wtf show are you watching?! They’re the same age??? Carol has adopted many children. None of them were a middle aged man named Daryl who she flirts with a dreams about being married too.

[spockcock]

Actively disturbed by the fact Dan and Phil are t'hy'la (Vulcan word used to indicate people with a close bond; essentially translates to a combination friend, brother, and lover. Used most often to reference the characters Kirk and Spock as something like soulmates or spouses)

[savannahinhell]

Here’s the thing about why I will always defend Destiel: if the ship were straight nobody would question it and no one would ever say it’s ‘weird’ to ship it bc it’d be a man & woman.

[castielfucks]

why is every shipping poll destiel vs ship and characters I've never heard of

[casdeans-pie]

The fan asked about this :favorite kind of scenes act like do you prefer more serious or fun?

Jensen: I prefer either comedic scenes or action scenes

Jared: I prefer dramatic scenes

Jensen: We were each other

And the audience screams

Houston, 2016, the main panel it's at 12:20 https://youtu.be/3NYBrw15cRU?si=UG63FQy7f06h5MMM

I'm not really sure how to answer this one.......

I actually didn't understand the last part of this - what were the audience screaming at? "We were each other" made no sense. So I went and watched the time stamp and I felt like

I can't say for sure but I feeeeeel like we're in very different spectrums of the fandom... how did you get here?? did you take a wrong turn ????

Listen, you do you Nonny ! You enjoy watching your favourite panels and I'll enjoy watching mine okay?? 💖 just don't send them to people who you know aren't going to enjoy them

[dotthings]

.

[demilypyro]

It's been fascinating seeing the reaction to the poll. The Destiel fans seem to think their ship deserves to stay popular and relevant just because... it used to be popular and relevant, I guess? Reading these tags has such a flavor of entitlement, it's really something.

It's like they're not realizing that the standards for what qualifies as good representation, or even a good show, have shifted in the last 10 or so years. Not realizing that a lot of people who were here back then, like me, never cared for Supernatural, and don't agree it was important at all, and would not be interested in celebrating it. Not realizing that other fandoms have been happening around them, and that some, like in the case of Mobile Suit Gundam, have legacies that reach back to decades before Supernatural was even on the air.

Destiel is such a product of its time. It's a fanon ship that, as I recall, was strongly disliked by its show's staff, acknowledged only because the fans demanded it so much. The ending of Supernatural was widely mocked, and the show is now mostly remembered as that meme people learn the news through.

Sulemio meanwhile had the full, joyous support of its staff, and was canon since the first episode of Gundam Witch. The whole show's plot revolved around this pairing. The Gundam franchise hit record sales numbers during and after the show. Sulemio brought hundreds if not thousands of new people into the mecha audience, and got many of them interested in the hobby of building Gunpla. Suletta and Miorine being canonically married even stood out politically, because gay marriage is not legal in Japan.

Is this not progress? Is this not worth celebrating? Why cling to the old and busted when the new hotness is doing such great things?

"Be serious", they say. But I am serious. I've been serious the whole time.

Maybe it's not for me to understand.

[shipsandmyths]

lately I've come across a couple people both here and on tiktok that are now getting into supernatural and basically going "woah you destiel shippers were not kidding, I always thought you were probably exaggerating". And it's like we definetely were not, but I also wonder where this reaction comes from and I think I've got it.

We all know what fandom is, especially if we're talking about non-canon ships. We take the subtext and make it textual, we live in the crevices of stolen glances and romantic paralels. But most of the time there's another (straight) canon ship that the writers can use to queerbait us, being like "see? this is who he really wants". Take BBC Merlin, for example: the devotion and closeness between Merlin and Arthur is obvious, but it's easy to point at Arthur's feelings for Gwen and say "see? this is what's real. you're reading too much into it".

