Mirror Mirror on the Wall: Chapter 7 - On Sam In the Box
Sammy's Box
What, then, was Sam required to sacrifice in order to remain within good standing in the Winchester family?
The directive "Keep Sam safe," guided much of what was required of Dean, that he sacrifice his needs and wishes to serve as the protector of his younger brother, and so it directed what was demanded, too, of Sam.
Sam's position as the object of "Keep Sam safe" has both positive and negative consequences for him.
On one hand, he was protected in a way that Dean was not. He didn't have to bear the burden of care when he was young. He didn't have to experience that horror of jeopardizing someone he loves' life if he gives into a simple urge to shirk responsibilities and play for a little. Sam was allowed some of that basic self-centeredness that is often typical of adolescence, that they can be very loving and giving, but sometimes just not GET the impact they have on other people in the pursuit of their own needs. Indeed, Sam still had some growing up to do in Season 1 before he could perceive his father fully as a human being motivated by complex and contradictory emotions.
DEAN: But even when you two weren't talking, he used to swing by Stanford whenever he could. Keep an eye on you. Make sure you were safe.
SAM: What?
DEAN: Yeah.
Bugs
And, not least among the benefits, Dean watched out for Sam. How many times in Season 1 did we see Dean save Sam? Sam probably would have died long before Cold Oak if not for Dean's vigilance. I refer you to blacklid 's excellent meta on this subject if you have any doubts.
What do you mean shooting Caspar in the face, freak.
Pilot
Wendigo roast
Wendigo
You killed them
Bloody Mary
Handsome devil
Skin
That's just weird.
Provenance
Death by Childhood Emotional Baggage
Something Wicked
But, on the other hand, being the object of "Keep Sam safe!" has other not so positive implications for Sam.
Being the Object of "Keep Sam Safe"
It keeps Sam one down, always assuming that he'll be in need of protection. It is, when push comes to shove, to be the object of an action, not the one performing the act. It precludes an equal footing with his brother and father. "Keep Sam safe" doesn't allow Sam to take risks of his own choosing, and the choice of what risks to take and willingness to accept responsibility for them is a touchstone of adulthood. In short, "Keep Sam safe," is infantilizing.
DEAN: Don't get mad at me. Don't you do that. I had to. I had to look out for you. That's my job.
SAM: And what do you think my job is?
DEAN: What?
SAM: You've saved my life over and over. I mean, you sacrifice everything for me. Don't you think I'd do the same for you? You're my big brother. There's nothing I wouldn't do for you. And I don't care what it takes, I'm going to get you out of this. Guess I got to save your ass for a change.
All Hell Breaks Loose 2
"Keep Sam safe" sends the likely unintended message that he is less capable and therefore requires special attention for his safety. If this were a family of adults or much older siblings, this might reflect run of the mill baby-brother issues, in which the younger sibling's safety is put in the hands of older, much more capable siblings. But it's not. Dean's only 4 years older than Sam. How old was Dean in the flashbacks of Something Wicked, 9? 10? And yet he was given much more responsibility than Sam was at 14.
SAM: I want Lucky Charms.
DEAN: There’s no more Lucky Charms.
SAM: I saw the box.
DEAN: Okay, maybe there is, but there’s only enough left for one bowl, and I haven’t had any yet.
Something Wicked
DEAN: Got your lunch? Books? Butterfly knife?
SAM: Yeah, Dean.
DEAN: You okay?
SAM: Sure.
DEAN: Sammy?
SAM: Look, this is the third school we've been to this year, and it's only November. I'm just sick of always being the new kid.
DEAN: You'll be fine. If anyone gives you any trouble, just let me know.
After School Special
Keeping someone in a one-down position "for their own good," especially in this context of assumption of ability in other members of the family at the same or younger ages, sends all kinds of messages of concern about that person's competence.
Complying with his family's way of thinking and doing things, then, means that Sam would have to buy into both that perception of lesser competence and the admonition that they be hunters and expose themselves to grave danger. Sam then, would have to 1) buy into the idea that he was not expected or relied upon to try to protect the people that he loved, giving him little means of coping with their risk and 2) accept grave danger while expected to be dependent on others for his safety. That's a pretty powerless position to be in.
