(no subject)

[frelling_tralk]

So I've been seeing this video several times on my flist and I'm trying to work out my thoughts on it

The video in question


I haven't had all that much exposure to Supernatural cons, so I'm wondering if there's some context that I'm missing, but I actually felt like it was a real overreaction the way that everyone tried to shut that fan down

This post has the person who asked the question explaining what happened This is the full question that she wanted to ask:

I’ve loved seeing Dean’s character become more comfortable with himself this season. As a bisexual, I’ve noticed some possible subtext, as seen in Everybody Hates Hitler, that Dean might be coming to accept himself as something other than straight too? I know you’ve said you know Dean better than anyone, so, in your professional opinion, as the preeminent scholar on Dean Winchester, if you see that as a valid interpretation of what’s going on with the character this season.

She then notes that Now here is what happened when I attempted to ask this question. I got as far as the word “bisexual” before the crowd groaned. I proceeded to hold my hand up in a ‘please just wait a second and let me finish’ way and then got as far as the word subtext before the crowd was full on booing and starting to shout a couple things I couldn’t make out. This is when Clif stepped out from behind the curtain looking very intimidating. He said, “Are you really going to ask this question?”

The video also shows Jensen saying "really that's the first question" and jokingly saying don't ruin it for everyone (which did seem to be aimed at her, but I'll take her word for it that she felt it was addressed more at the crowd booing her), and finally says that he's going to pretend that he didn't hear the question and let's move on. And supposedly shipping questions were then banned from the con? But the thing is that she wasn't asking a shipping question at all that I could see, and there are several scenes in canon that can be read as Dean being bixsexual. I don't see it as completely invalid fanwank to ask the actors or the writers about it when the writers are putting those scenes in there. I certainly don't think that anyone deserves to be booed for simply asking the question, nor was there any need for fans to get that defensive over someone perceived as making the actors uncomfortable.

I'm kind of torn because I do hate when fans constantly harp on Destial or Wincest to the actors and look to them to validate their ship, just yikes. But this felt like the other extreme to me with an oddly hostile response from the crowd before she had even finished speaking. I don't know if it's just because a lot of the audience are used to those questions from other cons and have a kneejerk response to them by now, or if they thought she was oversharing or what? I think I might be missing some context with what supposedly happened at Misha's panel earlier as well. But still there's a big difference between asking an actor to sign a fan manip or drawing of something REALLY inappropiate (if you know what I mean...), and an audience of fans having complete second-hand embarassment at someone merely asking "poor Jensen" if the character he plays could be bisexual.

And is a question like that really so inappropriate for a show that all the time teases the audience with quotes like "Cas, last time someone looked at me like that I got laid" and "get out of my ass". It almost seems like it's fine for the writers to joke around with it in a frat-boy kind of a way, but god forbid the audience take any of hints of bisexuality or homosexuality as anything more than something hysterically funny to play around with

Comments

[frelling-tralk.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the link :) Honestly I think I'm still missing some context though because I don't see why asking if Castiel is in love with Dean would be all that awkward, it seemed like Misha was very hesitant to be asked that question because he came in for a lot of hate after his last panel and was accused of being against gay rights? So yeah I'm not sure what happened there exactly, but in itself I don't think it's that big a deal to ask a question like that. If anything I think it would be way more awkward to ask about something like Wincest which, although I ship it, is really out there to bring up to the actors. But with Castiel he clearly has a 'profound bond' with Dean so, although I don't personally ship Destial, I can't argue that it's not a valid reading to see some subtext there which means those kinds of questions might come up. Again though it seemed like no one in the room wanted to hear it, so I'm guessing that there's a lot of con history there that I'm not aware of

[electricmonk333.livejournal.com]

I think fandom is reactive when it comes to shipping questions these days because it may reflect poorly on the fandom at large. Shipping questions are directed at the cast and crew all the time through interviews, cons, twitter, personal interactions and what have you. I imagine it gets tedious. Also, for stuff like Wincest and Destiel where is no actual canonic development, the general feeling seems to be that fanon and canon should stay separate. In other words, don't continue to bring up fanon isssues with the cast and crew, especially when they have already made it clear that they would rather not answer such questions. Lastly, I want to point out that no one in the audience was booing the fact that the girl said she was bisexual. No, the collective groan was because they thought it was leading to territory most people would rather stay clear off. Did they overreact? May be, but we will never know. Was it out of line? I don't think so. I think people are just tired you know?

[frelling-tralk.livejournal.com]

That makes sense, I've always been one of the people that suffers second-hand embarrassment myself when fandom gets brought up to the actors and wished that people wouldn't do it. It was just the collective unease that greeted the question that puzzled me, when all she seemed to be about to ask was subtext with Dean which, although not a question that I would ever ask, doesn't really fall into the realm of embarrassing shipping question for me either. But the way the response seemed to be wow let's movie in as quickly as possible and pretend that we didn't understand the question really weirded me out and seemed to make things even more uncomfortable then if Jensen had just laughed off her question with a no , it came off as weirdly taboo which is odd for a show like SpN which does joke around with subtext all the time

[electricmonk333.livejournal.com]

For me the point of contention is how many times can you ask the same question, you know? I am speaking here in a general sense. How many times can you ask is Dean in love with Cas or is Cas in love with Dean, or do you think Dean is bisexual? What answer do you expect to get that everyone would believe?

Here's what happened (supposedly) from the girl's own words: http://themysterygirlfromnjcon.tumblr.com/post/49756443708/direct-from-the-mystery-girl

Somewhere in there she says and I quote :

The answer to this question didn’t really matter to me personally, I’m going to ship what I’m going to ship no matter what the canon sexuality of a character is. But I know it does matter to a lot of people and that is why I decided on asking this.

You know what that tells me? She asked a question the response to which she didn't care about to begin with. Also, it had nothing to do with her bisexuality - that was a ruse to make the question sound more sophisticated and socially conscious. It was ultimately about shipping, make no mistake. Nothing wrong with a shipping question either, except, as I pointed out earlier, how far can you push the same question at the same people?

[frelling-tralk.livejournal.com]

Shipping questions can definitely be annoying if they've already been asked a thousand time I agree. I suppose that it was mostly Jensen saying that I didn't hear the question, or 'I'm going to pretend I didn't', that made it seem more a taboo subject to ask about then simply another frustrating question that they've heard a thousand times before. The whole atmosphere just seemed really awkward from everyone involved, and downright hostile from the crowd