There are two particularly egregious pieces of accepted wisdom floating about in SPN fandom. One is that the show is racist, and I addressed that elsewhere; the other is that it is misogynist. I thoroughly refute both charges, and will give my reasons regarding the misogyny charge here.

But first, let me offer some credentials. I have identified myself as a leftist feminist for the past thirty years. My post graduate work is in gender studies and I hope to present at the IGALA conference in Tokyo next year on gender and language. My gender thesis literature review alone has over 100 entries, and I read Bordo and Butler, Cameron and Kulick, Greer and Dworkin as a daily matter of course, and teach reconstructionist gender awareness at a tertiary level. This doesn't make me *the* expert, nor does it invalidate others' views. I'm simply letting folks know that I don't come to this uninformed.

My position is that, far from being misogynistic, SPN portrays women in an admirable way. I titled this 'Strong, capable, courageous' because to me that's how SPN overwhelmingly shows women. Believe me, my studies leave me allergic to misogynistic representations of women, and I see a lot of it about. But not in SPN.

Let's get to specifics. In the pilot, we see Mary die horrifically, and later Jessica has the same fate. Both of these events are shown as tragedies. Neither is gratuitous to the plot; both are cornerstones of the mytharc. I struggle to see the writers chanting 'Burn, bitch, burn.' There is no evidence that these deaths were regarded as anything other than horrific. Later, we discover that Mary was strong, capable and courageous. Take note. That pops up a lot.

Wendigo. We meet Hayley, who is strong, capable and courageous. She determines to go and rescue her brother, despite the danger to herself.

Dead in the water. We meet a widow who is nurturing both her father and her traumatised son. She is intelligent, caring, funny. She almost becomes a victim, but this is due to her father's transgressions, not her own.

Phantom Traveller. Here's the flight attendant who is strong, capable and courageous. She is facing her terror of flying after being involved in a deadly crash. She is proactive in helping Dean and Sam subdue the demon.

Jump to Home and here are three women. A single mother who is starting life anew. She is shown as being caring and brave. Missouri Mosley defines strong, capable and courageous, and Mary sacrifices herself to save her sons. Struggling to see the misogyny so far.

Enter Cassie. A feisty, intelligent, independent woman of colour who is shown as being the first woman for whom Dean has fallen in love (yeah, those racism and misogyny charges are looking very well-supported here). She is proactive in chasing the cause of her father's death. Can we say strong, capable, courageous? Why yes, we can.

The Benders. Jessica Steen's cop is one of the finest portrayals of a law enforcement officer I've seen on any show, anywhere. Strong, capable and courageous? Proactive? You bet; plus caring and compassionate and smart.

Provenance. Sarah. She's the first woman Sam is attracted to post-Jessica, and once again, she is shown as strong, capable and courageous, refusing to let others deal with something for which she may be in any way responsible despite her own fear. Dean approves so much he tells Sam to marry her, only partly in jest.

Season 2 and we have Ellen. You know how highly I think of her as a character. Jo, though green, shows herself as being strong, capable and courageous in No Exit. Linda Blair's cop in The Usual Suspects? Ditto. Children shouldn't play with dead things - the zombie is female, but she is an unnatural creature, and not responsible for her actions. If misogyny is seen in her destruction, what of the fact that the person responsible for her state and the deaths is male, and he too is killed? Was his death a moment of unholy glee in the writer's room? Or are male deaths accorded a different status in the minds of those accusing the show of women hating?

Look, I could go on. S3 and the first episode shows us Tamara - strong, capable, courageous. Bela Talbot, ditto. As an indicator of misogyny, I don't think it matters that Bela is amoral. The overwhelming majority of women on the show are portrayed as more admirable than men. Bela herself is shown to be a victim of terrible crimes that warped her as a child. She's hardly the poster girl for 'Women as evil'.

The witches in Malleus Maleficarum are an interesting case. One of them is shown to be malevolent. Of the other three - one is a demon, one is a manipulative bitch, and one risks her life to save the others when confronted with the reality of her choices. Is it, again, the fact that these women die that elicits the M charge? But what of all the good, strong women characters - with the exceptions, now, of Mary, Ellen and Jo, all of the ones mentioned above - who live? One can't pick and choose evidence.

Playthings - there are two women in the house and a child. One has spent her life protecting her family, the other is supporting her child and ailing mother while running a business with integrity and without self-pity. Strong, capable, courageous? Grandmother and mother, both.

Look, I'm at a loss. Where is this 'undeniable' misogyny? For every Meg there's an Alastair. For every Lilith there's an Azazel. For Ruby there's Gordon. For every female hunter killed - the one at the start of the rising of the witnesses ep - there's the male hunter in the same ep, or Steve Wandell, or Ron Lea's hunter in Metamorphosis.

Perhaps it's Dean's conflicted feelings about women that lead to an unfortunate and unsupported conflation of the show's intent and Dean's confusion. I think I'll do another meta (hey, fair warning) about Dean and his attitude to women, because there's a lot there. Suffice it to say that the transference of Dean's occasional hostility to the intent of the show's creators is unwise and unsubstantiated.

