A not-so-gentle reminder for anyone following me here, on Tumblr, or on Ao3:

I love the vast majority of what SPN's writers have done from S11-S15, I admire & respect them as creators and as people, and I have absolutely no patience or good humor left for anyone attacking them.

Why am I mentioning this?

Well. Because I'm fucking tired.

Tired of seeing people accuse them of queerbaiting and/or homophobia.

Tired of seeing people accuse them of being "cowards" or whatever the hell else if they don't have Dean explicitly come out as bi next week.

First off, you'd do well to remember that this hasn't been a writer's room of wall-to-wall straights in a long time.

There have been people in that room with skin in the game of getting more rep on screen for years.

Accusing them of queerbaiting or homophobia is beyond gross.

Personally, I came to understand my own bisexuality in my late 20's because of Dean Winchester.

Without Dean, I would still be closeted.

Without Dean, I wouldn't be married to the love of my life.

Believe me, I am *invested* in his story.

Nothing would make me happier than to see him finally able to own and name this part of himself aloud on screen.

But the chances of that are unbelievably slim.

Obviously we all know that on some level, or fandom wouldn't be pre-emptively gnashing their collective teeth over it.

(brief sidebar to apologize for the phrase "collective teeth" because jesus h christ that's a horrifying mental image i've just given myself)

(chomp chomp chomp)

Obviously I hope that I'm wrong!

But if we don't see Dean's feelings for Cas shown any more explicitly than we already have (though frankly, the subtext here been pretty damn close to the surface for a while) I don't believe for a second that it's because the writers didn't try.

If you've been any paying attention at all for the past four years under Dabb, it's clear that this team has tried their absolute hardest to give us this story.

But they've had to do it within the confines of the industry at large and this show's history in particular.

And it's no secret that the higher-ups at The CW harbor some dated, shallow, & downright wrong ideas about this show.

They legitimately don't understand it.

They see it as nothing but an action show about Tough Dudes With Guns and Monsters™

They sincerely think that the show's continued success comes from Joe the Red-Blooded Hetero, and they don't want to alienate him.

A real thing that they said while talking about SPN's online fandom is that "Tumblr is the male Pinterest".

(source: https://www.wsj.com/articles/BL-269B-1697)

Please go back and read that again.

They're so deluded about who has been watching, rewatching, livetweeting, and otherwise participating in online promotion and discussion of Supernatural, that they called TUMBLR. THE MALE PINTEREST.

They don't get it. At all. They never have.

With that in mind?

Castiel's speech in 15.18 went far beyond any reasonable expectations anyone could've had for a lead character in this particular show. FAR beyond.

I'd be willing to bet that every writer in that room had to fight like hell to get the network to approve it.

Even outside of this show, the TV industry at large still makes writers jump through hoops any time they want to put queer content in a show that isn't specifically marketed as For The Gays™.

Should it still be this way in 2020? Absolutely not.

But it is what it is.

So if Castiel's confession was all that the writers were able to get approved in explicit terms?

Well, I'm sure as hell not going to sit here and listen to people who attack them or accuse them of baiting, or queerphobia, or cowardice, or any of that shit.

All that subtextual queer coding that has been built and built and built between Dean and Cas, particularly since Dabb took over, we now know was put there on purpose.

And that coding has not been one sided.

It's gone both ways.

We correctly interpreted it on Castiel's side.

Explicit confirmation of one side is implicit confirmation of the other.

I absolutely agree that not getting the final part of the equation isn't fair.

But these writers have shown their work for years, and I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that they expect us to do some simple math to fill in the blank they've likely had to leave.

Acting as though the writers have the final say, or as though this was remotely easy or simple for them to pull off, only discounts and devalues the massive amount of work that they've very clearly put into it.

Anyway. I got incredibly off track. I already said most of this last week.

The original point I wanted to make is this:

If you're going to take a bad-faith angle, if you're going to attack the writers and ignore all of the network politics and industry hoop-jumping that had to happen for them to give us as much as they could, then I'm honestly just not interested in engaging with you.

Further--don't trash talk the writers in the replies of my fic or tweets.

"The writers suck, your fic should be canon" is not the compliment that some of you seem to think it is.

Seeing my work used to disrespect people I consider personal role models is downright insulting.

So if you hate the writers, or hate the show?

My content is not for you.

I don't want your clicks. I don't want your kudos. I don't want your follows. I don't want your engagement at all.

Also, in case it's not obvious -- this is not an invitation for anyone to debate me.

Also, so that this is clear: I have no issue with people who are optimistic that Dean will explicitly reciprocate, or that we'll see Cas on screen again for Dean to do so!

I admire your faith, and I would love to have your optimism.

I don't think you're crazy for expecting or hoping for it, even if I cannot rationalize that level of optimism myself when I consider all of the available information.

My issue is very specifically with people who have decided that Dean *has to* explicitly come out / respond, and that if he doesn't the writers are terrible queerbaiters and homophobes and the whole show is trash.