different person here but also, dean does constantly compare sam to female characters, especially in the early seasons, which is a big part of the reason i (and others) think dean somewhat sees sam as a women/questions his masculinity
i understand that, anon, and i also think supernatural was made in 2005 and the writers were/are misogynistic. this falls away more in the later seasons, especially when dean becomes more comfortable in his own masculinity and femininity and isn’t performing to the degree he is in originally. i don’t take much stake in this as a reading unless it takes into account that dean is the one who is narratively compared to women (he’s named after his grandma, deanna, compared to mary, has baby as a metaphor for his body who he refers to as she/her, is a direct comparison to amara, etc.) and is chastised for being too emotional by sam. it’s not to say that they’re invalid readings, or that headcanons aren’t perfectly okay, but i think when we’re comparing two characters who are written as men (particularly cis men) in canon, discussing who is more girl coded is just odd to me. that’s my personal opinion. i’m a big fan of transnatural as well, so this not a criticism of that by any means. headcanons, fanart, fanfic, etc. do not have to be based in canon. but i stand by my belief that many of the people who say sam is girl coded in canon are particularly focused on the pain and shame of femininity, and i just don’t like to think in that way. i think we could better focus on characters who are written to be women.