Destiel doesn't have one. The very (mysoginistic) nature of the show means neither Dean nor Cas have any significant relationships the writers could point to and show us the "truth" so there is nothing to distract from what's obviously happening on our screens. There is no great romantic storyline to tell us "this is who he really wants" so they are all that it's left and what's between them becomes undeniable. What's even worse, the other main relationship in the show is as platonic as you can get because Sam and Dean are related (let's ignore the existence of wincest please and thank you), so the difference between Dean's relationship with Sam and his relationship with Cas is so stark, so obvious, that is hard to even begin to compare them and try to paint them both with the same brush.

I know I'm just rambling but would love to hear your thoughts on it.

[ao3topshipsbracket]

honestly I'm kinda disappointed all the popular/well known ships are gone/eliminated

the semis look kinda boring now tbh

(ps: I don't mean to hate on the ships winning. I'm sure they're winning for a reason. it's just they're all kinda unknown/not mainstream)

We're definitely surprised to see some of the highly seeded ships go down early, but personally, I think that makes the remaining matches more exciting, not less! Who doesn't love an upset, after all? But of course, with Bubbline in one half and Destiel in the other, there are definitely some significant heavy hitters still in the running!

That being said, we know we have some underdog semifinalists that people are less familiar with, so here's a brief primer on each of them!

Hualian comes from the Chinese novel Tian Guan Ci Fu, or Heaven Official's Blessing. If you've heard of Wangxian of Mo Dao Zu Shi/The Untamed fame, TGCF comes from the same author. It is a xianxia love story about ghost kings and fallen gods. Here's the plot synopsis from IMDB:

Eight hundred years ago, Xie Lian was the Crown Prince of the Xian Le kingdom. He was loved by his citizens and was considered the darling of the world. He ascended to the Heavens at a young age; however, due to unfortunate circumstances, was quickly banished back to the mortal realm. Years later, he ascends again, only to be banished again a few minutes after his ascension. Now, eight hundred years later, Xie Lian ascends to the Heavens for the third time as the laughing stock among all three realms. On his first task as a god thrice ascended, he meets a mysterious demon who rules the ghosts and terrifies the Heavens, yet, unbeknownst to Xie Lian, this demon king has been paying attention to him for a very, very long time.

At #58 in the Tumblr 2023 top ship list, they're solidly middle of the pack in terms of seeding, but they did take down Buddie at #10, and Davekat of Homestuck infamy: a very impressive showing!

Sulemio hails from the latest installment in the Mobile Suit Gundam anime franchise, The Witch from Mercury; as with all Gundam series, it is a sci-fi military drama featuring giant robots and space warfare. This one happens to also feature heavy inspiration from Revolutionary Girl Utena. Official synopses seem a bit lacking, and I unfortunately don't know enough about the series to summarize it myself, but I'll link this very helpful guide that someone left in our notes!

They're the lowest seeded of our semifinalists, ranking #59 on Tumblr's 2023 top ship list, so the fact that they've taken out the top seed is truly a feat; having a rallying force with @demilypyro has certainly helped their cause (and our very busy activity feed 😅) a great deal!

Regardless of who wins the next rounds, there are very fun underdog journeys present on both sides of the bracket. Plus, it's always good to remember that polls like these are not meant to be indicators of popularity, but of passion.

[tomato-soup-whore]

why, pray tell WHY must these fucking writers not commit to the best ships ever. the makers of arcane clearly have no qualms about portraying gay people in an unrestricted manner, so WHY didnt they commit to jayvik. im genuinely so puzzled at this point.

its one thing when you have a ship like destiel that was accidentally written into homosexuality by a homophobic network, i at least understand how that ship came to be and why it never went fully canon. but JAYVIK??? for a ship with so much fucking evidence and chemistry and content to work with, made by clearly progressive writers, i have no goddamn idea why they wouldnt just make it CANON at this point. i have confidence that the writers could have made a well written love triangle between mel and jayce and viktor, truly. i am by no means a mel hater, love that queen, but him and viktor just have so much more fucking chemistry.

as we know at this point, the animators did a great job making all the characters super expressive and detailed. that being said, there are some scenes that i cannot imagine were made while thinking viktor and jayce had completely platonic feelings for each other.

i cant find the gif rn, but that moment in episode 3 of season 1 when mel finds them trying to break into heimerdingers lab and after she walks away jayce looks all happy and viktor looks at him and back at mel and then looks like he wants to OFF HIMSELF?? idk man personally thats not how i would look if someone had just very kindly covered for me doing illegal shit. that was gay and there was no other reason for him to do that. so WHYYYYYY animate it like that in the first place?

tl;dr: im just genuinely confused as to why the writers wouldnt make jayvik canon when they have all the reason and resources to

[tvfangirladdict]

New Show Rec!!!!

