What if a hierarchy of power, but everyone was in their rightful place?
March 17, 2022 7:56 AM Subscribe
Youtuber Shaun takes a deep dive into the dangerously liberal moral philosophy of the Harry Potter universe. [SLYT 1h48m]
Meanwhile in Scotland: a Twitter user named Joanne continues to support her pals, just like a good friend should.
Meanwhile in Scotland: a Twitter user named Joanne continues to support her pals, just like a good friend should.
I have not watched this video, but the first thing I thought of when I read this post was the Great Chain Of Being, which had every individual in their place along the continuum between inanimate matter and Yahweh. Not really a liberal conception, truly.
posted by hippybear at 10:47 AM on March 17, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by hippybear at 10:47 AM on March 17, 2022 [1 favorite]
I feel as if "liberal" should have the world's largest quotation marks in that link. Or be "neoliberal," at the least.
I'm not sure about that. The criticism that liberal writers just paint pictures of nicer hierarchies (or nicer hierarchies displacing nastier ones) predates the idea of neoliberalism by some considerable time. Most obviously, Orwell's Charles Dickens was written in 1939, and you could substitute "wizarding" for "middle class", "Slytherin" for "rentier", and "muggle" for "proletarian" and his basic argument would stand against Rowling.
To some extent I suspect this is a UK vs US terminology issue. The video maker is British. The British radical left largely uses "liberal" as a pejorative, in the broad sense of "classical liberal", rather than the more modern and region specific sense of "not conservative".
posted by howfar at 11:20 AM on March 17, 2022 [35 favorites]
I'm not sure about that. The criticism that liberal writers just paint pictures of nicer hierarchies (or nicer hierarchies displacing nastier ones) predates the idea of neoliberalism by some considerable time. Most obviously, Orwell's Charles Dickens was written in 1939, and you could substitute "wizarding" for "middle class", "Slytherin" for "rentier", and "muggle" for "proletarian" and his basic argument would stand against Rowling.
To some extent I suspect this is a UK vs US terminology issue. The video maker is British. The British radical left largely uses "liberal" as a pejorative, in the broad sense of "classical liberal", rather than the more modern and region specific sense of "not conservative".
posted by howfar at 11:20 AM on March 17, 2022 [35 favorites]
Oh, I failed to take into account the US/UK terminology divide. That might be fair, then. My mistake if so.
posted by KChasm at 11:23 AM on March 17, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by KChasm at 11:23 AM on March 17, 2022 [1 favorite]
It's a good video, as most of Shaun's are. It is a daunting nearly 2 hours, but, the visuals usually aren't that critical for Shaun, so you can just listen to it, like a podcast.
TL;DW: he ties Rowling's failures to meet her fan's expectations of progressive ideas is that she's not progressive, she a Blairite liberal. He's pretty methodical, and he has an engaging voice and presentation, so, if you want a very thorough examination of Harry Potter and why some of the the elements are the way they are, it's a decent thesis.
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:25 AM on March 17, 2022 [15 favorites]
TL;DW: he ties Rowling's failures to meet her fan's expectations of progressive ideas is that she's not progressive, she a Blairite liberal. He's pretty methodical, and he has an engaging voice and presentation, so, if you want a very thorough examination of Harry Potter and why some of the the elements are the way they are, it's a decent thesis.
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:25 AM on March 17, 2022 [15 favorites]
The British radical left largely uses "liberal" (as a pejorative) in the broad sense of "classical liberal", rather than the more modern and region specific sense of "not conservative".
The US radical left does the same.
The usage of "liberal" to mean "left" is an ongoing gaslighting campaign by the Democratic Party to pretend that anything further left of them is completely untenable and to deny that they're centrists.
But this whole tangent on the meaning of "liberal" is a derail, IMO.
posted by explosion at 11:28 AM on March 17, 2022 [23 favorites]
The US radical left does the same.
The usage of "liberal" to mean "left" is an ongoing gaslighting campaign by the Democratic Party to pretend that anything further left of them is completely untenable and to deny that they're centrists.
But this whole tangent on the meaning of "liberal" is a derail, IMO.
posted by explosion at 11:28 AM on March 17, 2022 [23 favorites]
If you just want a not-mean-spirited takedown of Rowling, it's that, too.
He's recently be sparring with the BBC over their terrible lying coverage of Trans issues, their lying bout their lying coverage of trans issues, and their failure to cover a protest about their lying about their lying coverage of trans issues (and equivocating about that).
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:31 AM on March 17, 2022 [13 favorites]
He's recently be sparring with the BBC over their terrible lying coverage of Trans issues, their lying bout their lying coverage of trans issues, and their failure to cover a protest about their lying about their lying coverage of trans issues (and equivocating about that).
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:31 AM on March 17, 2022 [13 favorites]
But this whole tangent on the meaning of "liberal" is a derail, IMO.
Yes. A reminder that this is a video from the UK about a UK topic and uses UK terminology. Please leave US assumptions at the door. The terminology is very clear if you watch the video. I realize it's poretty long, but not commenting is also an option.
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:34 AM on March 17, 2022 [20 favorites]
Yes. A reminder that this is a video from the UK about a UK topic and uses UK terminology. Please leave US assumptions at the door. The terminology is very clear if you watch the video. I realize it's poretty long, but not commenting is also an option.
