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Massive turnout. When I clicked in the guy was talking out getting harassed for his investigative journalism. https://twitter.com/RepMTG/status/1770146916510446005 Also, the right wing is going off on Obama today because he visited 10 Downing Street and how come he isnt happy with having a 3rd term that now he's running for a 4th term as president.
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Mar 19, 2024 20:10
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je1 healthcare posted:See, I was lucky enough to never get into those books in the first place because my dad thought they promoted satanism. A decade later I opened up the first one and got halfway through because it seemed like a narcissistic fairy tale, just generic child wish fulfillment. I'm not defending Rowling here but have you ever read any other young adult fiction? Because a lot of young adult fiction is exactly that and there's nothing inherently wrong with it What we're criticizing here is all the "buried ledes" so to speak. I read all the books 20+ years ago and enjoyed them at face value because when I read pop fiction I'm not always trying to find hidden beliefs of the authors and also I was a lot younger and a lot dumber
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Mar 19, 2024 20:26
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All of the writing and plotting and story in the Harry Potter books is so wildly incoherent and incompetent I tend to think it's less her intentionally writing in all these facist things and more her being a terrible lovely writer who let all of her lovely beliefs leak in. At least in the early books. Later books I could see her starting to try to justify poo poo even though the plotting writing and everything was still juvenile as hell
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Mar 19, 2024 20:35
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I don't think J.K. Rowling had any particularly strong political beliefs (or at least conscious ones) when she was writing the books originally, which is part of why they're dogshit. Of course, she's picked up a few in the years since then. Hoo boy has she ever.
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Mar 19, 2024 20:38
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:I don't think J.K. Rowling had any particularly strong political beliefs (or at least conscious ones) when she was writing the books originally, which is part of why they're dogshit. I think she, of course, had beliefs, she just wasn't particularly aware of what her beliefs were. I mean, she wrote a series of books where magic lets you conjure whatever you like out of thin air, and yet there was still poverty. That comes from somewhere, and I must say it's a terribly dark place.
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Mar 19, 2024 20:49
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This was iterated in the Shaun video but yeah she has initial ideas, like recognizing inequalities in the worlds she made but decides it cant be any other way. Harry, after all thats happened, decides to be a cop, supporting the system that failed extremely hard and Dobby is actually a wierdo for not wanting to be a Slave.
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Mar 19, 2024 20:52
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Just struggling to conceive of a better world within the fiction of the Harry Potter universe doesn't necessarily make someone bad. There's an argument to be made that it's emblematic of the intellectual rot at the heart of British culture that their defining fantasy work just inherently accepts classism. It's a failure of imagination and if that's your issue go read Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. It's when she started to actively pushing back against the trans movement, many of whom were huge fans of the Harry Potter books, and started the slippery slope to Holocaust Denier that it became bad.
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Mar 19, 2024 20:56
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PT6A posted:I think she, of course, had beliefs, she just wasn't particularly aware of what her beliefs were. Yeah, that's more or less what I meant to say. quote:I mean, she wrote a series of books where magic lets you conjure whatever you like out of thin air, and yet there was still poverty. That comes from somewhere, and I must say it's a terribly dark place. J.K. Rowling sucks rear end infinitely but creators not thinking through the full ramifications of their story beats is amazingly, frustratingly common in fantasy and sci-fi media. It doesn't necessarily come from terribly dark places in their psyches.
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Mar 19, 2024 20:57
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PT6A posted:I think she, of course, had beliefs, she just wasn't particularly aware of what her beliefs were. I dunno, I think that's more lack of imagination on her part. I don't think there's anything behind that plot hole at all, just lovely writing and plotting. Like I said, I can see things crystalizing for her a bit more as the series wore on and she started trying to justify or work her way around the gigantic plot holes and in the process incorporating a lot of her lovely ideas but initially I think she was writing whatever thought popped into her head and moving on and not having any consistent or coherent view of how the world she was creating worked
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Mar 19, 2024 21:11
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https://twitter.com/aterkel/status/1770178003969941933 Lara Trump is now a good pick since she threw this weirdo under the bus right off the bat.
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Mar 19, 2024 21:14
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Morrow posted:There's an argument to be made that it's emblematic of the intellectual rot at the heart of British culture that their defining fantasy work just inherently accepts classism.
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Mar 19, 2024 21:27
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Dr. Faustus posted:Did you just call Harry Potter Britain's "defining fantasy work?" I mean as much as the fascists today like to try and co-opt Tolkien, I think that in terms of direct influence, Potter has probably had more influence on people - and especially their politics - than The Lord of the Rings if we are limiting things to like the last 30-40 years. Tolkien's stuff has still had enormous influence, yes, but the lion's share of it was indirect through its influence on the fantasy genre as a whole rather than directly.
