A collection of essays about Supernatural that went to press before the debut of Season 3; therefore there's some Jossing.
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meganbmoore, I think this essay would've been greatly improved by a better variety in the content. There was a lot of 'and we all know Supernatural is awesome, right?' attitude in the book, which made it feel far less like a
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...Umm, wow. Okay, as someone who filled out the poll about ages and skewed them young and then mentioned the military aspect, I feel it behooves me to clarify my experiences, and why what John Winchester did with his kids was not okay. Recognizing that I only know what he did with his kids via fannish osmosis, so I may have details wrong.
When I said my parents left me to watch my younger sisters overnight when I was in my early teens, what I meant was that they would leave about mid-evening, I would get my sisters and myself to bed, and my parents would be back by the time we woke up the next morning. I meant that they did not do this more than three to four times a year until I left home at twenty, and that they did not do this until we had been in a dwelling for at least three months. They did not do this unless they had verified they had working numbers for people I knew and trusted that I could contact in case of an emergency, people who would be at the house within fifteen minutes.
It would never have occured to my parents to leave my sisters or I alone in an unfamiliar motel room for longer than a half an hour. We moved when I was seventeen, and I was the only one of the children allowed to stay in the room by myself for more than fifteen minutes. And my parents didn't believe that every stranger might house a demon. Had we been staying in a single room for a few weeks, and had my family made good friends with the couple who ran the motel and the lady who owned the diner where we had breakfast every morning, then I could see my parents leaving my sisters or I alone in a room for a few hours if we were over sixteen and there was no other option, and then they would have had said couple checking in on us every half hour, and the lady at the diner giving us a call every hour.
It is, in fact, the responsibility of parents to be physically present for their children. If a parent cannot be physically present, the onus is on them to find a suitable substitute, preferrably someone the child/ren also trust and like. In John Winchester's case, this means he should have been dropping his children off with Bobby or Pastor Jim whenever he was going to have to be away from them overnight, until and unless his eldest was at least seventeen and he was leaving them with sufficient provisions in a dwelling with which they had at least a few months' familiarity. And you better believe I mean that "should." Child abuse of every kind is not uncommon in military families, but neglect has a clear lead, and the results are not pretty.
Also, seriously? I'm trying to remain calm about her phrasing, but it is so fucking offensive. My father missed Christmas in the midst of fighting a war. He had no choice about being away, which is frankly not the impression I get about John Winchester. My father didn't leave us alone in a motel room for several days with no or insufficient provisions and no acknowledgement of the holiday. We were at home with our mother, with full access to transportation in a familiar city, with as much food as our budget would allow, with all basic necessities at hand. Our father wasn't there to put up the tree or hand out presents, but his paycheck provided the tree and the presents, and he made sure to send us each a letter for the holiday. Are there military fathers who do less? Absolutely, and you better believe the military has an entire disciplinary system in place for when their abuse of their children comes to light.
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And yeah, it's...it's so insulting on so many levels, isn't it? Your personal button is the military thing-- for obvious reasons-- my personal button is the YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME THAT ABUSED CHILDREN ARE HORRIBLE, THEREFORE DEAN AND SAM WERE PARENTED WELL ENOUGH (::kicks things::) and...I just. I cannot believe this woman is for real!
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Oh, man. YES. Because survivors of abuse don't have enough shit to deal with, please let us determine that if you're not a horrible person, you weren't really abused.
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Because outright saying somebody's family was abusive tends to make idjits like the person you were talking to fucking uncomfortable. Also, quite possibly, it might just be a sensitive topic, and so the sensitive touch on it lightly and leave any explication to the person whose story it actually is. I swear, the things people think they're entitled to know about other people.
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