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:34 AM on March 17, 2022 [20 favorites]
The usage of "liberal" to mean "left" is an ongoing gaslighting campaign by the Democratic Party to pretend that anything further left of them is completely untenable and to deny that they're centrists.
This is ahistorical nonsense, offered either in bad faith or ignorance.
Maybe you also think political labels are sometime stable and precisely definable.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 11:55 AM on March 17, 2022 [12 favorites]
This is ahistorical nonsense, offered either in bad faith or ignorance.
Maybe you also think political labels are sometime stable and precisely definable.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 11:55 AM on March 17, 2022 [12 favorites]
Maybe you also think political labels are sometime stable and precisely definable.
This.
"NAZis Were soCIAlIST Its In the nAmE"
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 11:57 AM on March 17, 2022 [4 favorites]
This.
"NAZis Were soCIAlIST Its In the nAmE"
posted by Your Childhood Pet Rock at 11:57 AM on March 17, 2022 [4 favorites]
Getting back to the topic at hand:
I'm 13 minutes in, and he's detailing some serious deviations between the books and the movies. I expect that a lot of us have watched the movies more recently and may be more likely to rewatch the movies than re-read the books.
As such, it's kind of a shock to see JK Rowling's words repeated on screen. It's been 15+ years since I read the books.
Like, I'm very firmly in the camp of "JK is a terf and her writing's middling at best," but wow, that's a lot of fat-phobia that I just kind of forgot was there. The movies really cleaned up some of the worst impulses and the general judgmental tone of the books.
posted by explosion at 12:02 PM on March 17, 2022 [24 favorites]
I'm 13 minutes in, and he's detailing some serious deviations between the books and the movies. I expect that a lot of us have watched the movies more recently and may be more likely to rewatch the movies than re-read the books.
As such, it's kind of a shock to see JK Rowling's words repeated on screen. It's been 15+ years since I read the books.
Like, I'm very firmly in the camp of "JK is a terf and her writing's middling at best," but wow, that's a lot of fat-phobia that I just kind of forgot was there. The movies really cleaned up some of the worst impulses and the general judgmental tone of the books.
posted by explosion at 12:02 PM on March 17, 2022 [24 favorites]
The Shrieking Shack is an even more daunting 300+ hours, but they came to very similar conclusions very quickly in their close reading. As they put it, in Rowling's world, it is very suspicious to be either too fat or too thin, too good-looking or too ugly. Sub-5s and 10s are all evil; only 7s can be truly good people.
posted by Scattercat at 1:11 PM on March 17, 2022 [13 favorites]
posted by Scattercat at 1:11 PM on March 17, 2022 [13 favorites]
Another observation of Shaun's which is really interesting and on-the-nose is that, in Rowling's world, there are no good or bad acts, only good or bad people. So if a bad person, say, humiliates some one, it's bad because they are bad; if a good person does it, it's OK because they are good. It's a very corrosive morality.
posted by GenjiandProust at 1:16 PM on March 17, 2022 [49 favorites]
posted by GenjiandProust at 1:16 PM on March 17, 2022 [49 favorites]
[CW transphobia]
I read the transcript and it makes some interesting points. I didn't notice at the time but "if a character is supposed to be bad then Rowling usually presents them as being physically ugly, and for women the way she makes them ugly is to make them large and masculine". E.g. "She was large and square and her heavy jaw jutted aggressively."
I read one of my favourite books "Charmed Life" by Diana Wynne Jones to my kid lately, and I was reassured by the ending. (Spoilers) For most of the book it seems like they're living in a country house owned by an aristocratic wizard Chrestomanci. But at the end it turns out Chrestomanci is a title. He's not an aristocrat, he just works for the government and his job is to stop the other wizards from using their powers to dominate other people.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 1:36 PM on March 17, 2022 [11 favorites]
I read the transcript and it makes some interesting points. I didn't notice at the time but "if a character is supposed to be bad then Rowling usually presents them as being physically ugly, and for women the way she makes them ugly is to make them large and masculine". E.g. "She was large and square and her heavy jaw jutted aggressively."
I read one of my favourite books "Charmed Life" by Diana Wynne Jones to my kid lately, and I was reassured by the ending. (Spoilers) For most of the book it seems like they're living in a country house owned by an aristocratic wizard Chrestomanci. But at the end it turns out Chrestomanci is a title. He's not an aristocrat, he just works for the government and his job is to stop the other wizards from using their powers to dominate other people.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 1:36 PM on March 17, 2022 [11 favorites]
I'm about 20 minutes from the end and am really enjoying it. I knew about a lot of the things he was talking about already/had seen them analyzed in similar ways in other places, but without the same connective tissue which is basically "status quo good"/"fighting evil means returning to the status quo and no more". One thing that was new to me was the discussion of the statue in the ministry of magic, and just how blatant it is that JK sets up the existence of systemic oppression in the wizarding world and talks about its consequences (e.g., the oppressed siding with Voldemort), and then just...does nothing with it. The status quo is restored at the end, so, we're done. I'm also going to take this moment to plug All the Young Dudes which actually does a fantastic job of grappling with the mistreatment of werewolves from the point of view of Remus Lupin.
