Let's not forget her hook-nosed goblins that run the economy from the shadows!
JK Rowling's new book - A detective novel about a trans serial killer murdering women
- Thread starter Dirty Hipsters
- Start date
USA
You really DIDN'T read the books.. The werewolf was their friend, a good guy who actively tried to keep himself from harming anyone when he would uncontrollably turn and didn't want to infect or kill anyone. He taught Harry how to fight off the dementors, which saved both Harry's and Harry's Godfather Sirius life. The Werewolf gave his life fighting against the Death Eaters ( the Nazis). to protect the kids. Harry was The werewolf's son's Godfather.
The house elves were not "fine" being slaves. When Harry tricked Lucius Malfoy into freeing his house elf Dobby, Dobby then attacked his former master defending Harry and used his new found freedom to work at Hogwarts where he was paid and could come and go as he pleased. He voluntarily gave his life freeing Harry from the Deatheaters.
Last edited:
There's that, but I put that under interpreted meaning rather than intended meaning.
Except Dobby's an oddity. Most house elves are happy to serve.
That said, I've never seen the house elves as being an analogy for slavery. The house elves have their roots in folklore (elves helping humans while they're sleeping or something), and since they're a separate species, if they truly enjoy serving our every whim, who are we to complain? The books seem to settle on a middle ground by the end - Hermione's imposing her own values on the house elves, while it points out that they're still open for abuse.
Ah, but the other werewolf (Fenrir Greyback) who bit Remus Lupin was evil and wanted to infect as many people as he could, in particular kids.
If parents stopped naming their kids Werewolf McWerewolf, there'd not be anymore werewolf attacks, it seems.
Oh goodie, this again.
TBH, I've always found the lycanthropy = AIDS claim to be suspect. Yes, Rowling's claimed it was intended, but that was long after lycanthropy was introduced to the series. And lycanthropy is a pre-existing fictional condition. Vampires and/or werewolves wanting to create more vampires/werewolves isn't unheard of in fiction, and it makes sense from a biological standpoint. But by this logic, any intentional spreading of lycanthropy or vamprism could be interpreted as a metaphor for AIDS.
I'm talking about the bad guy werewolf who led a pack of evil werewolves and wanted to infect as many people as possible. Preferable children it seems.
Which, you know, is fine and all in a fictional sense, but if the author later claims being a werewolf is a metaphor for aids... Like, what the fuck!?
I don't think they were fine to serve. The Ministry of Magic forced them to serve, as they were magical beings. They often suffered long term abuse, even though the Ministry of Magic had outlawed abuse, it lacked enforcement. House elves were magically compelled to serve and could not deny a " master's " order even if they wanted to. I don't see that as " happy" to do anything as they had their free will removed. They had served wizards though for so long, they no longer even knew what else they could do. That is terribly sad. If Harry had freed more House elves, I am sure they would have acclimated over time to find their way again without being ordered around it just would have taken time.
I think most Species in Harry potter could be good or bad and it widely varied with plenty of shades of gray. So werewolves weren't just evil or try to bite people, it as up to the individual instead. Take Kreacher for example, He was mean and racist and gave Harry Potter maggots, but he also lead the House Elf Army to fight against the Death eaters. I mean Dementors were considered extremely evil, but they were also used to keep harmful wizards from harming other under the employment of the ministry.
Yea I had not heard the " Aids" connection there, that is just .. strange. But then again there are a lot of strange things in Harry potter..
It seems though that not all werewolves are evil, as with most characters and species in Harry Potter, it was up to the individual as to whether or not they chose to be evil. of course it is a lot harder for werewolves to try to be good considering when they turned they have Zero control over what happens after that until they change back, that was why they try to cage themselves up on full moons to prevent themselves from harming anyone. So those who did not want to harm anyone took preemptive measure to keep it from happening when they lost control after they turned. If someone was crazy enough to come in range of them while they were caged/ chained ect that wasn't the werewolves fault after that.
Last edited:
My wife struggles with this sort of thing, too. Progress on women's rights was fast, and even 10-20 years makes a big difference in perception because of how much changed, so she grew up in a very different world from todays 20- and early 30-somethings. There was a feeling from her youth that her identity as a "woman" was something dictated by men rather than women, and after all that struggle now it feels like it's being dictated by trans-women insetad. It's not remotely about disliking trans people, thinking there's something wrong with being trans, or denying that trans people are subjected to appalling abuse, assault and difficulties. She just finds that aspects of the way that trans discussion goes feel like a denial of her identity: to be described as a "person who menstruates" rather than a "woman" is a kick in the teeth.
Part of this I think is also that she feels there is a gender disparity in that these same cis/trans debates over identity don't seem to have the same intensity for men, perhaps indicating that men's identity in society still seems relatively secure and normalised.
Now that were talking Harry Potter, can someone explain to me why these wizards never used the conveniences of modern society, like internet, cars, cellphones or anything like that? I get that the books were written before cellphones were really a thing, but that still doesn't explain why this secret society is living like they're in the 18th century. You'd think they'd look at the modern world and atleast think 'the way they've designed and built roads sure seems a lot better than this cobble street shit we've got going on'.
Eh, I suspect Rowling may well be claiming it's a clever metaphor after the fact, same as the whole Nagini thing (and I question the cleverness), but while it makes sense and there's precedent for creating more monsters that way, you could very well work it as a metaphor for AIDS, intentionally or not. Or not, depending how you did it.
