I think that the writers were definitely too fixated on writing Dawn as the young innocent to be protected and shielded, the problem was the audience shouting that she was only one or two years younger that the scoobies were at the beginning of the show. It's a shame because they could have taken the opportunity of Buffy's death to mature the character a lot, I always fanwanked that she was extra protected in season 5 because of the monks wanting the other characters to feel that way about her, hence Real Me even drawing attention to Dawn being too old for a babysitter.. You got the feeling that Joyce had coddled her a lot and she had been protected from a lot of stuff, but you would expect her to mature fast after losing her mother and then Buffy. But then you get to season 6 with the others still babysitting her, Willow covering her eyes from Spike/Anya sex, Tara not wanting her to see a picture of a demon even, and it all just felt like it was going a bit too far when she was 15 and Bts had started with Buffy and co aged 16