The discussion of Snuff near the end was good; I recently reread it and had the same suspicion he did that it might have been a reaction to the house elves (stuffed goblin head over the door of the pub as a direct call out to the house elf heads in Grimmauld Place, with Sam Vimes notably coming to the conclusion that slavery is wrong, and hanging up the heads of sentient creatures is wrong, unlike Harry Potter). Pratchett definitely had his blind spots (see: a lot of the early Rincewald stuff), but at least he seemed to learn and take things in, and most of his later books are very much on the theme of "Yes, these people are people too and should be treated as such" and just hammering it in.
posted by damayanti at 2:26 PM on March 17, 2022 [6 favorites]
The discussion of Snuff near the end was good; I recently reread it and had the same suspicion he did that it might have been a reaction to the house elves (stuffed goblin head over the door of the pub as a direct call out to the house elf heads in Grimmauld Place, with Sam Vimes notably coming to the conclusion that slavery is wrong, and hanging up the heads of sentient creatures is wrong, unlike Harry Potter). Pratchett definitely had his blind spots (see: a lot of the early Rincewald stuff), but at least he seemed to learn and take things in, and most of his later books are very much on the theme of "Yes, these people are people too and should be treated as such" and just hammering it in.
posted by damayanti at 2:26 PM on March 17, 2022 [6 favorites]
"Think of all the Hollywood blockbusters in which the good side are those seeking to preserve the status quo and the antagonists are people with legitimate grievances about the world and a desire to change it and then they pull a cheap trick and have the antagonists just murder a baby or something so the audience knows that they’re the bad guys."
You can save some time by just saying The Legend of Korra.
posted by Parasite Unseen at 4:28 PM on March 17, 2022 [11 favorites]
You can save some time by just saying The Legend of Korra.
posted by Parasite Unseen at 4:28 PM on March 17, 2022 [11 favorites]
You can save some time by just saying The Legend of Korra.
I immediately thought of The Incredibles, but it covers a million things.
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 5:18 PM on March 17, 2022 [7 favorites]
I immediately thought of The Incredibles, but it covers a million things.
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 5:18 PM on March 17, 2022 [7 favorites]
The British radical left largely uses "liberal" (as a pejorative) in the broad sense of "classical liberal", rather than the more modern and region specific sense of "not conservative".
The US radical left does the same.
I for one want to eradicate the word "liberal" just because it can have almost the complete opposite meaning, depending on who's using it. It's a tainted word. Better to use different words. For the right, liberal is synonymous with the left, and for the left, it's synonymous with centrists or the center-right. Can we all just use those instead?
posted by zardoz at 5:31 PM on March 17, 2022 [7 favorites]
The US radical left does the same.
I for one want to eradicate the word "liberal" just because it can have almost the complete opposite meaning, depending on who's using it. It's a tainted word. Better to use different words. For the right, liberal is synonymous with the left, and for the left, it's synonymous with centrists or the center-right. Can we all just use those instead?
posted by zardoz at 5:31 PM on March 17, 2022 [7 favorites]
You can save some time by just saying The Legend of Korra.’sup roughly 30% of MCU movies
I immediately thought of The Incredibles, but it covers a million things.
posted by DoctorFedora at 7:18 PM on March 17, 2022 [8 favorites]
You can save some time by just saying The Legend of Korra.My immediate thought was Killmonger in The Black Panther
I immediately thought of The Incredibles, but it covers a million things.
’sup roughly 30% of MCU movies
posted by Schmucko at 7:37 PM on March 17, 2022 [9 favorites]
About to listen to the video, thanks for sharing. From this discussion it sounds as if it covers a lot of things I've been wondering about the fantasy genre in general.
"Think of all the Hollywood blockbusters in which the good side are those seeking to preserve the status quo and the antagonists are people with legitimate grievances about the world and a desire to change it and then they pull a cheap trick and have the antagonists just murder a baby or something so the audience knows that they’re the bad guys."
Is Magneto also an example of this?
posted by Zumbador at 9:23 PM on March 17, 2022 [5 favorites]
"Think of all the Hollywood blockbusters in which the good side are those seeking to preserve the status quo and the antagonists are people with legitimate grievances about the world and a desire to change it and then they pull a cheap trick and have the antagonists just murder a baby or something so the audience knows that they’re the bad guys."
Is Magneto also an example of this?
posted by Zumbador at 9:23 PM on March 17, 2022 [5 favorites]
If anything, JKR flying her terf flag fly has been really 'helpful' because it invited fandom's singular obsessive focus (being its primary mode of thinking) to investigate her politics (of course as an attempt to square their love of the work, in the early days especially) because i had felt like a crazy person for years when my friends are really into it, so i tolerate it as a socializing-space fandom and just to keep up with the Joneses as it were, while thinking am i being too mean, too internally sexist, because when I read her books i genuinely feel the opposite of a good time.
posted by cendawanita at 12:53 AM on March 18, 2022 [8 favorites]
posted by cendawanita at 12:53 AM on March 18, 2022 [8 favorites]
most of his later books are very much on the theme of "Yes, these people are people too and should be treated as such" and just hammering it in.
I find it fascinating how the explicit theme of multiculturalism (I think this is the most appropriate term, given the period of his works) emerged from Pterry's (I think) liberal humanism and (arguably post-) structuralist epistemology. To me, the heart of his genius (not too strong a word) is in showing us that (a) people are people and should be treated as such; and (b) "people" is an odd and logically precarious* set, defined not by the similarity of its members but rather by the nature of their interaction. Even coppers are people, we learn, not because watchmen aren't bastards (AWAB) but because being a bastard isn't the sort of thing you can do without a person to do it to. That sort of engagement involves a form of (typically unequal) power transfer: in order to express any aspect of personality (and thus personhood) we have to accept the existence of another perspective. Our interaction itself, even a dehumanising one, cedes the other's personhood despite us. For example, no-one can be a bastard to a tool, but no-one can avoid being a bastard to a golem if they try to treat it like one: there are some entities you as a person cannot interact with without acknowledging or affirming their personhood. Pratchett, through loving devotion to material specificity and internal logic, illustrates that everyone emerges from the interaction of difference, and that a world is essentially that process allowed to reach an incrementum ad absurdum of complexity.
