Hi. Since you seem to be a Cas-understander with a good grasp of canon, do you mind helping me figure something out? I have a SPN theory that hinges on just how much Castiel's actions are motivated by guilt. I mean, I know they are MASSIVELY motivated by a desire to fix the stuff he thinks he broke (and often did break), but my question is: How many instances can you think of where Castiel helped spontaneously, without being asked or there being some perceived kind of debt or exchange? I can only think of the example of him healing that baby's mystery illness, and tbh I've forgotten the context of that. Oh and there was that case he took while Sam and Dean were imprisoned by the feds... bc of angel business... nevermind. Everything else is either requested (including his rebellion, though that was a Big Ask and is what my theory is about), a bribe (Soulless Sam), self-inflicted punishment, or a debt that's owed (Claire). Just... in a show about two brothers who do the shittiest volunteer work possible but which they actively seek out bc they want to help people - and sometimes kill things, but mostly it's about helping - Cas seems kind of passive until something forces his hand.
well there are a couple situations where he works cases - golden time and gimme shelter, for example. and arguably heaven can't wait - he calls dean for help in that episode but he does take initiative there. and he frequently helps people who ask him to, often other angels (see: season nine and early season ten angel plots; rachel's approach to him in the man who would be king). and of course dean, as you said. and i'll throw in kelly as well.
but you've hit on something interesting about cas because he is in fact extremely passive. he tends to just sort of stand there and wait for someone to give him an order, which, you know, kind of makes sense. he spent billions of years doing just that, it's what he's used to. so in the first few seasons, he mostly does that. then a bunch of bad things happen at least nominally because of choices he made, and that natural passivity turns into trauma-induced learned helplessness. he essentially learns that he can't do anything right, and reacts by trying to yoke himself to the nearest authority figure. i've written or reblogged a lot of posts about cas and choice and post-godstiel trauma generally, here's a selection that i might suggest:
on honey cas specifically: one / two / three
on his reactions to godstiel arc: one / two / three
on cas and free will generally: one / two / three / four
also, interestingly, the vast majority of his conflict is based in this tendency to do what other people tell him: most of his conflict is about divided loyalties, where he's trying to obey two different sets of people who hate each other, and eventually has to choose between them (usually but not always heaven vs. the winchesters).
also, interestingly, when he does help people proactively, it's him acting as a hunter (as noted before, in golden time, gimme shelter, and heaven can't wait, as well as a bunch of times offscreen in the dabb era when he goes hunting with jack bc they didn't feel like paying misha and alcal that episode). so that's something he learns from salmondean and from being around them, it's not something he would have thought of before, being an angel, essentially expected for most of his existence to be a machine that follows orders. but it also doesn't make a ton of sense - in stairway to heaven, we see cas ordering a contingent of his army to go help people with their angel powers at the local hospital, which, if later, after that falls apart, he wanted to help people, is something he could do instead of hunting, so it's interesting to see him functioning essentially according to expectations rather than thinking logically about what would help, but cas have never been the most logical guy in the universe.
and the thing is that this has a doylist explanation: cas is a side character. salmondean, as protagonists, have to Do The Plot, and cas has to just sort of sit there waiting for them to tell him what to do. this is why, for example, cas is the only one who is allowed to show his trauma and issues by collapsing and being unable to do stuff (as opposed to hitting things and yelling and drinking and flinching but still accomplishing tasks at the same rate as normal). and it's also why he only does things when other people ask: because his motivations don't really matter to the narrative, so they don't really exist.
but also re: your ask: i also think it's... kind of strange? to conceptualize such an intense moral distinction between types of motivation, and between active and passive. but let me play in the space for a few paragraphs and see where it takes me.
so like... the winchesters seem to also be significantly motivated by other things? like, revenge (notably sam in the pilot, because he wanted out of the hunting life and didn't change his mind until jessica, but also a lot of moments in the later seasons like dean killing the stynes or moriah), or family obligation (i feel like this is obvious), or, yes, guilt (at the end of season seven, once dean isn't keeping him in the life, sam dips immediately, and then when dean comes back he guilt trips him aggressively with the potential people he could have saved until sam is broken down, and this is when sam seems to give up his dream of leaving hunting; in what is and what should never be, it seems like dean's main motivation for leaving the dream instead of just dying in there, happy, is the guilt of all the people he's not saving.
plus, as the show goes on, they seem less and less interested in saving people. for example, in season eleven, sam has a few episodes of like "hey maybe we should try prioritizing saving people instead of just killing things" and dean is like you pussy idiot. and then sam is taught a lesson in 11x06 (someone literally says "pacifism doesn't pay" in it) and reverts back to the old ways of not...... really caring about victims all that much. but even in the beginning saving people was kind of a tenuous goal at best. in season four, sam and dean have this big argument over sam's powers, and sam's argument is that the powers save people instead of just killing them, and dean's argument is that... using inhuman abilities makes sam a monster and monsters are bad. and in the end, dean's side is endorsed by the narrative. so like the "saving people" in "saving people, hunting things" is frequently just sort of a bonus.
i mean, look at stairway to heaven, the episode where cas has angels (including one called flagstaff) helping people at the local hospital:
FLAGSTAFF: No. Can I go? I have lives to save.
DEAN: Welcome to the club. [FLAGSTAFF smirks] Something funny?
FLAGSTAFF: Not funny "ha ha." But you thinking you help people -- it's amusing. I help people. A clogged artery here, a tumor there. I do good in this world. You -- you believe every problem can be solved with a gun. You play the hero, but underneath the hype, you're a killer with oceans of blood on his hands. I hate men like you.
dean has no answer for this, and ends up just physically assaulting her. and in the end, dean ends up semi-purposefully wrecking cas' whole organization, a group whose purpose was to help angels and organize them into a nonabusive form of government, because cas can't be allowed to make choices outside of following dean's orders (echoes of godstiel arc here). like cas is actually punished for any attempts at agency he takes, including attempts to help people. so it kinda makes sense that he's like... not big on initiative.
and re: the distinction you make between active and passive altruism, how is going out and actively trying to help people so different from giving help when asked? especially if you compare him to the winchesters, who frequently refuse requests for help (especially from cas, actually). which smacks of their desire to help people maybe having more to do with control than help.
