𝐿𝒢𝓃𝒢 "not yet begun to fight"18h ago

TRANS PERSON: please don't press the button that makes children kill themselves

CIS PERSON: but it's such a pretty button

TRANS PERSON: yes but it kills children

CIS PERSON: it looks so fun to press tho

TRANS PERSON: uh huh it kills children

CIS PERSON: you don't understand this button reminds me of my own childhood

TRANS PERSON: i feel like I need to remind you - dead children

CIS PERSON: *sweat pouring down their face* but i can separate the button from the person who made the button!

TRANS PERSON: good for you, the button still makes children kill themselves

CIS PERSON: *straining from the effort of not pushing the button* but i want my children to enjoy the button

TRANS PERSON: the button that kills children

CIS PERSON: you just don't want anyone to enjoy things

TRANS PERSON: again...dead children

CIS PERSON: *pushes the button*

This post is about JK Rowling.

Show threadCassandrich

@Lana From my experience of my own kid's social circles: the ones who were HP fans had moms who'd been HP fans and gave off "gaslight gatekeep girlboss feminist" vibes. AFAIK none of them are friends anymore, which is also related to them having gone off to private schools because the middle school *gasp* has Black kids at it and Black folks living in the neighborhood around it.

Folks who were drawn to HP were drawn to it for a reason.

Apr 3 at 4:51pmWeb
Show threadgjm17h ago

@dalias @Lana Maybe that's true for people young enough never to have encountered the books without the "author is an anti-trans fanatic" associations.

But, e.g., my university-age daughter was an HP fan and has none of that stuff going on. She thinks JKR is contemptible and is keen to make sure that none of her money ever flows in JKR's direction ever again, but she loved the books when they were first published. She enjoyed the books and the movies "for a reason", but the reason was that the books were fun to read and the movies were fun to watch. (And also maybe that _practically everyone_ of her age was reading the books and watching the movies.)

I don't think justice is served by deciding retroactively that actually the books were obviously saturated with bigotry and that everyone who enjoyed them was a bigot.

(Yes, there absolutely is some shitty stuff in the books -- e.g., ye gods, the goblins -- but not so much that only Bad People could have liked them.)

Show threadCassandrich17h ago
@gjm @Lana I don't think you have to have been a bad person to like them back then, but they did particularly appeal to people with certain affinities, and the "I made these books enough of a part of my identity I want to pass that on to my kids" folks come across creepy to me.
Show threadgjm15h ago
@dalias @Lana So far as I can tell, most children who liked those books liked them more because _they_ liked them than because their parents were fans and somehow forced them into it. But, again, maybe we're talking about different age-groups; my own daughter was of about the age to read them as they originally came out and was distinctly more a fan than either parent.
Show threadCassandrich15h ago
@gjm @Lana I'm talking about parents who read them then as kids, with kids who read them in the past decade.
Show threadAlessandro Corazza πŸ‡¨πŸ‡¦13h ago

@dalias

I can't believe the books with "Cho Chang" and totally-not-jewish banker goblins have a statistically significant racist readership. Who could have seen that coming?

@Lana

Show threadγ•γ‚ˆγͺγ‚‰ηš†γ•γ‚“7h ago
@alessandro holy shit that naming is so racist it’s beyond belief lmao