Supernatural's depiction of consent issues and rape
[Trigger warning: consent issues, rape, torture and mental health issues]
The Supernatural writers are fairly inconsistent with their attitude to rape. Overall, it is possible to divide their depictions into 3 categories: rape as drama, rape as comedy, and rape that is unacknowledged as such by the narrative.
Occasionally, the Supernatural writers will have a sudden realisation that rape is a nasty experience to go through and a character might be affected by it. A chance, perhaps, to portray rape sensitively?
Of course not. Itâs used as shocking drama. The two best examples of this are Bela Talbot and Sam Winchester.
For much of season 3, Bela is an unlikable character. Sheâs amoral and ruthless and appears to lack empathy. Sheâs even revealed, in Red Sky At Morning, to have killed a family member.
Then, in Time Is On My Side, it is revealed that she was raped/sexually abused as a child. She doesnât share this information with Dean or Sam; instead, she says of her parents, âThey were lovely people. And I killed them. And I got rich. I canât be bothered to give a damn.â This is consistent with her previous characterisation of being determinedly independent regardless of her circumstance.
Although this was a dramatic reveal in her last episode, there are earlier hints of her history, such as in Red Sky At Morning, when Dean asked, âHey, Bela, howâd you get like this, huh? What, Daddy not give you enough hugs or something?â and, later, when she said, âYou wouldnât understand, no one did. Never mind, Iâll just do what Iâve always done, Iâll deal with it myselfâ. However, for the most part, this reveal was a surprise that subverted the audienceâs beliefs about Bela, turning her from an unsympathetic and unlikable character into a more sympathetic character who had experienced terrible things in her childhood. The revelation also parallels Dean, who was also abused by his father, albeit in a very different way.
So here, Belaâs rape/sexual abuse is used to shock the audience. To some extent, this is a good thing - rape is shocking and you canât predict whether someone has been raped or not. However, this revelation was only a few scenes before she died. The only reason why this revelation happened was to shock the audience and make her death sad. This revelation added depth to her character, as it made her behaviour make a lot more sense, but it could have happened much earlier; the only reason it didnât (and was saved until her death episode) was for shock value.
Personally, I donât like the use of rape for shock value, because it turns a traumatic event into something used solely for drama. In her final episode, Bela is made memorable because of bad things that happened to her, not anything she herself did. Rape survivors are often reduced to this one aspect of their life (that they didnât choose), being seen as victims whose lives and selves have been ruined. In Belaâs final scenes, she isnât portrayed as someone in control of her life, but as a victim, whose life was shortened and ruined by her rape(s).
This is better than using rape for comedy, but it is still problematic.
The other main case of rape being used as drama in Supernatural is Sam, who has been raped by Lucifer while in Hell (judging from Luciferâs comments). Iâve ranted about this before, but Samâs Hell is seen as much worse than Deanâs and there is an argument (mostly on Castielâs part, but also supported by Death) that Sam shouldnât be rescued from Hell because the after-effects are so great. Given how much rape is emphasised in Samâs Hell (unlike in Deanâs), the show implies that being raped is much worse than being tortured (which doesnât really make any sense). Thereâs a belief in society that rape is worse than anything else, especially death (which it is often compared to), which places an unfair burden on rape survivors, because they are seen as not having fought hard enough to stop the rape merely because they werenât killed during the assault. So this view is very problematic and reinforces peopleâs ideas about rape.
Samâs hallucinations have been emphasised as debilitating (in a way that none of Deanâs PTSD symptoms were) and Lucifer frequently refers to raping Sam. Thereâs no reason why he should emphasise this over other tortures of Sam - heâs an archangel, Iâm sure he could torture Sam in other traumatic ways too - except because it seems more dramatic if Samâs been raped than if heâs just been tortured. Itâs something that people can imagine (unlike Deanâs torture of having his body sliced up) and it reflects society, in this case the high rape rates in prisons. However, Sam doesnât seem specifically traumatised by being raped - he doesnât seem afraid of other men, for example, and he isnât triggered when heâs tied to Beckyâs bed in Time For A Wedding. Obviously, not everyone reacts to rape in the same way, but aside from the explicit comments from Lucifer, thereâs no sign that he was raped, which suggests that Sam was raped because the writers thought it was dramatic and edgy, rather than because they wanted to explore the emotional response of someone whoâs experienced rape. And I say this because they donât seem to have put any thought into that at all, not even Sam occasionally looking nervous around groups of men or situations that might resemble his experiences.