TLDR I think Pratchett makes an exceptionally strong case that we are fundamentally entities of the particular, and our particularity is what makes people worthy of respect, not "shared humanity". As a result, he emerges as less liberal than communitarian, and often surprisingly† closely aligned with modern identity politics.
The philosophical depth and scope of his work means Pratchett will be productively read for as long as there are people to read, while Rowling's body of work will be only really notable for the historic curiosity of its sales figures.
*by which I guess I mean "I can't currently be bothered to sit down and work out how I'd define it, but it probably involves overdetermination and aporia because natch lol"
†I don't know how surprising this really is. I think that Pterry must have had at least some familiarity with Hegel, likely Lévi-Strauss, and possibly some degree of awareness of the post-structuralists. Hence he was probably working from basically the same sources in basically the same era.
posted by howfar at 4:45 AM on March 18, 2022 [23 favorites]
I find it fascinating how the explicit theme of multiculturalism (I think this is the most appropriate term, given the period of his works) emerged from Pterry's (I think) liberal humanism and (arguably post-) structuralist epistemology. To me, the heart of his genius (not too strong a word) is in showing us that (a) people are people and should be treated as such; and (b) "people" is an odd and logically precarious* set, defined not by the similarity of its members but rather by the nature of their interaction. Even coppers are people, we learn, not because watchmen aren't bastards (AWAB) but because being a bastard isn't the sort of thing you can do without a person to do it to. That sort of engagement involves a form of (typically unequal) power transfer: in order to express any aspect of personality (and thus personhood) we have to accept the existence of another perspective. Our interaction itself, even a dehumanising one, cedes the other's personhood despite us. For example, no-one can be a bastard to a tool, but no-one can avoid being a bastard to a golem if they try to treat it like one: there are some entities you as a person cannot interact with without acknowledging or affirming their personhood. Pratchett, through loving devotion to material specificity and internal logic, illustrates that everyone emerges from the interaction of difference, and that a world is essentially that process allowed to reach an incrementum ad absurdum of complexity.
TLDR I think Pratchett makes an exceptionally strong case that we are fundamentally entities of the particular, and our particularity is what makes people worthy of respect, not "shared humanity". As a result, he emerges as less liberal than communitarian, and often surprisingly† closely aligned with modern identity politics.
The philosophical depth and scope of his work means Pratchett will be productively read for as long as there are people to read, while Rowling's body of work will be only really notable for the historic curiosity of its sales figures.
*by which I guess I mean "I can't currently be bothered to sit down and work out how I'd define it, but it probably involves overdetermination and aporia because natch lol"
†I don't know how surprising this really is. I think that Pterry must have had at least some familiarity with Hegel, likely Lévi-Strauss, and possibly some degree of awareness of the post-structuralists. Hence he was probably working from basically the same sources in basically the same era.
posted by howfar at 4:45 AM on March 18, 2022 [23 favorites]
For me, a useful encapsulation of what is fucked up about the whole series is that Harry is a popular jock who inherited enormous wealth and status.
posted by prefpara at 6:11 AM on March 18, 2022 [11 favorites]
posted by prefpara at 6:11 AM on March 18, 2022 [11 favorites]
popular jock
For a second I was wondering if Rowling had declared Potter canonically Scottish and if I should flag this for offensiveness. Two nations, common language, all that.
posted by howfar at 6:25 AM on March 18, 2022 [7 favorites]
For a second I was wondering if Rowling had declared Potter canonically Scottish and if I should flag this for offensiveness. Two nations, common language, all that.
posted by howfar at 6:25 AM on March 18, 2022 [7 favorites]
He goes into great length on how HP is really a shitty person. He is wealthier than Croesus but does nothing to alleviate the poverty of his friends. He does next to nothing about the literal slavery endured by the house elves as a race. Sure he frees Dobby to "own" the Malfoys, but does nothing to free Kreacher or any of his kin, even after they fight for Harry's side in the Civil War, so to speak. Harry does nothing about the structural inequities in the entire wizarding world, in fact he grows up to be an Auror, basically, a cop to support the magic status quo. Shaun argues that throughout her writings JKR promulgates a conservative and essentialist point of view.
posted by xigxag at 7:50 AM on March 18, 2022 [15 favorites]
posted by xigxag at 7:50 AM on March 18, 2022 [15 favorites]
For anyone else who was bewildered by the jock thing, Wikipedia advises me that the US meaning is approximately "sporty meathead" and the UK meaning is "a Scottish person."
posted by All Might Be Well at 8:56 AM on March 18, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by All Might Be Well at 8:56 AM on March 18, 2022 [2 favorites]
He goes into great length on how HP is really a shitty person. He is wealthier than Croesus but does nothing to alleviate the poverty of his friends. He does next to nothing about the literal slavery endured by the house elves as a race. Sure he frees Dobby to "own" the Malfoys, but does nothing to free Kreacher or any of his kin, even after they fight for Harry's side in the Civil War, so to speak. Harry does nothing about the structural inequities in the entire wizarding world, in fact he grows up to be an Auror, basically, a cop to support the magic status quo.