I dislike the blithe way this epithet is bandied about as a given. Do those levelling this charge seriously think that Sera Gamble, Raelle Tucker and Julie Siege are so psychologically damaged that they hate themselves? That Eric Kripke, Robert Singer, Cyrus Yavneh et al actively delight in seeing women die? That is a foul and pernicious accusation. To me, spurious complaints like this do not help women's cause. Get up in arms, please, about CSI et al, where women are portrayed as victims and perpetrators at a grotesquely disproportionate level(men are far, far more likely to die from violence, and very few women murder. One wouldn't think that, watching the cop procedurals). Rail against Top Model, where women are encouraged to aspire to wear a frock and walk, whilst not eating. Spurn Stargate, where a middle aged female officer was shown as a pining lovesick fool. But please don't try to mount a charge against Supernatural, because I firmly believe such a charge is unfounded.

As ever, I am very willing to have my mind changed, because to me that's a signifier of growth, so please, if you disagree, let me know and offer your evidence. I always approach counter-arguments in an open and welcoming manner. As I've stated before - I like to win an argument. I love to lose one.

Well, I loved this. I've been surprised by some of the reactions, to the point that I thought - huh, did I miss something? But I've seen so many folks on Buddy TV confused about how the boys got away from Lucy - to me it was obvious Castiel took them. In Changing Channels, in Nutcracker (of immortal fame), Cas looked as though he was about to touch them both as he said, basically, right, we're off. So I'm presuming he can still - what, teleport? - both himself (as evidenced) and others.

And I completely agree with standing_fic, who asked in bewilderment - how is this episode evidence of misogyny? I doubt if those two actors have ever had meatier roles with better death scenes. They were tough, unsentimental, full of real emotion, heroic, beautiful in their sacrifice. Their deaths weren't pointless - they died for the good of humanity, to give Dean and Sam a chance to end Lucifer, and with him, the apocalypse. Hard to think of a *less* pointless death, or a more respectful one. These women weren't victims, they were proactive agents in their own lives and deaths, and as a feminist of many, many years proud service I say thank you Mr Kripke for this episode.

Okay - rant over. Other bits n pieces:

Mark Sheppard seems to be everywhere lately, and I'm happy for it! First saw him on Firefly, of course. But I just marathoned the last two seasons of BSG, and there he was in all his glory there, too. And the night before he was on some bleedin' CSI thing. (Hm. Bleeding CSI - tautology?) I adored Crowley, and his 'functional morons'. Good icon, there. I wish he hadn't been watching Hitler - rather obvious, and it's not like Ben Edlund to miss a chance for something a bit wittier. Maybe America's Top Model? Sarah Palin?

I have a feeling we'll be seeing Crowley again, and I *love* what he does to the plot (and his lines - 'piggy banker'). Because now it's not Lucifer and demons versus angels and humanity: we've got angels versus angels; angels versus humanity; angels as wild cards; Lucifer versus angels and humanity; Lucifer versus demons?; demons versus angels and humans; demons versus Lucifer; demons versus demons (which we've had since S3, in the Lilith/Azazel split). I mean, yes please. No conflict is simplistic, and this all rings true - multiple agendas, shifting alliances.

Badass Cas - 'going... down'. Hee!

I liked Dean giving Sam shit about demon trust issues, and Sam's response. It seemed very healthy to me. They didn't tiptoe around, looking all moony eyed and significant. Nah, Dean went for the cheap shot, Sam gave the long suffering return sweep, and that seemed pretty good to me.

The colt - so glad it wasn't the magic fixit beastie. At first, when it didn't kill Lucifer, I thought - Crowley put dud bullets in there. It was all a trap to get Sam to Lucifer. But then when Lucifer said there were five things that couldn't be killed by the colt, I figured the Four Horsemen and him.

I liked the editing in this ep - terrific job. Nicely done with Castiel's appearances and disappearances, as when he and Crowley shift from the scene and when Cas was in the street and then suddenly in the room above.

The most chilling thing in the episode for me was that big sign 'Anti-God=Anti American'. Unfortunately I've seen similar things at real rallies. ~shudder~ If America is not a theocracy it's coming damn close, and that just makes me more and more glad I live in a country where 15% of the population identifies as Christian, and if a politician started spouting god stuff we'd all back away slowly before heading to the pub. (I noticed the 'Jesus saves' sign, too, and immediately thought of that gorgeous graffiti - 'Jesus Saves. But Bremner scores on the rebound'. Insert Beckham if you don't understand the reference).

Lucifer is marvellous. I suspect he's going to get more and more grotesque as the season goes on, what with splitting out of his meatsuit and all.

The lighting on Misha Collins made him look edible - all big dark eyes and cheekbones. Castiel was fabulous in so many ways in this ep. I enjoy this incarnation of Meg.

