[ SECRET POST #2433 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2433 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.


__________________________________________________



02.


__________________________________________________



03.


__________________________________________________



04.


__________________________________________________



05.


__________________________________________________



06.


__________________________________________________



07.


__________________________________________________



08.


__________________________________________________



09.


__________________________________________________



10.


__________________________________________________



11.


__________________________________________________















Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 073 secrets from Secret Submission Post #348.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 1 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

09. http://i41.tinypic.com/2j0c9og.jpg

[(Anonymous)]

In general I agree, but at the same time...he was basically saying "I can't stand to think of you dying and going to Hell, that would suck hardcore, life wouldn't be worth living. Yeah so I'm gonna do that to you instead."

[elaminator]

IA. This doesn't make him a bad person, but I wouldn't say his reasons were entirely selfless.

[(Anonymous)]

And I don't know why he would assume Sam went to hell in the first place. It's not like the guy sold his soul, Dean didn't know about the Demon blood yet, and Sam died because he refused to do what the YED wanted. That doesn't scream "road to hell" to me. As far as I recall there's also no canon evidence that Dean thought this. He tells Bobby: "I couldn't let him die."

So he really didn't think this through, but I can hardly blame him for not thinking clearly in this situation.

[(Anonymous)]

He didn't know heaven existed at that point either. All he knew about was hell, so it was a pretty safe assumption that Sam's soul would go to the only afterlife Dean knew about.

[(Anonymous)]

Eh, he didn't want Sam to know. People always forget that bit during these debates. He was adamant that Bobby not tell him. Sam didn't figure it out until Jake was all "dude wtf how are you alive I killed you." Granted, Dean didn't really think through how he was going to keep it a secret but it wasn't him deciding that Sam would have to deal with the same pain he had suffered when John made his deal. Sam was never supposed to figure it out.

Though I also don't know why people think Dean thought he was saving Sam from hell. There's never been an indication of where Sam went when he died, heaven or hell, and no reason for Dean to think that Sam was hellbound. Dean was saving Sam from being dead period.

[(Anonymous)]

Truth right here.

[(Anonymous)]

Agggghhhh add stroke to words for the love of my eyes! Or make the words a darker grey.

[(Anonymous)]

honestly, Dean is so fucked up in the head that standards like 'selfish' and such don't really seem to be applicable. dude was raised on the road as a monster hunter by a soldier who told him it was his life's mission to protect his little brother (since he was FOUR, wtf dudes). poor bastich wasn't socialized worth shit. Nature vs nurture is a HUGE consideration with Dean as far as I'm concerned. (also that's why in all my AUs Dean is like a manny or a kindergarten teacher or something. Maybe he has prize rosebushes. Dude has 'frusterated nester' vibes RADIATING from him)

[(Anonymous)]

Dude has 'frusterated nester' vibes RADIATING from him

this is totally true

Maybe he has prize rosebushes.

this is totally awesome and i want to read it ASAP

(are gardening AUs a thing?)

[kaijinscendre]

Also, didn't John make Dean kill a human when he was like...10?

[(Anonymous)]

I wish there was more/better fic for this characterisation because I love the shit out if it. Rosebushes!

[(Anonymous)]

I fully agree, tbh. It's not considered acceptable in SPN fandom these days but I've never understood why Dean's deal is considered selfish by any standard. There's very little less selfish than giving up your life to save someone else. And for those saying that he was making Sam deal with the fact that Dean would be suffering in Hell, keep in mind that Dean had every intention of lying to Sam about it. He didn't want Sam to know.

People are so quick to call Dean selfish for making his deal, it drives me crazy. Especially since it seems to ignore the fact that Dean's got an incredibly shitty sense of self - he really is selfless, particularly towards the start of the show. He had very little idea of things he might want for himself and things he might actually like as Dean Winchester, not like because John had liked them or Sam liked them or whatever. He's gained a sense of identity since then but it wasn't really until S8 that his sense of self had anything other than massive amounts of guilt and self loathing and need to protect others.

The thing is, Dean's deal was selfless. It's a deconstruction of the classic trope of someone selflessly giving themselves up to save someone else. Dean is selfless and it's a very very bad thing.

[(Anonymous)]

He wasn't thinking about himself, he just wasn't thinking about anyone else, either. While this is technically selfless, I'm not sure it meets the definition of the word as it is usually used.

[transcriptanon]

[Picture is Dean Winchester from the TV show "Supernatural" in a promotional image.]

I don't understand the comments in the recent Supernatural secrets about Dean being selfish when he made the deal to save Sam. Yes, it was in part because he didn't want to lose Sam, but I don't think that was the only reason. And if it were my sister who was dead and who I assumed would be in hell, I'd do it in a heartbeat.

[(Anonymous)]

This struck home for me pretty hard, since I identify with Dean so damn strongly.

Sticks with parents to help with dangerous, thankless family business, at the detriment of self? Check. Need to protect others? Check check. Lack of sense of self, because the self has been so thoroughly embattled and devalued at such a young age through repeated exposure to danger of self and others? Check.

And I totally understood where he was coming from-- you value your family above all else, because that is literally the only thing you can count on having in the world. You spent your life looking out for and saving each other, like hell if you're just going to give up when you have the tools to save them.