If you enjoy watching two men with black cat/golden retriever energy(and not in the order you'd assuume) behave like a bickering, old married couple while simultaneously calling each other 'babe', telling each other they love them all the time, and kicking ass, I've got a show for you. Seriously, you don't even need subtext with these two, they're just blatantly in love with each other and everyone and their mother knows it.

I've fallen down a new rabbit hole. I was looking for a new show to watch and decided to give Hawaii Five-0 a shot finally because I've seen some overlapping appreciation in the Buddie, Destiel, and One Chicago Fandoms. And damn, this did not disappoint. How are more people not completely insane over McDanno??????

Personally, I didn't watch before now because even though I enjoyed MacGyver for a while, I didn't want another overdramatic procedural show filled with outlandish action scenes and bad CGI done by CBS. Cop shows are a dime a dozen now, and nothing about it really stuck out to me. But man, I was wrong.

I was thoroughly impressed by the first season. Between the chemistry between Steve and Danny, the amazing fight scenes that are better than most blockbusters, and their focus on character stories, I was hooked faster than ever.

And while the writing went down hill towards the end just like with most shows(I guess there was a lot going on bts and people were unhappy, I don't know much) and we didn't get the ending we wanted, it's still worth the watch. Besides, this is the perfect recipe for more and better fanfiction to be written in my opinion, when viewers are left unsatisfied.

Anyway, I know the shows a few years old now and the fandom's probably pretty quiet, I'd like to recommend this to any of the Buddie, Destiel, Sevasey, Sterek, etc shippers. There's probably other fandoms and ships similar to these that would enjoy McDanno too, but these are the ones I can think of off the top of my head. Basically, two guys working together with 'old married couple' energy and an unprecedented number non-platonic interactions. These two are the worst I've ever seen in the best way.

So if I can share this with even just one person, I'll be happy, because this is so amazing to watch after living off of scraps on shows like 911 and Supernatural.

[scoobydoodean]

I have 2 spn accounts, a Deancentric blog that ships Destiel and another account that unintentionally follows a lot of Samgirl blogs. So one blog follows majority Deangirl blogs and the other incidentally follows a lot of Samgirl blogs. And here's the major difference I've noticed on the different dashboards.

Deangirl dashboard: Great meta analysis. Beautiful art. Level 1 and 2 headcanons (largely based in canon). Pro-Dean. Stumble across reblogs of Deancrit. Bitter Deangirl blogging. Generally fair portrayal and discussion of the positive and negative traits and actions of Dean, Sam and Cas. Deanhater anons.

Samgirl dashboard: An entirely different pool of beautiful art. Whole lotta woobie!Sam art where Dean is his abuser. Deancrit about Dean being an abuser. Bitter Samgirl blogging about how people will find any excuse to hate Sam. "How can anyone be Samcrit he has done nothing wrong ever." Level 5 headcanons (you literally ignored canon to make that up). More about how Dean is Sam's abuser. So many posts about how awful Samcrit is. "Do Deangirls really think that Dean cries himself to sleep at night thinking that ppl thinks he doesn't know how to read." I have yet to see any actual Samcrit posts (not even links or reblogs from Sam defenders), not even after literally searching the Samcrit tag for it. The Samcrit tag is full of Samgirls crying about Samcrit and no actual Samcrit. "Samgirls are feral, but we need to be bc of the hate ppl throw Sam's way."

I literally have to block so many people on the incidentally Samgirl dashboard bc I'm not on Tumblr to randomly stumble across a post on how Dean is a toxic stalker who abused Sam by changing Amelia's number in his cellphone. Do you have any idea on why Samgirls seem to feel so attacked all the time even though I literally only ever see *them* attacking Dean?