I would love it if Sam had been raped and the show actually dealt with it. But instead itâs used as a dramatic shock and not much else.
âThe wittier rapeâ - when Supernatural sees rape as funny
No. Just no. Just never, ever make rape jokes or puns or comics or anything that uses rape around words or anything that are supposed to be funny.Â
The Supernatural writers disagree with me. I know this, because they make rape jokes on a regular basis.Â
For example, in Repo Man, Lucifer refers to, âThe rapier wit - the wittier rapeâ, which is clearly supposed to be seen as clever wordplay.
Seriously, rape should never be used in clever wordplay or any sort of humour. Itâs treated flippantly by society and making jokes about it reinforces the idea that rape isnât a serious issue and rape jokes often trigger rape survivors.
Anyway, there are other jokes/references to Lucifer raping Sam, such as âLong time, no spooningâ in Meet The New Boss. But Repo Man and The Born-Again Identity both try to make Lucifer quirkily likable. Heâs witty and entertaining and youâre clearly supposed to love him.
This is really problematic, because although a rapist can be witty and charming, portraying a rapist (who raped a main character) as likable (and wanting the audience to like him) is awful. No one seems to acknowledge that Luciferâs presence (regardless of what heâs doing) might be traumatic to Sam. The audience are supposed to look past Luciferâs torturing and raping Sam and laugh at his zany antics.
Rape should never be portrayed as something you can âlook pastâ, because too often in real life, rapistsâ actions are ignored because theyâre charming or likable people. Their victims are criticised for talking about their experiences, in case they ruin the rapistâs life (as if the rapist doesnât deserve to be held accountable for their crime). Making Lucifer a likable character reinforces these views, which is harmful for rape survivors.
Even aside from Lucifer, Sam seems to be the target of a lot of consent-related humour this season. Time For A Wedding, for example, features Becky drugging him with a love potion and marrying him. Fortunately, she doesnât rape him (sex with him in this state would be rape), but she clearly wants to. I donât know if the writers chose not to have her rape him because they realised it would be rape, but given that she is portrayed sympathetically (well, pathetically, but youâre meant to sympathise with her) I donât think they really understood that it was rape.Â
That whole episode was incredibly offensive, because it relied on the premise that Becky gave Sam a love potion and forced him to marry her, and that this was hilarious. It was presented as a zany, fun episode, which makes it even worse. Consent issues were seen as a joke. I think this is partly because Sam is huge, so the thought of him being knocked out/tied up/forced into anything by someone, especially a small woman, is strange. But men are raped too, sometimes by women, but they are rarely believed because people think a woman raping a man is ridiculous and funny. These narratives hurt rape survivors.
Time For A Wedding also falls into the âsympathetic rapistâ trap, although in a different way from Luciferâs episodes. Here, Becky is seen as desperate and pathetic. She drugs Sam out of love (or at least a desire for love). Connecting rape and love is very common in the media, but extremely harmful - rape and love are not connected at all, but people assume that rape within a relationship isnât as serious as other rape and that rape is a sign of love. This is both damaging and offensive, and can be triggering to rape survivors.
Dean, however, doesnât escape rape or rape jokes, as is clear in Clap Your Hands If You Believe. During the episode, Dean is sexually assaulted or raped (itâs unclear which) by Oberon. Soulless!Sam asks, âDean? Did you service Oberon, King of the Fairies?â and Deanâs reaction obviously means he did (âserviceâ, in this case, has a sexual connotation so would definitely mean sexual assault or rape). Dean also acknowledges that there was a âprobing tableâ.Â
Yet this is all passed off as a joke. Soulless!Sam finds it funny, and the audience is clearly supposed to as well.
This isnât the first time Supernatural has used the âprobing is hilarious tropeâ. It previously appeared in Tall Tales, when a douchey frat boy was abducted and probed (i.e. sexually assaulted) repeatedly. This incident was clearly supposed to be funny, as it was followed by the alien slow dancing with him (which also reinforces the problematic idea that rape/sexual assault are related to romance). Furthermore, this was portrayed as something that he deserved, which reinforces victim-blaming narratives that some people deserve to be raped (which of course are harmful to rape survivors).Â
These examples are worse than the occasional rape joke. The Supernatural writers are presenting sexual assault and rape of men as inherently funny. This is appalling. Male rape survivors are hardly believed as it is - even less than female survivors - because people donât believe that men can be raped or because they believe it wouldnât be traumatic but would instead be a funny or enjoyable experience. This is an attitude that should be challenged by the media, not perpetuated by it.Â
Rape that is unacknowledged as such by the narrative
There are a number of cases where someone - usually male - does something that is rape to another person, but without any other characters acknowledging any issues with this behaviour. Frequently (although not always), the rapist is a likable and sympathetic character.
