#pro john

Their situation was less than ideal, John himself admitted as much (and expressed his desire for Sam and Dean to have a normal life), and Dean is one of those unfortunate souls who grew up a little too fast, because he was an older sibling with a single parent. This means baby-sitting, this means cooking, this means having to “be the man of the house” when Dad is away. It’s common in families with a single working parent (or two working parents) who can’t afford a baby-sitter because they are not middle class.

Dean also offered emotional support both to John and Sam, because it’s in his nature (he was doing show in that flashback in Heaven, he saw that his mother was upset and even as a four year old he reached out and tried to comfort her), and John let him, because he needed the help. It was unfair to Dean, and John apologized for it, it surely plays a part in some of Dean’s issues, but there is not ONE parent on Earth who hasn’t done some wrong by their kid. Not one. It doesn’t make him a monster, it doesn’t mean that he didn’t do his job as a parent. In Dean’s own words: “He did a hell of a lot more good than he did bad.”

John wasn’t more focused on revenge than being a father, otherwise Sam and Dean wouldn’t be alive, because a traumatized four year old can’t take care of himself and his six months old brother. This means that John HAD to tend to them. Not to mention that he proved that his sons were more important than revenge when he gave up the Colt AND the chance to kill Azazel by giving his soul to save Dean instead.

John didn’t create the circumstances of Sam and Dean’s childhood, Azazel did. John was handed a big pile of crap, he watched his world turn upside down as he found out that MONSTERS were real and that his family was a target and he was left to learn a) how to deal with this new reality, b) how to keep not only himself but his sons alive through all that. He ended up training them “as soldiers” to do that, he ended up moving them around to not risk their safety, and he made tons of mistakes along the way. It doesn’t mean that he was a monster who did everything wrong, it doesn’t mean that he’s THE reason why Sam and Dean are not well-adjusted. John isn’t to blame if Sam and Dean didn’t have a normal childhood, he wasn’t the one who chose this for them: he was stuck between a rock and a hard place. “Do you want your kids to live but never have a normal life or do you want to ignore that you will probably have to watch them die like your wife for the illusion of a peaceful reality?” Yeah, both options sound GREAT.

Not to mention that the biggest traumas in Sam and Dean’s life came long after John was dead and gone.

(You can give your interpretation of the text, you can project your feelings, you can headcanon John as the worst abusive monster ever or as The Reason of all his sons’ problems, but that’s your headcanon and your interpretation of a text that DIDN’T show John as an irredeemable abusive monster, but rather as a human being in a grey area, who did good and did bad, who tried to do his best with what he was given and didn’t always succeed, who sometimes got angry and lashed out, etc. - not unlike his sons, actually -. 

First of all, he wasn’t that constant presence in their life as kids as many people like to believe: he used to be one of their baby-sitters, then he chased them all out of his property with a fucking shotgun, and the next time he saw them they were “grown”. Which probably means season 1 of the show, because I highly doubt that John would have left his kids with Bobby again after all that and the boys didn’t seem to know him that well anymore.

Bobby became a father figure, he helped them when in need, he was a guide, but only after John’s death. I hate it when people glorify Bobby’s role in Sam and Dean’s life as if he had always been a substitute for John. John was the one who raised his kids, not Bobby, and saying otherwise is so fucking disrespectful to this single father in this hellish situation. 

I can’t really understand how anyone could think that the boys would have been better off growing up with Bobby than with John, tbh. One of the biggest complaints against John is “He was an alcholic!!!”, when in reality we have never seen John drinking that much on screen (I recall like one scene of him having a drink, maybe?) and the only thing we have is Sam saying that when John drinks he has a temper. Which doesn’t mean that he is always drunk or that he beats his kids, for the record. But Bobby? Bobby was a straight up alcholic who passed his abusive father’s advice to Dean (”Just because it kills your liver it doesn’t mean it ain’t medicine”). 

He also was way more emotionally abusive than John has ever been on screen. 

People like to blame Dean’s attempts to be a “macho guy” in the beginning of the show on John, who supposedly told him that crying was unmanly, hugging was for girls etc. 

Mmh. Are those tears, John?

What are you doing, you are supposed to think that’s unmanly!!!

Goddammit John.

But seriously. The guy spent half of his time on screen crying, he straight up hugged Dean when he saw him (and Dean immediately went for the hug, he didn’t hesitate, he knew that his father wouldn’t refuse him a hug, which shows that John didn’t shame him for wanting to show physical affection), we learn in season 12 that he talked to Dean about Mary, about how they first met, what her favourite song was, etc, and he also openly talked to Sam about his feelings in 1x20. Dean’s attempt to be more masculine probably originates from the fact that John was a naturally “manly looking” guy and Dean wanted to be like him (Dean has a natural “pretty face”). 

Meanwhile, Bobby’s character is typically shown to be uncomfortable with displays of affection, and sometimes it’s crancky, sassy, and funny, sometimes it’s more emotionally abusive.

Like here:

You stupid, stupid son of a bitch! Well, boo hoo, I am so sorry your feelings are hurt, princess! Are you under the impression that family’s supposed to make you feel good?! Make you an apple pie, maybe? They’re supposed to make you miserable! That’s why they’re family!

