fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2641 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2641 ⌋

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Bad* father who accidentally did tiny bits of good along the way, or good father with major flaws?

*Bad defined as someone who is actively harmful, not someone who just isn't very good at being a parent.

My vote us for good but flawed. Were his choices always the best? No. Did his emotions cloud his judgment? Yes. But you don't have kids and suddenly become a robot. He did the best he could with what he had (both in terms of resources and fortitude) to keep his kids alive while hunting down evil things.

I know, this is old, but I've been hit with a fresh round of "John Winchester is the LITERAL WORST PERSON EVER" (apparently a joke 'lost on me...but it's not my fault') and am grumpy.

I haven't kept up with the fandom, so my answers are based on JW as presented in the first few seasons: good father with major flaws. He lost his wife and did everything he could to protect his kids. He fucked up a lot, but no one is perfect.

Now, the later seasons (and here's why I quit watching) did everything they could to retcon his character into an abusive asshole toward Dean (I seem to recall Jeffrey Dean Morgan publicly complaining about character assassination... I could be wrong). So really, answers to your question could go either way, depending on what people accept as canon.

Bad father who accidentally did tiny bits of good along the way.

He did the best he could with what he had (both in terms of resources and fortitude) to keep his kids alive while hunting down evil things.

Not really, though? In some of the expanded verse you learn John had a brother he stayed with for a while after Mary died. And if you don't count the expanded verse he still had Bobby and Pastor Jim.

He could have left Sam and Dean with any of them. This would allowed them to have a relatively normal childhood. If he was worried about them being attacked, well he knows how to set up wards and such.

So instead of leaving Sam and Dean somewhere safe, he makes them live in various motels. He leaves a child to watch another child. He sometimes leaves so long that Dean had to steal food because he ran out of money. He blames Dean for Sam being attacked by a monster (Dean still feels responsible for this as an adult).

If your son can tell you are a demon because you are saying you are proud of him for saving you, you have fucked up somewhere.

He basically ruined any chance either will ever have any semblance of a normal life. He also ruined any chance of either being able to create meaningful and healthy relationships. He taught them that love is something that must be earned and can be taken away as soon as you mess up.

That is not a good parent.

Edited 2014-03-27 23:40 (UTC)

This is my reasoning, as well. During the first season I would have said good father with bad moments, but everything else made him look worse and worse, especially all those times he left Dean solely responsible for Sam.

You read my mind

I am in your brain. Touching your stuff.

I can't be held responsible for whatever you come across

Thank you, you explained it very well. John Winchester let his anger and his fear hurt his sons far worse than their mother's death had to. It's understandable why he fucked up, anyone could under those circumstances, but the fact is that he fucked up really badly.

I think he did what he felt he had to do, and he tried his hardest, and he loved his kids. But his choices were ultimately wrong and deeply harmful. He was a bad father. Although I'm not sure I could condemn him as a bad person overall.

My thoughts as well - bad FATHER, but not a bad PERSON.

I was going to say this. Bad father who loved his kids.

Yup, completely agree.

People can love their kids and try their hardest and ultimately still end up being bad parents or making bad calls, which does not mean they are bad people.

I think where Sam is concerned John was a good father who occasionally did more harm than good without exactly meaning to, but that the reverse was true with Dean.
Dean often comes across to me as someone who has suffered some form of abuse, whereas Sam just doesn't.

I think that, although Sam and John fought and didn't get along, Dean bore the brunt of any abusive behavior John threw around.

I find passing judgment on any of the characters in that show silly, since they're stuck in a world/life that bears no connection to reality. Like, how are we to judge what the mark of a "good parent" is in a life filled with hunting demons and other weird supernatural creatures, while your son's soul has been sold to another demon or whatever? What's the point of deciding whether a fictional character is a good or bad parent in those circumstances that will never apply to a real person.

Yeah, good but flawed.

He was a father with both some very good and some very bad traits. I'm not sure it's possible to classify him as solidly one or the other overall.

One thing I will say: The fact that he managed to raise two small boys to adulthood who have survived eight and a half seasons of Hell (both literally and figuratively) and saved the world multiple times often seems to get overlooked by his critics. If he'd been the world's most positive and nurturing parent, and Sam and/or Dean had gotten killed as a result (or played out their destined roles as archangelic meatsuits,) either of which seems entirely likely to me, I don't know how it would be possible to call him an all-around good father then either. The guy can't win.

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