I *wish* you'd been able to get up here last weekend!

Me too! ::whines:: I love my family and I had a lot of fun, but if I'm going to eat that much and end up that exhausted, it would have been more fun with fangirls. ::sigh::

And yeah, I don't think there's active intentional misogyny there: nobody's sitting around the writers' room bitching about feminazis. (I hope.) But they're not seeing what they're saying when they say it.

If they are seeing it, and they're going forward anyway... erg.

And yeah, I don't think there's active intentional misogyny there: nobody's sitting around the writers' room bitching about feminazis. (I hope.) But they're not seeing what they're saying when they say it.

I totally don't think they're seeing it. I think they're sitting around in a feedback loop of OOO! That'd RULE!!!!11!. (I'm starting to suspect Rayelle Tucker was the one who'd bop them on the nose and rein in the excess, though. I miss her.)

We really need to develop some sort of shorthand for that conversation, because we keep coming back to it. Maybe hand gestures of some sort, I dunno.

We can expand on it as our next trick! I think the thing you get when the root issue with the writing is misanthropy instead of misogyny is a hell of a lot less in the way of filtering out the bile and nasty. So when that's combined with a genre or form that's already problematic (such as horror or comics), it magnifies both the nasty in the text, and the inherent problematic aspects of the form.

That could be the PBR talking.

I think the thing you get when the root issue with the writing is misanthropy instead of misogyny is a hell of a lot less in the way of filtering out the bile and nasty.

Yep. The writers probably aren't looking at it from a specifically (or even vaguely!) feminist studies viewpoint, but from a "Humans suck, rocks fall, everyone dies, hey let's ramp up the evil and destroy everything! That'd be funny!" one. Not to mention I don't think they're that interested in, oh, subverting horror genre tropes, but are just playing around with them They're not trying to do anything new. Which is fine, but like you said, there are some inherent problems with the genre.

I think the biggest problem the writers have is that they don't stop to think how things might be interpreted outside of their group brain. So when someone (okay, fandom) goes "OMGWTF do you not see what you just did there?!", the writers would probably all look confused and go "But that's not what we meant! Dude, what are you talking about?"

Not taking a side in this debate but I wanted to respond to this:

I think the biggest problem the writers have is that they don't stop to think how things might be interpreted outside of their group brain.

Speaking as a writer, I can say that this is a slippery slope. As soon as you start thinking about how other people will react or interpret your work, you've shot yourself in the foot. Or maybe in the head. Either way, you're handicapping yourself.

I know that I've been guilty of it myself. I'm working on something and I start to worry about how people will react and I'm done. Self-censorship kills the creative process.

At the end of the day, you have to write the stories that you think are interesting or compelling. Then you put it out into the world and hope that there are enough people who will also find it interesting or compelling. If there are, great. If not, well, better luck next time.

But if you flip the order of those things and start thinking about the audience before thinking about the story, I think you end up with really bad storytelling. Plus, if you're guessing what people want to see or how they're going to react, you're almost always going to guess wrong.

So when someone (okay, fandom) goes "OMGWTF do you not see what you just did there?!", the writers would probably all look confused and go "But that's not what we meant! Dude, what are you talking about?"

This reminds me of anteka's theories on the Impala as an avatar for Dean's emotional state, and what it meant that Sam never drove in S2. She worked it all out and had a pretty sound theory, IMO.

Then, she was at a con and asked a question about it, and the answer was "Sam doesn't drive because it's Dean's car."

There's a difference between metaphor and misogyny, of course, but I think the concept of group brain is the same.

At the end of the day, you have to write the stories that you think are interesting or compelling. Then you put it out into the world and hope that there are enough people who will also find it interesting or compelling. If there are, great. If not, well, better luck next time.

I totally get that, and it's part of the reason I'm willing to give SPN so much slack for its flaws. But there are times when I would like to see a little glimmer of outside perspective dawn in the SPN writers' collective heads about the dodgy gender and race issues they keep stirring up.

(Of course, I'd also like to see them do more than a 10-second search on Google for their occult and folklore research, but that's my pet soapboax.)

My fear is that outside perspective is what leads to Bionic Woman. (hee)

Okay, I watched the bit where Phoebe!Demon started talking about the "Leader" from the west.

Unfortunately (or possibly purposefully) she garbled what she was saying so I can tell if she said, "This demon, he doesn't like (something something)" or "This demon, it doesn't like. . " but in no way did she say " she " etc. And Lilith is always female? Maybe Lilith isn't the demon rising in the West.

At the end of the day, you have to write the stories that you think are interesting or compelling. Then you put it out into the world and hope that there are enough people who will also find it interesting or compelling.

On the one hand, this is true. On the other hand, when your audience's response is "Dude. Therapy.", then it's appropriate to pause and consider audience feedback. A writer who fails to consider the audience entirely -- or selectively considers, in an echo-chamber, narrow-niche way -- is a writer masturbating to his own psychological problems. And really, aren't there enough Frank Millers on this planet already?

Basically, it used to be funny to call the writers of Supernatural fanfic writers, because they were all cracked-out and OTT-emo. But then I realized that, actually, I hold professional product to a higher standard, and will not tolerate pure id-vortex material in a television show that I would tolerate (or at least politely ignore) in fanfic. When you're writing for millions of viewers, with money at stake, you have to be able to write at a level more complex than "My crazy, let me show you it."

Speaking as a writer, I can say that this is a slippery slope. As soon as you start thinking about how other people will react or interpret your work, you've shot yourself in the foot. Or maybe in the head. Either way, you're handicapping yourself.

Oh, I get that. I have stories I haven't finished because of concerns about audience reaction.

I think, though, that there should perhaps be a basic level of education about the sexist and racist tropes that have been a staple of popular entertainment. A baseline, so that you can merrily go about writing your story without winding up with egg and/or guac all over your face like Vogue just did.

(And yes, I'm still pissed off about BtVS S7.)

That said, one of the most annoying things about the SPN writing team is that they *do* listen to audience but in ways that seem self-defeating. (See also: Jo. Kripke, put down the keyboard, and step away from the TWoP.)

But there are times when I would like to see a little glimmer of outside perspective dawn in the SPN writers' collective heads about the dodgy gender and race issues they keep stirring up.

Totally. Just, you know, pull back from the trees for a second and look at the forest!