Yes, and I think that's all more realistic and plausible than a 'better' version of Harry. He is a naive and ignorant teenager who fundamentally accepts the world he is introduced to, because in it he can have a meaningful and privileged existence. He does very little that is heroic, functioning more as a talisman/pawn (and sometimes loose cannon) than anything else.
Also, I've read so much more fanfic more recently than the originals, so my internal version of HP is probably not quite canon any more. There is a lot of possibility within the world that's been set up, even if the economics and demographics don't appear to work at all.
posted by plonkee at 9:18 AM on March 18, 2022 [2 favorites]
Yes, and I think that's all more realistic and plausible than a 'better' version of Harry. He is a naive and ignorant teenager who fundamentally accepts the world he is introduced to, because in it he can have a meaningful and privileged existence. He does very little that is heroic, functioning more as a talisman/pawn (and sometimes loose cannon) than anything else.
Also, I've read so much more fanfic more recently than the originals, so my internal version of HP is probably not quite canon any more. There is a lot of possibility within the world that's been set up, even if the economics and demographics don't appear to work at all.
posted by plonkee at 9:18 AM on March 18, 2022 [2 favorites]
I don't know that it is more realistic.
An impoverished/deprived boy who suddenly had access to untold riches would be an absolute spendthrift. He'd go completely batty at his newfound power to ease his friends' troubles after suffering injustice and indignity at the Dursleys' hands.
That's not to say that he'd be perfectly considerate (what 11-year-old is?), but an ordinary boy would need to be told repeatedly to stop flashing his cash.
posted by explosion at 9:31 AM on March 18, 2022 [7 favorites]
An impoverished/deprived boy who suddenly had access to untold riches would be an absolute spendthrift. He'd go completely batty at his newfound power to ease his friends' troubles after suffering injustice and indignity at the Dursleys' hands.
That's not to say that he'd be perfectly considerate (what 11-year-old is?), but an ordinary boy would need to be told repeatedly to stop flashing his cash.
posted by explosion at 9:31 AM on March 18, 2022 [7 favorites]
The criticism that liberal writers just paint pictures of nicer hierarchies (or nicer hierarchies displacing nastier ones) predates the idea of neoliberalism by some considerable time.
I mean, my favorite franchise, in just about every iteration.
posted by Halloween Jack at 11:56 AM on March 18, 2022 [2 favorites]
I mean, my favorite franchise, in just about every iteration.
posted by Halloween Jack at 11:56 AM on March 18, 2022 [2 favorites]
Basically the unnamed but obviously Harry Potter character in those League of Extraordinary Gentlemen books that everyone got shirty about at the time was pretty on the nose.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 4:07 PM on March 18, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 4:07 PM on March 18, 2022 [2 favorites]
Apropos thread about a new HP video game
posted by Ten Cold Hot Dogs at 5:47 PM on March 18, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by Ten Cold Hot Dogs at 5:47 PM on March 18, 2022 [3 favorites]
Basically the unnamed but obviously Harry Potter character in those League of Extraordinary Gentlemen books that everyone got shirty about at the time was pretty on the nose.
Alan Oswald Moore knew the quidditch score.
posted by howfar at 5:01 AM on March 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
Alan Oswald Moore knew the quidditch score.
posted by howfar at 5:01 AM on March 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
does nothing to alleviate the poverty of his friends.
One very weird aspect of the whole "the Weasleys are grotesquely poor" bit of worldbuilding is that it leaves one with no idea where Hermione is, wealthwise. I mean, sure, her parents are in highly remunerative professions (dentists, IIRC), but their net worth is denominated in pounds and you can't buy robes and wands and all with that. And yet, it's Ron who ends up with hand-me-downs and doing without. Is Hermione supported by a scholarship for Muggleborns? That seems reasonably plausible but is never actually made clear --- and even if she is a scholarship girl, that sort of thing (in the British school system at least, as I understand it) comes with a sort of social weight which makes itself known (for instance, Draco never insults her as a freeloader or similar — it's only Ron whom he targets as from an inferior social class). No, Hermione is an upper-middle-class swot and so Rowling can't be bothered to work out the ramifications of her not having any actual money, so it's just handwaved away. I don't need to have every fantasy economy completely worked out, and I get wanting to keep lore simple, but if you're going to assert that wealth still matters in what seems like it could be a post-scarcity society, I think answering the question "why does the person who has no money still have nice things?" is not too much to ask. It doesn't even have to be a good answer, but it seems like Rowling authentically never thought about it.