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Mar 19, 2024 21:39
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Morrow posted:Just struggling to conceive of a better world within the fiction of the Harry Potter universe doesn't necessarily make someone bad. There's an argument to be made that it's emblematic of the intellectual rot at the heart of British culture that their defining fantasy work just inherently accepts classism. It's a failure of imagination and if that's your issue go read Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. Is that the one written by the far-right influancer from LessWrong? Sarkkan of I Can't Be Assed To Actually Look This Up? RoboChrist 9000 posted:I mean as much as the fascists today like to try and co-opt Tolkien, I think that in terms of direct influence, Potter has probably had more influence on people - and especially their politics - than The Lord of the Rings if we are limiting things to like the last 30-40 years. Tolkien's stuff has still had enormous influence, yes, but the lion's share of it was indirect through its influence on the fantasy genre as a whole rather than directly. 
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Mar 19, 2024 21:46
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I'll do a post-hoc rationalization that I forgot Lord of the Rings was British because it's not steeped in British culture like Harry Potter is: it's set in a fantasy world while Hogwarts is a British school populated by British people. But I'll strengthen my argument by conceding that it's post-Thatcher/Modern Britain's defining fantasy work. Neito posted:Is that the one written by the far-right influancer from LessWrong? Sarkkan of I Can't Be Assed To Actually Look This Up? I haven't read it in like a decade so I wouldn't be surprised if the author has been milkshake ducked.
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Mar 19, 2024 21:46
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Neito posted:Is that the one written by the far-right influancer from LessWrong? Sarkkan of I Can't Be Assed To Actually Look This Up?
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Mar 19, 2024 22:18
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Morrow posted:Just struggling to conceive of a better world within the fiction of the Harry Potter universe doesn't necessarily make someone bad. There's an argument to be made that it's emblematic of the intellectual rot at the heart of British culture that their defining fantasy work just inherently accepts classism. It's a failure of imagination and if that's your issue go read Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. That's what I always figured, and I never got why people criticized Harry's decision to become a cop. Of course he's going to work within the existing, rotten system. He's British! It's fantastic verisimilitude that even wizards have an existing cultural context that shapes what ideas are acceptable. Criticizing a work because not every character within it acts like a perfectly enlightened altruist is a route to only accepting bland, preachy stories. Edit: that being said, I don't think Rowling takes advantage of this. It would be pretty fascinating to read Harry Potter and the Leftist Goblin Revolt (even if I don't think she could handle it). William Bear fucked around with this message at 22:41 on Mar 19, 2024 |
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Mar 19, 2024 22:34
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Elephant Ambush posted:I'm not defending Rowling here but have you ever read any other young adult fiction? Because a lot of young adult fiction is exactly that and there's nothing inherently wrong with it Not really, the things I read for fun at that age were classic science fiction, newsstand magazines, and somethingawful dot com Browsing YA books by the time I was in college got kind of boring because I noticed the consistent theme of the protagonist being the hero by sole virtue of existing, they're born special and send ripples throughout the universe without having to really consciously do anything. Things just happen to them, they don't have to make any challenging decisions (standing up for your friends doesn't count), and at best the writing can make it seem like they kinda sorta did something bold and heroic even when it's something most people would do in the same situation. They're often immersed in a fantastical world that's beyond their control or full comprehension and come out on top due to their identity. Identity trumps all I understand why that would appeal to kids and young adults, I'm not knocking it because they clearly entertain a ton of people and that's all any book really needs to do. I assume they parallel the readers' life situations, young people also live in a world that feels beyond their control or comprehension, existing under the yoke of arbitrary rules-based systems. And despite being relatively small and powerless, they (hopefully) derive self-esteem from being told they're special and they will some day do great things by sole virtue of being themselves. As a youth, your identity is really all you have and if you're fortunate you have people that love you unconditionally for existing. But I could also be wildly off the mark here, as I'm generalizing based off my impression of like 2 and a half YA novels. I'm sure people can post counter-examples. Like what you like, if you can see things from the perspective of a child again then consider yourself blessed In the 2000s most of my exposure to Harry Potter came from reading news and entertainment articles about the franchise, the fandom, the publishing machine behind it and the nonstop film productions (thanks Entertainment Weekly). My dad hated it, but he was also weirdly aloof and kind of random when it came to his hangups which seemed like baggage from his catholic upbringing. But from an outside perspective that was Rowling's controversial stance of the decade- promoting witchcraft as a Cool Thing for Kids and supporting gay marriage
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Mar 19, 2024 22:36
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RoboChrist 9000 posted:I mean as much as the fascists today like to try and co-opt Tolkien, I think that in terms of direct influence, Potter has probably had more influence on people - and especially their politics - than The Lord of the Rings if we are limiting things to like the last 30-40 years. Tolkien's stuff has still had enormous influence, yes, but the lion's share of it was indirect through its influence on the fantasy genre as a whole rather than directly. I think this is definitely in "Citation needed" territory. I'm sure it's more popular among Millennials, but I don't think it was as big of a hit with GenX or older, and now a lot of Zoomers are turning away from it. I'm not sure how you're arriving at it affecting people's politics, - I see a lot of shallow personality quiz stuff referencing it, but Millennials don't appear to be more anti-trans, anti-semetic, anit-fat, or supportive of slavery than GenX, Boomers, or older generations who didn't get into HP. Can you at least articulate what politics you think it's promoting and influencing people towards?