Jensen Ackles - damn. His subtle voice shift when he says, "Hellhounds." He manages to convey Dean's terror and horror in the slightest of vocal shifts. Almost letting go when talking to Bobby on the radio, then 'Right... right... right' as he gathers himself together. The kissing of Jo. He just breaks my heart, and yes, I did cry. (For the record, the other times this show has made me cry are WIAWWNB - the cemetery scene, AHBL Pt1 as Sam dies in his arms, AHBL2 during his monologue, NRFTW when he's bravely telling Sam to go on and HAH as he tells of what hell did to him. And I simply don't cry at things on telly, so...).

Alona Tal did a fantastic job. Shooting down Dean's clumsy seduction attempt - God, he can be such a *bloke* sometimes. Sigh. The little noises she made as she first sat there injured - small sounds of terror and pain that were so realistic. 'Literally your last chance to treat me as an adult'. Her courage and her fear - beautifully done.

And Sam Ferris? Slayed me. It was almost too painful to watch, and as I've commented elsewhere, I think dying with her daughter was the best outcome for her, given the circumstances. It was a kindness that she had something to do, some reason to stay, because otherwise she may have felt she owed the greater good and been forced to leave, to try to back up the endplay with Lucifer. I think that would have destroyed her. In the end they had the comfort of each other. Oh, when she said, 'You got me, Jo' - hell, I'm tearing up as I type it now, 12 hours later.

So - things are grim. That's good news for us angst hounds.

One other comment (okay, rant) about things I've read elsewhere - how does it work that people let themselves get spoiled for an episode and then complain because they knew something was going to happen so it didn't have a big impact on them??? That's like jumping to the end of a mystery, reading whodunnit, then going back reading the rest and complaining that they knew who the murderer was so there was no suspense. It's madness. And it would drive me nuts as a creator of something. I was completely unspoiled for this ep, so Jo and Ellen being in it was a surprise, Jo being mortally injured was a shock, and Ellen staying broke my heart. That, surely, is what the storytellers want you to experience? I bet spoiler junkies used to search for their presents and unwrap them before Christmas, too. Bah, humbug.

For me there's often a sudden moment that just unlocks a door in my mind (or elsewhere, depending on what kind of guttermind we're talking about here) with a bloke/character for whom I've developed a very mature, refined, ladylike, not at all squeeing obsession.

Ahem.

Sometimes I watch a series thinking that one or more character is rather gorgeous, but the 'moment' never comes that it all tips over into madness.

I remember for Paul Gross/ Benton Fraser in Due South it was a moment of vulnerability in the pilot, a single frame where he is suddenly clearly alone and lonely in the big city. That was unusual in that it hit me so early. Often I have to watch a series for several episodes before something just clicks.

For Daniel Jackson/ Michael Shanks in Stargate it was the scene in 'There but for the grace of God' where he is left dying on a spaceship and says, "Go - I'll watch your back." That came at the end of the entire first series.

And in Supernatural, it was the scene in S1 'Home' (so 9 episodes in)where Dean goes around behind the dunny at the petrol station and calls his father. The sight of the hitherto 'too cool for school', super guarded Dean in tears was such a shocking insight into the vulnerability of his character that it flipped a switch for me. I'm never interested in one-note tough guys, but show me the vulnerability beneath the mask and oh, yes. Until that scene I was pretty much equally invested in the brothers, probably enjoyed and related to Dean's character more but wasn't in lust/love with either. That single scene? Began four years enslavement. Sigh.

So - was there a particular moment when a particular lightbulb went off in a particular place for you? Or did it sneak up on you when you were least expecting it? And please, don't confine yourself to Jensen or Jared. Anyone that moves your furniture, share the coup de foudre.

From my house on the hill I can see to the horizon about 20 kilometres away, usually. Today it's become increasingly obscured by smoke. Now I can barely see the back fence. Everyone here is terrified of another bad summer, another day when we lose 190 people. We've been warned that this summer is likely to be worse than the last. And here it is only mid-November and already there must be a big fire somewhere.

We're perfectly safe here, but it's awful when the smoke obscures everything so much and you can't tell what direction the fire is...

Taken from scarletfbl

1) List 5 celebrities you would have sex with without even asking questions.
2) Put all of them IN ORDER of your lust for them [5 - 1, 1 is the hottest].
3) Say which movie/show/thing it was that hooked you.
4) Supply photos for said people.
5) Tag five people.

Alas, the photos, they are beyond me.

5)Simon Baker. Because he's an Aussie. And I need a blonde in there somewhere to complete my evil collection (hey, each one gets their own room in the basement. It's not like I'm sick and depraved, or something).

4) Nathan Fillion. Who cares if he's gay? First spotted in Buffy, then I went to Firefly, of course.

3) Chewitel Ejiofor. First pinged my radar in 'Serenity'. Those eyes. That voice.

2) James Avery - and sadly, I first noticed this bloke when he was done up as a faun in the first Narnia flick. So we've gone from hulking strong black guy to weedy thin white one. Hey, I've got range.