(and, yeah, the extent to which Harry doesn't solve problems by throwing money at them is very strange, and rightly called out. I particularly like the bit where he wonders where he can find a bunch of free high-end broomsticks for the Quidditch team. He literally never just takes a lot of money and buys something he needs, which given that we had it hammered home early that he's rich, is really bizarre.)
posted by jackbishop at 4:23 PM on March 19, 2022 [6 favorites]
One very weird aspect of the whole "the Weasleys are grotesquely poor" bit of worldbuilding is that it leaves one with no idea where Hermione is, wealthwise. I mean, sure, her parents are in highly remunerative professions (dentists, IIRC), but their net worth is denominated in pounds and you can't buy robes and wands and all with that. And yet, it's Ron who ends up with hand-me-downs and doing without. Is Hermione supported by a scholarship for Muggleborns? That seems reasonably plausible but is never actually made clear --- and even if she is a scholarship girl, that sort of thing (in the British school system at least, as I understand it) comes with a sort of social weight which makes itself known (for instance, Draco never insults her as a freeloader or similar — it's only Ron whom he targets as from an inferior social class). No, Hermione is an upper-middle-class swot and so Rowling can't be bothered to work out the ramifications of her not having any actual money, so it's just handwaved away. I don't need to have every fantasy economy completely worked out, and I get wanting to keep lore simple, but if you're going to assert that wealth still matters in what seems like it could be a post-scarcity society, I think answering the question "why does the person who has no money still have nice things?" is not too much to ask. It doesn't even have to be a good answer, but it seems like Rowling authentically never thought about it.
(and, yeah, the extent to which Harry doesn't solve problems by throwing money at them is very strange, and rightly called out. I particularly like the bit where he wonders where he can find a bunch of free high-end broomsticks for the Quidditch team. He literally never just takes a lot of money and buys something he needs, which given that we had it hammered home early that he's rich, is really bizarre.)
posted by jackbishop at 4:23 PM on March 19, 2022 [6 favorites]
He goes into great length on how HP is really a shitty person. He is wealthier than Croesus but does nothing to alleviate the poverty of his friends. He does next to nothing about the literal slavery endured by the house elves as a race. Sure he frees Dobby to "own" the Malfoys, but does nothing to free Kreacher or any of his kin, even after they fight for Harry's side in the Civil War, so to speak. Harry does nothing about the structural inequities in the entire wizarding world, in fact he grows up to be an Auror, basically, a cop to support the magic status quo. Shaun argues that throughout her writings JKR promulgates a conservative and essentialist point of view.
The version of Harry that I have found most sympathetic and compelling as an adult is a person who was horrifically abused and deliberately encouraged to be passive, who doesn't actually develop the capacity for healthy-ish relationships with others until some time after the seventh book. Hermione is proactive and heroic, Harry is at best reactive and often more miserable than he is capable of articulating.
Like, I can't conceive of the Harry of What We Pretend We Can't See successfully agitating for a single structural change to anything, but I think a lot of people can relate to doing things one doesn't like but that are "the sort of thing he thinks the person he wants to be would do, and he knows he has to try."
posted by All Might Be Well at 3:34 PM on March 20, 2022 [2 favorites]
The version of Harry that I have found most sympathetic and compelling as an adult is a person who was horrifically abused and deliberately encouraged to be passive, who doesn't actually develop the capacity for healthy-ish relationships with others until some time after the seventh book. Hermione is proactive and heroic, Harry is at best reactive and often more miserable than he is capable of articulating.
Like, I can't conceive of the Harry of What We Pretend We Can't See successfully agitating for a single structural change to anything, but I think a lot of people can relate to doing things one doesn't like but that are "the sort of thing he thinks the person he wants to be would do, and he knows he has to try."
posted by All Might Be Well at 3:34 PM on March 20, 2022 [2 favorites]
The video breakdown is very detailed and well done.
Before this video, I just assumed the author was inept and completely out of tune with the modern world - like an elderly relative saying terrible things at family gatherings.
But this video shows that while her plots and stories were inept (very poor world building) the problems around her attitudes are systemic and deeply worrying.
As an aside, I team teams how to use screen readers, and recently grabbed a passage from the first Harry Potter as example text. I had to change the example text after the first session as it was SO fat-phobic, it was horrifying listening to it read aloud.
posted by greenhornet at 3:36 PM on March 20, 2022
Before this video, I just assumed the author was inept and completely out of tune with the modern world - like an elderly relative saying terrible things at family gatherings.
But this video shows that while her plots and stories were inept (very poor world building) the problems around her attitudes are systemic and deeply worrying.
As an aside, I team teams how to use screen readers, and recently grabbed a passage from the first Harry Potter as example text. I had to change the example text after the first session as it was SO fat-phobic, it was horrifying listening to it read aloud.
posted by greenhornet at 3:36 PM on March 20, 2022
I really enjoyed this, any other good thoughtful takedowns of HP ?
posted by The otter lady at 7:07 PM on March 20, 2022
posted by The otter lady at 7:07 PM on March 20, 2022
Pointing out these kinds of flaws in Rowling's writing is a bit like shooting fish in a barrel. Weirdly, in a way, as these particular fish richly deserve to be blasted to kingdom come.
posted by Nerd of the North at 1:08 AM on March 21, 2022
posted by Nerd of the North at 1:08 AM on March 21, 2022
I had not previously considered that the final fight between Harry and Voldemort comes down to a contractual interpretation.
(i.e. who is the Master of the Elder Wand)
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 10:50 AM on March 21, 2022 [1 favorite]
(i.e. who is the Master of the Elder Wand)
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 10:50 AM on March 21, 2022 [1 favorite]
The latest from Jowling Kowling Rowling on Twitter is, to me, quite revealing in light of Shaun's central thesis: she honestly thinks that Good People are always good, even if they engage in the very same tactics that Bad People employ. Curiously, that mimics the gender essentialism she and her creepy GC crew revere when it comes to trans folks.