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Mar 19, 2024 22:56
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Elephant Ambush posted:I'm not defending Rowling here but have you ever read any other young adult fiction? Because a lot of young adult fiction is exactly that and there's nothing inherently wrong with it I think this is an area where, once again, K.A. Applegate's Animorphs series really shines as a counter-example to the typical YA experience. Better, more engaging content is out here. New YA fiction seems to be targeted towards adults with more limited media literacy, unfortunately.
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Mar 19, 2024 23:05
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je1 healthcare posted:Browsing YA books by the time I was in college got kind of boring because I noticed the consistent theme of the protagonist being the hero by sole virtue of existing, they're born special and send ripples throughout the universe without having to really consciously do anything. Things just happen to them, they don't have to make any challenging decisions (standing up for your friends doesn't count), and at best the writing can make it seem like they kinda sorta did something bold and heroic even when it's something most people would do in the same situation. They're often immersed in a fantastical world that's beyond their control or full comprehension and come out on top due to their identity. Identity trumps all The year is 2030 and Harry Potter has been reimagined as a simulpublished webtoon / light novel, "I Was Adopted By A Magical Boarding School And Won The Lottery, Now I Can't Stop Beating The King Of Evil"
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Mar 20, 2024 00:13
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Pantaloon Pontiff posted:I think this is definitely in "Citation needed" territory. I'm sure it's more popular among Millennials, but I don't think it was as big of a hit with GenX or older, and now a lot of Zoomers are turning away from it. I'm not sure how you're arriving at it affecting people's politics, - I see a lot of shallow personality quiz stuff referencing it, but Millennials don't appear to be more anti-trans, anti-semetic, anit-fat, or supportive of slavery than GenX, Boomers, or older generations who didn't get into HP. Can you at least articulate what politics you think it's promoting and influencing people towards? Did you not see the deluge of liberals making "Trump is just like Voldemort!" comments for the last decade? Like I feel like Harry Potter Liberal was a term we more or les used on these very forums. Yeah, a lot of older generations had Tolkien as an influence, but I don't think he was as big an influence on Gen X overall the way Potter was on Millennials. Like yeah, they don't follow Rowling, but they definitely have the milquetoast centrist liberalism of the books reinforcing their own beliefs. And they dream about going to Hogwarts. LotR had a bigger impact among those most impacted by it, if we're talking depth, but in terms of overall breadth of influence, I don't think any fantasy property besides maybe Twilight can begin to approach what Potter has had over the last ~50 years. EDIT: And, to clarify because I am being tired and may not be entirely clear, I mean in terms of *direct* influence as in direct from the text/film to the audience. Yes, LOTR still has a broader impact by virtue of being the bedrock on which basically all modern fantasy and it tropes is based, but I don't think as many people in the last 50 years have been directly impacted by reading or seeing the books/films as they have with the Potter books/films. LOTR's influence these days is more one or more steps removed from the source.
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Mar 20, 2024 00:31
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OK, this is driving me nuts so I have to finally ask someone: what the gently caress does this smiley mean? I see it used all the time and maybe I'm just a dumbass but I've never even been able to figure it out by context.