If you dig deep enough into any fandom, you will encounter people who fetishize "helpless victimhood". Some fandoms attract more people with those particular proclivities than others. Supernatural and Sam in particular attracts people who hold those sorts of aesthetic interests because of his relationship toward accountability versus Dean's.

Dean is a character with an overactive sense of responsibility. He blames himself for the Lindbergh baby and unemployment and every child murdered by a shrtiga from 1990 to 2005 because he went to play an arcade game when he was 10. He also blames himself for things like Jessica dying and Sam not being in school. Other characters pile on this blame frequently. John blames Dean for Sam getting hurt (1.18). Ruby tells him (and Sam) that Sam is a weak baby who won't psychologically survive without Dean there to protect him (3.11). Meg alleges that Dean is "dragging Sam everywhere" (1.16). Sam rewrites reality from 1.05 to 1.21 to make Dean responsible for his burning desire for revenge. Cas and Zachariah and Gabriel blame Dean when Sam breaks the last seal because he didn't stop Sam in time. Sam blames Dean for him drinking demon blood first because Dean wasn't there to protect him and then—in a complete 180—because Dean is smothering (4.04, 5.05). Dean generally absorbs blame when it is piled at his feet because he has been blamed for things he couldn't control for most of his life and thus he feels guilty and responsible for things even when him being responsible makes no logical sense. He's never a victim of anything—everything is always on him.

Sam, on the other hand, tends to eventually deflect blame because he can't handle the gnawing bite of it for long. It reminds him too deeply of being left isolated and alone as a child and the feelings of otherness and wrongness he developed through that neglect. When his actions ultimately have consequences he didn't foresee and/or that he finds undesirable, it makes him feel ugly and unaccepted and he can't face it so he eventually finds a way to make what happened someone else's fault—usually Dean's fault. Nothing is ever on him. He's always at least a little bit of a victim and Dean always carries at least partial responsibility for his decisions (1.21, 1.08, 4.04, 5.05, 8.23, 11.01)

In other words, Sam has an under-active sense of responsibility and Dean has an overactive responsibility and that dynamic—driven by their childhood experiences—places them into a vicious cycle of blame being cast onto Dean for Sam's decisions and Dean absorbing it. Dean absorbing it reinforcing the narrative for samgirls with a victimhood fetish that Dean deserves blame and that Sam truly is a helpless baby. They never watch what actually happens on the show to see whether this narrative that Dean is responsible for everything and Sam is a helpless baby lines up with the actual events that occurred onscreen because why would they? That would ruin their enjoyment. Sam isn't interesting to them outside of his capacity to be mourned as some sort of helpless martyr. And yes—they will cry and moan about how horrible and unfair Sam's suffering is, but it isn't because they're having a bad time. They're having a great time. They love thinking about Sam that way. They wouldn't be here blogging about it day in and day out for the last 20 years if they didn't actually want to see exactly what they're seeing.

Related tags of note:

#sams motivations

#taurus sam in the flesh

#In which Sam is not a helpless little waif with his hands cast over his eyes being carried along by the tides of the immutable sea

#sam the hunter

#sams follower/leader false dichotomy

#parentification

[hawkatana]

So, given everything that's happened in recent hours, I thought I might give people who don't know about Gundam some stuff to learn about. Hopefully I can give a balanced and not-racist take like some people.

What is Gundam?

Created by Yoshiyuki Tomino with help by Yoshikazu Yasuhiko and animated by the studio Sunrise (currently Bandai Namco Animation, though I refuse to call them that), the original Mobile Suit Gundam released in 1979 to initially-limited success, though would gain popularity through a combination of fujoshis shipping the characters, the sale of plastic model kits referred to as "Gunpla" and a recut of the series into three compilation movies throughout the early 80's. And as of 2024 is the 66th highest-grossing media franchise of all time, beating out Scooby Doo, Minecraft and the Simpsons.

Also, I'm pretty sure it's what sparked Japanese sci-fi's obsession with O'Neill Cylinders.

