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Paragon8 posted:the only thing more disturbing than the MOR thing is how some people think it is unironically the best thing they've read.
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Dec 24, 2012 00:27
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jivjov posted:If you want to run with D&D alignments, I always saw Hufflepuff as the Lawful Good, almost to a fault. Remember McMillan? The one with a stick up his rear end about being polite and pompous? Gryffindor seemed to run from Neutral Good through Chaotic Good with a side helping of Lawful Neutral. Ravenclaw seems to be most of the neutral spectrum, and Slytherin (at least as written) is Lawful Evil through Neutral Evil. I don't think any of this makes any sense. The D&D alignment system is terrible to start with, and as far as it can be taken, you'll find people of all alignments in each of the Houses. Apart from Sytherin obviously being the house where all the evil people go, anyway (not that it didn't have good people too). And besides, they're children - Draco Malfoy starts out seeming pretty evil but ends up alright; what's his D&D alignment? According to the Sorting Hat, who is the authority on these things, kids are sorted based on what kinds of qualities they value in themselves and others. We know basically nothing about Ravenclaw except that they value knowledge and reason. We know basically nothing about Hufflepuff except that they value loyalty and industriousness. No one said what Hufflepuffs are loyal to, and I suspect it depends on the Hufflepuff. An individual Hufflepuff could be loyal to friends, family, leaders, Hogwarts, Hufflepuff, their favorite quidditch team, their moral values, themselves, their employers, their country, their lover, their pets. . . . Maybe they're loyal to dark magic. Maybe they're loyal to the Bible. Maybe they're loyal to the voice inside their head that tells them to steal things. We don't know. So I wouldn't say they're always Lawful Good, or even inclining towards that corner of the alignment chart. The values of each House have basically nothing to do with D&D alignment. The two alignment axes are best described as altruism vs. selfishness and free-thinking vs. obedience. It has nothing to do with bravery, honor, knowledge, reason, cunning, or industriousness. The closest parallels are that you could draw a loose connection between loyalty and obedience (Law) or ambition and selfishness (Evil). But it's a stretch.
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Dec 24, 2012 01:22
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To build off of what DontMockMySmock is saying, wasn't there somewhere that Rowling said that the sorting hat is based off of what you value and not what qualities you actually have? Like, someone could be dumb as a rock and still get into Ravenclaw as long as he or she thought that knowledge was really important (although I'd imagine s/he'd never be able to get into the dorms!) or they could be cowardly and still get into Gryffindor as long as they valued bravery above all else. I can't remember where I heard that but I seem to remember her saying something to that effect. It explains Neville, I suppose.
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Dec 24, 2012 01:27
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WeaponGradeSadness posted:I can't remember where I heard that but I seem to remember her saying something to that effect. It explains Neville, I suppose. It's all through the books, really, and I think is spelled out by the Sorting Hat at some point. Very few of the sorts make a whole lot of sense without this fact. Neville is a good example, but there are plenty more: Hermione is more smart than brave, Ron is more loyal than brave, Luna is more brave than smart, etc.
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Dec 24, 2012 02:04
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DontMockMySmock posted:It's all through the books, really, and I think is spelled out by the Sorting Hat at some point. Very few of the sorts make a whole lot of sense without this fact. Neville is a good example, but there are plenty more: Hermione is more smart than brave, Ron is more loyal than brave, Luna is more brave than smart, etc. Peter Pettigrew too. You can just imagine that weak snivelling poo poo looking up to all the brave kids.
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Dec 24, 2012 02:09
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Sorry, I wasn't attempting to give a complete and comprehensive look at the houses, just a quick overview. Also, I should have specified that I was more using the "popular view" of the D&D alignment matrix rather that rules-as-written.
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Dec 24, 2012 03:44
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DontMockMySmock posted:It's all through the books, really, and I think is spelled out by the Sorting Hat at some point. Very few of the sorts make a whole lot of sense without this fact. Neville is a good example, but there are plenty more: Hermione is more smart than brave, Ron is more loyal than brave, Luna is more brave than smart, etc. I always read the central three as being representative of more than just Griffyndor. Ron is basically a Hufflepuff, Hermione a Ravenclaw, and Harry's a Slytherin like the hat said.
