A post about Harry Potter, the Warner Brothers, and Slash...

[conuly]

I'm describing it that way because I'm about to go off on a tangent.

A while back, I made a passing comment about potential gay relationships in Harry Potter, and received the reply that it would never happen because JKR is writing a fun book, she's not trying to "make a point about homosexuality".

I didn't reply. I know this may come as a surprise, given my propensity for charging in wherever I think somebody is wrong, but... I couldn't find the words. What could I possibly say to this person?

I remember the Kel books, by Tamora Pierce. In one of them - the first one, I think - one of the characters (a good guy, as it happens), got back at the Sexist Pig Jerk character for an insult by turning it around and making it a gay innuendo. Which eventually prompted a short discussion on how homosexuality isn't accepted in Tortall, but it is elsewhere, something our main character, as far as I remember, doesn't find completely rational (the first part, not the second). Gay people are at least acknowledged to exist in Tammy's books, even if in them no person is explicitly identified as gay. This didn't detract in any way from my enjoyment of the books, nor did I feel I'd been preached at. Later, I read transcripts of several conversations with her in which different characters are identified as gay. (Pretty sure they were reliable transcripts, but I could be wrong here. I wouldn't mention them, though, if I doubted their veracity.) Does that make these books political?

Harry Potter already had one openly-disabled character, Moody. Nobody thinks that having a guy missing a leg and an eye is some sort of statement on disability, do they? They don't complain that by having him turn his missing eye into an advantage that she's somehow bowing to political correctness, not that I've seen.

Racism is a persistant theme in the Harry Potter books. Various groups of people are discriminated against because of what they are, instead of who they are. This would seem to go against the idea that JKR is just trying to write a fun book. But, interestingly, all conversation about race is limited to fictional groups of people - giants, werewolves, goblins, elves. There's at least two clearly defined black people in this English school. There's the Patil twins, obviously Indian. Does this mean that JKR is trying to make some sort of point about race and multiculturalism in England? Or is she just writing the magical world as a logical subset of the nonmagical world, with the human races represented in the same proportions as they are here? Certainly, if she is going for that level of realism, it would be fair to assume that the same percentage of wizards and witches are gay/bi as in the real world, right?

When we find out that Blaize is black, nobody in the books seems to go around shouting OMG! BLACK PEOPLE IN OUR SCHOOL! (The real world is a separate issue, and it will cease to be so as soon as I self-define "real world" to exclude those sillies.) So why should it be an issue to find out that a minor character (or, gasp, a major character, should she be so daring) isn't straight? All it has to be is one line about how so-and-so kissed so-and-so else, and they both are the same sex. They've had interracial couples, and nobody thought that was some sort of political point.

I mean, this is Harry Potter! Action, adventure, and derring-do! It's not like she's devoting chapters and chapters to... um... well, if she'd had more gay, maybe she would've avoided it so as to not upset the fundies. (Not like she should care, they hate her already for magic, but...)

Comments

[ladydiana.livejournal.com]

Sorry, and you're not going to like this, but I think this argument is complete and utter CRAP.

Rowling is just barely, BARELY displaying that the characters are even *aware* of sexuality at all, and only the barest hint, and it's not a central plot of the story. Moody's injuries WERE a CENTRAL PART OF THE STORY.

In my high school, my graduating class had 300 people. I know that ONE of them has since either decided he's gay or came to terms with it, but he "appeared" to be straight in high school. Whether because of fear or confusion or indecisiveness, I haven't a clue, nor do I care, because who he sleeps with is none of my damned business.

I think the comment you're objecting to stems from the blindness by the "fandom", the "slashers" and the "shippers", an alarming number of whom are apparently in desperate need of INTENSIVE PSYCHOTHERAPY, ********ARE******** using their writing to make a point about homosexuality. No matter how many times people insist that Harry/Snape "is canon!", when the AUTHOR SAYS IT'S NOT, IT'S NOT. And when upon hearing this announcement, the author is treated with the utmost contempt because she "doesn't know anything about the real characters"...there is a FUCKING PROBLEM.

P-E-R-I-O-D.

