You know what I've been seeing a *lot* of lately and want to stop?

[conuly]

I want people to stop - just stop - with the Healing Power of Luna Lovegood.

I'm so tired of random characters coming across Luna, taking her seriously, and being totally healed of all their prejudices and, incidentally, inner turmoil. Life doesn't work that way.

I'm also tired of everybody who runs across Luna being surprised that other people might ever be mean to this girl, and becoming bestest fwends. Life doesn't work like that either. Most people coming across Luna during school would probably act just like her housemates - hiding her things, taunting her, and generally being annoying bullies. And most people *outside* of school would pretend they were too grown-up for that, yet would still probably exclude her just because she's too different to get along with for most of them. (It's very interesting how in fic nobody is presented who used to bully Luna. No, somehow they were always either mostly oblivious or, at worst, they watched and felt guilty. One wonders why her stuff went missing every year, then....)

I appreciate that a lot of people either see themselves as Lovely Luna, or would like to, but - it doesn't work. (What's more, it turns poor Luna from a character into a kinda annoying, sueified plot device. Why doesn't she get to angst and have inner turmoil and occasionally learn new things? Poor girl.)

Comments

[conuly]

Oh, yes. So far I've seen her heal Snape, Dudley, Draco, and - notably - Tom Riddle.

What's really creepy is that they're often combining "Luna has a cure-all childlike innocence" with "healing powers of sex0rs!" to get "Luna Lovegood Heals Everybody!!!!!!!!!", and that's really fucking wrong.