It also makes no sense to me to think that John was a walking drunk when he was hunting.

I don't know how it would work if he was shitfaced in between hunts and able to stay dry for the days/weeks it would take to see a hunt through. I would think that his obsession to find Yellow Eyes would keep him from going too far and losing control. Ocassional bouts, sure, but not the consumate alcholic Sam seemed to paint him as.

Ocassional bouts, sure, but not the consumate alcholic Sam seemed to paint him as.

Yes. This. Although in Sam's defense, if he saw one or two of those bouts when he was younger, it could have left a pretty strong impression.

I'm pretty sure a lot of fic writers worked out--or displayed, rather than actually working out--their own parental issues with John as a substitute.

Yes. Although I think there is a subset who makes John horrible as a cheap and easy way to woobify one boy or the other.

What does "walking drunk" mean? His eldest is saving the world on 50 drinks a week--there's plenty of room for him to have been a huge boozer.

At this point, they need to stipulate which hunters don't drink, not which ones do. We've seen that Bobby, Rufus, Sam, and Dean have sought comfort or distraction in the bottom of the bottle. Just like Dean's assumption that you have to have damage to hunt, it's reasonably simple to apply that overgeneralisation to alcohol too, just because of how we've seen it be used so far.

When you say Sam painted him a consummate alcoholic, do you mean the pilot assumption that he was on a binge? Or is there more? Because I'm not getting consummate alcoholic off of that and a throwaway comment in S7 (which did also imply he was an angry drunk, by the way).

Basically--what evidence do we have that Sam's an unreliable narrator? Just him being mad at John? Because it would pretty much be that and demon blood that we've seen him lie about. It's not exactly pathological.

Was this something said in an interview that I'm missing? Because not even Daddy's little soldier contradicted the notion that John got drunk.

I would assume "walking drunk" means a functioning alcoholic, which is pretty much what Dean is now. And he doesn't have a problem doing his job.

Wasn't John drinking in Dead Man's Blood? While he's sitting at the desk talking to Sam? I might be remembering him holding the jar of blood at the end of the scene, though.

Basically--what evidence do we have that Sam's an unreliable narrator?

I don't think Sam is an unreliable narrator in a strict sense. I think even in the pilot he was still prone to emotional exaggeration, about John being drunk, etc., and I'd guess it was because he was startled and uneasy at Dean showing up not only in the middle of the night, but breaking in.

I also think, based purely on my reading of it, that John probably drank less than Dean did -- with two kids to care for, and apartments/housing to find, he would have had to. But I think he did drink, and Sam's remark about Jack, Jim, and Jose (or whatever it was) had more to do with recognizing that his dad drowned his grief and rage in alcohol instead of something emotionally healthier (aka normal).

Man, there's so much Show doesn't show us. I wonder if, with Dean's alcoholic levels, if he had a kid (I'm discounting his months with Ben, for some reason), if that kid would look back at Dean with contempt and bias and associate him most strongly with being drunk.

I think the difference is, though, that at least given his behavior with Sam, Dean is not passing out, or slurring, or falling down, or forgetting to pick him up, etc. That's the stuff, in my experience, that makes drinking = BAD for a lot of kids.

And nowhere in any season is it mentioned that he physically hit his kids. With the wholehearted hugging that went on when they did get together, I don't think they were physically afraid of him.

They were adults in their mid-to-late twenties; abject fear of having their hides tanned was probably a thing of the past. John was a blue collar ex-marine living in a high stress lifestyle, so I don't think quiet time outs are likely to have been a part of his parenting style. I'd imagine both kids were familiar with belt whippings.

Oh, I don't think so, Matt. I've been a parent for over twenty years, and I don't know anyone who would think of hitting their kids with a belt. A spanking, sure, but not a belt.

I think a lot of folks here are lucky to have been raised in a progressive environment where corporal punishment was seen as something near-mythical and only practiced in the Dark Ages or by ogres. I've been belt whipped, and John Winchester reads as a lot more of a strict disciplinarian to me than my Dad was.

So, my parents were basically hippies, and me and my older brother would make a game out of stealing one of our father's belts, folding it in half, and snapping it while the other screamed. Yes, the idea of being beaten with a belt was so silly and outlandish that we made a game out of it.

And now I feel like a jackass. Sorry, Matt.

I'd think John's form of punishment would be lunges until you puke or pushups until their arms gave out in muscle fatigue. The smoke-the-whole-pack-of-cigarettes-until-you-turn-green. Extra laps around the motel. Punishment that, in the end, makes you stronger (I went to basic with guys who didn't mind getting punished because they knew it would just make them better).