1) Jensen Ackles. You know, I had a wonderful dream about him the other day. It was so good I was very sorry when I woke up and it wasn't true. Anyway, first saw in SPN.



I dunno about tagging. How about anyone who reads it?

Who sleeps in bed next to you?
My daughter, very often. Or my evil cat, Chia-Mu. So named because she's a stray who I thought was an Himalayan, so she copped a Tibetan girl's name. Turns out she's a ragdoll cat with an anti-social personality.

What did you last eat?
Tea last night. Chicken fettucine, broccoli, carrot.

What kind of books do you read?
Mostly non-fiction, mostly histories or social commentary.

What are you reading right now?
Crazy for God by Frank Schaeffer; Gender Trouble by Judith Butler. Oh, and 58 4,000 word reflective journals from my students. Sigh.

If you could be anywhere right now, where would it be?
On the coast, near Narooma. (Jensen Ackles' bed is too creepy, right? Because he'd scream, and then throw me out, and then call the police, and really, that would be more than fair. I've had boyfriends do the same thing).

What's really creepy?
Conservative politicians trying to pretend they're 'little Aussie battlers' when they've never had to struggle for money one day in their lives.

Name one odd item within five feet of you.
A scarab beetle figurine.

What's your current fandom / obsession / addiction?
SPN/J2.

What did you really want to do today that you didn't?
Well, it's morning here, so I don't know what I'm going to stuff up yet. But I will lay odds it will be that I won't get enough of those journals marked.

What are you most excited for?
Cricket season begins in a couple of weeks!!! And then Christmas, of course. I'm a Christmas and cricket tragic.

What websites do you always visit when you go online?
LJ, email, Supernatural.tv

What was the last thing you bought?
A Three Musketeers Ken doll. You know, I was going to womanfully resist all the Barbie crap, but then my niece, in a fit of philanthropy for which I'm trying to forgive her, passed all her Barbies (I always think of Klaus Barbie, so ew) on to my little when said little was about 3, so yeah, we've got the Barbies. Little has decided that she needs a bloke doll so they can get married. My efforts to propagate a post-structuralist non heteronormative lesbian commune with her various Barbs has fallen on deaf ears.

If you could have any pet, what would it be?
Well, otters are my favourite critters, but I can't imagine they'd want to be my pet. Okay, I'll say Veronika (Penthouse October 1985)

What do you want right this minute, off the top of your head?
The Sri Lankan conjoined twins, Trishn and Krishna, to be okay. I think just about everyone in Oz is hanging off the fate of these two.

Where is the place you like to return to in order to calm down / relax / etc.?
My parents have a creek running along the bottom of their garden that has river flats on the opposite bank - just bush as far as you can see. Beautiful.

How many licks does it take to get to the Tootsie Roll center of a Tootsie Pop?
What is a Tootsie Pop?

Are there any bits of childhood that you miss?
The games of pretend - *so* intense. I still play, but everyone else has grown up too much.

Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter?
Autumn! Summer is waaaay too hot. Autumn is my time of regeneration after the trauma of summer. Summer is snakes, spiders, sunstroke and bushfires. I live in the country. Already people are taking about not leaving their properties over summer because of the bushfire threat.

To the person who tagged me - dugindeep, thank you, hon! What a surprise.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Wkf7GiT37c&feature=related

This is why I love these two. That Jensen rescues Jared when he realises Jared doesn't have a clue how to auction, that Jared is overcome, embarrassed at asking $500 to begin with and clearly thanks the winning bidder for some time, that Jensen thanks the opposition bidder and gives the winning bidder a big smile - just gorgeous.

The rest of the Chicago con is just brilliant, too, and Jensen is on fire!

Posted by cloudyvision.

I'm glad I slept on this before posting, because had I posted last night when I saw the show I would have been far more harsh. But I'm sorry to say I struggled to enjoy this ep. I'm so delighted to see that I'm out of step with most of my flist, and I'm really happy so many saw it as a hoot, but after quite literally laughing out loud at Changing Channels, I sat almost straight-faced through this. That's the nature of humour, of course; I have a vow now never to recommend humour because the number of times I've raved about something only to have the other person look at me as though I am insane, well... And am I the only person on the planet who found Seinfeld, There's Something About Mary and The Gods Must Be Crazy as abysmal? In Oz people raved about Muriel's Wedding and I came away desperately depressed by it. Frasier and Arrested Development are my happy places; Two and a Half Men makes me homicidal.

However, I've realised that I did like Damian and Barnes, I did like the fact they were a gay couple and they were the ones who actually got rid of the ghosts. I liked them because they played it straight (yeah, I get the pun). Humour for me comes from the unexpected juxtaposition of two conflicting elements, or some such thing I can never quite remember properly when I'm trying to be all interleckshual and stuff. So Damian and Barnes were funny when they broke from 'character' and said "Coolest game ever!" The squeeing fanboy parts came as comic relief, and worked for me.