The original anime takes place in the year 0079 of the Universal Century, where the Principality of Zeon: a nation composed of orbital space colonies declares a war of independence against the Earth Federation. This "One Year War" has already claimed half the human population by series start and is waged through the use of "Mobile Suits": bipedal mecha powered by a fusion reactor capable of effectively fighting out in the reaches of space.

Main character Amuro Ray is the son of a Federation engineer who lives in an out-of-the-way space colony, though soon finds his home under attack by a Zeon infiltration. After finding the secret Mobile Suit project his father was working on: the RX-78-2 Gundam, he fights off the Zeon invaders, though finds himself and a bunch of other kids conscripted by the Federation to fight the forces of Zeon aboard the ship the White Base. Throughout his journey, Amuro and the Gundam fight many battles against Zeon, including against their mysterious masked ace pilot Char Aznable.

The series was responsible for the codification (but not creation, people get this wrong all the time) of the "Real Robot" subgenre of mecha, where the robots were relatively more realistic and used as weapons of war as opposed to the more fantastical "Super Robot" subgenre pioneered by Mazinger Z and Getter Robo.

A major theme of the show, and the franchise as a whole is "War is bad", as demonstrated through this meme:

Yes, this is the original version of this meme format.

Anyway, Tomino, a renowned pacifist who grew up in the shadow of Japan's involvement in WW2 tried to use his platform as an anime director to try and tell a story that would get people to realise war's futility and brutality.

So I hear you asking, "That's nice and all, but what about the space lesbians who beat Destiel on their home turf?" Well, let's get into that.

What is the Witch From Mercury?

Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury, or "G-Witch" for short is one of the more recent entries in the Gundam Franchise and a (very) loose adaptation of William Shakespeare's The Tempest. Set in the year 122 Ad Stella, the solar system is under the de facto control of the Benerit Group: a megacorporation with borderline-medieval internal politics that maintains a system of capitalism that benefits Spacians at the expense of those who live on Earth.

Main heroine Suletta Mercury enrolls at Asticassia School of Technology owned by the Benrit Group at the behest of her mother: CEO Prospera Mercury of the Mercury-based Shin Sei Development Corporation, and wins a Mobile Suit duel against a bully in her own MS: the Gundam Aerial. This however means she has now won the hand in marriage of daughter of the Benerit Group CEO: Miorine Rembran, beginning a series of consequences that shape the very political landscape of the solar system.

G-Witch was a massive hit, both critically and commercially. The first episode: the Witch and the Bride attracting record numbers for the studio and the Gunpla kit for the Aerial is currently the best-selling Gunpla kit ever.

Contrary to popular belief, G-Witch is not the first piece of Gundam media to feature a female protagonist. That honour would go to the 2002 Japan-only manga École du Ciel, nor would it have the first queer main character, which goes to 1999's Turn-A Gundam (and if you were to ask any fan of the series, they'd so it goes back to the very beginning). But it became notable for its lesbian representation in anime (in spite of Sunrise's attempts to downplay it, to the anger of the director, writer, producer, artists, animators, cast, fans and even their own parent company Bandai Namco who forced them to back off).

One thing I need to clarify: You don't need to have watched the original series to enjoy G-Witch. They're not even in the same continuity.

So if you're interested in the series and you've only watched G-Witch, I'll give out three recommendations for you all to enjoy:

Mobile Suit Gundam 00

Gundam 00 takes place in the year 2307 (the only series to use our own calendar), where the world is divided between three global superpowers: The Union of Free & Solar Nations (The Americas, Australia, New Zealand and Japan), the Human Reform League (China, South, East, Southeast and Central Asia) and the Advanced European Union (all of Europe, including all of Russia west of the Urals) who each control a space elevator near the equator and wage proxy-wars in Africa and the Middle-East over Earth's dwindling resources. This eventually culminates in the emergence of Celestial Being: a terrorist group consisting of Setsuna F. Seiei, Lockon Stratos, Allelujah Haptism and Tierria Erde, all of whom use powerful "Gundam" Mobile Suits and try to forcefully impose global peace on the Earth.

