/*cough* Merope Gaunt *cough*/ Not to mention Romilda Vane's attempted roofieing of Harry in HBP.
But, then again, barring access to dorms wouldn't help there. Just PERHAPS DOSING ALL DRINKS WITH ANTIDOTES TO THE EASY-TO-OBTAIN, BREWABLE-IN-A-FEW-HOURS MIND-RAPE DRUGS.
Seriously, fanfiction does silly things with them, but love potions are horrific. (Not least because the absurd love-potion plots in fanfiction aren't actually banned by canon. You COULD hypothetically dose someone into marrying you so you could steal their fortunes. Say... I wonder if Blaise Zabini's mother has a nice Potions business on the side...) And Hogwarts teaches IN CLASS how to brew the strongest one known? I mean - what. They shouldn't even be LEGAL.
/end rant
/Oh, Harry, you really can’t make your mind up about who you hate the most. I notice that Voldemort is never on that list./ Some Snapefans have made the point, if I recall correctly, that the conflict between Snape and Harry is a bigger part of the books than the conflict between Voldemort than Harry. Assuming they mean with respect to character interactions and not with respect to plot, I agree. Voldemort really just runs around shrieking in the background for a lot of the books. Snape's the one Harry personally knows and hates.
On that subject, another point often made by anti-fans - Harry sure knows how to hate. Love is a different matter. I wonder how often in each book he states his hate for someone versus how often he states his love for someone? A tally might prove educational...
And let's not forget that the love potion idea is apparently 'parent-approved' by Molly! She gives Ginny and Hermione the impression that she used one to get Arthur to notice her.
I am thankful I don't remember that part of the books.
I also wonder if the books would be significantly improved if JKR had never attempted to put any romance in them. The more she talks about a pairing, the more wildly disastrous it gets. I used to think Grindelwald/Dumbledore was particularly persecuted on that front, but no - every pairing she discusses overlong tends to acquire a rancid stink.
Oh well. Let's just hope Next-Gen doesn't get hit too badly...
Well, it was a drop-by line in PoA, I think it was before Harry boarded the train (or maybe before he left the Leaky Cauldron for King's Cross) and Arthur tried to tell him to stay away from Sirius Black, whom Harry had no personal reason to go after at all, no siree. And during that he heard Molly tell Hermione and Ginny about a love potion she'd brewed, and "all three of them appeared giggly".
This is boardering on slut-shaming, perhaps, but even the non-flattering evaluation of Ginny being "the girl who dates" has nothing on her dear mother.
Assuming you're correct about that scene being in PoA, I don't think it's necessarily problematic that Hermione and Ginny are giggling about love potions. Hermione would have been 13-almost-14 then, and Ginny 12. Middle school kids tend to be rather weird and crazy, so much so that many substitute teachers won't go to middle schools because the kids are much harder to handle than either elementary or high school kids.
However, a middle-aged woman with grown children giggling about rape drugs is really sick and completely inexcusable. What was JKR thinking? This is what happens when an author can't reason an argument to its logical conclusion, in this case, the reality that fictional "love potions" represent.
In one of Notwolf's great fanfics, we find out the reason Snape was obsessed with Lily was because when they were teenagers, Lily made a love potion using a recipe in Witch Weekly. It was just supposed to be a joke, and when it worked all too well, she didn't know how to reverse it and was too embarrassed by what she'd done to admit her mistake. More than 20 years later, Severus found out what had happened, was able to reverse it and find a woman to love and marry.
On an unrelated subject, is that a Sherlock Holmes icon? I like it a lot.
I checked my PoA book, it was in the beginning of Chapter V "The Dementor":
They headed down to breakfast, where Mr. Weasley was reading the front page of the Daily Prophet with a furrowed brow and Mrs. Weasley was telling Hermione and Ginny about a love potion she’d made as a young girl. All three of them were rather giggly.
I might have used the term "A has nothing on B" wrongly, what I meant to convey is that even if we bash Ginny for dating a string of boys while hoping that Harry could only notice her, Mrs. Weasley's "no-big-deal"-ness regarding love potions is much, much worse.