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Mar 20, 2024 00:55
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Elephant Ambush posted:I'm not defending Rowling here but have you ever read any other young adult fiction? Because a lot of young adult fiction is exactly that and there's nothing inherently wrong with it I mean, I don't know about that as an accurate critique of YA fiction as a whole. One series that made a similar cultural splash was The Hunger Games, and it at least raised some interesting questions about our society as well as a hypothetical society depicted in the books, even if it suffered from similar problems from time to time. Perhaps if people read and referenced that, instead of HP, we'd have a common agreement in western society that bombing hospitals to "kill terrorists" is Bad, for example. HP is interesting in that it doesn't really ask the reader to consider any nuanced moral questions. The Bad Guys Are Bad, the Good Guys Are Good. The lack of moral ambiguity helps to characterize it as an aesthetically fascist work.
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Mar 20, 2024 00:55
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...! posted:OK, this is driving me nuts so I have to finally ask someone: what the gently caress does this smiley mean? I see it used all the time and maybe I'm just a dumbass but I've never even been able to figure it out by context. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Side_Eyeing_Chloe
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Mar 20, 2024 00:57
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I mean it's very well documented that people who were kids when Harry Potter came out are less conservative than their parents, so if the Harry Potter books are propaganda that makes you fascist or whatever they did a terrible job of it.
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Mar 20, 2024 01:00
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...! posted:OK, this is driving me nuts so I have to finally ask someone: what the gently caress does this smiley mean? I see it used all the time and maybe I'm just a dumbass but I've never even been able to figure it out by context. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Side_Eyeing_Chloe
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Mar 20, 2024 01:01
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RoboChrist 9000 posted:Did you not see the deluge of liberals making "Trump is just like Voldemort!" comments for the last decade? I think this is a symptom of being terminally online. No I've literally never heard that comparison in real life, at least not in a serious way. Even in a joking way I'm not sure I ever heard it.
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Mar 20, 2024 01:08
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:J.K. Rowling sucks rear end infinitely but creators not thinking through the full ramifications of their story beats is amazingly, frustratingly common in fantasy and sci-fi media. It doesn't necessarily come from terribly dark places in their psyches. True, but in some Alice in Wonderland type whimsical fantasy media thinking through the full ramifications of the setting and plot would be a bit um, pointless, as often the lack of coherence is intentional. Something like the Labyrinth, why do all the fantasy creatures turn up in the girls room a the end to have a party, who knows, whatever, fun way to end the film. This doesn't apply to something like Harry Potter though, as actions in it are shown to have consequences and while it has elements of whimsy the setting is meant to follow consistent rules.
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Mar 20, 2024 01:09
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Thanks!
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Mar 20, 2024 02:53
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Neito posted:Is that the one written by the far-right influancer from LessWrong? Sarkkan of I Can't Be Assed To Actually Look This Up? eliezer yudkowski isn't someone i'd call a 'far right influencer,' but in him is the blueprint for how "rationalist" communities slowly transform into radical environments peppered with a handful of secretly batshit founding clauses accepted as unshakeable axiom with no real education to speak of in machine learning (and the essential strength of pouring out pages upon pages upon pages of rationalization on a constant basis to extoll your normal as highest truth above partisanship), he managed to ever get taken seriously in various fields that held him in mental obsession, including: cryonic life preservation, rationalist thought, and AI is going to kill us all
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Mar 20, 2024 03:47
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Boris Galerkin posted:I think this is a symptom of being terminally online. I have. And also like, those online posts are made by people, you know. If a great number of twitter accounts seem to relate their political views through Harry Potter metaphors, don't you think that says something?