00 is pretty slow-paced and is more about the world than the individual characters, but said characters are really well-written, especially the characters from the three power blocs who are the de facto protagonists as they try to stop what are in their eyes a bunch of crazed terrorists preaching a hypocritical and incoherent ideology of "peace through force".

And to address the elephant in the room, this series is VERY post-9/11. Constant talks about terrorism, proxy-conflicts in the global south (especially the Middle-East), religious extremism, dwindling resources and the wars fought over them. While the franchise has always been political and of-its-time, you can just tell 00 was made in the mid-2000's. Again, it's good. But just something to keep in mind.

Turn-A Gundam

Turn-A Gundam is one of the weirder elements of the franchise for a myriad of reasons. Not the least of which being its unique setting taking inspiration from the famous sci-fi novel War of the Worlds.

In the Year 2345 of the Correct Century, human civilisation is at a level of technology reminiscent of the late-19th/early 20th centuries, save for the Moonrace on... well, the moon. As part of their queen Diana Soreil's plan to reintegrate both Lunar and Terran societies, several scouts are sent to the planet to set up their return to the planet. One such scout: Loran Cehack integrates into Terran society as a driver for the wealthy Heim family, though at a coming of age ceremony for the family's second daughter, a member of the Moonrace attacks the technologically-inferior Terrans. However, a mysterious mustached statue breaks apart to reveal a "White Doll": the Turn-A Gundam, allowing Loran to fend off the invaders. rest of the series becomes more of a mystery to how the supposedly-peace loving Moonrace could allow of such brutality.

The setting of the Correct Century timeline alone is one of the draws of Turn-A, though its excellent characters and compelling mystery also help a lot.

I do however have two warnings for people interested in watching it. The first is that this series was never dubbed. While it did receive an official sub in 2015, there still isn't a dub for the series. So if that bothers you, there's your warning.

The other is that there's a pretty big twist in the latter part of the series that while I will not spoil it here, it's such a big deal that I can't not mention it. It doesn't make any sense, and it actively detracts from not just the series, but the whole franchise. You'll know it when you see it. It doesn't ruin my enjoyment, but a lot of people don't like Turn-A for that alone.

Mobile Fighter G Gundam

Favourite entry. Don't care. It's peak.

In the Year 60 of the Future Century, war has been abandoned by the nations of humanity in favour of the Gundam fight: a quad-annual fighting tournament between Gundams representative of the countries of the world where the winner rules space until the next Gundam fight, all while leaving the Earth ecologically devastated in the fighting. Neo-Japan's Gundam Fighter: Domon Kasshu arrives on Earth seeking information on his older brother Kyoji, who killed their mother and led to their father's arrest before stealing the experimental Devil Gundam to Earth, beating up every Gundam Fighter in his way. However, he eventually learns of far more dangerous revelations about the incident.

G Gundam is to put it bluntly: bat-shit insane. And I love it. It basically took a look at the then-stagnating franchise in the wake of the wet fart that was Victory Gundam and said "I know what can save this franchise, Bruce Lee movies!" And it somehow worked.

Word of advice: watch it dubbed. Mark Gatha absolutely kills it as Domon every time, and puts just the right amount of ham into every line.

So yeah, that's some stuff on Gundam. This was a long post to write out. I'm gonna take a break now.

[have-some-pudding]

You know what I think is really going to hurt next week.

I know that 99.9% Lokius will not be canon. It is Disney +, it is the MCU, Loki has too many fans they won't let him be in a relationship with a man.

I have been through this many times before, Merthur, Destiel etc.

But the difference is: this feels real. This feels like it is not queerbaiting. This feels like their love for each other is profound, unconditional. For both of them their 1st priority is each other. The many touches, body language, heart to hearts, Loki fixing himself up before he goes to talk to Mobius. The "it's about what I wanted"..."Mobius should have a choice". The pure adoration they have for each other. Them saving each other without a second thought. There is absolutely nothing toxic in their relationship and it feels real. For the first time ever this feels like the writers are not playing with us.