Middle school (i presume you mean ages 13-16 and grades seven to nine) had been pure hell for me, I barely made any friends, schoolwork was tough in many ways and the classmates did their best to drive me bonkers with their general loudness, disrespect of most of the teachers and their incapability to talk about serious topics, not even once in a while. I pity the poor teachers, I really do; I didn't get a Snapish teacher until high school physics.
(Thank you so much for reccing Notwolf's fic! What site is it posted on? And what's the title? I'd love to read it; I read about the plot somewhere - perhaps on this very site - but didn't have enough info to find the fic.)
I know that RL date-rape drugs are mostly about incapacitating the victim (doubly dangerous when used in pubs or nightclubs, since the onlookers might mistake hir for just being drunk) so he/she wouldn't be able to protest the un-consenting sex; but HP love potions actually make the victim want to jump you. Even fantasizing about that effect makes me highly uncomfortable.
~*~
On an unrelated subject, is that a Sherlock Holmes icon? I like it a lot.
Bingo, indeed it is! He's very distinctive when he's all introspective while imbibing nicotine, eh? Thank you for saying that, I made the icon myself. In fact, the only two icons I didn't make myself are the Joker one and the Lucy Van Pelt Quoting Nietzsche one. You can steal this if you like, although I suggest you do a mirror-flip of it so we won't look entirely the same on this community. This icon came from a Chinese translation of SH that I own (well, the PDF files, at least), it was done back in 1979 and the quality still stands to this day. If you ever want to learn Chinese I recommend you read this version of SH instead of Harry Potter, the Chinese translation of the latter was rubbish. This translation if Sherlock Homes also had the most *gorgeous* set of illustration sketches in the opening of every book; they're original sketches done by a native artist using Chinese ink-brush techniques, and one day I might be able to send you the files so you can see for yourself. :-)
"I might have used the term "A has nothing on B" wrongly, what I meant to convey is that even if we bash Ginny for dating a string of boys while hoping that Harry could only notice her, Mrs. Weasley's "no-big-deal"-ness regarding love potions is much, much worse"
There is no "we" bashing Ginny for dating multiple boys. There was one poster, Madderbrad, who refused to stop criticizing her dating despite being called out for the slut-shaming sexism of that criticism multiple times. Unless you agree that a female dating multiple males when all parties freely consent is immoral and should be punished, THERE IS NO COMPARISON TO BE MADE with the willful violation and rape of someone's mind and body.
If you do disagree with the idea that a girl dating multiple boys is worthy of censure, you shouldn't have made the comparison in the first place. If you agree with it, there are multiple, very long threads laying out in detail why those sentiments are sexist and unwelcome in this community. The most recent was in Mary_J_59's "A plea for tolerance?" Please do not bring this up again. I, and others, come here to relax, not be hit over the head with more bigotry and casual hate.
Also, FREE SPEECH!11!!!1eleventy1!!!! is not an excuse. Yes, you do have a right to free speech. You DO NOT have the right to an ***AUDIENCE***! Unless you are the owner of livejournal or moderator of this community, you have no more right to subject us to your bilge after being asked to stop than you do to harass someone in their private home, hijack a classroom to pontificate on your preferred topic, or graffiti your views on public walkways. Please. Just. Stop. ___
I don't expect children like Hermione and Ginny were at that time to know instinctively that Love Potions are immoral, especially when they are so romanticized by their culture. That cultural indoctrination is also important to remember when judging Molly.
Our current Enlightenment/Humanist value system is a recent development that grew out of centuries of activism and debate and struggle. People living in the millennia before that did not, by and large, treat their fellow humans with less dignity and deny them their freedom and rights out of willful ignorance and malice (there were exceptions). They did so because that was all they had ever known, and the assumptions on which that inequality was built were so ubiquitous they seemed as unobjectionable as pointing out that things fall to the ground when dropped. This is why visionaries who can imagine a more just and equitable world, and convince others to join them in creating it, are so rare and valuable.
