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chasingtides Sep. 20th, 2008 12:38 am)
chasingtides Sep. 20th, 2008 12:38 am)I am going to open this meta with the statement that I am, probably, likely to be considered a violent person. I hit things. And people. Usually with my cane, Niccolo Machiavelli. I also throw things. And like shooting my compound bow. And hitting things.
I like Dean a lot. Probably, partially, because he also hits things.
Now, I've seen around the internet that it seems that a lot of people don't like Dean hitting things. They say that he likes to pick on women. That's he's mean to women. That he's written as a misogynist.
Well, thinks I, I am not so sure about that. I hit women, but I don't think of myself as a misogynist for a variety of reasons, but partially because I also hit men.
So, I decided to analyze exactly who Dean hits in Lazarus Rising.
If we set aside the opening montage of season three as irrelevant to this meta and focus upon Dean's acts of personal violence against others, we can look at four separate incidents of such personal violence in Lazarus Rising. The first is Dean's fist/knife fight with Bobby; the second, his fist/knife fight with Sam; the third, his slapping of the possessed waitress; and the fourth, his attack upon the angel Castiel.
Bobby, as Dean expresses in this self-same episode, is the closest thing Dean has to a father. Presumably, this works the other way (and I am taking a cue from Bobby's new drinking habit as well) and Bobby feels that Sam and Dean are the closest things he has to sons. As he said so eloquently in the finale of the third season, "Family don't end with blood, boy." And yet despite this - or perhaps because of it, for who would not be startled and afraid to see a loved one arise from the grave - the first thing he does when he sees Dean is attack him with a knife. Dean responds in kind, returning the fight with his fists. This continues until Dean has wrested the knife from Bobby and purposefully cuts himself.
This same scene magically repeats itself when Dean sees Sam for the first time. Sam, too, does not know what to do upon seeing Dean alive and thus attacks him with a knife. This time Bobby helps Dean with the fisticuffs, but it is still an act of personal violence upon the person whom, I can say with little reservation, Dean loves most in the world. In fact, Dean is not rejoicing at being out of hell because he is fearing for the state of his brother's soul. And the first thing they do when they see one another is get into a fist/knife fight.
Then comes the fight with the demonically possessed waitress. However, Dean does not slap her because she gave him bad service. In fact, before he visits personal violence upon her person she says, "I'll drag you back to Hell myself," and, "I'm going to reach down your throat and rip out your lungs." And then Dean slaps her twice.
Lastly, Dean does personal violence upon the angel Castiel. He and Bobby both shoot him, but it has been suggested to me that this is not personal violence and shouldn't be dissected here. But he also stabs Castiel with Ruby's demon killing knife. Dean doesn't just want to kill Castiel's body or insult him or bruise him; Dean wants to kill Castiel's soul. Even in the Supernatural world, that's big. Dean's not playing with Castiel. He wants him dead and forgotten.
Now I've written before that I don't like treating demons (or, now, angels) as though they are gendered by their meatsuits/vessels. The demon possessing that waitress could well be male gendered even though his body is currently female sexed. But as most of the people who inspired this meta are treating it one way, I am willing to treat this situation as one of Dean doing personal violence upon male and female bodies.
In this episode, 25% of the personal violence Dean does is upon female bodies and 75% of the violence Dean does is upon male bodies. 50% of the personal violence Dean does is upon loved ones. 25% is done upon angels, 25% is done upon demons, and 50% is done upon humans (for the purposes of my current knowledge, both Sam and Bobby are human). The only unprovoked personal violence Dean does is upon the angel Castiel who is currently inhabited a meatsuit/vessel which appears to be male sexed. Castiel, from what research I have been able to do, is also male gendered. The most frantic of the personal violence which Dean does is upon Castiel who is, to my knowledge, both male sexed and gendered.