The first example of this is in Simon Says, when the audience is introduced to the character of Andy. He is introduced by leaving a block of flats and looking up, where an attractive (in fact, out of his league), scantily-clad woman leans out and waves. The implication is that heâs had sex with her. As this is part of a montage of Andy using his mind control to get things from people, it is strongly implied that he used his mind control to persuade this woman to have sex with him. This is rape.Â
Yet Andy is clearly supposed to be liked by the audience. Heâs a red herring, who insists on joining Sam and Dean to save his ex girlfriend. After meeting him, Dean even believes that Andy canât be guilty of murder, which is very similar to the idea that rapists cannot be guilty, because of their other traits. Itâs obvious that Andy is intended to be liked, because heâs brought back in All Hell Breaks Loose, where he is one of the characters the audience must care about/not want to die. Andy is presented as a quirky, likable (if strange) character.
But, if heâs used mind control to make someone have sex with him, heâs also a rapist.
Yet this is barely acknowledged by the narrative. Andy says he never used his powers on his ex girlfriend, but she is clearly the exception. No one points out to him that his behaviour (in using his powers for sex) is wrong.
Later, in All Hell Breaks Loose, he tells Sam that he used his powers on someone he  disliked to make them have gay porn playing in their head constantly. At the very least, this is sexual harassment; I would classify this as sexual assault. Yet this is seen as a funny, cool thing that Andy did.
The other example of a likable main character raping someone is in The French Mistake, when itâs heavily implied that Sam has sex with meta!Gen while she believes heâs meta!Jared. She leads him upstairs seductively and he follows. Itâs unclear if anything happened, but itâs implied that they had sex. This is rape, because she thinks heâs her husband. However, no one on the show mentions any consent issues with this, and the character in question is Sam, who is generally the sensitive and moral character on the show. The audience is not supposed to see an issue in this.
This is awful. It reinforces rape culture and implies that itâs completely OK to deceive women into having sex with men (or, in this case, raping women).
(This scene would still be incredibly problematic if Dean did it, but Sam is always seen as the better of the two, so itâs especially bad that the moral character doesnât see a problem with this and implies itâs something that any normal and nice guy would do with no moral issues whatsoever.)
A similar example, albeit with an unlikable character, is in Two And A Half Men, when the shapeshifter impersonates womenâs husbands and has sex with the women, then collects the baby afterwards.
Like Sam and meta!Gen, this is rape. However, the narrative never seems to acknowledge this. The impersonated men divorce their wives for infidelity, but no one seems to think about the consent issues and that these women have been raped. This is terrible. It implies that womenâs experiences donât matter and reinforces peopleâs beliefs that deceiving women so they have sex with men is a normal and unremarkable thing to do, which makes it easier for rapists to justify their behaviour and increases peopleâs tendency to blame rape survivors for what happened to them.
âDid you ever think there was a girl in here?â - The vessel problem
Firstly, Iâm going to quote an interview with Sera Gamble.
I need to take a few sentences to gush over âI Know What You Did Last Summer.â The script was gorgeous, as was Jaredâs performance of Sam at his absolute lowest point. You gave him some outstanding material to work with. Out of all your scripts, that so far is my favorite. Having said that, did the ridiculous fan debate about Sam being a rapist prompt you to give Ruby an empty shell to inhabit (great line, by the way, âAl Gore would be proudâ) or was that the plan all along?
We started work on the episode before any debate began that I know of, so none of it was a reaction. But we did know that Sam having sex with a demon would be provocative. Actually, I was very excited to work on the episode. People do a lot of otherwise unthinkable things when theyâre grieving. Who doesnât want to write the episode where a character theyâve worked on for 70 episodes does stuff heâd otherwise never do?
But anyway, the state of Rubyâs body was the subject of much conversation, mostly because I couldnât shut up about it. I just couldnât get past the rape thing. I think I actually disappointed some people I work with, who thought Iâd be tougher or darker or something. Or possibly just didnât care as much as I did one way or another. But I took a lot of writersâ room time talking about it. And ultimately took the long way around so I could get her into a vaguely more morally acceptable body. I readily admit itâs rather silly, and the mechanics are contrived â thatâs why I leaned into the joke so much.