Do I want this to happen?

Do I want my favourite chatacter since I am 15 to be loved as he has never been loved before, to be cherished, to be accepted just as he is, to be chosen without hesitation?

Of course i do.

Will this happen? No. It will not. Either he will suddenly end up with Sylvie, proving that he is not worthy of anybodies love only his own, or he will stay alone.

They could have given us a normal friendship between him and Mobius. Would people still ship them? Of course, that is what shipping is about. But they have given us the most dangerous thing, the very thing that could end up hurting us more than anything: hope.

Becouse I know deep in my head it won't happen, but they made it so real I cannot help but to hope that maybe this time they won't hurt us, maybe this time for the first time we can be happy for our favourite characters, just maybe this one time all of us queer people can feel like we have won.

Loki was right: hope is hard.

[watching-sam-and-dean-again]

Confession Time!

A lot of people say they wouldn't have a problem with destiel if it wasn’t for how terribly the hellers (not the regular, unproblematic Destiel shippers) behave. I agree on the fact that the death-threat hurling, actor harassing, fandom toxifying, gaslighting asses make me actively hate the ship, too. But, even if all of its shippers were calm and lovely, I would STILL hate the idea of destiel. This is going to about the ship itself and why I don’t like it, not about criticizing the people who ship it (reasonably).

If anyone stumbles across this and wants to claim it’s because I’m homophoic or some dumb shit, feel free to show yourself out. And grow up. If you agree or are just curious as to why, feel free to read on.

The first reason I can’t get on board with destiel is Castiel himself:

I hate the ship because, if you look at it as Castiel having feeling for Dean from early on, he comes off as a creep. First, how many times has he invaded Dean's personal space or stared at him while he slept, even though Dean has repeatedly told him not to and indicated it made him uncomfortable? I can think of at least 4 off the top of my head, but I’m sure there are more. These moment are written as jokes, and to show Cas is a derpy weirdo, but if you want to read them as a biproduct of Castiel having feeling for Dean, it makes him a stalker.

Second, Castiel only caring about other people, including Sam and Jack, because of Dean makes him a s selfish and kind of shitty character to me. I like the idea of Castiel being a defective amgel, coming off the assembly line with a "crack in his chassy," meaning he was always inclined to question things too much, maybe have an natural affinity for humans, to rebel. The idea that our show's version of Sam, Dean and even Castiel were special because they always defied the story that was written for them is the ultimate demonstration of free will winning out, and it speaks to the uniqueness of "our versions" of their characters. But, when it’s framed as Castiel only rebelling because he has a boner for Dean (like the "confession" scene seems to retroactively suggest), only ever questioned anything because he had a boner for Dean, only went against his fellow angels because he was hot for Dean and not becuae Dean inspired him to do the right thing, and only cared about people he says he loves and calls family because of Dean … that makes Dean special, not Castiel. In fact, it makes Castiel a simp who can’t think for himself, and is anything but genuine in his claim of caring about anyone but Dean. It makes him bereft of his own agency.

Finally, I hate the idea of Dean and Castiel ever being in a romantic relationship because of Castiel's shitty behavior. Castiel essentially forced Jimmy Novak to become his vessel again by possessing his daughter and basically holding her ransom until he consented, and he still thinks he did the right thing into late seasons. Even when he finds Claire to sort of, kind of try make up for taking her dad away, he makes a feeble effort at best, and then basically just wonders off and forgets about her again after his momentary attack of conscious. For Dean, a character who fights to have free will, to shack-up with someone who took over a man's body and when he died (because Castiel took his boy into battle), he just sort of took over the body for himself and called it his, like a crab finding a new shell … is a would make Dean a bit gross, too. Hello, even depressed and desperate Sam wouldn’t bang Ruby until she found a braindead vessel, whose soul had likely departed already (and he’s the monster fucker). Castiel also broke Sam's hell wall leading to him going insane and nearly dying of insomnia, and he did it purposely just to hurt and worry Dean, distracting him from his plan to play god. This is inexcusable, and that fact that Dean even stays his friend feels like a betrayal to Sam, as well as out of character frankly, never mind going on to have a relationship with him. Finally, Castiel has threatened and beaten Dean when he doesn’t do what he wants more than once, when he is much more powerful than Dean (so it’s not even a fair fight) and despite what hellers seem to think, I don’t find abuse sexy.