I know it's not a great thing to hold on to, and Shaun himself says at the end of his video that his critique does not extend to those who love and hold dear the HP books and their various incarnations, but really? How can you support this lady? Just gross.
posted by Ten Cold Hot Dogs at 3:51 PM on March 21, 2022
I know it's not a great thing to hold on to, and Shaun himself says at the end of his video that his critique does not extend to those who love and hold dear the HP books and their various incarnations, but really? How can you support this lady? Just gross.
posted by Ten Cold Hot Dogs at 3:51 PM on March 21, 2022
I know it's not a great thing to hold on to, and Shaun himself says at the end of his video that his critique does not extend to those who love and hold dear the HP books and their various incarnations, but really? How can you support this lady? Just gross.
I guess it depends on what you’re doing with it. If you already own the books and/or movies, does it hurt to revisit them? How about writing fan fiction? Talking with friends about what the stories mean to you? How much support is too much?
I think about these issues a lot because I engage with Lovecraft’s material quite a bit. Now, he’s dead, and Rowling isn’t, so he’s not directly benefiting, but he was a garbage person in a lot of ways, and his IP has become a big market, one that, arguably, drains energy from more worthy authors’ work. So how much engagement is too much? And do people who engage with problematic work deserve part of that blame?
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:04 PM on March 21, 2022 [2 favorites]
I guess it depends on what you’re doing with it. If you already own the books and/or movies, does it hurt to revisit them? How about writing fan fiction? Talking with friends about what the stories mean to you? How much support is too much?
I think about these issues a lot because I engage with Lovecraft’s material quite a bit. Now, he’s dead, and Rowling isn’t, so he’s not directly benefiting, but he was a garbage person in a lot of ways, and his IP has become a big market, one that, arguably, drains energy from more worthy authors’ work. So how much engagement is too much? And do people who engage with problematic work deserve part of that blame?
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:04 PM on March 21, 2022 [2 favorites]
I feel like part of it is that Lovecraft died penniless and obscure quite a long time ago, while the still-alive Rowling owns her own castle and a global media empire
so, you know, there's at least that difference in play
posted by DoctorFedora at 6:45 PM on March 21, 2022 [2 favorites]
so, you know, there's at least that difference in play
posted by DoctorFedora at 6:45 PM on March 21, 2022 [2 favorites]
I know it's not a great thing to hold on to, and Shaun himself says at the end of his video that his critique does not extend to those who love and hold dear the HP books and their various incarnations, but really? How can you support this lady? Just gross.
Understanding this as meaning "how can you go on reading and loving these stories" and not getting into the very interesting question of whether simply reading or watching = support of the creator.
I'm 50, and so too old to have met Harry Potter at the ideal age of about 11 or so. So I don't love the Harry Potter books. I've read them all and find them fascinating as a cultural phenomenon. (Why did these particular books catch the popular imagination?) I love reading fan theories and head cannon examples as proof of how people care deeply about stories.
To answer the question in a more general sense, of how can I love and find meaning in deeply problematic stories:
First, I have a lot of privilege as a white, middle class person who sort of passes as "normal" for neurotypical and gender stuff even though I'm not.
I grew up in 80s South Africa under Apartheid, youngest of a family who were part of the struggle against Apartheid and so pretty ostracised by the white, church going community we lived in, as well as most of our extended family.
The school I went to was whites only, and we were taught according to the government sanctioned Christian National Education system. Extremely patriarchal, racist, misogynistic, homophobic, fascist the list is long.
I was an avid reader.
None of the books I read as a child or teenager were in my first language as at that time all Afrikaans books I had access to were thinly disguised propaganda.
None of the English books I read were set in my own country or were about people I recognised from my daily life.
So I became very good at creating my own head cannon about stories, and finding things to love and learn from them while wilfully ignoring aspects that didn't work for me.
My extreme allergy to Christianity, created by my daily life, didn't prevent me from finding deep meaning and connection in the Narnia books, as I gave myself permission to appropriate the parts that had meaning for me.
For example, reading Aslan tearing off Eustaces thick dragon skin as being about psychological transformation rather than religious redemption. I was too young at the time to articulate and even understand what I was doing, but I was still able to do it.
As I've grown older, some of the books I used to love have become more difficult to enjoy.
These days, I wince at a lot of Diana Wynne Jones with the underlying thread of gate-keeping around magical power, and villains tending to be ugly and lower class people.
I believe in the power and relevance of my own private reading of a story, and my right to discard the writer's intention.
As a rule, I try not to judge others by what stories they enjoy, and I resist the capitalist, consumer based way of understanding the relationship between a story teller and their audience, where the relationship is understood to be primarily a financial one, and stories are commercial products to be either consumed or boycotted.
posted by Zumbador at 9:37 PM on March 21, 2022 [4 favorites]
Understanding this as meaning "how can you go on reading and loving these stories" and not getting into the very interesting question of whether simply reading or watching = support of the creator.
I'm 50, and so too old to have met Harry Potter at the ideal age of about 11 or so. So I don't love the Harry Potter books. I've read them all and find them fascinating as a cultural phenomenon. (Why did these particular books catch the popular imagination?) I love reading fan theories and head cannon examples as proof of how people care deeply about stories.
To answer the question in a more general sense, of how can I love and find meaning in deeply problematic stories:
First, I have a lot of privilege as a white, middle class person who sort of passes as "normal" for neurotypical and gender stuff even though I'm not.
I grew up in 80s South Africa under Apartheid, youngest of a family who were part of the struggle against Apartheid and so pretty ostracised by the white, church going community we lived in, as well as most of our extended family.