I don't know if you've read Anne Rice or not, but in one of her novels, there is an almost unconscionable amount of incest, child rape, child molestation, inbreeding, and gay and bisexual males (I don't recall there being any lesbians). I mean, to the point that it felt like EVERY SINGLE PAGE. And that was one thing, but the prettifying of it, to make it "ok" and "acceptable" behaviour was disturbing.

However, in that novel, it was a CENTRAL PART OF THE PLOT LINE. That's how that family kept their bloodline pure to breed a supernatural creature every 13 generations. She could, potentially, have made it considerably less graphic and less of a FOCUS on the book (i.e. mentioned it without going into several chapter long descriptions of sexual encounters), and she could certainly have championed it a bit less, but it *WAS* a central part of the entire story line.

"Shippers" and "slashers" DO NOT HAVE THIS BENEFIT. All I have EVER seen come out of FanFic in the past five years is gratutious sex with no plotline, usually piss-poorly written, trying to make a statement. And while it used to be a "curious anomaly", it's now taking away from the enjoyment of the original series.

Mentioning someone is gay is one thing. Forcing THE ENTIRE FUCKING CAST AND CHARACTERS TO ALL BE HAVING ROMPING ANAL SEX IN THE CORRIDORS IS ANOTHER ENTIRELY. And until that distinction is understood, there's not much point in further discussion.

[conuly]

You need to calm down NOW. There's no reason to be ranting in ALL CAPS on my journal, on a thread which has been dead for days now. Calm down, and then we'll talk.

[ladydiana.livejournal.com]

In the absence of Rowling defining a character's sexual orientation, you are insisting that that character is gay. Even, sometimes, in the presence of her definining it as *not* homosexual. I clarified that the author did not make the Slytherin cronies all raging homosexuals, and you concluded that I was insisting they're all straight, which I was *not* doing. I was simply saying that your automatic conclusion that they're gay because they disguised themselves under orders from a student they're terrified of does not automatically make them homosexual, which you have seen, twice at least, to declare.

[conuly]

1. No, I'm not. I don't know where you got that idea, but I never did that. I said it is a possibility. You are putting words in my mouth. That is impolite.

2. No, I didn't. I never said you said they were all straight. I said simply that lack of proof is not proof of lack - which is what my original post had been about. Somebody, who was not you, claimed that no character in the Harry Potter books could ever be gay. I said otherwise. Where you get the idea that I'm insisting anything else, I don't know, but it's not true.

3. Again, you are putting words in my mouth which I never said. I can only conclude that you are taking this discussion far too seriously, and are not paying proper attention to what anybody has said. That might help to explain why you're yelling at me over things I didn't say.

[ladydiana.livejournal.com]

1 - A "possibility", which she in the main isn't regarding one way OR the other, isn't

2 - Uhm...yes, you did. Here (http://www.livejournal.com/users/conuly/853892.html?thread=6481028#t6481028). Read your own words. And I didn't get that someone was saying "none of them could ever be gay", I got that they were saying "failure to discuss sexuality at all beyond a very basic, very innocent, and main character only" is a refusal to discuss the gay characters. Dumbledore could be gay...he could NOT be gay. His relationships aren't discussed! Same with
all the other teachers; their relationships are not discussed. Most of the students relationships are not discussed. At all. So expecting her to focus on the gayness of the characters is expecting her to make a statement! She's almost not talking about their sexuality at all, and your argument, and the argument you posted a link to , are upset that she's not doing it sufficiently to your satisfaction. That's bascially telling the author how to write her own series.

That poster was outraged because Rowling isn't catering to the slash community. That takes some hubris right there. That's absolutely obnoxious. And that poster is not alone. I myself have witnessed people saying "DIE!" about her because a book or a statement she made didn't cater to that own person's opinion of what should have happened, and Rowling's been treated horribly by her supposed "fandom", and you don't think there's a problem with that???

3 - Yes, I am taking this seriously. Amd you've put words in my mouth too, which you then insist you didn't say. In any case, I honestly think people writing "chan" should be put in jail, because that's PRIME material for predators to use to go after otherwise innocent children. "See, look here, Harry Potter does it!" That is child pornography.

I made the HORRID mistake of looking for a Harry Potter discussion after having finished the book (about a day after it came out). The only things I found were

• some fan sites, which were specifically stating they weren't going to discuss the books at all until a week after publication
• some interviews with Rowling where she'd been veritably attacked by the "slashers" and the "shippers", and
• "slash" and "chan", poorly written, with no plot. Pages and pages of it.
  
