Sakura is worse than Orochimaru, Madara, Danzo, Pein, Gaara's dad and Hidan put together...
...or so you'd think from the way the Naruto fandom erupted over the fake confession to Naruto. "She should die." "She ruined Naruto's life." "She's evil and a liar." "Naruto should beat her up." "She's the worst character ever." "She treats Naruto like shit and Naruto's a pussy for letting her." "Hinata did it better." "She'll never get any development now." And the best of all: "Sakura deserves to get raped and stabbed."
Yes, what Sakura did to Naruto was pretty cruel. Yes, she took advantage of his feelings for her, and yes, he was upset. Yes, her intentions were good - she wanted Naruto to stop putting himself in danger running after Sasuke - but the way she went about it was cack-handed, and yes, gassing Sai, Lee and Kiba was a dick move. However, the amount of hate she's getting over it is beyond ridiculous. There are characters who kill people for fun, who inflict horrific mental torture on others, who have experimented on children, who want to commit genocide, who are responsible for the death of an entire clan and releasing a demonic entity onto Konoha, who destroyed entire villages, who exploit a vulnerable, messed-up young man and use him for their own means, who turn teenagers into monsters, who betray their own villages...you get the picture. And yet, lying to Naruto is worse than any of these, judging by the fandom's reaction.
It seems to have become even more fashionable than ever to bash Sakura and act like she's never done anything good, that she is and always has been useless, that all she does is cry. I admit I am frustrated about how Kishimoto's written her recently, and I wonder what the point of the Sasori fight was if he's just going to undo her development, but I can't hate her. And what really annoys me is that the Sakura fandom are getting bashed now as well because people can't understand how we can like someone so horrible, even though Orochimaru and the fucking Akatsuki members all have fans (not bashing those characters, Oro was one of the greatest baddies Naruto had, and I'm a big Kisame fangirl). Funnily enough, Naruto was still willing to save her from Sasuke. So much for him hating her. After everything Sasuke's done, Naruto still doesn't hate him, so why would he hate Sakura just for lying?
And bashing her for not killing Sasuke? I can kind of see why Kishi made her hesitate. Partly because of the effect his death would have on Naruto, partly because Sakura still has feelings for Sasuke despite everything, partly because Sasuke is still her team mate in spirit - any of these seem plausible. The funny thing is, if she'd offed him, she still would have been bashed. So yeah, once again, Sakura can't win.
Also, people are STILL bitter about the Sasori fight? It was, what, how many years ago and people are still claiming that Chiyo and Sakura didn't really win and Sasori let them win, or that it was the dreaded Plot no Jutsu? Sheesh.