Wow that thread is just so bad. The lack of common sense and fandom and media awareness combined with what seems to be a willful, deliberate determination to make Jensen the villain.
I agree with you. Making room for people to feel hurt or sad doesn't mean having to tolerate these extreme bad faith takes against Jensen. It doesn't mean condoning these kinds of bad takes.
Couple of things I want to elaborate on--firstly, even in media with loudly openly queer romances and characters, the homophobes show up and start trolling. Secondly, Misha's very open and loud support for queer Cas in love with Dean did absolutely nothing to shut down the denialism about queer Cas or slow down the hatred targeting the ship and shippers. Thirdly, Jensen is allowed his opinions on a character he plays, Jensen said nothing at purcon hurtful or attacking anyone for having their view, he didn't say anything vitriolic, while he was being badgered in person. Fourthly, blaming him for hateful people existing is about the same as Misha antis who claim his support of queer Cas is responsible for ruining the fandom etc.
There is no stopping the hate trolls.
Every fandom. EVERY FANDOM.
Some people on the destiel side claimed for years that if only we had this or that thing, the hate would stop. Guess what, we got some of those things.
What happened? The hate just kept on going.
Some people even started rooting for canon destiel just to shut the antis up.
Not because they wanted to see it. Not because they felt it made sense for the characters or story. Not for representation. No, they just wanted to just the antis up.
That thread is fully off the rails and it is malicious and it insinuates anyone who doesn't have an issue with Jensen is part of the problem too, it throws insinuations on destiel shippers who are vocal and supportive of queer Cas and destiel lenses while we put our foot down about the hatred flung at Jensen.
I also fail to see how anything he said at purcon was "homophobic rhetoric." That is not a reasonable assessment of what happened whatsoever.
But hey if that account is going to blame Jensen for making antidestiels behave like dicks on the internet
I'm allowed to repeat something I said recently, how some people in the destiel lane are a harm to it and to its goals and they help make the destiel lane less welcoming, not more welcoming, and are harming good faith relations with Jensen and Misha, and adding to the hurt destiel shippers have to bear.
Unfortunately things have become so bad that inside the destiel lane the only popularized acceptable viewpoint is to slam Jensen. It's not deserved. And they don't care how much support anyone has given. Anyone who sticks up for Jensen is treated as a sell out or a traitor or a fake destiel shipper etc etc.