#it's just queer yo

[wellofdean]

I read your post about Supernatural being queer somehow from season 1 and I have two questions.

1. Don't you think it straight-appropriates the word "queer" to say it just means "not normal"? That argument seems disingenuous to me, and a lot of us want representation, and to see that word applied to explicit depiction of queer sexuality, and it's a cheat that they don't. Queer studies did start as the study of queer sexualities and the experience of queer people.

2. Are you saying that the makers of Supernatural intended for it to be "flesh on queer bones"? Do you think they intentionally sat down to tell a queer story?

Those are good questions my anonymous friend. Thank you for asking. Here are my thoughts:

To answer your first question: no, I don't think it appropriates anything. Here's why: firstly, if we're talking about sexuality and gender, it's queer 101 that no one owes anyone a justification of their queerness, and not everyone who is queer is interested in labeling it or making it legible to you, and they have no obligation to do so, and not doing so doesn't make them any less queer. Furthermore, some people who are queer are not interested in sex, so what about them?

All of that together is why, for me, the entire queer project is much more deeply about non-compliance with hegemony, and specifically with hegemony around gender roles, sexuality and to put it under a big umbrella, patriarchy, than it is about who you fuck. Those things extend into so many other aspects of life that I think you can easily talk about "queering" a very wide range of topics, and possibly? ANY TOPIC.

You are responding to this post, I think, and in it, I made a choice to talk about family and hunting, and our heroes roles and characterizations in that, and did not talk about gender shenanigans or sexuality, because my point was that even before we get to anything to do with it, Sam and Dean are immersed in a queered world in a fundamental, structural way. That said, I assure you that if you go back into season 1 of Supernatural, you will find LOADS that could be said about gender and sexuality, too. As well as other things, and a particularly important area, as @ironworked pointed out in the tags, is blue collar/white collar class issues.

As I said, the depth of queerness in Supernatural is actually dizzying just in terms of the story's BONES to say nothing of how they flesh it out. Queerness is about deviation from the norm. It's about rebellion and disobedience against hegemonic systems for the sake of personal authenticity and love.

Think about Cas for a minute. Cas's whole story is that he rejects his role in a hegemonic heaven. He rebels for love, and that is pretty explicit as early as season 4 when he tells Dean "We're making it up as we go". Fellas, that is THE QUEEREST SHIT EVER even if he didn't do it for Dean, and like... HE DID IT FOR DEAN. Cas did not have to tell Dean he loved him for me to know it, and for Cas to be a deeply queered character. When he DID say it, I wasn't the least bit surprised he was in love with Dean, because seriously, we been knew. I was only surprised I got to have the immense pleasure of hearing him say it and looking at Dean's face while he took it in. Jesus. I will NEVER RECOVER.

This is my perspective on representation in Supernatural: It's excellent, and I relate to, and feel seen by it as a queer person. Nobody needs to get fucked on the maps table for me to do the math that this is a queer story. It is very, very, very thoroughgoingly canonically queer in so many ways, and not all of them are to do with sex. I think some fans will only allow it to be called queer if dudes make out in it. I am not one of those fans.

As to your second question, I think there is a wealth of evidence in the filmic oeuvre of Eric Kripke to suggest that as an artist and a writer, he is concerned or maybe even preoccupied with masculinity issues and issues around family, and around the way patriarchy fucks men up. So, yes. I think he knew what he was doing and he knew that queerness was part of the mix. For fucks sake, it's a family of men who hunt monsters. That is very fucking on the nose. Do I think he kicked off Supernatural in 2005 planning a 15 year operatic queer romance between Cas and Dean? No. I don't think anyone planned for it to go as long as it did, and it's a matter of record that some things were influenced by fan response, actors' chemistry, different writers and showrunners' preferences and etc. What I will say is that when they had a choice to "straighten shit out" or lean into the queerness, they fucking leaned in, nearly EVERY TIME. Like, it's pretty amazing how consistently they lean the fuck in.

I'll admit -- I wasn't watching it with those eyes the first time, and I didn't give it much real estate in my mind when I watched it as it aired from 2006 to the end, but the last three episodes reshaped it for me and made me angry, and also made me need to watch it all again, this time with an explicitly queer lens, and BOY HOWDY let me tell you this: the Supernatch rewatch journey is a wild and wonderful trip to Queertown. It is legit more difficult to argue that Dean is straight than it is to argue that he is queer. There is a full on CORNUCOPIA of story evidence to support that read and relatively little that convincingly counters it on the straight side, and that starts right at the beginning, when they bend pretty baby Dean over a police car in episode one, and he smirks insouciantly in his lip gloss. Do I think everyone involved knew how that looked? Sexy, submissive and a bit gay?

YES I DO.

[cairoscene]

i think a hugely important and often overlooked counterpart to "curate your online experience" is that even when you block and mute and filter, you are still going to see things that upset you and make you uncomfortable. you just are. and just because you were upset or felt uncomfortable doesn't mean you should never have seen it; sometimes things just happen that make you upset. the counterpart is that as well as curating your online experience, you have to learn to manage and deal with your emotions. how you feel is your responsibility and no one else's.