  No discussion, and a screaming absence of any "other" fan fic. Which I otherwise would have been utterly delighted to read.

[conuly]

2. No, I didn't.

You can be barely kissing and still be gay. You can be a virgin and be gay. Why are you insisting that they're all straight?

Hell, I could be bi and not even know it!

I fail to see how that can possibly be construed as "they're all gay". All that can be construed as is "you're insisting that they're all straight".

If you want to read my words as that, you can feel free, but, believe me, that's not what I intended.

And I didn't get that someone was saying "none of them could ever be gay", I got that they were saying "failure to discuss sexuality at all beyond a very basic, very innocent, and main character only" is a refusal to discuss the gay characters.

These are my words in this post:

A while back, I made a passing comment about potential gay relationships in Harry Potter, and received the reply that it would never happen because JKR is writing a fun book, she's not trying to "make a point about homosexuality".

How is that saying what you think I said?

I said that the relationships were potential, I got the reply that no gay in the books is ever going to be possible because that would mean she was "making some sort of point". There's simply nothing else there other than that statement! I never said that there was gay in the books (though I've made jokes along those lines), or that I prefered gay in the books, or that I'm angry at the lack of gay. All I said is that it was possible, and that if it existed, it wouldn't be to "make a point".

She's almost not talking about their sexuality at all, and your argument, and the argument you posted a link to , are upset that she's not doing it sufficiently to your satisfaction.

I didn't say she had to discuss their sexuality. What I said is that she could have a gay relationship just by mentioning that one character kissed another.

That post isn't discussing what JKR should or should not do in her books. It is discussing what they wanted to do at a convention - they wanted to discuss queer readings of Harry Potter, and they weren't able to. Warner Brothers, as far as they know, inappropriately prevented them from doing this at an event that was not affiliated with Warner Brothers. Nobody is saying that JKR should have slash or gayness in Harry Potter, they were merely going to discuss it.

That poster was outraged because Rowling isn't catering to the slash community.

That is blatantly untrue. I suggest you re-read the link.

Amd you've put words in my mouth too, which you then insist you didn't say.

Quote me, then we'll talk.

In any case, I honestly think people writing "chan" should be put in jail, because that's PRIME material for predators to use to go after otherwise innocent children. "See, look here, Harry Potter does it!" That is child pornography.

WTF? Where did this come from? Were we discussing chan? Did I say "child pornography should be legal"? Let's stay on topic, okay?

No discussion, and a screaming absence of any "other" fan fic. Which I otherwise would have been utterly delighted to read.

That's the complete opposite of what I found - a lot of discussion, some gen fic, some het fic, some well-written slash, no chan. I also will note that I haven't seen slashers attacking Rowling. And no, that post doesn't count, because you appear to have misread it.

[ladydiana.livejournal.com]

The thing was, I wasn't insisting they were all straight. I was simply trying to clarify that the lack of Rowling to declare they're all homosexual, in a story where it's inappropriate in any case, is not some kind of "hide the gayz0rz under the rug". In fact, I *don't* think they're ALL straight; I think that Worple is either gay or bi, and it's pretty obvious Sanguini is bi. And probably a bottom, if you want to go that far.

However, for the vast majority of the characters, to bring their sexuality (homo, hetero, bi, "try anything", or "fuck anything that's not nailed shut") into the story would be a HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE non-sequitor. Or she'd have to rewrite the whole series at all.

[conuly]

But I never said she should do that! Nor that she should bring their sexuality into the story at all - I mean, we've already had too much of that, ick.

All I said is that if she did, that wouldn't necessarily be equivilant to "making a point" about gayness, and also that people should be able to say "gee, this character seems gay to me" or "Gee, let's read this as an allegory for gayness/autism/satanic rituals" without being censored.

[ladydiana.livejournal.com]

My argument is really against anyone making ANYTHING not what the author intended...whatever that means. For instance, turning Crabbe and Goyle into closet intellectuals would probably have me throwing things. As far as I'm concerned, that's THEFT. People are falling all over themselves to say that Malfoy really ISN'T a spoiled, petulant, bullying brat...he's really just "misunderstood" and "tragic" and whatever other dribble. Even Rowlling herself said that these insistences were "not healthy"...you know, what more do you want?