Now I will examine the situation with the possessed waitress, which has distressed many. The waitress threatens Dean with two very real threats, "I'll drag you back to Hell myself," and, "I'm going to reach down your throat and rip out your lungs." Dean has just now returned from Hell, a place where, presumably, no one goes willingly. Even Sam, who is sociopathically calm in a later scene with the same demon, is ready to attack the waitress when she threatens to return Dean to hell.
Wondering if perhaps I was reacting violently myself to these threats, which are both gruesome and no doubt frightening to Dean, I consulted an outside source. Our conversation went as follows:
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chasingtides: "If you were threatened with actually being dragged to hell and then having your lungs pulled out of your mouth, is hitting the person threatening you reasonable?"
una__sola: "No.
It's not nearly extreme enough."
To be quite frank, I realised I agreed with this. Really, the demon wearing this women isn't just threatening Dean's life, though she is with the second threat; she is threatening his soul. By returning to life, Dean has received a second chance. He doesn't have to go to hell and he doesn't have to become a demon. He no longer has to become what he hates and pray that someone kills him quickly. Well. Damn. That's a good deal. But this demon is threatening to take all of that away. That warrants more than a few slaps.
Also, I have slapped people (okay one guy) like that in a fight. It is one of the most ineffective maneuvers out there. This is why I only used it once. It is very wimpy and pointless. Mostly, your hand stings and maybe their cheek turns pink. This is not a drastic level of violence.
Finally, I will close with a few thoughts on violence against female bodies in media. If I am going to an action movie where the hero has a big ole machine gun and is shooting everyone, I expect women to be shot. If the hero - or villain - purposefully only kills men, then that is sexism in media. If the hero - or villain - only kills women, this too is sexism in media. If the hero - or villain - kills both men and women, that is equality.
There is real violence against women in the world. I do not doubt this. I know and love women who have survived it. I myself have survived it. But when someone hates or hurts or hits people of any and all gender, class, race, or other subdivision of humanity, it doesn't mean that they are being sexist, classist, racist, or subscribing to any other "ism" of the world. It means that they are hateful or hurtful or violent. Period. End of story.
Now, if you don't want to watch a show about a violent person, I'm not sure why you're watching TV. But that's an issue for another day.
I like Dean a lot. Probably, partially, because he also hits things.
Now, I've seen around the internet that it seems that a lot of people don't like Dean hitting things. They say that he likes to pick on women. That's he's mean to women. That he's written as a misogynist.
Well, thinks I, I am not so sure about that. I hit women, but I don't think of myself as a misogynist for a variety of reasons, but partially because I also hit men.
So, I decided to analyze exactly who Dean hits in Lazarus Rising.
If we set aside the opening montage of season three as irrelevant to this meta and focus upon Dean's acts of personal violence against others, we can look at four separate incidents of such personal violence in Lazarus Rising. The first is Dean's fist/knife fight with Bobby; the second, his fist/knife fight with Sam; the third, his slapping of the possessed waitress; and the fourth, his attack upon the angel Castiel.
Bobby, as Dean expresses in this self-same episode, is the closest thing Dean has to a father. Presumably, this works the other way (and I am taking a cue from Bobby's new drinking habit as well) and Bobby feels that Sam and Dean are the closest things he has to sons. As he said so eloquently in the finale of the third season, "Family don't end with blood, boy." And yet despite this - or perhaps because of it, for who would not be startled and afraid to see a loved one arise from the grave - the first thing he does when he sees Dean is attack him with a knife. Dean responds in kind, returning the fight with his fists. This continues until Dean has wrested the knife from Bobby and purposefully cuts himself.
This same scene magically repeats itself when Dean sees Sam for the first time. Sam, too, does not know what to do upon seeing Dean alive and thus attacks him with a knife. This time Bobby helps Dean with the fisticuffs, but it is still an act of personal violence upon the person whom, I can say with little reservation, Dean loves most in the world. In fact, Dean is not rejoicing at being out of hell because he is fearing for the state of his brother's soul. And the first thing they do when they see one another is get into a fist/knife fight.
