don't show me your weakness
So luzdeestrellas and I were talking, as we are wont to do, about Dean Winchester, and this particular conversation was about Dean and women.
There are a couple of really good posts on the subject here (by dotfic) and here (by desertport) (spoilers through Heart), so I'm just going to ramble instead of being in any way organized in my thoughts.
I think Dean genuinely likes women. I think he likes having sex with them, yeah, he likes that a lot (and he really does ping me as straight), but I think he also likes women as people, not just walking sets of genitalia to be used to scratch an itch.
If you look at his interactions with women (who are not evil/supernatural/trying to kill him), he is generally respectful and often appreciative. With women in authority - Deputy Kathleen, Detective Ballard - he is smarmy and/or snarky, but his usual contempt for authority is somewhat tempered, and what there is of it is for the authority, not the woman wielding it, nor the fact that it is a woman wielding it (i.e., Dean is not the type of guy who thinks women should be kept out of positions of authority). His behavior with Ellen and Jo is also a good example of this. He bickers with Jo like a sibling in No Exit, and he clearly has respect and admiration for Ellen (the way he hugs her in AHBL2 makes me all melty. He leans in and nuzzles her, just like he does with Mary in WIaWSNB).
Part of this is probably the memory of Mary, idealized over the years, and his desire to make her proud of him; losing her has probably also made him keenly aware of how important mothers - and women in general - are in people's lives, and how that loss has shaped his (and Sam's); part of this is probably John's training and insistence that women be treated properly and with respect (I imagine John was not pleased with Dean's tomcatting, but turned a blind eye so long as he was sure that 1. Dean wasn't getting too attached and wanting to stay somewhere; 1a. no unexpected grandchildren resulted; 2. Dean was treating the girl with respect; and 3. having safer sex). Part of it is that Dean is, despite his own apparent self-loathing, a genuinely decent guy.
Dean's easy sexuality does not, I think, contradict any of this. While he may lie about his name and/or his profession, he does not, that we see, make any promises or commitments he doesn't intend to keep, he doesn't lead anyone on or manipulate them for his own non-work-related ends; he understands that no means no and he backs off when he gets shot down, no hard feelings; and he gets down to cases when it turns out that the woman he's flirting with is involved in the case he's working on. Nor do we ever see him denigrate the women he hits on/sleeps with in any way. In fact, I would say that even accounting for exaggeration for effect in "Tall Tales," his vision of Starla is probably not far from how he actually saw her - "a smart chick, classy," he says.
Cassie, for all that she was poorly executed and stuck in a terrible episode (the nadir of season 1, imo), shows us that Dean fell in love with a smart, passionate, professional woman who was willing to call him on his shit, and that when he's in, he's all in, willing to lay his cards on the table and tell the truth about who he is and what he does. The fact that she rejects him for it is unfortunate, and has probably had long-lasting consequences on his willingness to be truthful and commit again, should he ever be in a position to do so, but he did it, and it seems to me that should a similar situation arise in the future, and he had the emotional resources available (i.e., no 'save Sam or kill him' or 'you only have a year to live' etc. hanging over him), he would do it again.
And, as netninny pointed out, when his brain is taxed to come up with a woman who would make him docilely stay in his wishverse, sure, he picks a hot chick from a beer ad, but he makes her a nurse ("that's so... respectable"). Again, a strong, smart, passionate professional woman, and one who is not always sexually available whenever he wants (she pushes him away because she has to go to work; parallel much?).
Neither Carmen nor Cassie strikes me as someone who would take a guy treating them disrespectfully, cheating on them or being a sexist pig (which isn't to say that he doesn't have some sexist tendencies - our society is sexist, and while he is not as much a product of society as most of us, given the way he was raised, it's still there).
Even his treatment of Jess - both in the pilot (he keeps his eyes up) and in his conversations with Sam about her later (and the way he hugs the stuffing out of her in WIaWSNB) - and the way he goes about trying to convince Sam to go for Sarah in Provenance strike me as positive and supportive of women who are strong and smart and capable.
There's a genuine sweetness to a lot of his interactions with women, even though he could get away with just his looks and his bad boy persona, he doesn't.
So when he's portrayed in fanfic as cruel or callous or disrespectful towards women, especially towards the women he's sleeping with, I just can't make that leap - it in no way jibes with what I see on screen.
***
In other news, ellen_fremedon and hesychasm say smart things about writing responsibly so I don't have to.