Why Must Sam Be Kept Safe?
There are other messages contained in the subtext of "Keep Sam safe," one of which I keep coming back to whenever Sam has such strong reactions to the implication that something is wrong, bad, different, evil about him.
As I've described in the sections about John, his father's hypervigilance to Sam's safety seems to be driven by his fears related to the possible connection between the Evil Thing that killed Mary and his son.
Regardless of when John figured out that the Yellow-Eyed Demon had done something to Sam, from Sam's earliest days, John would have been watching his son, wondering. The very nature of watching and wondering changes the thing watched. It's the nature of self-fulfilling prophecies. In order to avoid the thing feared, we are hypervigilant to it, putting all kinds of strategies in motion to prevent it. If John feared the connection between the Evil Supernatural and Sam, he would have inevitably communicated this on some subtle, subtextual, intuitive, gut-level basis.
For example: Why did John treat Sam differently than Dean? Why was John so vigilant about Sam's safety? Why did he expect Dean to sacrifice so much of himself in the service of watching over Sam? Why didn't John give Sam responsibilities that he had given Dean at the same age? These would have been acted out time and time again in family life. "Keep Sam safe" can't help communicating that there's something different-bad-wrong about Sam.
Kids know these things. They know when one sibling is being treated differently than the other/s. Sam and Dean knew it. They just didn't know what was driving it. They were left alone to figure out what was going on, why their father treated Sam differently than Dean.
DEAN: He was afraid of what could happen to you if he wasn't around. But even when you two weren't talking, he used to swing by Stanford whenever he could. Keep an eye on you. Make sure you were safe.
Bugs
in comparison to:
DEAN/shapeshifter: Hell, I did everything Dad asked me to, and he ditched me, too. No explanation, nothing, just poof. Left me with your sorry ass.
Skin
Dean attributed the "Sam is different" subtext to a preference that John had for his younger son.
I mean, think about it, all he ever did was train you. Boss you around. But Sam, Sam he doted on. Sam, he loved. Dad knew who you really were, a good soldier and nothing else. Daddy's blunt little instrument. Your own father didn't care if you lived or died, why should you?
Dream a Little Dream
Sam attributed it to his father seeing something bad-wrong-different-inadequate in him.
SAM: I respected him, but no matter what I did, it was never good enough.
DEAN: So, what are you saying, Dad was disappointed in you?
Sam: Was? Is! Always has been.
Bugs
This feeling of being bad-wrong-different has had a strong influence on shaping Sam's perception of himself. So much so that it becomes a bit of emotional baggage that he carries with him into other relationships. He's got something of a heightened sensitivity to it.
Because, I don't want to be the freak for once, Dean.
After School Special
SAM: No, that’s okay. You know, the truth is, even at Stanford, deep down, I never really fit in.
Skin
So, to summarize thus far: Complying with his family's demands, aligning himself with the beliefs and fears that drove his father, meant that Sam would have to accept a powerless position. He would not be allowed the freedom to choose for himself. He would have to accept 1) what was likely to be a permanent one-down position while at the same time having to face dangers to himself and those he loved, and 2) the idea that there was something bad-wrong-different about himself that made him the object of "Keep Sam safe."
Pandora Unboxed
It's no coincidence that Sam is associated with Barry and Dirk in After School Special, Barry who committed suicide in the school's bathroom and Dirk who fell into alcohol, violence and drugs until there was no further down to go. I would argue that all three, Sam included, were on a path of despair and self-destruction.
Sam and Coping
While Dean found a method of coping with his situation that was fairly effective for him, Sam struggled.
As mentioned before, Dean copes with his situation by adopting the family's core values, identifying whole-heartedly with his father. Being the extravert of the family, he emotes outward. He may not use words to reveal what's going on inside of his head, but man does he show it through his behavior. You very seldom do not know where Dean is coming from. Because of this tendency to externalize, Dean copes by putting up his emotional walls and fronts with a persona that is "out there in the world," all brash and cockiness.