The next reason I can’t get onboard with Destiel is Dean:

Dean laterallyliterally implies, out right says, and demonstrates multiple times throughout the show that he is straight. Thus, with the version of Castiel that Dean knows being in a male vessel, Dean just isn’t going to be interested in him that way. I’ve seen shippers argue that people sometimes fall in love with someone of the same sex despite identifying as straight, but come on, that is going to be a relatively small percentage of of people. But more than that, Dean isn’t a real person; he’s a character. If the writers were going to make his character have a change of sexuality, or make an exception for Castiel, they would have had to explicitly show it on screen, through words and actions, and not just drop "subtext hints" that never go anywhere, and are largely stupid or hinged on stereotypes. They never did, so Dean remained heterosexual to the end.

Even if his sexuality were not a barrier, Dean does not knowingly peruse monsters. Castiel despite how depowered and essentially useless he becomes over time, is not a human. Angels are essentially just another flavor of monster on Supernatural, thus Dean is not be interested in dating Castiel even if he were in a female vessel, despite what some shippers like to claim. The only times Dean has knowingly hooked up with a monster was with Anna, and that was before she got her grace back and was a true angel again. The other monster he slept with was the Amazon, or whatever she was, before she had a kid with him without his consent, and Dean didn’t know that she was a monster. He frequently criticized Sam for having been with monsters, and that criticism makes it pretty clear that he wouldn’t want to be with any himself. Finally, this is a bit of a side note, any many may not agree with me, but I don't think Dean sees any supernatural creatures as quite equal to humans, and that includes Castiel, Jack and Benny. If it weren’t enough that Dean isn’t into males, the fact that he also isn’t into monsters, pretty much makes the destiel ship dead in the water for me.

Finally, the way Dean treats Castiel is not conducive to friendship at times, never mind romance. Dean pretty frequently belittles Castiel, calling him essentially uselesess when he doesn’t have powers (baby in a trench coat), and he makes fun of Castiel working at the Gas 'n Sip to try sustain himself, after Dean kicked him out of the bunker powerless and penniless. If Dean loves Castiel, mocking him for working whatever job he can after he turned him away, is an interesting way to show it. He also lashes out at Castiel pretty harshly (I though often deservedly). He tells Castiel that "nobody cares that he’s broken," and he says "everything that goes wrong" seems to be because of Castiel, and he told him that if anything happened to his mother after Castiel failed to warn them about Jack' behavior, Castiel would be "dead" to him. Even when the show reminds us of Castiel's existence when he’s not in an episode by having Dean claim he’s worried about him, or having Sam reassure him they’ll find/help Castiel, when Castiel actually is back, Dean essentially goes back to ignoreimg him. Dean only seems to care about Castiel when he’s missing or when he can help them fight something. In down time, he’s usually pretty happy just to chill with Sam.

Finally, I can’t ship destiel because of Sam, or more specially, Sam & Dean:

Sam and Dean have such a twisted-up, enmeshed, and all-consuming relationship with each other, that shipping either of them with characters outside of their relationship just isn’t interesting to me. I personally don’t ship them together, either. What they have goes beyind relationship categorization (brothers, friends, adversaries, parent/child, life partners, etc.), and I honesty think if the show had defied network parameters and actually had them hook up sexually, the relationship would have lost something. Sam and Dean are so unique and compelling in that their big love is a sibling and not a romantic parnptner, or even a parent/child relationship, that even as a fan of a good romantic pairing normally, I love that them exactly as they are. And their relationship is more meaningful to me than almost any other fictional one I’ve encountered. So frankly, shipping either with anyone long-term (I wouldn’t have hated seeing both of them have one more short romantic relationship in there somewhere) just feels pointless to me, and would just pale in comparison to what Sam and Dean are with to each other.