Becky, on the other hand? Began at volume 11 (and if ever there was a lesson in playing something straight to make it hilarious, it's Spinal Tap). She began as a rabid chipmunk and stayed there. Basically, for me Becky was such an annoying dickhead that she pretty much threw the whole ep. I would much prefer it had she been played as the publisher in MATEOTB was played - that is, as someone who could pass as normal until you scratched the surface. That made her funny and believable. Becky was insane from the start, and Chuck being attracted to her just made me squirm.

And because Becky pissed me off so much all the fourth wall breakdown stuff dragged me too far out of my suspension of disbelief, so the ghosts didn't work. And I started getting nitpicky in a way I usually am not; how did Dean and Sam get to drive away from the place so quickly when there was an unexplained body, killed by multiple stab wounds? What explanation was given that meant everyone was cool about letting people leave the hotel?

But I did like the actor playing Gore - the way she responded to Dean, her cynicism, her mobile phone going off. The fans asking questions at the con were fine, the LARPing was fine. Overall it wasn't as bad as I thought it was first up, just - please, send Becky to the special hell. Please.

I hate it when I'm not being celebratory about the show. So to end on positives; loved the gun to the head/ slitting throat gestures from the boys at the end. Chuck is always welcome. Liked that there was no big revelation about Sam and Dean being Sam and Dean. Next week looks terrific.

A terrific 'Bourne' style thriller, J2AU RPS.

http://community.livejournal.com/zuben_fic/3108.html

She's got a great style for this sort of story, wonderful pace to it all, and she writes action so well - which I always find a pretty challenging thing to do. This is intelligent, sexy spy stuff. Very cool.

I've been seeing comments for some time on various SPN forums, complaining about the way that angels are being represented on SPN, claiming it's blasphemous and offensive. And I must say that it both bemuses and annoys me, depending on how I'm travelling at any particular time.

Because I'm left thinking - these are Christians (perhaps lower case christians?) who know very little about the bible. Hey, I was born and christened and raised in the Christian church, and basically by the time I was ten I called bullshit. I didn't want to; I wanted a brilliant theologian to clear the path, to challenge my intellect, to throw me some hard ones to gnaw at in the dark. Instead, I was offered blancmange level platitudes. Don't think; just believe. What is that great Bill Maher quote? Faith is a great excuse for not thinking.

So I read the bible, cover to cover, when I was ten. And I can only think that these viewers who are whining about the way SPN represents angelic behaviour and state their quivering opinion that it's blasphemy *really* haven't dipped in to the old book for a while. My recent sojourns OT side have not been enlightening reading.

Look, we're dealing with a bronze age desert god, who was followed by a small and threatened tribe. Of course it is bloody, vengeful, unreasonable, capricious, because our gods reflect our lives. Now that so many of us in the western world are living in middle class beigedom the god being prescribed is a caring and sharing, shhhh don't wake the neighbours god. But that dolphin-friendly god does *not* sit well with what is written in the Old Testament.

You either believe the Old Testament was transcribed from God to his chosen prophet, or you don't. But if you don't, and you still call yourself a Christian, you're treading a very fine line. And you really have no right to throw stones at a show that takes the Old Testament as written. Because, yeah - the god of that book is a misogynist, racist bastard. This is inarguable. Go read it. Try to rationalise it with your modern sensibilities and accommodate it within your modern ethics. You can't. So equally, you can't therefore complain if a show takes God and his angels as written and runs with it.

There are many brilliant, sane, intellectually rigorous Christians in the world who are grappling with the inconsistencies and ugliness present in the bible. I respect their efforts, wish them well. I don't respect fluffy Christians who want to have little widdle angel notepaper and feel a bit upset because angels are like Roma Downey and nothing but Niceness and cute little wings. They wield the offense card but don't even know what they're defending.

Five reasons why I love Carol:

1) She's warm, witty, wise and always wonderful.
2) She gets to sit on the Queen's lap regularly yet is still a GINORMOUS SQUEEING FANGIRL.
3) She has excellent taste in PBs even if the natural wonder that is Jensen Ackles fails to move her.
4) She is extraordinarily generous, keeps herself nice, and yet can go the mongrel when required.
5) She comes in funsize, and because she's so little her mind is always close to the gutter.

Happy Birthday O Small But Scary!

Wish I was there to give you an enormous birthday hug and kiss and steal all your whisky.

Just read a terrific, quite spooky J2 RPF. Jensen's behvaiour is increasingly odd, and Jared and Misha do what they can to help him out, not realising exactly what it is they're up against, or how dangerous it will be for them all. Unusually, this is a genfic, so there's no smut - just strong plot and characterisation, great atmosphere and a lingering sense of threat throughout. She's got a lovely style too. Plenty of angst and h/c.

http://kamelionwriter.livejournal.com/tag/lodestone

Something of a disappointment, this one. I always knew it would be a hard sell for me to like it, given JA wasn't going to be in it much. But I did enjoy Chad Everett more than I did Brock Kelly.