I think the whole point of the wizarding worldis that it's UNRELATED to the "real world" in which the readers are trapped. They don't discuss ANY witches or wizards being PREGNANT, either...there is not even a ward at the hospital for them! Certainly, if the child were gifted by magic and magic tends to reveal itself in times of emotion and pain, it would display during childbirth? So what, are we to assume that children aren't born? Uhm...there are kids in this story, obviously that's not true.

Maybe they're brought by the stork, then.

[conuly]

I disagree, though. Well, of course, we're discussing this, right?

I think that what the author intended is something important to consider. However, in the long run, I think it's more important to see how we read the books - what we bring to them from our own lives. Authors die, pages eventually crumble, but the words, the ideas, what we bring to make the story whole, that will last us forever.

Look at your Crabbe and Goyle example. If people just randomly had them being brilliant, while I wouldn't throw things (or call it theft, but I'll get to that), I probably would laugh hysterically and wander off. How silly. But if they wrote a fic where we find that one of them had hidden depths, that maybe he wasn't booksmart, but he was streetsmart, and he was smart enough not to show it - that would be a believable extension of his character.

furiosity, she of Last Mudblood fame (love that fic) writes a lot of Harry/Draco (hush, you don't have to read it). If you approach that with a random "Harry and Draco see each other, start fucking, and reveal that they've been in love since they first saw each other", that's not realistic. But if you write a fic where we see that they've always been competing, always a center, and then eventually realized their supressed homosexuality... that's a bit believable, especially if we've got some redemption going on.

If we look at Ron and Hermione, and they are shown all grown up, but behaving just the same as they are now, that's not believable, even with canon evidence for it. If we see them, instead, the same people, but changed - even if they've changed so much they're not madly in love - that can be believable.

Your mileage may vary as to what you're willing to believe, of course.

As for intellectual property, that's a very new concept. I'm not sure how much I accept it as a basis for ethical action, either. People make good livings tracing ballads and fairy tales, showing how they change from one area to another as different storytellers emphasised one aspect of the story over another. Nobody complains that the very first person to tell the kernal of "Cinderella" has had their story stolen in all the myriad forms of the tale. But with Harry Potter, just because we know who wrote it, and she did it recently, we have to accept her view of these events, without question?

We don't even do that in real life. Something happens, and on each side they tell a different story. The Civil War (to free the slaves) is also the War of Northern Aggression.

If I see this story, and see it as a good way to deal with my sexuality, or my autism, or my whateverelse, maybe that's not how JKR wanted it used. But her words are worthless to people who have nothing to bring to the story. We can't read it and hear only her thoughts, our thoughts are there too.

I've babbled, and I apologise.

[ladydiana.livejournal.com]

See, and here is another huge peeve of mine.

I *absolutely loved* the Dragonlance series. Loved some of the fan written books much mroe than I liked the original three. (Some of the others, I didn't like so much). THIS SERIES has SUCH an UNBELIEVABLE potential for fan fic books that it's *mind boggling*. And in the hands of competent writers that aren't out to work a political agenda, they could make BILLIONS of dollars between them. And would significantly add to the series.

I work in the tech industry...intellectual property is a part of my everyday life. Whether it's a new concept or not is irrelevant, whether it's shayd or not is irrelevant (I can't invent so much as an improved kind of paper without surrendering my revenue to my current and last employer) that is how things are done now, and the books were written in that era. Cinderella is a several hundred year old story, and whether someone was complaining or not is an unknowable. And yes, I do think we have to accept the authors declaration on what the stories are about, without question. She knows, she wrote them. Case in point, this entire discussion. I said you sai done thing, or meant one thing, and you insist you didn't. Who knows...you, or me?

You using the story to deal with your sexuality or your autism in relative private isn't the issue. The issue is the insistence (not necessarily yours) that the author really meant things in a way she has so stated she did not.

[conuly]

And yes, I do think we have to accept the authors declaration on what the stories are about, without question. She knows, she wrote them. Case in point, this entire discussion. I said you sai done thing, or meant one thing, and you insist you didn't. Who knows...you, or me?