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Dec 24, 2012 11:59
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MrFlibble posted:Peter Pettigrew too. You can just imagine that weak snivelling poo poo looking up to all the brave kids. I think that Peter does have a kind of courage - the courage to survive, no matter what it takes. I could easily see a coward betraying his friends to save his own skin, but mutilating himself to make his fake death more convincing? I honestly think that if I had a choice between 1) personally and intentionally cutting off one of my body parts and 2) certain death, I would wuss out so hard.
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Dec 24, 2012 12:43
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jivjov posted:If you want to run with D&D alignments, I always saw Hufflepuff as the Lawful Good, almost to a fault. Remember McMillan? The one with a stick up his rear end about being polite and pompous? Gryffindor seemed to run from Neutral Good through Chaotic Good with a side helping of Lawful Neutral. Ravenclaw seems to be most of the neutral spectrum, and Slytherin (at least as written) is Lawful Evil through Neutral Evil. And Ravenclaw are the ones assigning D&D alignments to the other houses 
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Dec 24, 2012 15:37
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Danzou posted:It's pretty different, and to the author's credit, he's able to eventually improve his writing and do some clever things. If you're the sort of person who doesn't immediately understand why it's so godawful, its likely everything you ever wanted in a story. Heh, I wonder if the author of MOR reads this thread because I just checked out the latest page and it has Harry explaining that he's messed up because of the whole evil magic soul in his head and then an explanation of the whole 'ten year old suggests raping another ten year old' thing.
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Dec 24, 2012 17:47
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Yeah, but he also explains the rape thing in the same chapter within which it occurs. Wizard society is being depicted as backwards and barbaric, and young lords think rape is a good way of humiliating and dominating a woman because that's how they're raised to think, and Harry, raised by Muggles, is revolted by this and immediately vows in his head to reform wizard society. He spends most of the story trying to reform Draco. How people manage to read the scene as some kind of endorsement of Draco's mentality is baffling. Or are people reacting to the fact that somebody mentioned rape in a Harry Potter fanfiction? When rape is something that happens in the actual canon?
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Dec 24, 2012 21:28
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Calef posted:Yeah, but he also explains the rape thing in the same chapter within which it occurs. Wizard society is being depicted as backwards and barbaric, and young lords think rape is a good way of humiliating and dominating a woman because that's how they're raised to think, and Harry, raised by Muggles, is revolted by this and immediately vows in his head to reform wizard society. He spends most of the story trying to reform Draco. How people manage to read the scene as some kind of endorsement of Draco's mentality is baffling. The whole point of MOR is that it isn't really fan-fiction at all. It's all just a contrivance to explain and apply logical and mathematical proofs (in a particularly humanistic way) to real world situations. The magical world is just a convenient setting in which none of the characters have any of the preconceptions that the reader does. The rape thing is just something the author uses to establish that the character in question has a morality utterly removed from the reader - it's lazy because he's done the exact same thing in Three Worlds Collide and was called out then because it's a really lazy and insensitive way of doing what he's trying to do.
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Dec 24, 2012 21:46
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Alchenar posted:The whole point of MOR is that it isn't really fan-fiction at all. It's all just a contrivance to explain and apply logical and mathematical proofs (in a particularly humanistic way) to real world situations. The magical world is just a convenient setting in which none of the characters have any of the preconceptions that the reader does. I ... see your point.
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Dec 24, 2012 22:04
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The first few chapters are both pretty naked in their self insertion and how raw they're written. The author is an intelligent and successful guy in his own fields of interest, but as a writer he was clearly fed by genre publications and shoddy internet fiction, and tries to break down and piece back together his influences, in that autistic sort of TVtropes approach. It wasn't so much that the scene was espousing some hosed up view, but that it reveals the hosed up writing process, and the malformed personality, of the author. No, if you want to read Methods of Rationality being textully offensive about rape: quote:"Merlin preserve us," said Penelope Clearwater in a strangled voice. "You mean that's how men would treat us if we didn't have wands to defend ourselves?"
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Dec 24, 2012 22:47
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Well ... Um, that's cannon though. Quirrell is Voldemort ... Voldermort's mother used a love potion on his father. If that's reprehensible, then Harry Potter was already reprehensible.
