The Rabbit Hole

It does seem to be the general opinion that that is the case. I still half wonder if it isn't gratitude and excitement over being, canonically involved that's pardoning the slight more than the slight not being there. It's also funny to me that I'm the one seeing the dig but the target demographic does not. Outside versus in, I believe.

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Some who are in the demographic are seeing the slight (reading more reactions this morning). Most seem to be very, very, rolling-on-the-floor-laughing amused while they wait for the earth to swallow them.

Which was my reaction--I don't write wincest but there was enough other stuff on-point to make *me* squirm...

I dunno...I didn't read it as a slight. I mean yes, they were mocking, but not in a condemning way. Yanking our chain and having their fun.

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It does seem like they took care to get it right, which probably helps. People don't mock half so well when they don't do their research. It does not always imply love (see Tina Fey), but there is a certain respect if nothing else. So even if the show is tut-tutting, it isn't saying "Stop that" either. Sam and Dean are saying "STOP THAT," but not so much the show.

I wonder if the actors are as much aware of this as the rest of the creative team? I suppose it would be hard to avoid for any internet savvy person, but the slash stuff? I wonder. I don't think I'd go near fanfic for anything I was working on, knowing the internet like I do, but I don't know that everyone has enough forewarning to do so...

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I wonder if the actors are as much aware of this as the rest of the creative team?
Oh, they're aware. Fans have made them aware. Poor Misha actually said at the last con he wanted to learn more about slash. He's going to get sent so much eyeball melting stuff because of that.

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I'm actually less worried about what this show says the showrunners think about wincest (read--I don't actually care. I don't think it's possible to write fanfic for anything and really care about the showrunners' opinions of it), than I am about what this will do to fandom. Because whether or not the show meant it as mean-spirited, you know this is going to kick off a round of gen writers flaming wincest writers.

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Hush, don't give anyone any ideas. *looks around nervously*

I mean, it crossed my mind. Gen writers could claim that it disgusts Dean, clearly Sam and Dean are not doing it, therefore it's not canon and argue people shouldn't write it.

That will be when I fall off my chair laughing (again). Because uh...since when has "not!canon" ever been a good reason to not write something?

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I have like three minutes before I have to leave for ICON, but as I think about this, I'm not happy about the wincest call-out. I don't mind the showrunners knowing about it or mentioning it, but, like many slash writers, I'm very careful who I let know about it. I feel like slash is the sort of thing that anyone who's in any way engaged with online fan communities or goes to cons knows about, but that's still not the majority of viewers. So putting it in the show brings it to the attention of all the viewers who don't know about it--and it feels like flashing them my underwear drawer. Cause if they weren't involved online enough to know about it, then they probably disapprove, and I don't actually want them to know about it. Does that make sense?

I just get this feeling of a whole new set of people being disgusted by my fandom.

This could also be because I'm about to go to ICON, where I have previously faced serious hatred of slash. And this mention just feels like the showrunners handing them a loaded gun to point at me.

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I just get this feeling of a whole new set of people being disgusted by my fandom.

Which is why I asked the question in the first place. Because while I see it as a point for humor, I could see how negative this commentary could be as well. It plays to, as you've pointed out, one segment of fans over the other--it's put an "eww!" face on the slashers. Canonically. Now, that can be a teasing from the show runners, but people who are not those people won't necessarily see it that way. I'm not, clearly, seeing that way. Not entirely.

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The view within fandom seems to be split, now, between those who thought it was affectionate, those who thought it was affectionate but won't look good to the general public, and those who thought the showrunners were taking a nastier jab at fanfic (and it looks bad to the general public).

My original thinking had been concerned with the view from within--are the showrunners really being nasty to fandom, y/n. (My opinion is no). But there is a real question of what this means with millions of viewers who have no idea what fandom is and how they'd react.

But I don't think SPN shouldn't have done it. If anything, it's a step towards making fanfic more socially acceptable. Since you first have to make people aware of something in order to get them to accept it.

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This episode also put an ew! face on romance novels as a whole--and that's something I know a lot of romance readers feel very sensitive about. But romance is a widely known genre. Slash is not. For a lot of people, this is the first time they've heard of it, and gently as it was meant, that first time is the characters in a show they like pointing it out specifically for ridicule.

I did laugh, I'll admit. (I should also point out that, even though this is "canonical anti-wincest," it's pretty damn easy to use it to justify wincest.) But I'm really uncomfortable with show runners talking about slash in interviews, let alone on the show. I really prefer just to be left alone. Especially when the group pointing and laughing has a huge platform and those being pointed at have...no platform at all.

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It's an anti-romance novel statement? Why? Just because of the ::snerk:: cover?

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No, the editor makes some comment about how all people want these days are those awful romances. Don't remember it exactly.

They also called out LARPers in this. I wonder if there's any reaction to that--though LARPing is a bit more well known, and honestly, the LARPers have got to just be used to it by now.

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