Getting back to Molly, it's clear the WW has no problem with love potions. Unpleasant if YOU'RE dosed with one behind your back, perhaps, but generally silly and harmless. They seem to follow the reasoning that if you felt pleasure at the time, it couldn't have been that bad, rather like the people who still claim that if someone orgasmed, than obviously they couldn't have been raped. Which is harmful and toxic and just wrong on every level. Because Molly grew up in this toxic environment and was never really exposed to other viewpoints (nor did she realistically have an opportunity to be without expending massive resources and time - which she might never have had available - to research outside of her community), I don't fault her as harshly for not realizing how problematic love potions are as I would someone who grew up in a first world muggle country and should be well aware of the importance of consent (Rowling). That doesn't mean she's blameless for not looking at the matter critically and coming to her own conclusions. On the other hand, I don't think Molly is the type of person who is psychologically capable of that level of self-awareness, in which case it's rather unreasonable to demand of her something she just. can't. do.
If Rowling had deconstructed the use of love potions later, then I would have no problem with this scene. What we got instead in book 6 was... problematic at best, and thoroughly inadequate to the issues raised.
My apologies. It was very wrong of me to drag people down with that usage of "we". You expressed plainly and coherently why it was wrong to fault Ginny like that, and I shall do the best I can to understand that and amend my ways in future posting. However, nowhere in my previous comment as far as I can see did I play the free speech card or "demand an audience". I agreed with someone else's offensive and unplesant viewpoint and got called out on it. Good for you and boo to me. The criticisms you made came naturally and practically wrote themselves, how could I be asking for them if (until the point of posting my last comment, at least) I thought of my words as OK?
My point that the right to free speech does not equal the right to an audience was intended as a preemptive rebuttal to an argument that many, many people, and Brad, in particular, have repeatedly raised as an excuse for offensive content and refusal to respect the wishes of others that they refrain in a particular community. I did not, under any circumstances, want to be drawn into another cycle of arguments over "FREEZE PEACH!!!!1!" rights when the subject has already been debated here ad nauseam. I truly cannot express in words how sick I am of free speech being used as an excuse to insult, harass, intimidate, denigrate, marginalize, slander, and even threaten others by claiming requests for simple courtesy in a private community is an abridgement of fundamental rights. If you want to talk about those horrible sluts not waiting long enough between boyfriends, or whatever it is that interests you personally, you are more than welcome to start your own blog on the subject if the community you've been posting in makes it clear they don't share that interest.
If this particular issue doesn't apply to you, then it doesn't apply to you. There are far too many people who don't share your enlightenment to take that as given.
The criticisms you made came naturally and practically wrote themselves, how could I be asking for them if (until the point of posting my last comment, at least) I thought of my words as OK?
I'm not sure what you mean by this. Do you mean you didn't expect anyone to object since you thought you were correct, and thus we would agree with you? Or did you think people might object but not be irritated at needing to deal (AGAIN!) with the same sexist sludge we had to wade through extensively less than a few months ago? Did you expect only a particular type of criticism? If so, how did you expect us to respond?
Please don't be mad. I don't even know what the heck I wrote anymore (it seemed so clear at the time), let me apoligize again:
I am now aware that the points I'd made before are sexist and wrong. Ridding myself of such a mindset, however, would not be so instantaneous (otherwise I'd just be a troll); so for the time being I shall try my best to never talk like that on LJ anymore, and if I'm lucky, I'd might have some real improvements in how I think. If I have any future lapses or display any other types of prejudice or bigotry, far be it for me to protest any of you calling out on my BS. It was not my intention to not let you critisize me, it's just that I'm not comforable with the usage of "preemptive" 'And don't say that-' kind of reasoning. I've used it on other people before and the results were never good. But maybe it's due to my fluctuation of empathy, most of the time I can't even attempt to understand what other people feel. And I have to change that.
I am now aware that the points I'd made before are sexist and wrong.
I'm not sure they were. But if annoni_no had her way only her opinion as to 'right and wrong' would matter in this community, no other perspective would be necessary or welcome. Thankfully that's (currently) not the case, as far as I'm aware.