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Dec 24, 2012 23:21
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The love potion and the names are the only canon things in that excerpt (and the rest of that stupid fanfiction).
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Dec 24, 2012 23:52
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Calef posted:Well ... Um, that's cannon though. Quirrell is Voldemort ... Voldermort's mother used a love potion on his father. If that's reprehensible, then Harry Potter was already reprehensible.
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Dec 25, 2012 00:18
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Calef posted:Well ... Um, that's cannon though.
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Dec 25, 2012 00:30
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Danzou posted:Again, the problem is neither that the subject was broached or its glorification. It's that Quirrell is interrupting a woman's rights protest to spout MRA talking points. That might have something to do with the fact that he's wizard-hitler.
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Dec 25, 2012 00:51
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I think my biggest problem with the Draco rape discussion was the part where Harry's reflecting on the fact that wizard royalty think they can rape whoever, and then thinksquote:"There were places in Muggle-land where it was still the same way, countries where that sort of nobility still existed and still thought like that, or even grimmer lands where it wasn't just the nobility. It was like that in every place and time that didn't descend directly from the Enlightenment."
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Dec 25, 2012 04:39
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WeaponGradeSadness posted:It explains Neville, I suppose. Now wait just a minute there. Neville is plenty Gryffindor. He's the one that stands up to Harry&co when he sees them breaking the rules for the umpteen time, he's (or has tried to) kicked the everloving crap out of Malfoy on several occasions, and he's the one that destroyed the final Horcrux. Hell, the only reason the books aren't called "Neville Longbottom and the X" (well, apart from the name being silly) is that Voldemort apparently flipped a coin between him and Harry and decided "yup, that's the Chosen One!". Also, he ends up together with Luna, clear winner there.
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Dec 26, 2012 16:35
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Bad Wolf posted:Also, he ends up together with Luna, clear winner there. He marries Hannah Abbott.
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Dec 26, 2012 18:39
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Wait, does anyone marry a non-wizard? Or are there no-mugglebloods in the Harry Potter future?
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Dec 26, 2012 18:44
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Alchenar posted:Or are there no-mugglebloods in the Harry Potter future? Hermione/Ron's and Harry/Ginny's kids are all half-bloods.
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Dec 26, 2012 19:28
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Joramun posted:Scorpius Malfoy, Draco's son. And possibly Bill and Fleur's daughter as well. How do you figure Draco's son is a half-blood? Or, for that matter, Bill and Fleur's daughter? Fleur's grandmother was a Veela (which I suppose isn't "wizard blood", but implies she's not Muggle-born). Hermione, Ron, Harry and Ginny are all wizards, so unless you follow a "one-drop" interpretation of wizard purity (god, this is getting hosed up, isn't it?) their kids are all wizard-born. I don't think anyone in Harry's year (at least that we know of) married a Muggle, which is a bit strange considering that a few people in his year were born of such marriages (Dean and Seamus come to mind). This could just be for the sake of storytelling, mind you, because it would be weird to mention in the epilogue that someone married some random Muggle we've never heard of.
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Dec 26, 2012 20:05
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PT6A posted:How do you figure Draco's son is a half-blood? Or, for that matter, Bill and Fleur's daughter? Fleur's grandmother was a Veela (which I suppose isn't "wizard blood", but implies she's not Muggle-born). Obviously as a fig leaf to the gay community she should have had someone marry Dudley.
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Dec 26, 2012 20:11
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PT6A posted:How do you figure Draco's son is a half-blood? Or, for that matter, Bill and Fleur's daughter? PT6A posted:Hermione, Ron, Harry and Ginny are all wizards, so unless you follow a "one-drop" interpretation of wizard purity (god, this is getting hosed up, isn't it?) their kids are all wizard-born.
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Dec 26, 2012 20:12
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This talk about MoR made me check it out. I'd heard of it in this thread in the past. I thought it was a continuation of the story not a retelling where Harry Potter's step-dad is a biologist. Apparently having a scientist for a step-father makes you a genius.quote:Harry sent his parents a glare. "I am a conscientious objector to child conscription, on grounds that I should not have to suffer for a disintegrating school system's failure to provide teachers or study materials of even minimally adequate quality." No 11-12 year old talks like this. Is this really the best fanfiction for the series out there?