Then comes the fight with the demonically possessed waitress. However, Dean does not slap her because she gave him bad service. In fact, before he visits personal violence upon her person she says, "I'll drag you back to Hell myself," and, "I'm going to reach down your throat and rip out your lungs." And then Dean slaps her twice.
Lastly, Dean does personal violence upon the angel Castiel. He and Bobby both shoot him, but it has been suggested to me that this is not personal violence and shouldn't be dissected here. But he also stabs Castiel with Ruby's demon killing knife. Dean doesn't just want to kill Castiel's body or insult him or bruise him; Dean wants to kill Castiel's soul. Even in the Supernatural world, that's big. Dean's not playing with Castiel. He wants him dead and forgotten.
Now I've written before that I don't like treating demons (or, now, angels) as though they are gendered by their meatsuits/vessels. The demon possessing that waitress could well be male gendered even though his body is currently female sexed. But as most of the people who inspired this meta are treating it one way, I am willing to treat this situation as one of Dean doing personal violence upon male and female bodies.
In this episode, 25% of the personal violence Dean does is upon female bodies and 75% of the violence Dean does is upon male bodies. 50% of the personal violence Dean does is upon loved ones. 25% is done upon angels, 25% is done upon demons, and 50% is done upon humans (for the purposes of my current knowledge, both Sam and Bobby are human). The only unprovoked personal violence Dean does is upon the angel Castiel who is currently inhabited a meatsuit/vessel which appears to be male sexed. Castiel, from what research I have been able to do, is also male gendered. The most frantic of the personal violence which Dean does is upon Castiel who is, to my knowledge, both male sexed and gendered.
Now I will examine the situation with the possessed waitress, which has distressed many. The waitress threatens Dean with two very real threats, "I'll drag you back to Hell myself," and, "I'm going to reach down your throat and rip out your lungs." Dean has just now returned from Hell, a place where, presumably, no one goes willingly. Even Sam, who is sociopathically calm in a later scene with the same demon, is ready to attack the waitress when she threatens to return Dean to hell.
Wondering if perhaps I was reacting violently myself to these threats, which are both gruesome and no doubt frightening to Dean, I consulted an outside source. Our conversation went as follows:
chasingtides: "If you were threatened with actually being dragged to hell and then having your lungs pulled out of your mouth, is hitting the person threatening you reasonable?"una__sola: "No.It's not nearly extreme enough."
To be quite frank, I realised I agreed with this. Really, the demon wearing this women isn't just threatening Dean's life, though she is with the second threat; she is threatening his soul. By returning to life, Dean has received a second chance. He doesn't have to go to hell and he doesn't have to become a demon. He no longer has to become what he hates and pray that someone kills him quickly. Well. Damn. That's a good deal. But this demon is threatening to take all of that away. That warrants more than a few slaps.
Also, I have slapped people (okay one guy) like that in a fight. It is one of the most ineffective maneuvers out there. This is why I only used it once. It is very wimpy and pointless. Mostly, your hand stings and maybe their cheek turns pink. This is not a drastic level of violence.
Finally, I will close with a few thoughts on violence against female bodies in media. If I am going to an action movie where the hero has a big ole machine gun and is shooting everyone, I expect women to be shot. If the hero - or villain - purposefully only kills men, then that is sexism in media. If the hero - or villain - only kills women, this too is sexism in media. If the hero - or villain - kills both men and women, that is equality.
There is real violence against women in the world. I do not doubt this. I know and love women who have survived it. I myself have survived it. But when someone hates or hurts or hits people of any and all gender, class, race, or other subdivision of humanity, it doesn't mean that they are being sexist, classist, racist, or subscribing to any other "ism" of the world. It means that they are hateful or hurtful or violent. Period. End of story.
Now, if you don't want to watch a show about a violent person, I'm not sure why you're watching TV. But that's an issue for another day.
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I don't disagree with the No Rest for the Wicked example. I wouldn't regard the fanfic as an example though, merely because that is not canon, and it is, to my mind fans projecting their own desires onto the hurt/comfort thing. It is not direct evidence provided by the writers and film-makers of the show itself.