I agree with your wife, it does feel as though that we are no longer allowed to determine our own identity as well. The words we have come to identify ourselves with as biologically sexed and gendered females our entire lives are now being " taken" from us to mean something else and we are not supposed to have a say in it at all.
Being told that the terms we have used our entire lives to describe our own experience and identity as biologically sexed females no longer mean that does feel like we are not allowed to identify ourselves, but they are, and that they are allowed to define us as well now. That does not exactly seem right either. .As Girls growing up we bonded and identified with our struggles as being biologically sexed females. Our bodies do weird things. It is like how guys can relate to the weird things they have gone through with getting boners at the wrong time. Girls have our own set of problems, like having a period start unexpectedly and having other girls save you by having a tampax and a change of clothes. Girls curled up on the floor in the bathroom with extreme cramping and others helping them through it because we all understand and relate. There really is so much more that we experienced at every age that is different than biologically sexed males.
It really does. So does " cis". Women, both cis and trans, need beautiful words to describe the beautiful women they are meant to represent. Trying to tell biologically sexed women how they are allowed to identify themselves and then also calling us " breeders" or "menstruateurs" and other rude names is not helping the situation. Considering the hell biologically sexed women have endured historically due to their menstrual cycles, even being locked in boxes, abused and killed, to attack a woman's menstrual cycle or mock or refer to women as such is an attack on everything we as biologically sexed women understand what it actually means to be a woman, the identity of the experience of a woman. Is it right for someone who does not even understand that experience to then try to redefine what the words we use to describe it for us? Cutting out that huge part of the female identity, makes it feel as though a huge part of who we are as women is just being dismissed as not important to us.
So at times, it does tend to look like Biologically sexed males, are able to define themselves and us regardless of their gender, but Biologically sexed females have no say over anything. We are now just " breeders" or "menstruateurs" or something because it is not okay for us to define ourselves anymore or something.
That doesn't mean we don't want Transwomen to have beautiful names for themselves as well that define their experience, or that we do not recognize them as being female gendered, and want to help them be recognized as such. It is understandable for transwomen to be defensive due to the hell they have been put through as well, but marginalizing biologically sexed women when that was done to them as well, doesn't help anything here, and I pretty much feel like that is what is happening at times. Not all transwomen of course, but some of the things being said in the broader community are pretty wrong for all involved. Attacking a woman for questioning whether or not we can identify ourselves as well anymore as being transphobic isn't right either, especially when I have literally had people ask me if I have a vagina or a penis entirely too often these days when I say I am a woman like we are handing out party favors or something just to identify myself. Better specific terms are needed than just trying to lump penises and vaginas under the same term.
Last edited:
They used cars, but their cars could drive or fly. Their magic was much faster however. The time period didn't have internet or cellphones I don't think among the muggles.
Their magic was generally better than what Muggles had for the most part is why they didn't use them. They didn't have to worry about traffic:
I think the simplest answer comes with numbers (though not exact numbers, I don't have them): a lot of HP fans -> a lot of trans HP fans -> a lot of lefty-liberal HP fans that hang around Twitter. Rowling tweets a lot, is a big celebrity, rags to riches, and has donated a lot of money to charity so she's also a role model of sorts. Then, her ideas about gender identity are close to what most people think and contemporary liberal Twitter in general doesn't like what most people think about gender issues at all. Rowling's relationship with her Twitter audience -- including the articles that arise from it -- have forced her to defend her views, which are not out of the ordinary but still under a great deal of criticism if you stumble upon certain circles.
You're not supposed to think about that stuff. Just imagine describing surgery to wizards.
Wasnt she supposed to be cancelled or some shit? I'm starting to suspect this modernised rallying against "cancel culture" is just another load of vacuous deflecting poppycock yet again.
Yea.. No. I still plan on giving my sister another Harry Potter themed present this year for Christmas. I already have the really cool Hogwarts castle popup card for her. HEY.. Does that mean people will be selling their Harry Potter stuff and I could get a better deal on it? hmm... XD
This is the card:
Yes, that's something she's said too. Also that from a perspective of privilege, for all the huge difficulties many trans people suffer, if male privilege is a thing then they had and experienced it until their transition in a way girls did not, and it will lead to differences. Getting anecdotal, I've heard some cis women complain that trans women are more aggressive and domineering, and suggesting that they are taking some of that male attitude and assumption of authority into the debate, although it's not something I have an opinion on as it could as easily be a misconception or cognitive bias.
I think there has to be some acceptance that terms to define genders are broad and will not cover all bases, bearing in mind the impracticality of flooding gender with innumerable categories to meet all individual variation. With this in mind I think it's extremely problematic to tell cis-women they can't identify as a "woman" by their vaginas, uteruses, etc., whist accepting that we need to remember that a woman can be other than that, too.
If you're sneakily trying to hint i should sell you all my cool harry potter stuff for cheapsies, well I'm afraid you're all outta luck! As the closest i got is a DVD of Fantastic Beasts and that was given to someone else way before Rowling starting publicly surfing the terfs. I got, umm...Knives Out? It's about privelidged white people in a massive house still? Wait no, you cant have that one, i still need it for...things.Yea.. No. I still plan on giving my sister another Harry Potter themed present this year for Christmas. I already have the really cool Hogwarts castle popup card for her. HEY.. Does that mean people will be selling their Harry Potter stuff and I could get a better deal on it? hmm... XD
This is the card:
That's not a bad pop-up card. I can see the appeal. Needs more horror though.