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Dec 27, 2012 07:00
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Kneel Before Zog posted:No 11-12 year old talks like this. Is this really the best fanfiction for the series out there? If you're a humourless jackass with self-diagnosed Aspergers who hates Harry Potter? Yes it is.
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Dec 27, 2012 07:18
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Kneel Before Zog posted:No 11-12 year old talks like this. Is this really the best fanfiction for the series out there? I'm actually willing to accept that as one of the digs at Harry Potter fans. Learning Magic and confronting an evil Wizard is fine, but being savant-like smart is unrealistic for a 12 year old?
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Dec 27, 2012 11:08
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Alchenar posted:I'm actually willing to accept that as one of the digs at Harry Potter fans. Learning Magic and confronting an evil Wizard is fine, but being savant-like smart is unrealistic for a 12 year old? I would argue that the last one lacks verisimilitude, which is related to but distinct from realism. The rules that govern how magic works in Harry Potter are adequately explained by the narrative, though some details fall apart under scrutiny (e.g. you can't Transfigure inorganic objects into food, but you can Transfigure them into live food animals). Being raised by professors doesn't adequately explain why a 10-year-old's dialogue reads like a poorly-written academic essay.
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Dec 27, 2012 11:57
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The whole Methods of Rationality Harry Talks Too Smart thing is explained on the previous page of this very thread. The conceit of that fanfic is that Harry absorbed Voldemort's intellect when he took on his soul fragment.
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Dec 28, 2012 18:51
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Calef posted:The whole Methods of Rationality Harry Talks Too Smart thing is explained on the previous page of this very thread. The conceit of that fanfic is that Harry absorbed Voldemort's intellect when he took on his soul fragment. Right, but Voldemort wasn't really that intelligent and was a charming sociopathic manipulator, not a spergy robot.
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Dec 28, 2012 20:36
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Yeah, the correct answer is that it isn't fanfiction, it's one of those textbooks that uses narrative to try to teach math and logic theories except the narrative has gotten way out of control.
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Dec 28, 2012 20:44
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Kneel Before Zog posted:This talk about MoR made me check it out. I'd heard of it in this thread in the past. I thought it was a continuation of the story not a retelling where Harry Potter's step-dad is a biologist. Apparently having a scientist for a step-father makes you a genius. I think it was linked earlier in the thread but as far as Harry Potter fanfic's go I rather liked A Black Comedy by Nonjon: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3401052/1/A-Black-Comedy The premise is that after Harry beats Voldemort he goes to work for the Ministry of magic on the Veil that Sirius Black fell through. Harry goes through it accidentally and end up in an alternate universe that his godfather ended up in. It's a fairly funny, lighthearted comedy that doesn't take itself or the source material too seriously. Just stay away from the rest of his stuff. It's all laden with wish fulfillment and mary-sue-ing and 
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Dec 28, 2012 21:33
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Harry learned how to kill dementors by thinking really hard about how cool space is.
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Dec 31, 2012 02:54
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Sarkozymandias posted:Harry learned how to kill dementors by thinking really hard about how cool space is.
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Dec 31, 2012 12:16
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WeaponGradeSadness posted:I can't remember where I heard that but I seem to remember her saying something to that effect. It explains Neville, I suppose. I always thought that Neville was explained by his family's history in Gryffindor. The Longbottom parents were almost certainly in Gryffindor, and based on her comments, Gran might have been in Gryffindor as well. Of course, the family history might just be a psychological thing that influences your house request. If your entire family is in a particular house, the desire to fit in with them is probably going to be on your mind, whether consciously or not.
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Dec 31, 2012 18:30
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Sarkozymandias posted:Harry learned how to kill dementors by thinking really hard about how cool space is. No, no, he learned to kill dementors by using his superior transhumanist ideals to reject the very concept of death, so his "happy thought" is that nobody has to die ever, which kills dementors because they are secretly the physical manifestations of the concept of death, and apparently Rowena Ravenclaw figured it out but didn't tell anyone? 
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Dec 31, 2012 20:50
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Joramun posted:That actually wouldn't be entirely inappurtenant, considering dementors are supposed to represent a physical metaphor for depression. That sure is one cool word you used there.
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Dec 31, 2012 23:27
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