I enjoyed Dean and Bobby's interactions, especially the fact that Dean gave Bobby a bit of a serve. He was right to do so, and he was also right to sit Bobby down and have the kind of chat that Dean would, I have no doubt, avoid in favour of a chupacabra wrestle any day.

I liked Patrick. I read in another journal entry that his accent was poor, but I will freely confess my ear is not good enough to catch the failing. I thought he was by turns charming, kind, sinister and pitiful.

I liked Sam winning at the cards, because I did fall for it and think okay, so they're not going to win through the card stuff, how is this going to be reconciled? (Because I'm naive like that sometimes). Well played, Sammy.

However, for the bulk of it I disliked Sam heartily in this ep. What a callous jerk! His brother is transformed into an eighty year old and he's going to find it hilarious? He's going to mock Dean's self-sacrifice (Dean only got into that state because he cared more about Bobby's predicament than his own well-being - yes, Sam, what a hoot) and ignore the very real peril that his brother was in? Really? He's *so* hung up on his power-lust that any chance where he has Dean at some kind of disadvantage, he's going to rub it into his face, regardless of the circumstances? Real classy, Sam.

I disliked the heavy handed 'let's mock the old guy' all round, really. There is no reason why an eighty year old Dean wouldn't be as fit as a mallee-bull. My 75 year old mother rides 70 kilometres twice a week, and in her cycling group there are men older than that who do more. Equating age with feebleness is weak itself, and crashingly cliched. If Dean were to survive until he was eighty I'd back him to be a tough old coot. Going for cheap laughs was shallow and utterly predictable.

Didn't like or get the 'manwitch' thing. Warlock, anyone? Or, you know, a witch can be male or female. Perhaps it was a linguistic barb on Dean's part - he wouldn't use the correct term as a mark of disrespect. But it grated.

For me, overall this was a minor episode. Remove it from canon and we've lost little beyond an overt admittance by Bobby that he's struggling to cope, and although it's likely that the boys *did* need to be hit over the head with that (because they're boys, and unless someone actually says, "You know, struggling here' they'll take surface reassurances every time. It's how they operate) I'm not sure the viewer did.

And it lacked tension. We *knew* Dean wasn't going to die. Now, I'm aware that this is so in every ep (except the end of S3, curse you Kripke!), but somehow the lack of inherent threat was there throughout. It was rather a matter of thinking, okay, they're going to reverse this, wonder how? Because no one would ever think Chad baby was signed up for the rest of the season. When the physical threat is dull, there needs to be some moral or emotional peril, and there was nothing like that. Had another charcater been in danger - say Bobby, or a sympathetic guest star ( a la Evan of Crossroads) - there would have been more uncertainty and tension.

Oh, dear. Not a favourable comment, really. Never mind. I'll take third rate SPN over most top of the line stuff on TV any day. Just - hoping for better next week.

Copied from Gillianinoz's LJ.

Name a TV show series in which you have seen every episode at least twice:
Supernatural

Name a (current) show you can't miss:
Supernatural

Name an actor that would make you more inclined to watch a show:
Chewetel Ejiofor

Name an actor who would make you less likely to watch a show:
Bruce Willis

Name a show you can, and do, quote from:
Stargate (Deny the battle)

Name a show you like that no one else enjoys:
_

Name a TV show which you’ve been known to sing the theme song:
Firefly

Name a show you would recommend everyone to watch:
Press Gang

Name a TV series you own:
Press Gang

What is your favourite episode of your favourite series?
'What is and what should never be' - Supernatural, but it's a tough call.

A show you mean to watch, but you just haven’t gotten around to yet:
Deadwood

Ever quit watching a show because it was so bad?
So many! All Saints; Law and Order SVU

Name a show you aren't interested in watching, not in the least:
NCIS

Name a show that’s made you cry multiple times:
Supernatural

Oldest TV show you like?
Cosmos

Newest TV show you like?
Castle

What do you eat when you watch TV?
Dinner

How often do you watch TV?
3  - 4 hours per day

Do you have a favorite talk show?
Insight with Jennie Brockie

What’s the last TV show you watched?
Bottletop Bill

What’s your favourite/preferred genre of TV?
Fantasy/SF

What's your least favourite genre of TV?
Reality TV

What was the first TV show you were obsessed with?
Lost in Space

What TV show do you wish you never watched?
Australia's Top Model or somesuch - they had to pose like murder victims, and were treated to comments such as "Oh, you look so hot and dead!" I'm sure it did my blood pressure no good at all.

What’s the weirdest show you enjoyed?
Monkey

What TV show scared you the most?
"Blink" Dr Who

What is the funniest TV show you have ever watched?
Arrested Development

Which do you think is the best TV series ever made?
Firefly

I am utterly over the plethora of sickening crime drama on telly. The CSIs, the Criminal Minds, the Law and Orders. The other night I flipped from channel to channel, and each one had one of these. By the time a Midsomer Murder show from the UK came on it seemed positively quaint and rather sweet. All those nice tidy little English murders.