I don't think it was "selfish" of Dean. I don't think the concept of saving Sam entered his head through the filter of his own needs and wants. He was tasked with being the big brother, Sammy's protector. Dean would have failed his brother, his father, and his own duty in life if he had let Sam go to hell.

[(Anonymous)]

I would do the same thing for my little brother without a moment of hesitation. I have to assume that a lot of the people who called him selfish because of the deal probably don't have younger siblings or children.

[(Anonymous)]

I would do it in an instant for my siblings, with not even a thought, and I don't consider myself nearly as screwed up as Dean, who, we have to remember, thought at this point that you either died and went to hell, haunted something and became evil, or just sort of...disappeared. They had no reason to believe there was heaven (and once they got to heaven, well, it kind of sucks).

But...I don't think it could be selfish or unselfish, because I don't think Dean was thinking about it consciously. He hadn't been able to save his Dad. He didn't think he should be alive anyway. Sammy was dead. He knew how to make Sammy not dead and take care of his pesky being alive problem. Problem solved. Sammy taken care of.

[(Anonymous)]

Selfish or selfless, does it really matter?

Sam got to live again. Dean went to hell. They both profited and they both lost because of the deal.

No act is ever truly selfless and Dean has so much guilt about Sam - "that's my job, take care of my pain in the ass little brother", "It's like I had one job," "I let down the people that I love." Dean did it because it was the only thing he could think of, I don't think selfishness or selflessness even mattered.

[(Anonymous)]

The way I see it, basically the ONLY thing Dean wanted the first 2 seasons of the show was his family back together. Except John dies, and then Sam dies. Dean's alone, the only thing he wanted out of life completely unobtainable. He'd failed his life's mission (taking care of Sam), and he's desperate and suicidal. He was probably gonna put a bullet in his head. Then he thought 'why not make my death matter, give Sam a chance?'. I don't really see selfishness coming into it, more like desperation and low self-esteem and grief, at the end of a year-long depression.

(TBH, I get the impression that the whole 'Dean was selfish for making the deal' comes from some extreme Sam fans, clinging to it in an attempt to prove that Dean is just as selfish as Sam, or something.)

[(Anonymous)]

But... you just made the argument for it being selfish. The only thing he wanted was his family back together. Making the deal got what there was of his family back together.

[(Anonymous)]

I seriously don't understand this train of logic at all, either. It's not like Sam wanted to be dead. Bringing him back to life wasn't some cruelty Dean was inflicting on Sam for Dean's sole benefit. Sam wasn't suicidal, he didn't intentionally sacrifice himself for the greater good because he knew what was planned for him (although that would been a pretty interesting way to go), he was murdered. All Dean knew was that his baby brother was dead against his will and he had the means to bring him back undamaged. He did the same thing for Sam that John did for Dean. Is what John did considered selfish, too? Was Sam selfish for trying to make the same deal once Dean was dead, only the demons refused him? I guess everybody on the damn show is selfish for being willing to die to save their loved ones. Jesus.

[(Anonymous)]

I think it's often seen as selfish because he is generally seen as making the deal because he couldn't handle Sam being dead. Why couldn't he handle it? Because he had an unhealthy John Winchester-induced obsession with protecting his little brother, because he already lost the rest of his family, because he loved Sam, because he needed someone to take care of to give himself a purpose, because he was following his father's example, because a lot of reasons that mostly are not selfish.

But when you come down to it, he made the deal because he wanted to, because he couldn't take the way things were, not because he thought he should, for Sam's sake or otherwise. He knew he shouldn't, but he did, because he was eighteen different kinds of fucked up.

[(Anonymous)]

Oh God, Dean stans and their complete inability to deconstruct narrative and character. Dean didn't make the deal for Sam's soul, he didn't do it to save Sam's life (the guy was well dead). He did it for himself, for his own sense of loss, grief, failure, failing John Winchester whatever. He did it for himself. Selfish reasons, yes, he's fucked in the head, yes he's a great character who's had done things good and bad, but the crossroads deal was not a moment of shining selflessness. It was about his needs. I love 'me both. They both screwed the pooch.

[(Anonymous)]

That doesn't make any sense though. By your definition nothing can ever be selfless because no matter what someone does for someone else, they will ultimately be doing it for themselves first and foremost because it will make them happy to help another.

I don't believe that. Dean didn't want to be tortured forever but he did want Sam to be alive. He sacrificed himself to save Sam's life. It doesn't matter that Sam was already dead, it still fits the very definition of "saving someone's life." I'm at a loss for how you can describe it as anything BUT selflessness. It's a shining example of selflessness.

The thing is, selflessness of this variety is INCREDIBLY damaging. And SPN showcases that. Dean was selfless, utterly and completely selfless, and it was a TERRIBLE thing. Why is it so hard for Sam!girls to acknowledge that? "Selfless" =/= saintly and wonderful and nothing but good things.

Though I guess none of it matters. The fact that you're insulting anyone who thinks Dean was being selfless and dismissing them as "Dean stans" indicates that your opinion on this is so biased as to not be worth listening to.