I also think the scene in Mystery Spot you are citing is not a good example, when taken in context. Sam had an injury he was taking care of where parts of his very attractive physique were on display. But, I took it as more "Sammy is badass and dangerous". It additionally could have erotic subtext. But I don't think it is an example of violence, or the threat of violence being committed against a person being erotic.
It isn't simply Winchester violence towards women which is eroticized, I think. I think it's the whole damn show's framework of reference. Violence is a threat against women explicitly and it is sexualized.
The eroticized violence against women is everywhere, from Tricia Helfer's character in Roadkill (strung up, with the other ghost slicing at her exposed, stomach and well nigh groping her) to the dead black girl with her guts gore and body on display in Hookman, to the overly eroticized choice of footage of the female swimmer in the early minutes of "Dead in the Water" (compare it to similar footage in "Jaws" - where the female swimmer is naked, but the body is blurred/darkened to the point that it "clouds her") to the witch in "Malleus Maleficarum" biting it on her pretty, slightly slinky nightgown . . . gore and sexuality on display everywhere there . . . There was also the scene in "Nightshifter" with the blonde woman, gagged, bond, and bloody, her cleavage bloody and heaving . . . practically on display. It was massively creepy for a number of reasons, but the sexualization was there, particularly since the Skinwalker had just made really creepy passes at her minutes before. And besides. If it was just down to the cleavage, wardrobe could've given her a different shirt. But they didn't. And they chose the clips and the angles the chose for a reason.
Those are a few examples I can think off just off the top of my head. But there are plenty more. And that's not even touching on the sticky wicket of the "evil" women and their "dangerous and foreboding" sexuality. Nor the portrayal of women in the show in general.
Now, I can excuse some of this in light of the fact that it is a horror show, and it's within genre conventions. Horror - and urban myths and legends in the first couple seasons - often play upon the things people fear most. And one thing which is a definite reality and fear for many women is the threat of violence. I could excuse it if it was used in a fashion to make the horror/suspense more horrible. But often it's not. Often it just seems like cheap titillation rather than smart discourse on violence against women.
I think it's massively sexist and the writers don't even seem to have spent a minute dwelling on it, either. I think saying the show is otherwise is ignoring reams of footage and evidence on how women in general are treated by the show. That doesn't also mean the show doesn't have a lot of really awesome things about it and I don't love it in spite of it's faults. And I think being sexist is different from being misogynistic. Most people are sexist to an extent, or have had sexist thoughts towards women (this goes for women and men), I think, just because it's so culturally ingrained it's hard not to be. But misogynistic? That's a whole other ballgame, methinks, though related. Just because women are getting smacked around in SPN frequently doesn't make it misogynistic. Or that much different from so much other TV and movies out there.
Jo! God. I loved Jo. I wish they hadn't written her out like they did, nor Ellen, but that's a whole other ball of thread, I suppose.
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Personally, I think horror (and I do classify SPN as horror, a direct descendant of the stock horror of the late 60's, 70's, and 80's) is about what we don't understand and fear most. Sometimes in horror that means demonising that which we don't understand, for example mental illness is ever popular. If the plot is about violence, then sexualised violence is often the most frightening and hard to understand. Personally, I would rather be mugged on the street three times than ever be sexually assaulted again. I can deal with being beaten and bruised better than I can deal with being sexually assaulted. This is true for most people I know.
Also, I have trouble seeing how a bullet wound isn't violent. He's been shot.
Additionally, I think that the existence of sexuality is better handled here than on many television shows. From what I can see, Dean is fairly sex-positive, for both himself and the women he's with. In Tall Tales, he defends Purple Nurple Girl against Sam, the one who insists that she's sleazy. We have the understanding that Dean does sleep with women he picks up in bars, but never once have I seen that as degrading to women. However, that is a whole other issue that could be debated until the cow's come home.