The school I went to was whites only, and we were taught according to the government sanctioned Christian National Education system. Extremely patriarchal, racist, misogynistic, homophobic, fascist the list is long.
I was an avid reader.
None of the books I read as a child or teenager were in my first language as at that time all Afrikaans books I had access to were thinly disguised propaganda.
None of the English books I read were set in my own country or were about people I recognised from my daily life.
So I became very good at creating my own head cannon about stories, and finding things to love and learn from them while wilfully ignoring aspects that didn't work for me.
My extreme allergy to Christianity, created by my daily life, didn't prevent me from finding deep meaning and connection in the Narnia books, as I gave myself permission to appropriate the parts that had meaning for me.
For example, reading Aslan tearing off Eustaces thick dragon skin as being about psychological transformation rather than religious redemption. I was too young at the time to articulate and even understand what I was doing, but I was still able to do it.
As I've grown older, some of the books I used to love have become more difficult to enjoy.
These days, I wince at a lot of Diana Wynne Jones with the underlying thread of gate-keeping around magical power, and villains tending to be ugly and lower class people.
I believe in the power and relevance of my own private reading of a story, and my right to discard the writer's intention.
As a rule, I try not to judge others by what stories they enjoy, and I resist the capitalist, consumer based way of understanding the relationship between a story teller and their audience, where the relationship is understood to be primarily a financial one, and stories are commercial products to be either consumed or boycotted.
posted by Zumbador at 9:37 PM on March 21, 2022 [4 favorites]
Another great video by Shaun: Hijacking the Dead? Terry Pratchett & the Trans "Debate".
posted by Pendragon at 5:57 AM on March 22, 2022 [3 favorites]
posted by Pendragon at 5:57 AM on March 22, 2022 [3 favorites]
One very weird aspect of the whole "the Weasleys are grotesquely poor"..., Draco never insults [Hermione] as a freeloader or similar — it's only Ron whom he targets as from an inferior social class
I think that the weirdness primarily comes from a very British piece of snobbery which (presumably for an international audience) is not reproduced in the films. The Weasleys' poverty is shameful to them and Malfoy because the Weasleys' are coded not as working class but as impoverished gentry (i.e. upper upper middle class) or untitled members of some form of aristocracy (i.e. lower upper class). They are of the same social class (remembering that "class" in Britain functions much more like "caste" than in the US) as the Malfoys, and thus it is embarassing that they are poor. It's not embarassing, in this world view, for the lower orders to be poor: it's their natural state. Posh people should be rich and commoners should be poor. That this grotesque oddity is never commented on by the books suggests that it is yet another unexamined reinforcement or endorsement of a hierarchical worldview.
posted by howfar at 12:50 AM on March 23, 2022 [3 favorites]
I think that the weirdness primarily comes from a very British piece of snobbery which (presumably for an international audience) is not reproduced in the films. The Weasleys' poverty is shameful to them and Malfoy because the Weasleys' are coded not as working class but as impoverished gentry (i.e. upper upper middle class) or untitled members of some form of aristocracy (i.e. lower upper class). They are of the same social class (remembering that "class" in Britain functions much more like "caste" than in the US) as the Malfoys, and thus it is embarassing that they are poor. It's not embarassing, in this world view, for the lower orders to be poor: it's their natural state. Posh people should be rich and commoners should be poor. That this grotesque oddity is never commented on by the books suggests that it is yet another unexamined reinforcement or endorsement of a hierarchical worldview.
posted by howfar at 12:50 AM on March 23, 2022 [3 favorites]
The Weasleys' poverty is shameful to them and Malfoy because the Weasleys' are coded not as working class but as impoverished gentry (i.e. upper upper middle class) or untitled members of some form of aristocracy (i.e. lower upper class). They are of the same social class (remembering that "class" in Britain functions much more like "caste" than in the US) as the Malfoys, and thus it is embarassing that they are poor.
Yes. There are effectively real world counterparts to the Weasleys, who have a middling income but spend all their money on school fees, horses, and other class signifiers rather than clothes or cars. Usually living in the country. The Weasleys aren't 'poor' in absolute terms, but they have very little wealth for a family with their pedigree.
This is all also a trope in British boarding school stories, of which is a genre HP firmly sits in as well as sitting in the fantasy/magical genre. It's an incredibly classist genre, which had its peak when Britain was very class conscious but had what we would think of as modern schools - between about 1900 and 1960. A 'good' wealthy character in those stories might offer to pay more often when eating out, or give slightly generous gifts, but people are supposed to see themselves more as custodians of wealth for the next generation rather philanthropists.
posted by plonkee at 3:59 AM on March 23, 2022 [4 favorites]
Yes. There are effectively real world counterparts to the Weasleys, who have a middling income but spend all their money on school fees, horses, and other class signifiers rather than clothes or cars. Usually living in the country. The Weasleys aren't 'poor' in absolute terms, but they have very little wealth for a family with their pedigree.
This is all also a trope in British boarding school stories, of which is a genre HP firmly sits in as well as sitting in the fantasy/magical genre. It's an incredibly classist genre, which had its peak when Britain was very class conscious but had what we would think of as modern schools - between about 1900 and 1960. A 'good' wealthy character in those stories might offer to pay more often when eating out, or give slightly generous gifts, but people are supposed to see themselves more as custodians of wealth for the next generation rather philanthropists.
posted by plonkee at 3:59 AM on March 23, 2022 [4 favorites]
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