Lastly, devildoll wins the internets with this post about how fandom is like prison. It's funny 'cause it's true.
***
There are a couple of really good posts on the subject here (by dotfic) and here (by desertport) (spoilers through Heart), so I'm just going to ramble instead of being in any way organized in my thoughts.
I think Dean genuinely likes women. I think he likes having sex with them, yeah, he likes that a lot (and he really does ping me as straight), but I think he also likes women as people, not just walking sets of genitalia to be used to scratch an itch.
If you look at his interactions with women (who are not evil/supernatural/trying to kill him), he is generally respectful and often appreciative. With women in authority - Deputy Kathleen, Detective Ballard - he is smarmy and/or snarky, but his usual contempt for authority is somewhat tempered, and what there is of it is for the authority, not the woman wielding it, nor the fact that it is a woman wielding it (i.e., Dean is not the type of guy who thinks women should be kept out of positions of authority). His behavior with Ellen and Jo is also a good example of this. He bickers with Jo like a sibling in No Exit, and he clearly has respect and admiration for Ellen (the way he hugs her in AHBL2 makes me all melty. He leans in and nuzzles her, just like he does with Mary in WIaWSNB).
Part of this is probably the memory of Mary, idealized over the years, and his desire to make her proud of him; losing her has probably also made him keenly aware of how important mothers - and women in general - are in people's lives, and how that loss has shaped his (and Sam's); part of this is probably John's training and insistence that women be treated properly and with respect (I imagine John was not pleased with Dean's tomcatting, but turned a blind eye so long as he was sure that 1. Dean wasn't getting too attached and wanting to stay somewhere; 1a. no unexpected grandchildren resulted; 2. Dean was treating the girl with respect; and 3. having safer sex). Part of it is that Dean is, despite his own apparent self-loathing, a genuinely decent guy.
Dean's easy sexuality does not, I think, contradict any of this. While he may lie about his name and/or his profession, he does not, that we see, make any promises or commitments he doesn't intend to keep, he doesn't lead anyone on or manipulate them for his own non-work-related ends; he understands that no means no and he backs off when he gets shot down, no hard feelings; and he gets down to cases when it turns out that the woman he's flirting with is involved in the case he's working on. Nor do we ever see him denigrate the women he hits on/sleeps with in any way. In fact, I would say that even accounting for exaggeration for effect in "Tall Tales," his vision of Starla is probably not far from how he actually saw her - "a smart chick, classy," he says.
Cassie, for all that she was poorly executed and stuck in a terrible episode (the nadir of season 1, imo), shows us that Dean fell in love with a smart, passionate, professional woman who was willing to call him on his shit, and that when he's in, he's all in, willing to lay his cards on the table and tell the truth about who he is and what he does. The fact that she rejects him for it is unfortunate, and has probably had long-lasting consequences on his willingness to be truthful and commit again, should he ever be in a position to do so, but he did it, and it seems to me that should a similar situation arise in the future, and he had the emotional resources available (i.e., no 'save Sam or kill him' or 'you only have a year to live' etc. hanging over him), he would do it again.
And, as netninny pointed out, when his brain is taxed to come up with a woman who would make him docilely stay in his wishverse, sure, he picks a hot chick from a beer ad, but he makes her a nurse ("that's so... respectable"). Again, a strong, smart, passionate professional woman, and one who is not always sexually available whenever he wants (she pushes him away because she has to go to work; parallel much?).
Neither Carmen nor Cassie strikes me as someone who would take a guy treating them disrespectfully, cheating on them or being a sexist pig (which isn't to say that he doesn't have some sexist tendencies - our society is sexist, and while he is not as much a product of society as most of us, given the way he was raised, it's still there).
Even his treatment of Jess - both in the pilot (he keeps his eyes up) and in his conversations with Sam about her later (and the way he hugs the stuffing out of her in WIaWSNB) - and the way he goes about trying to convince Sam to go for Sarah in Provenance strike me as positive and supportive of women who are strong and smart and capable.
There's a genuine sweetness to a lot of his interactions with women, even though he could get away with just his looks and his bad boy persona, he doesn't.
So when he's portrayed in fanfic as cruel or callous or disrespectful towards women, especially towards the women he's sleeping with, I just can't make that leap - it in no way jibes with what I see on screen.
***
In other news, ellen_fremedon and hesychasm say smart things about writing responsibly so I don't have to.
Lastly, devildoll wins the internets with this post about how fandom is like prison. It's funny 'cause it's true.
***