I came across this post only a few days ago and saw that my name was mentioned. You'll see that I expressed my disgust with annoni_no's attempts to lay down the law (all over you) in a comment below. As far as I know people are still allowed to express their opinions in this community ... even if they are not personally approved by annoni_no.
As to what you said originally:
This is boardering on slut-shaming, perhaps, but even the non-flattering evaluation of Ginny being "the girl who dates" has nothing on her dear mother.
'Slut shaming' is only vaguely connected to Ginny's title of The Girl Who Dates. annoni_no has to make several huge leaps to grant them equivalence. She's confused, I believe, thinking that a view of Ginny as The Girl Who Dates being *consistent* with (i.e. a 'subset of') 'Slut Shaming' means that one who holds the former view must surely agree with the latter. Whereas that is, of course, not the case. But annoni_no can't understand that one can see Ginny as The Girl Who Dates without making all of the jumps in illogic that she personally does to arrive at SLUT SHAMING OMG MUST SUPPRESS.
I have to agree with you and oneandthetruth and others that "a middle-aged woman with grown children giggling about rape drugs is really sick and completely inexcusable." Well, perhaps not with quite the same vehemence as per oneandthetruth's statement. I suppose a Rowling apologist could try and 'weaken' the efficacy of love potions, try and make out that it wasn't a big deal. And yet we know, from HBP, how seriously mind-altering they can be, viz Romilda's potion's effects on Ron.
HP love potions actually make the victim want to jump you. Even fantasizing about that effect makes me highly uncomfortable.
Yeah. Rowling just *didn't think* about what she wrote. I guess when she wrote the line with Molly - in PoA, you said? - she hadn't worked out how *strong* love potions could be (as was the case for most of the series, which she was making up as she went along). And then by HBP she'd probably forgotten what she'd written in PoA, given as how she's said how she's never re-read any of her books.
Ultimately, if the Imperius Curse is held to be an Unforgiveable, I'd say love potions should be put in the same category. And not sold in joke shops. :-)
Have to agree with Brad here. The attacks went on and on, even after an apology, and had the poor poster cyber-groveling, unsure of what s/he'd even written. It was brow-beating and, imo, humiliating. It made me very uncomfortable to read.
On Rowling's love potions, ugh. They're date-rape, nothing less. She's got a few little mean scenes involving unequal relationships - remember the guy who was his wife's coffee table? In fact, it seems to be a bid at a pseudo-feminist power play - I don't recall a man using a love potion, or forcing his wife to be a coffee table.
Why I say 'pseudo-feminist' - the women aren't winning the love game by being smart, personable, alluring, or even sexy, they're winning with an underhanded trick that only losers would use. That isn't feminist, it's despicable. Yes, I think that only losers would use something like a spell, love potion, or date rape drug to possess the object of their obsession.
In fact, it seems to be a bid at a pseudo-feminist power play - I don't recall a man using a love potion, or forcing his wife to be a coffee table.
Or slapping a boy (like Hermione slapped Draco) or attacking a boy with killer canaries (Hermione and Ron) or assaulting a boy behind his back in sneak attacks (Ginny against Smith times two). Girls get away with assaults that we never see boys even try to attempt, it seems. Rowling's old school double-standards seeping through?
Yes, I think that only losers would use something like a spell, love potion, or date rape drug to possess the object of their obsession.
Which is definitely the case for Merope; she's portrayed as close to a squib and can't survive in her own in the Muggle world. (Not that I don't feel sorry for her, being raised with her father and brother. Ugh.)
Male violence towards womenterri_testingSeptember 13 2014, 15:25:17 UTC
Yeah, we once hear a boy threaten a girl at Hogwarts (the gallant James's "Don't make me hex you, Evans!") but we don't see anyone follow through--the one time Hermione was hexed at Hogwarts it was by accident (Draco aiming at Harry). Even with DE's in battle, we only ever see the very worst wizards, the scummiest of the scum, deliberately attack women (Dolohov attacking HG in DoM battle, Amycus apparently getting off on trying to cast the Cruciatus on Ginny during the invasion of Hogwarts, Fenrir threatening HG in Malfoy Manor)....
If Tom had ever realized this, he should have recruited preferentially among witches to give them an edge!