The difference is that we're having a nonfictional discussion. I said one thing, you read something different, we fought, I clarified.

When it comes to fiction, we're not talking about that anymore. If I wrote a story about... oh, anything, and you read this story and interpreted two of the characters as being something other than what I'd written, and wrote a fanfic about it, or just told me about it, I'd do one of three things:

1. I'd say "gee, I hadn't considered that", and think about how cool it was that my story had prompted this thought.

2. I'd say "That's not what I meant, but it certainly looks like that."

3. I'd say "Wow, I have no idea what the hell you just read! Hah!" to myself, and make some non-commital statement to you while continuing to wonder what the hell you're smoking.

Even in the last one, I wouldn't say you're wrong to see something in the story that I didn't see. Books aren't worth anything if nobody is reading them, but once people read them, the words move into your head, where you can mess with them.

In this case, something different happened.

I said "I think this".
You read those words, but maybe I wasn't clear, or I don't know, and read "I think this other thing".

The only way to settle that is to go back and say "No, this is what I think". We're not discussing the motivations of fictional characters. We're not talking about what went on in the minds of people the narrator can't read. We're just talking about what one real person really thought, when the real person can correct you.

Different issue. Similar, sure, but different.

The issue is the insistence (not necessarily yours) that the author really meant things in a way she has so stated she did not.

Robert Frost, Robert Frost. Interpreting his work is a classic exercise in high schools around the country, completely contrary to his express statements regarding such work. But that doesn't mean that these interpretations are invalid. Sure, he said he was only talking about taking a walk in the woods - but does that make it wrong for us to say that when we read it, we hear a talk about the importance of choices? Sure, Rowling says that Ron and Hermione are deeply in love (and that does seem obvious). But you say that you think Hermione was better with Vicky. Whatever Rowling intended, you're not wrong to read the text and hear it in your thoughts.

From what I've gleaned, the discussions that weren't discussed over at Accio weren't saying "This is definitely what JKR meant, uh-huh!". Instead, they were "This is one way to read the books, this is one way to see how the characters might be motivated, this is one way to interpret this character's actions". And if this is what people hear when they read the books, that's good. Books don't stand by themselves. Authors know what they meant, but once you've written the words, they're not yours anymore. They belong to the people reading them, who can't hear the thoughts behind the words. They only can hear their own thoughts.

[ladydiana.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but you still wrote it.

Example: If you take <http://www.brownplasticpackagingtapemonster.com/story.shtml">The Brown Plastic Packaging Tape Monster Story and turn it into some insistence that I REALLY meant to give some psychological evalutaion of myself and my cat, I may have to hurt you. >:P Because, really, the situation was just *really godsdamned funny*, and I wanted to post it somewhere.

In that same vein, if Frost says he was "just talking about the woods", and that he wants people to quit psychoanalyzing what his buried meaning was, then they should quit fucking psychoanalyzing it already.

Authors know what they meant. If you misinterpret it, they are within their rights to correct you. Insistence that that's what they really meant does NOT make it "what they really meant".

[conuly]

I'm not saying that this or that is what "Frost really meant". I'm saying that we can find meaning that the author didn't intend.

This is humanity. We can find god, satan, and duckies in clouds, all within half an hour. We're perfectly justified in finding meaning for ourselves in books and poems, even if the author didn't intend to put that there.

I said it. Yeah, I did. But I wasn't telling a story, and I certainly wasn't telling a fictional story. Having a discussion isn't the same as telling a story.

Now, if in future years somebody should take this whole post apart, and form the basis of a religious group on my LiveJournal, using my posts as examples of "deeper meaning"... well, I'll laugh, but that's an acceptable use of... *giggles* God, that'd be funny.

I wouldn't stop them, anyway, even though I'm not writing any of this *giggles* for culties.

[rho]

Let me try to analogise somewhat. If I were to say "I don't really like Ron" and Rowling were to say "Ron is intended as a character that the reader will like" then we are both correct. If Rowling were to tell me that I'm wrong and I actually do like Ron then she would be just as wrong as if I were to tell her that she deliberately wrote him to be unlikable.