Gambleâs choice of words is interesting - she implies that the other writers see having a main character rape someone as dark and tough, with the implication that someone not wanting their likable, relatable main character to be a rapist is weak.
WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE? Thereâs an attitude in society - this isnât the first time Iâve seen this - that having a likable rapist is edgy and cool.
NO IT FUCKING ISNâT. Itâs offensive and damaging because then real rape survivors are told that they should let their experiences go because their rapist is so nice. It reinforces the culture of forgiving âniceâ rapists while condemning people who have a problem with rape as having something wrong with them, while people who like rapists and can look past their behaviour to the âperson withinâ are seen as morally superior.
Itâs fucking disgusting, basically.
Anyway, aside from Sera Gamble, the writing staff donât seem to care that an angel or demon has someone inside them if they have sex. There are some cases where itâs not certain whether or not someone is a rapist, such as the demon Meg. Weâve seen her flirt with people (mainly Castiel), but she hasnât had sex on-screen with anyone. However, given that Meg Masters in Are You There God? Itâs Me, Dean Winchester called the demon a âslutâ, I think itâs likely that Meg has had sex and therefore raped Meg Masters; whether sheâs raped her second vessel is unclear.
Occasionally this is handwaived away with a reference to the vessel - Meg says to Castiel in Caged Heat, âKeep talking dirty - it makes my meat suit all dewyâ and Lilith tells Sam in The Monster At The End Of This Book, âDonât worry. The dental hygienist in here? She wants it badâ.
Especially as both of these examples are after I Know What You Did Last Summer (in which Gamble brought up this issue), the writers must be aware that a demon having sex with someone while possessing a live person would be rape (which is presumably why it hasnât happened yet). However, the vessel experiencing a physiological reaction isnât a sign that they are able to consent. (Even in real life, some rape survivors experience physiological reactions to their attack. This is still rape, but people are less likely to believe these survivors. Supernatural shouldnât reinforce these attitudes.) Even if Lilithâs vessel really wants to have sex with Sam, she isnât in a position where she is able to consent, because Lilith is going to make the decision to have sex whether the unfortunate dental hygienist wants to or not. Sex with a demon when they are possessing a live person is rape.
Although the writers seem to have a vague awareness of this (hence their comments about their vesselsâ arousal), this knowledge flies out of the window as soon as angels are involved. Balthazar, for example, in The Third Man, says, âThis morning I had a mĂŠnage Ă - whatâs French for twelve?â This means heâs raped his vessel repeatedly.Â
Castiel and Meg having sex wouldnât just mean raping Megâs vessel but also Jimmy, if heâs still alive. Similarly, when Dean takes Castiel to a brothel in Free To Be You And Me, not only are there consent issues in Dean pressuring Castiel to have sex, but if Castiel did have sex with Chastity and Jimmy were still alive then Castiel would be raping Jimmy. In The Born-Again Identity, if Jimmy is still alive in his body, then Daphne and Castiel having sex would mean raping him. Given that Gamble wrote that episode, I take it as a sign that either Castiel and Daphne hadnât had sex (and, letâs face it, they didnât seem that into each other) or Jimmy is dead. As theyâre married, youâre meant to assume (presumably) that they have had sex, so Jimmy is presumed dead.
But this hasnât been made clear. There has been no comment from Castiel or anyone else that he is dead. Itâs as if itâs irrelevant, which is problematic in relation to the overall story, but especially when it comes to Castiel and sex. By not making it clear, the impression is that it doesnât matter if Castiel rapes Jimmy. I expect this is partly because Jimmy is male and most people associate rape with women, but this is still terrible. Male rape survivors are often forgotten, because people see rape as something that only affects women. This reinforces that attitude.
And none of these occasions are called out. No one ever points out that an angel having sex is raping their vessel. Balthazar is portrayed as a charming and likable character and his sexual escapades are a running joke. But they are references to his raping his vessel. Yet no one mentions this!
In conclusion, Supernatural either uses rape as a dramatic shock or itâs downplayed to comedy or completely ignored. All of these are offensive and perpetuate harmful ideas about rape and rape survivors. If Supernatural wants to deal with rape and with murky consent in general (i.e. their main characters possessing other people), they need to think about and research the issues theyâre dealing with, not just reducing them to comedy or drama or ignoring them completely.