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Mar 20, 2024 03:52
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Pantaloon Pontiff posted:I think this is definitely in "Citation needed" territory. I'm sure it's more popular among Millennials, but I don't think it was as big of a hit with GenX or older, and now a lot of Zoomers are turning away from it. I'm not sure how you're arriving at it affecting people's politics, - I see a lot of shallow personality quiz stuff referencing it, but Millennials don't appear to be more anti-trans, anti-semetic, anit-fat, or supportive of slavery than GenX, Boomers, or older generations who didn't get into HP. Can you at least articulate what politics you think it's promoting and influencing people towards? Hi, it's me, the Gen X fantasy reader who loved Harry Potter when it was current and made sure to read the later books as soon as they were published. I've read plenty of both young adult and adult fantasy, and the Harry Potter series was expressly crafted to "age with the audience" - the books get not only longer, but also more complex, serious, and violent as the series progresses. Also, I'm pretty sure the Harry Potter movies were popular across generations, since they did really well "both financially and critically" according to Wikipedia. I assume that level of success means a lot of adults were watching them, and not just parents bringing their kids to the theater or buying DVDs for the kids. I also read The Casual Vacancy, Rowling's novel for adults about a political conflict between conservative suburbanites and their impoverished neighbors living in government-assisted housing - there are multiple concurrent subplots as well. I was genuinely surprised to learn about Rowling's transphobic views, somewhere in the mid 2010's. She kept doubling down on those views no matter who tried to reason with her. I gave up on reading anything else she wrote. That turned out to be a blessing. I've browsed Wikipedia summaries of "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child" (technically she didn't write it, she just oversaw it) and "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" (I don't know her role in this and can't be bothered to care). I dodged reading/watching some gag-inducing schlock. Anyway, I listened to the entire Shaun Youtube podcast and HOLY poo poo there is so much in the books that I never thought too much about back when I read Harry Potter (as an adult!) poo poo about slavery (the house elves) and lack of consequences (almost every Slytherin either supports Voldemort or flees the final battle, but the House Slytherin is never dissolved or reformed) I dimly remember. What Shaun's podcast really drives home is that in Harry Potter, no one (except maybe Hermione's pushback against house elf slavery, and that's played for laughs before eventually being dropped) stops to think "This system is corrupt and systemic reform is needed." Dumbledore once says something like "the wizarding world has mistreated other fantastic races and now they might join Voldemort" but that tiny plot thread never goes anywhere. The Aurors do godawful things like employ mind-torturing, soul-stealing dementors and are never held accountable for it. Voldemort leads a fascist movement that slaughters anyone he doesn't like, but this is seen as an individualist problem solved by defeating Voldemort, not a systemic one that allows absolute power to corrupt his many followers absolutely. Shaun points out that this comes from J.K. Rowling's neoliberal philosophy that problems can only have individual solutions, not systemic or governmental solutions, and government reform or changes to the status quo are never worth considering. All that matters is defeating the bad guys and replacing them with good guys. A similar thing happens in The Casual Vacancy - poo poo gets really bad in the book, and when it's all over, the only ray of hope that anything might turn around is a few people's decisions to change how they live their lives. Again, there are individual efforts to make the suburb a better place, but no real consequences for bad actors, and no questioning whether the system is flawed or how the government should do anything better, despite a social worker's horrendous incompetence and the suffering caused by a monstrous criminal. TLDR - listen to Shaun's podcast, it's really good, and it does a lot to explain the maybe-not-obvious-at-first-glance neoliberal leanings of J.K. Rowling's writing.
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Mar 20, 2024 04:03
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The "read another book" meme exists for a very good reason
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Mar 20, 2024 05:20
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I took up Creative writing as a hobby after reading The Casual Vacancy. If unmitigated slop like that was deemed fit to publish, then my chances are pretty good. (Yes, I know a writer in her position has no editors or restraints)There's nothing quite like an out of touch billionaire trying their hand at social commentary.
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Mar 20, 2024 10:17
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Inspector Gesicht posted:I took up Creative writing as a hobby after reading The Casual Vacancy. If unmitigated slop like that was deemed fit to publish, then my chances are pretty good. (Yes, I know a writer in her position has no editors or restraints)There's nothing quite like an out of touch billionaire trying their hand at social commentary. In On Writing Stephen King recommends also reading bad books as "you might find yourself saying "I can write better than this. Hell, I AM writing better than this"
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Mar 20, 2024 11:02
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Ambitious Spider posted:In On Writing Stephen King recommends also reading bad books as "you might find yourself saying "I can write better than this. Hell, I AM writing better than this" I remember reading that a while back. The blogger Ronan Wills, who previously covered Rothfuss, has it out for King. Namely the same tropes he keeps using, like the 35 year old writer protagonist who has the opinions of a 70 year-old, the twee cute talking kids, and the magical negroes and psychic disabled dudes. https://www.ronanwills.com/ronans-blog/2019/5/15/how-to-write-a-stephen-king-novel https://www.ronanwills.com/ronans-blog/2020/6/17/the-return-of-the-stephen-king-double-bill-salems-lot-and-bag-of-bones
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Mar 20, 2024 11:47
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https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1770267586753708398
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Mar 20, 2024 13:14
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What does this even mean? Stand up to keep things as they are and don't dream of things getting better because that's actually a nightmare?
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Mar 20, 2024 15:13
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I thought the text of the tweet was a glib summarization of Scott's actual quote, and not... Scott's actual quote. 
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Mar 20, 2024 15:31
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Sax Mortar posted:What does this even mean? Stand up to keep things as they are and don't dream of things getting better because that's actually a nightmare? It means he got a word wrong, utopia/dystopia.
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