While Rowling (like other author) can say what her intention was when she wrote her books, she cannot tell me what my thoughts or feelings upon reading them should be. For me, the whole point of fandom is to explore those thoughts and feelings with other like-minded folks. Pretty much the whole point of fandom is to discuss things that aren't in the books. That can be trying to find a deeper meaning to some passage, or it can be predicting what happens next, or it can be alternate universe and what ifs, or it can be slash.

I have absolutely no time for people who say "no, this is what the author really meant", especially when the author has quite explicitly said otherwise. These people generally tend to be complete idiots. But there's a big difference between saying "this is what the author intended" and saying "this is what I see when I read".

For instance, when I read, I see a fairly strong Ginny/Luna romantic undercurrent. I'm almost positive that Rowling didn't intend this in what she wrote, but that doesn't mean that I don't see it. I can't help seeing that any more than I can help disliking Ron. For me to say that that's what I see is nothing more than a basic statement of fact.

Actual fanfiction is something more of a grey area, because there are copyright issues involved, but morally, I don't think that picking out slash is morally justified. Of course, slash is not what Rowling intended when she wrote her books, but then, nor is any other sort of fanfiction. If it was what she'd intended, then she would have written it herself. To single out slash as bad is something thsat I view as dangerous, because it seems to be giving the impression of "there is something in this piece of fiction that we especially don't approve of; homosexuality is bad".

Now, I'm not saying that that's how you're coming across to me. You seem to be equally as opposed to anything you see as going against Rowlings original intent, which would include Neville/Pansy just as much as it would include Neville/Draco. But there are people who would be happy to allow the former but not the latter, purely because the relationship is same sex, and I find that sort of position to be disturbing.

I don't read a whole lot of slash myself because I find most of it supremely uninteresting, badly written, and unsupported by cannon. But then, I have exactly the same reactions to most het and most gen. But if that's what other people are seeing then I wouldn't want totake away their ability to further explore their thoughts.

[conuly]

Rho, you're brilliant. Most of that is what I would've said if it had occured to me to say it. Much love.

(Incidentally, Rowling *does* tell us what to think a lot. If you like Draco as a character, and feel sorry for him, you "need to learn not to chase the bad boy", and if you like Dudley you're "reading the books for all the wrong reasons", and if you see Harry/Hermione (I don't, but let's move on from that) you're "delusional", which isn't a good thing for an author to go along with when talking about her own fans.)

[ladydiana.livejournal.com]

Ok, now wait, she did NOT say that the readers were delusional. Someone else said that, and she said "I wouldn't say 'delusional'".

And some of those people she was correcting had viciously attacked her for "not knowing anything about the story or the characters" because they had shipped or slashed something against what *she states is Canon*, so they went after her.

You know...there's a problem with that.

Although, everyone here seems to be in agreement with just about every single one of my peeves.

[conuly]

JKR: [points to herself and whispers] So do I!

ES: What was that?

JKR: [More loudly] Well so do I! So do I!

[All laugh; Melissa doubles over, hysterical, and may have died.]

ES: Harry/Hermione shippers - they're delusional!

JKR: Well no, I'm not going to - Emerson, I am not going to say they're delusional! They are still valued members of my readership! I am not going to use the word delusional. I am however, going to say — now I am trusting both of you to do the spoiler thing when you write this up —

The end of this may never be known. Saying "I'm not going to say they're delusional, I'm not going to use the word delusional" is a far cry from saying "They're not delusional" or "that's not a good thing to say". If the interview is to be trusted, they all continued laughing.

While some of them are psychotic freaks (hey, I'm not the author, I feel free to calls 'em as I sees 'em), she's tarring a whole group of people with the same brush. A sin of omission, perhaps?

[conuly]

And I suppose I did say that with more gay, maybe she would've avoided talking about their romances as much. But that was another joke. Kinda.

[ladydiana.livejournal.com]

Yeah, romance is another one of Rowling's NOT STRONG POINTS.

*ahem*

God.

Ick, indeed!

[conuly]

Hear, hear.

[conuly]

I'm sorry. I shouldn't be so condescending. But I really hate being yelled at, and you were horribly misunderstanding my views. It's irritating to be yelled at for something I didn't even do. But now I'm calm, and you're... either calm, or preparing to kill me, I don't know... anyway, you're quiet. So we can talk calmly, right?