Sam, on the other hand, is an introvert much like his father. He has an elaborated internal life that he rarely shows on the outside. Sam internalizes. And so he tends to cope by retreating inward.
"I'm not really here, don't see me,"
After School Special
"Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!"
After School Special
Sam hides, denies his ability to defend himself.
After School Special
"Don't force me out of my shell, Dean."
After School Special
Shutting down, withdrawing and hiding are all defensive strategies. They protect what is left of the self, hoarding bits and pieces of parts of who the person is that fuels them, but they don't change the circumstances that caused the pain in the first place.
Learning Helplessness
Sam at this stage in his life reminds me of Martin Seligman's poor dogs in his learned helplessness experiments. (ack! I've been reduced to referencing Wikipedia.)
Seligman put dogs in a shuttle box, some cages with the fence up, and some with the fence down. He then administered electric shock via the floors of the metal cages. Yep. That's what I said. Seligman later publicly admitted to his feelings of guilt and distress at causing the animals pain and struggled with the ethics of the experiment before, during and after he ran them. Anyway, dogs with the opportunity quickly learned to jump the fence that was down to avoid the shock. Dogs who couldn't get away from the shock because the fences were raised tried all kinds of escape strategies until they learned that there was no way to avoid the shock. At that point, they curled up, attempting to minimize the pain, and whimpered whenever put into the cage. Eventually, this generalized to a listlessness and a tendency to not even attempt to avoid the shock when escape was finally made possible. They had learned a helplessness that carried over into situations in which they actually could have been able to exert control.
WYATT: Anything you want to tell us about yourself, Sam?
SAM: No.
After School Special
Withdrawing and shutting down are a protective turning inward that is most effective when all other means of effecting change have failed. It allows people to endure what can be horrific circumstances beyond their control. But it decidedly does NOT promote the feelings of effectiveness, that cognitive sense of control that allows for hope that you can change your circumstances. Prolonged helplessness, instead, leads to despair, and eventually, if severe and unremitting, self-destruction of some kind.
Barry felt stuck and helpless. He lost sight of his escape plan. At that point, without hope, the only way out seemed to be suicide. Dirk, too, felt stuck and helpless. He took a more passively suicidal approach. His retreat to drugs whittled away at all the good things left in who he was and his life until there was nothing left. Because of rigidity of his family, Sam had very limited options for coping with his fear and despair. The ones he was offered weren't sufficient for him. Without being allowed options for affecting change, he withdrew. His withdrawal may have minimized the pain, but it sure didn't give him much in the way of hope. He learned to be helpless.
All of which begs the question, what would have happened to Sam if Mr. Wyatt hadn't opened that door for him?
The point is, there may be three or four big choices that shape someone's whole life, and you need to be the one that makes them, not anyone else.
After School Special
You're happy, Sam?
After School Special
I think we might have a pretty good idea:
Don’t take this the wrong way, buddy, but you don't look so hot. Guess burying your brother didn't agree with you.
I Know What You Did Last Summer
RUBY: And all I had to do was find you, and kill you.
SAM: Fine, go ahead. Do it.
I Know What You Did Last Summer
Next: Chapter 8: On Sam - Out of the Box
~*~
Chapter 1: On the Siren's Call
Chapter 2: On John the Man
Chapter 3: On John the Father
~*~
Chapter 4: On Dean The Motherless Child
Chapter 5: On Dean the Heart of the Family
~*~
Chapter 6: On Sam Born of Love and Loss
Chapter 7: On Sam in the Box
Chapter 8: On Sam out of the Box
Chapter 9 : On Sam Captive on a Carousel of Time
Chapter 10: On Sam Power Can Be Taken, But Not Given
Chapter 11: On Sam From Here Forward
Chapter 12: On Sam Out of the Box Redux
~*~
Chapter 13: On SamnDean Putting Away Childish Things
Chapter 14: On SamnDean Triangles are a Demon's Best Friend
Chapter 15: On SamnDean Stop the Carousel I Want to Get Off
~*~
credit goes to
oxoniensis and marishna of summerskin for the screencaps