The misogyny that is thrown at female characters on Supernatural is disgusting. Some people need to check at how they’ve internalized the patriarchy that they would rather have female characters dead in order to further their feelings about a fictional friendship between two male characters. I’ve got a post-bubbling on the stove about the appropriation of queer identity by straight women who only want to see two fictional men get together and can’t fathom that perhaps two men, of any sexual orientation, might love each other but not want to have a romantic relationship with each other.
The post is bubbling because I want to find some citations from Ian McKellen on The Lord of the Rings and his discussions with (straight) actors on how they might show affection for each other as comrades and friends, that has nothing to do with sexual attraction. We live in a culture where physical affection from men is often read as being about sexual attraction, but could be nothing more than affection for each other as friends.
I’m not in the Supernatural fandom, but I remember this happening in fandoms in general, making the female character just a sliver below “hell spawn” in order to push the two guys together (i.e. Relena from Gundam Wing, Sakura from Naruto, ect.) I’m guilty of doing this myself, back in the day, but if I can credit the Naruto fandom for one thing it’s that it showed me how crazy it was to just bash the female character so much just because she “interferes with the two guys.” Granted, there’s plenty of reason to get frustrated over Sakura in how she has moments of greatness that get shot down, but I’ll never forget the hatred people had because, “Ugh she interferes with the Sasuke and Naruto because she crushes on Sasuke so hard.”
A couple of things.
1. She was 12. 12 year old girls get crushes on popular boys sometimes. It just… happens.
2. No one seemed to point out that, as the series progressed, she started wanting to bring Sasuke back not for her sake, but for NARUTO’S SAKE, to have THE ENTIRE TEAM BACK TOGETHER, not just so she could crush on Sasuke some more.
3. No one seemed to point out how, as much as you think Sakura pines over Sasuke, no one pines over him more than Naruto. Yaoi lenses or not, there’s moments where I know that if Naruto were a girl, fans would’ve been calling her stupid in her complete devotion to this guy who, frankly, doesn’t want to come back. There’s a part in the manga, where Naruto is talking to someone (can’t remember who), but he flat out says something like, “I don’t care if I lose my arms, my legs, my eyes, I’ll still bring Sasuke back.” Just… and the fandom was all, “OMG IT’S SO CANON YOU GUYS,” and I had this moment of, “… that… just… no…” It wasn’t sweet, to me. It was… awful, because I knew that if Sakura said something like that, the fandom would condemn her, but since it was the boy character it was like, “Guys our yaoi circle is complete!”
Yaoi or not… someone being that dedicated to someone is… scary. Especially if said person’s response is, “Leave me alone.” Just… yeah. That’s called an unhealthy relationship. But somehow, Sakura was the “bitch,” and just… it made me see how much female characters are shunned for the sake of having two guys together… even if those characters really shouldn’t be together. Sasuke and Naruto is not cute, it’s not sweet, it’s… dangerous. Naruto is kinda obsessed (not sure if he is anymore since I gave up on the manga) and that’s not a good thing.