It's something that just confounds me. What is it saying about the zeitgeist? That we *want* to wallow in our paranoia? We want to see the thoroughly unnatural recreation of murder over and over again? I used to enjoy the original Law and Order series, because I was often fascinated by the legal aspects of it. Then the SVU series started up, and I was repelled by the endless stories of violence against women and children. Why? Why do people want to dwell in this?

And the more obsessed people get with murder (particularly the most deviant, hideous forms of it, such as serial killings), the more uptight they get about nudity and sexuality on the screen. I would much, much sooner welcome soft porn showing genuine intimacy between consenting adults of any gender. Healthy sexuality is something to be aspired to, enjoyed, shared and developed. The butchering of others, especially children? That is utterly unnatural. Yet, especially in the US, there are nightly scenes of slaughter and hardly a word of outcry; but show nudity and suddenly people are demanding that sponsorship be removed from the show. (I remember all the fuss about David Caruso's bum on NYPD Blue. If only they'd realised how much worse his other end could get as he endlessly takes off his sunnies, they may have kept quiet).

There's something to be said for trying to get things accurate, if you're doing a  murder story, and really convey the impact murder has. But the approach of those shows mentioned above rarely seems to have any emotional, or even moral depth; it's all about the processes of crime detection. I'm left with a bad taste in my mouth for the sheer callousness of it all. So I guess I'll abandon clinical accuracy for the kind of fluff that Castle and The Mentalist bring. At least they aren't hypocritical. They're not pretending they care. And hey, Nathan and Simon are both charming.

The one I would defend from the above list is Law and Order UK, because, based on the few I've seen,  somehow the Brits do seem to manage to inject some kind of emotional truth into their stories.

Thanks, Kitty, for the spark.

G'day folks!

I was just wondering - how did you come to choose the name you're using online? Standing fic, dug in deep, karabou, scribe, sacrletfbl etc.

I'm sure there must be some interesting stories or thinking there.

Mine's related to the most profound mystical/spiritual/ twilight zone experience I ever had. Whether or not it was the spirit world or my own brain, somehow I accessed a pretty spectacular place and discovered that my spirit guide was a crow. So when, many years later, I came online, I went off and researched various crow names in various languages and found them all lacking (I mean, in Wiradjuri it's Wang. Um, no). I quite liked 'Gavran' (Serbian). Despite being a Russophile, as a synaesthete I couldn't touch the Russian version (it began with a 'v', and for me 'v' names and words are an awful grey).

The Latin is corvus, and that reminded me of a poem I read as a kid, from the north of England - Twa Corbies. And I thought Corby sounded less wanky or pretentious, more down to earth and friendly. So Corby it was. It was fine until a very high profile drug smuggling case occurred - a young woman was sentenced to 20 years for smuggling dope into Bali, and her name was Schapelle Corby. So I kept seeing 'Corby' headlines everywhere!

I've had 23 private messages about my story, Ashes of the Moon. All of them have been positive, thank goodness. But of the 23 PMs, 21 had something in common. They all mentioned, in some way or another, that their minds had been changed or opened though the story.

A few people wrote that in the public feedback, too, but it's fascinating to me that most of the people who wanted to communicate that to me did so away from public scrutiny.

Almost all of them mentioned Jensen's speech (and really, it was a rather didactic late insert to the story that could only be described as speechifying) that was referred to in the text as Colonial Buttfuck 101. This had a huge impact on these readers.

I was absolutely thrilled. I am an educator by profession, after all - the thought that this story had transformative properties for even one person, let alone 20 odd, was utterly wonderful. It is the barest taste of what major authors must get when people say their books have meaning for them beyond the tale itself. So why then would this be conveyed to me under the radar, so to speak?

And I wondered if it's because folks think that learning through stories is somehow a lesser form of learning? That they were slightly embarrassed to admit to learning while being involved in what is, after all, one of the most ephemeral of literary genres. Have we lost the respect for the power and importance of stories that other cultures have held onto for millennia? Have we forgotten that story is at the heart of our human existence, and that to learn from it is as natural and universal as language?

I always use anecdotes in my teaching, and I know that makes an enormous difference for my students. I can give them all the theory in the world, but when I begin with, "There was one student I taught who..." I *see* their interest levels pick up. We are, my humanist heart believes, genetically programmed to learn through story.

One of the wisest things that someone ever told me was that every third person I met would have something to teach me. Of course, as there's no way of knowing who is that third person, it has led me to regard everyone as having something to teach me. And in that same spirit of an openness to learning, I believe the opportunity, the possibility of learning is there in every story I read, too. And that what can be learnt through story is often tremendously powerful because it comes with emotion entwined around it. Harper Lee taught me as much about racism as I ever learnt through textbooks, and her lessons have stayed longer and drove home deeper.

Anyway, I put this question to my correspondents, and their answers were interesting. Some were fearful that they would be regarded as racist for not thinking about such things before. But the rest agreed that they felt they would be thought of as being a bit 'dumb' for 'needing a J2 AU story to get what's happening in Africa'.

