*Unpopular Opinion?* I Hated Xander

[sosa lola]

In the early seasons he acts like Buffy 'owes' him something more than friendship and generally behaves like an entitled incel.

Xander was not an incel. From Urban Dictionary: incel means "a person (usually male) who has a horrible personality and treats women like sexual objects and thinks his lack of a sex life comes from being "ugly" when its really just his blatant sexism and terrible attitude. incels have little to no self awareness; even when they see other "ugly" men with girlfriends, they consider these men to be tricksters who have somehow beat the system and can get women despite being cursed with unattractiveness (in other words, they're respectful to women and women are attracted to their personalities, but incels cant comprehend such a phenomenon). they believe that women owe them sex, and many of the more extreme incels like to spend time in incel communities on the internet coming up with ways to make women have sex with them (often involving genocide of people of color, genocide of "Chads" (men who have sex), taking rights away from women, raping them, having sex with women's dead bodies, and other horrid, disgusting things. they cant understand that that is PRECISELY why women want nothing to do with them)."

Xander is attracted to Buffy, but he never acts like she owes him sex. People keep throwing these new fancy terms at Xander when most of them don't really apply. In the good old days, it used to be "Nice Guy", but when you look at the show closely, you'll see that Xander never stated that he deserves Buffy. He wishes that Buffy would notice him, but he never told her or told anyone that Buffy should be with him because he’s a good guy.

Xander never expects any rewards from Buffy. He saved her life more than I could count and never asked for a thank you much less used those times to get into her pants.

Xander can be an immature jerk and he does treat Buffy in regards to Angel horribly. He admits that he did in Amends, and from that episode, he stops doing it. He also reacted badly to Buffy sleeping with Spike, and he does admit that to Buffy in Seeing Red, and in S7 after living with Spike, Xander becomes objective about Spike. He doesn't join Anya and Dawn into hating Spike and he clears Spike's name.

I also find it horrible how he messes with Willow's feelings: all these years he must have known or at least suspected she was in love with him, and he was never interested. Then all of a sudden, when she's not available anymore, he has to have her. Cheating on Cordelia in the process, of course.

Xander was actually interested in Willow. The almost kiss in When She Was Bad proves that, his jealousy over Willow dating Oz, and his "I love you" in Becoming Part 2. He probably tries to ignore his attraction to Willow because he's scared he'll lose her if they break up.

I do agree with you that Xander did treat Buffy and Willow horribly on occasions, but IMO the good outweigh the bad. Xander was the one who did not give up on Buffy in Prophecy Girl even though she had rejected him ( how incel of him, right? ) and saved Buffy's life. Xander was the one who offered himself to Ampata as sacrifice to save Willow's life in Inca Mummy Girl. Putting your life in danger to save the people you love is a huge thing, and not that many people are capable of that, but it never stopped Xander when it came to Buffy and Willow.

And don't even get me started on what he does to Anya. Throughout their relationship, he spends so much time putting her down, making her feel like she's not behaving in the 'right' way, acting like he's always just a little bit ashamed of her.

I agree with @WillowFromBuffy . I thought Xander was a lovely boyfriend, but not a perfect one, who is anyway? Anya wasn't a perfect girlfriend either. How many times does Xander have to tell her to keep their sex life private? She never respected his wishes and blurted about them anyway. How many times does she keep insulting his friends?

Yes, Anya would not survive in the human world if it weren't for Xander guiding her through it. Once she aggravated Giles so much, he considered firing her if it weren't for Xander stepping in.

 

[r2dh2]

For me, Xander is character that I’ve loved, hated and then loved again… “My feelings are changeable but intense.” I think that he’s much simpler and much more complex than stated. He’s not a black-or-white character.

First, he’s a sweet, loyal and loving. He’s fiercely protective of the people he loves and often lets his heart lead the way, which might seem hypocritical at times (for instance, in Selfless). But he’s also often a jerk. I hate the way he treats Anya (more often than not, she’s absolutely irritating but I still dislike his patronizing attitude) and I absolutely hate that he’s extremely judgmental and stubborn.

However, when I look at Xander, I try to assess him with the appropriate lens. He’s basically a teenager and behaves at such (no, this is not “boys will be boys,” this is teenagers are immature and are gradually learning and becoming adults). He’s also living in the late 90s and his behavior closely resembles the behavior of my male friends when I was in high-school and college. Now I might have an objection to the several attitudes that seemed normal back then, but I also can be easy on him on account of the time he was living on.

Xander is also a very insecure man and a product of his environment (dysfunctional and abusive family), Anya rightly calls him out in Entropy and he finally grows up a lot towards the end of S6, acknowledging his mistakes and childish attitudes (I like a lot that he apologizes to Buffy in Seeing Red).

For me, the good outweighs the bad at the end, especially once we know more about his background and how deeply damaged he is. I don’t condone his bad behavior, but I’m willing to give him a chance to work on his bad traits and improve, as he does in S7. IMO, his heart is in the right place most of the time and he slowly learns how to tame his bad personality traits.

 

[OliAnn]

I didn't hate Xander but I never liked him.

 

[Veronique]

I think that I'm mostly indifferent about Xander. He has good moments and bad moments.

 

[thetopher]

Well I never knew I liked Xander until I saw how people hated him. Then I found it was mostly irrational so I defended him and ended up liking him more.

He can be a genuine ass but out of the main cast he's the one is most improved from S1 through to 7, and he does it fairly quietly.

 

[katmobile]

For me, Xander is character that I’ve loved, hated and then loved again… “My feelings are changeable but intense.” I think that he’s much simpler and much more complex than stated. He’s not a black-or-white character.

First, he’s a sweet, loyal and loving. He’s fiercely protective of the people he loves and often lets his heart lead the way, which might seem hypocritical at times (for instance, in Selfless). But he’s also often a jerk. I hate the way he treats Anya (more often than not, she’s absolutely irritating but I still dislike his patronizing attitude) and I absolutely hate that he’s extremely judgmental and stubborn.

However, when I look at Xander, I try to assess him with the appropriate lens. He’s basically a teenager and behaves at such (no, this is not “boys will be boys,” this is teenagers are immature and are gradually learning and becoming adults). He’s also living in the late 90s and his behavior closely resembles the behavior of my male friends when I was in high-school and college. Now I might have an objection to the several attitudes that seemed normal back then, but I also can be easy on him on account of the time he was living on.

Xander is also a very insecure man and a product of his environment (dysfunctional and abusive family), Anya rightly calls him out in Entropy and he finally grows up a lot towards the end of S6, acknowledging his mistakes and childish attitudes (I like a lot that he apologizes to Buffy in Seeing Red).

For me, the good outweighs the bad at the end, especially once we know more about his background and how deeply damaged he is. I don’t condone his bad behavior, but I’m willing to give him a chance to work on his bad traits and improve, as he does in S7. IMO, his heart is in the right place most of the time and he slowly learns how to tame his bad personality traits.

I find it hard to get past how hateful and hypocritical he is at times but yeah I'd agree with much of this and he further develops in the comics.

 

[DeadlyDuo]

I find it hard to get past how hateful and hypocritical he is at times

I agree and I think it is those moments that the hate stems from because he can be quite nasty when he gets going and also the fact he rarely gets called out on his behaviour by the other characters.

Overall he's a generally likeable character but his bad moments sometimes overshadow his good moments.