[cakerollk]

Someone explain why m/f shippers often feel the need to emphasise that they ship a m/f pair in a "not straight way"

Like I had to witness someone say they ship kaveh and nilou in a "sapphic way" when they clearly interpret kaveh as a cisman so like....what does that even mean

[stareyedsheeple]

dhmis is insane because i woke up to ten notifs from my friend yelling at me about the duck&red scene in electricity and i was like "??? THE TUMBLR ARTISTS WERE RIGHT????" they WERE gay tumblr users have the gift of prophecy and that scares me

[totallynotaraccoonindiscuise]

guy and summer from the Minecraft books are in a qpr i said so

[circusclownproductions]

Y’all need to be more normal ab trans ppl in het relationships I’m serious 😭

[oogies-art]

expression doodles of some guys being gays

[novafoxxo76]

i would love to wear a skirt, but alas i doubt anyone around me would like to see me in a skirt exposing my hairy legs, yet now that i think of it, shorts are fine? Why can't I wear a skirt, no dabloons :c me treasure chest be empty. A pirate like me has no time to shave me legs, especially not me peg, she be covered in barnacles.

i was possessed by a pirate and um well im leaving it in but yeah

point is that um.... i want a skirt but im poor and ugly

[non-un-topo]

Time to shift into academic mode and close all my fun tabs ;_; (ao3, google docs, research I was trying to cram in so I could write a short fic before the semester.... rip)

[gaysheep]

"dont debate with fascists" means "dont debate with fascists (because they are not having a discussion with you they are looking to turn you into a soundbyte)" not "immediately shun potential allies who you have an opening for dialogue with because they don't already have the same politics as you"

[bibiana112]

Okay, so what is we know the devil and should I watch it? Because your reblog spam you do every so often has me intrigued and I would like to hear you talk about it if you want to

We Know The Devil is a short little indie game about three kids on a summer camp for "bad kids" that is clearly a metaphor for conversion camps and they are in charge of beating the devil with their magical girl radios, the devil is also clearly a metaphor for queerness since it's something they insist is "just a phase" and something the camp goers are encouraged to shame others for "letting into their hearts". It's a visual novel style html game iirc, the prose is really interesting, super weird and informal but full of meaning once you get the full picture and I love how the pov in it shifts depending on the ending and the segments after 3AM just feel like very poignant poetry I wanna chew on it, and the choices you get to make is which one of the trio of protagonists gets together in the end! It's marketed sort of as a choose your own ship kind of thing, and it totally definitely doesn't have heart wrenching character exploration of how it feels to be the one left out in that sort of trio dynamic, totally not :)

It really is super short and accessible, found a really good playthrough of it too if you'd still like someone making voices for the characters, I think I got an ending in less than two hours and all the endings take around the same amount of time, and there are four endings total. I call it the poly lesbian body horror game because it has very light but still eery vibes and because of that I wanted to save it to play on Halloween but I'm gay and full of gay thoughts at the moment so ended up playing it again this week akshsk still at only 2/4 endings though so I'll keep reblog spamming sporadically lol

[duncanor]

In addition to my last post, let me show y'all some of Mike's songs on his official Spotify Playlist which are legit the most sus shit i have ever seen

The first song on the playlist is Smalltown Boy, a gay anthem. I don't think i need to say more.

But that's not the queerest thing on his Playlist because you see, the 11 song on his Playlist is the pride version of 'Don't you want me' by The human league. And in case you have any doubt on whether or not it was intentional, here's the normal version of the song a bit further down his Playlist.

But let's not forget the best part y'all. It's his 11 song, what could it possibly be about? It's a break up song. Yep. And it's a duet btw, the guy sing the first part then the girl.

That doesn't scream mileven endgame to me ngl

[badolmen]

Minor lie on that post - I’m pretty sure the most expensive piece of clothing I own (not resale value, how much was paid) is this red dress from Macy’s. It was late, we had just finished The Mall Run (Christmas shopping with ALL of my siblings for my mother’s gifts as is traditionally headed by my father every year). We’re on our way out of Macy’s to the parking lot and I see this lovely red dress - black underslip and a red lace pattern top. I go up to it and literally say out loud “ooo pretty” flip the price tag and say “ohhhh less pretty.” I’m pretty sure it was around $165? Anyways Dad had me round up the kids and take them to the car while him and my older sister finished paying for the Macy’s gifts. I didn’t think anything of it until I opened a gift Christmas morning and saw that he got me that dress. I literally cried about it. And like, even now that I’m out and he gets the Dyke vibes I still bring it home with me to wear on Sundays because dammit I still like dressing femme and I want my dad to know I still love this dress.

[mistninja]

how fast i can go from loving burrich to hating him truly i am fitz and fitz is me

[youwerelikeanangel]

sometimes. i think of what louis would be like now if he would’ve been allowed to share his queerness with the world

[rubys-domain]

... i think i'm gonna pull for arlecchino actually...