I would hope that we would all comprehend that we all find our way to understandings in our own time and in our own fashion, and that whatever helps us - be it a throwaway like my story, or a personal meeting, or a film, a song, a poem - is valuable and valid. God knows I have *so* much left to learn, and I'll be looking in all those places, and especially stories, to help me.

IN the previous yackfest that was 'Dean, Sam, the apocalypse and whatever else I threw in there', it occurred to me that it is interesting that Dean broke the first seal as a righteous man in Hell. 'And it is written (or at least, widlly paraphrased because I can't be arsed getting the DVD out and my Small One has commandeered it anyway and infested it with 'Scooby Doo' - aka Supernatural for spawnlings); as the righteous man breaks and spills blood, so does the first seal  break.' (Is it wrong of me to keep thinking of that "Is that ice cream on your face?" "Nah, I just blew a seal" joke? Probably).

How was it that Dean was still a Righteous Man? If we throw Dean's career under the Ten Commandments geiger counter, we find it lighting up like a Three Mile Island three headed goldfish.

1) I am the Lord thy God.
Well, Dean has explicitly stated that he doesn't believe. Not only did he do that, he did it in a *church*. Haunted by a ghostly priest, FCOL. Way to flip Heaven the bird, Dean. Zero points for Dean as a righteous man.
2)  You shall have no other gods before me.
I think the Daddy worship Dean has got going - made explicit in the latest ep - pretty much rules out a goal on this one. Points on the righteous scale- 0.
3) You shall not make for yourself an idol.
Not only has Dean got an unhealthy obsession with his car - he rebuilt it from scratch. And has libated it with bodily fluids at least once in canon. Impala = Dean's lingam. Points on the righteous scale - 0. In fact, negative fifty by now.
4) You shall not make wrongful use of the name of your god.
Now I feel sure Dean has said, "Oh, my god" before, but I'm drawing a blank. I keep thinking 'sonofabitch'. Oh, wait! I'm sure he said it in response to an attempted chick flick moment. 'Dream a little dream'? Zero score once more.
5) Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.
No evidence for or against this in a literal sense, but given Dean's attitude to god generally, I think we can safely say he won't trouble the scorers on this one either.
6) Honor your father and mother.
Alright, we'll give him this. One pointer.
7) You shall not kill.
Oops. Big negative point score here. Even if we take the Anglican version, 'thou shalt not murder', going armed and ready to kill someone and subsequently doing so must qualify in that regard, as it does under law. So Azazel's son in 'Devil's Trap'  and Beverley Tanner in 'Croatoan' spring to mind.
8) You shall not commit adultery.
Dean's never been married, so he has not committed adultery on his own wife; but what are the odds he's taken a little MILF action somewhere in his career? Wouldn't like to bet against it, since he bangs like a dunny door in a gale.
9) You shall not bear false witness against your neighbour.
Well, he couldn't lie straight in bed on a good day, so the odds of Dean bearing false witness somewhere along the way? Pretty strong.
10) You shall not covet anything of your neighbour's.
Hmmm. I don't think he's actually done this, so we'll give him a point there.

So - two points on the Ten Commandments scoreboard. Ouch. *No one* better than Dean has gone to hell? That speaks a level of bureaucratic accuracy in the sorting process  that beggars belief. I mean, Dean made a deal with a demon for his soul. Surely that earns a cosmic bitchslap from the great scorekeeper in the sky?

But what it does suggest is a rather more robust, more labyrinthine morality being accorded heaven and hell than is usually the case. Dean is a righteous man because he has tried to help others and has sacrificed his own happiness to that end. In other words, the heavenly hosts aren't sweating the details. I rather like that.

Today I took my child for her first haircut. She's six and a quarter years old. She has - or had - long, natural sausage curls down to below her bum.

And we got it all chopped off.

She's now got the cutest bob. The hairdresser was telling me,"You know, it can take a week for the bounce to come back." By the time we left, we had a mass of bouncing curls.

She looks utterly adorable. And her comment? "They can still tell I'm a girl, can't they."

Yes, darling, they can.

Harry Connick Jnr, here in Oz, agrees to go on a very crappy, very lame variety reunion show that decides, in its infinite wisdom, to have an act that is a blackface version of the Jackson Five. Harry Connick Jnr, because he is someone of integrity and class, complains and the host apologises to him during the show. This morning, fifty percent of respondents Don't Get Why There Needed To Be An Apology.

I just - every time I argue that Australia has some of the best anti-discrimination laws in the world, is one of the most successful multi-cultural countries in the world, is not intrinsically racist as some have suggested - something like this happens and I despair. We *are* a nation of reasonably laid back, reasonably fair minded people, but sometimes the laziness in our thinking leads to this kind of BS. We non-Indigenous Aussies have never been oppressed, we've never been marginalised, we're happy and spoiled and privileged and free and we *just don't get it* when we trample on the feelings of people who have had to fight for half of that.

Harry Connick Jnr - you, sir are a legend. On behalf of those Aussies with their heads out of their dumb fundamental orifices, I apologise.