I feel like I'm sort of in a weird place with this whole issue, because I absolutely agree that it sucks mightly that most of the insults and derogatory phrases we have in this language are either gendered female or suggest male homosexuality, as if those are the two absolute worst states of being. And even in this sentence, sucks is probably a derivation of cock-sucker. Language is really important; the words we use *mean* something even if we aren't aware of how we're using them. (For example, it took me a really long time to realize that saying you'd been gypped was a racial slur and now that I do I don't use that word.) So I'm not suggesting that people are wrong to bring up these issues or even be disturbed by them. Just that I'm not.
Like I said in my earlier comment, for me, bitch is not really a gendered word (although yes, I know that's a tautology because it *is*). Also, I think that the show is based on a couple of premises, one that you mention in your post. Sam and Dean are blue collar and their language is in some ways a class issue. I think it is also a function of the nature of the horror show. In much horror, the perversion of the female is the ultimate terror. Taking a mom or a wife or a maiden and making them evil, corrupting them (often this involves sexual promiscuity, or the hint of such, ala Stoker's Dracula), is the height of horror. And this is a horror show. That sometimes plays around with the genre and sometimes is steadfastly in teh grooves. Most of the "women" Dean insults are actually demons; in a very literal way, according to his thinking, they are bitches or sluts or skanks--the perversion of what the presumably good women whose bodies they are now wearing once were. Of course, that creates a Madonna/Whore complex for the whole show that is also problematic. LOL
So I don't think Dean is misogynistic; I think he uses that language when talking to demons because these aren't people. He calls Bela a bitch quite a bitch and she's a human but I'm not sure what other insult her could have called her that wasn't gendered. Asshole, I guess. I don't know.
Maybe this really should bother me.
And you wre not wrong in your skimming. Bitch is aimed at dudes from time to time.
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Like I said in my earlier comment, for me, bitch is not really a gendered word (although yes, I know that's a tautology because it *is*). Also, I think that the show is based on a couple of premises, one that you mention in your post. Sam and Dean are blue collar and their language is in some ways a class issue. I think it is also a function of the nature of the horror show. In much horror, the perversion of the female is the ultimate terror. Taking a mom or a wife or a maiden and making them evil, corrupting them (often this involves sexual promiscuity, or the hint of such, ala Stoker's Dracula), is the height of horror. And this is a horror show. That sometimes plays around with the genre and sometimes is steadfastly in teh grooves. Most of the "women" Dean insults are actually demons; in a very literal way, according to his thinking, they are bitches or sluts or skanks--the perversion of what the presumably good women whose bodies they are now wearing once were. Of course, that creates a Madonna/Whore complex for the whole show that is also problematic. LOL
So I don't think Dean is misogynistic; I think he uses that language when talking to demons because these aren't people. He calls Bela a bitch quite a bitch and she's a human but I'm not sure what other insult her could have called her that wasn't gendered. Asshole, I guess. I don't know.
Maybe this really should bother me.
And you wre not wrong in your skimming. Bitch is aimed at dudes from time to time.