who wants to hear my thoughts about characters in supernatural saying “bite me” versus “eat me”. well i’m sharing (copied from one of my serializd reviews)
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on account of the necessary lack of swearing in this network tv show, characters tend to say "bite me" or "eat me" a lot. However, though the insulting nature of the phrase is understood no matter the gender of the person saying it, for the whole show, men always say "bite me" and women always say "eat me". in my own experience, I get a lot of looks from people, as a woman, for jokingly saying things like "i like as much as the next guy". straight and cis people tend to be very unwilling to even jokingly refer to themselves, or others, with the wrong pronouns or gendered language, even when it's a turn of phrase. this was so consistent throughout the series, that i'm pretty sure the first episode i remember a female character saying bite me, i wrote noted it in my review. i think it was claire, but ill go back and check.
the MOSTT interesting part of all of this, is that the very first time anyone says either phrase, it’s dean. and dean actually says “eat me” instead of “bite me” (the benders; “eat me…no wait you actually might”.) from then on, it becomes a gendered thing. although this is clearly a cannibalism joke, “bite me” could’ve also worked, and every later instance of either phrase is specific to their gender, joking or not. compared to other characters in the series, dean seems to be one of the few who doesn’t mind referring to himself with the “wrong” gendered phrases; he calls himself sam’s mother, the my “my boobs are real” joke early in season one. if i am correct and the first woman to say bite me is claire, then the other notable exception to this rule is the lesbian. when nearly every other character makes jokes and fights back with strictly gendered insults, except for the lesbian, who already breaks gendered stereotypes, so doesn’t concern herself with making her insults match up with her gender, it also lends itself to a queer reading of dean. which i know you guys on here obviously support, so i am literally preaching to the choir, but it’s something small that stood out to me lol.
additionally this makes me think about the origins of the phrase i guess. “bite me” obviously means suck my dick, do this degrading sex act, etc, but it’s also inviting a painful experience for the guy? but eat me is meant the same way you say you’re eating someone out, which is still meant to degrade the person you’re talking to, but it’s not a painful experience for the woman. which in this case is one of the only female gendered insults i can think of that’s not….insulting to the woman? this is giving her a position of power, but she’s not getting her dick bitten off. but even male gendered insults like son of a bitch or bastard are still insulting the woman. “eat me” just means she’s getting head. anyway supernatural rewatch thoughts