I’m sorry, what?

Sam almost chocked Dean, Dean was clearly devastated, Dean expressed his feelings, says that he’s tired of chasing Sam, places the burden of Sam’s actions on Sam… And Bobby invalidates everything, with a “suck it up princess” and a reminder that family is… supposed to hurt you…? No, what the fuck, it isn’t. Suffering is a collateral effect of love, but family is not family because they make you miserable, what are you talking about?

Then there’s also Bobby using John to guilt trip Dean:

DEANI told him, “you walk out that door, don’t come back” and he walked out anyway! That was his choice!

BOBBYYou sound like a whiny brat. No, you sound like your dad. Well, let me tell you something. Your dad was a coward.

DEANMy dad was a lot of things, Bobby, but a coward?

BOBBYHe’d rather push Sam away than reach out to him. Well, that don’t strike me as brave. You are a better man than your daddy ever was. So you do both of us a favor. Don’t be him.

Aside from the fact that really, John was anything but a coward, Bobby brought up John pushing Sam away for the college thing as a way to guilt trip Dean into not making the same mistake. “If you do this, you are as bad as your father”. Really, Bobby?

Bobby was, in general, a big fan of gendered insults. But yeah, John was the one who showed toxic masculinity, sure thing.

There’s also the fact that Bobby didn’t tell Dean about Sam being alive in season 6. Bobby saw how devastated Dean was in 2x22, how could he keep this from him? 

But let’s pretend he had no idea how bad Dean was affected by this, okay? Dean told him. He told him how devastated he was knowing that Sam was gone, he was angry at Bobby for keeping it from him… And Bobby said he wasn’t sorry because he truly believed to be entitled to decide what was best for Dean, in spite of what Dean himself said.

Bobby blamed Dean for being upset when soulless!Sam turned him into a vampire, but then he gave the cold shoulder to Sam because soulless!Sam had attempted to kill him. He always preaches to Dean about how Sam is his responsibility and he is supposed to ignore his own feelings, but when Dean died in 3x16 Bobby let Sam go to drink his own grief away (which is understandable, but it’s an interesting double standard). 

The thing is, Bobby is a judgemental person. He unapologetically judges John for his choices and actions without even knowing the full story (as proven for example by his comment on Sam leaving for Stanford: it was a fight, Sam insulted him too and he wanted to leave, his reading of the whole thing is so inaccurate because it wasn’t John who wanted to cut off contact - after the heat of the moment -, it was Sam, who cut off ties with Dean too), he judges Dean whenever he expresses negative feelings (in general regarding Sam), but in the mean time he never holds himself accountable for his actions and he has the habit of feeling sorry for himself and taking his frustrations out on those around him.

He also gives some horrifying speeches, really. Right next to the “boo-oh princess” one, there’s the “You are not a person” in season 7 to Dean. 

Yeah, he took Dean out to throw a baseball once. So did John. And he brought his kids to Grand Canyon and to wrestling matches. 

Bobby didn’t raise Sam and Dean, John did. Bobby wasn’t the one who had to change diapers, wake up in the middle of the night because Sam was crying, try to figure out how to manage a traumatized 4 year old (Dean didn’t talk in the beginning after the fire) and an infant while grieving his wife and trying to figure out how to deal with a whole new world of monsters. John wasn’t blindly focused on his grief, otherwise Sam and Dean wouldn’t be here, because kids that young can’t survive on their own. Based on what we have in canon, I think that Bobby probably wouldn’t have managed to do what John did, he probably would have drowned everything in alchol instead of shoving his grief aside just enough raise his kids. Because that’s what he did when Dean died in season 3 (and the argument that Sam was an adult is pretty weak, because he may have been an adult but he still needed his father figure, he could have got himself killed very easily, and yet Bobby shut himself off, because it wasn’t a rational, thought-out reaction and there’s no reason to believe that the same thing wouldn’t have happened had Sam been six months old). 

Let’s be clear: even though here I’ve focused on the negative that Bobby has done, I don’t hate him nor I think that he was a completely negative influence on Sam and Dean. As I’ve already said, he helped them and was there for them after John’s death, overall their relatioship wasn’t abusive, but he did do some emotionally abusive things, he was hurtful a lot of times and he really wasn’t as selfless as most people try to make him out to be, he could be pretty self-absorbed (I mean, the whole thing with his soul… He sold it for information, he started working on getting it back without telling anything to Sam and Dean and then he… blamed them for not helping him…? You gotta ask if you want something, you can’t be mad because they won’t do something that you didn’t ask for in the first place). 

Yet, people like to place him on a pedestal and blame John for things that they assume he did and that Bobby actually did, but somehow it’s justifiable because… What, it’s ‘tough love’? The boys weren’t kids anymore? I find it ridiculous that people argue that Bobby should have raised Sam and Dean when he drank way more than John and he often insulted them. And no, he wouldn’t have avoided that had they been kids, that’s not how it works. You don’t get comfortable with emotional vulnerability just because you are around kids, and also raising kids is fucking stressful and in stressful/extreme emotional situations Bobby has often reacted very poorly.