One exception, however: I can't find my COS, but isn't there a Quikspell testimonial featuring a gentleman who turned his wife into a yak?
Re: Male violence towards womenlynn_waterfallSeptember 13 2014, 18:53:06 UTC
Yes:
"My wife used to sneer at my feeble charms, but one month into your fabulous Kwikspell course and I succeeded in turning her into a yak! Thank you, Kwikspell!"
Re: Male violence towards womenmadderbradSeptember 13 2014, 21:24:10 UTC
Even with DE's in battle, we only ever see the very worst wizards, the scummiest of the scum, deliberately attack women -
Yes!
I can't find my COS, but isn't there a Quikspell testimonial featuring a gentleman who turned his wife into a yak?
What brilliant memories you folk have! (Thanks Lynn!)
Okay, so Rowling can't be accused of having gender inequality entrenched (subconsciously) within the background of her universe, given James and the Yak.
But when it came to the overt acts featured in her story she made women a protected gender every time. Even Bellatrix had to be finished off by a woman; I wonder if that's the real reason Molly was unbelievably promoted to dueller extraordinaire in the final battle?
Not to mention Romilda Vane's attempted roofieing of Harry in HBP.
But, then again, barring access to dorms wouldn't help there. Just PERHAPS DOSING ALL DRINKS WITH ANTIDOTES TO THE EASY-TO-OBTAIN, BREWABLE-IN-A-FEW-HOURS MIND-RAPE DRUGS.
Seriously, fanfiction does silly things with them, but love potions are horrific. (Not least because the absurd love-potion plots in fanfiction aren't actually banned by canon. You COULD hypothetically dose someone into marrying you so you could steal their fortunes. Say... I wonder if Blaise Zabini's mother has a nice Potions business on the side...) And Hogwarts teaches IN CLASS how to brew the strongest one known? I mean - what. They shouldn't even be LEGAL.
/end rant
/Oh, Harry, you really can’t make your mind up about who you hate the most. I notice that Voldemort is never on that list./
Some Snapefans have made the point, if I recall correctly, that the conflict between Snape and Harry is a bigger part of the books than the conflict between Voldemort than Harry. Assuming they mean with respect to character interactions and not with respect to plot, I agree. Voldemort really just runs around shrieking in the background for a lot of the books. Snape's the one Harry personally knows and hates.
On that subject, another point often made by anti-fans - Harry sure knows how to hate. Love is a different matter. I wonder how often in each book he states his hate for someone versus how often he states his love for someone? A tally might prove educational...
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I also wonder if the books would be significantly improved if JKR had never attempted to put any romance in them. The more she talks about a pairing, the more wildly disastrous it gets. I used to think Grindelwald/Dumbledore was particularly persecuted on that front, but no - every pairing she discusses overlong tends to acquire a rancid stink.
Oh well. Let's just hope Next-Gen doesn't get hit too badly...
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This is boardering on slut-shaming, perhaps, but even the non-flattering evaluation of Ginny being "the girl who dates" has nothing on her dear mother.
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However, a middle-aged woman with grown children giggling about rape drugs is really sick and completely inexcusable. What was JKR thinking? This is what happens when an author can't reason an argument to its logical conclusion, in this case, the reality that fictional "love potions" represent.
In one of Notwolf's great fanfics, we find out the reason Snape was obsessed with Lily was because when they were teenagers, Lily made a love potion using a recipe in Witch Weekly. It was just supposed to be a joke, and when it worked all too well, she didn't know how to reverse it and was too embarrassed by what she'd done to admit her mistake. More than 20 years later, Severus found out what had happened, was able to reverse it and find a woman to love and marry.
On an unrelated subject, is that a Sherlock Holmes icon? I like it a lot.
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They headed down to breakfast, where Mr. Weasley was reading the front page of the Daily Prophet with a furrowed brow and Mrs. Weasley was telling Hermione and Ginny about a love potion she’d made as a young girl. All three of them were rather giggly.
I might have used the term "A has nothing on B" wrongly, what I meant to convey is that even if we bash Ginny for dating a string of boys while hoping that Harry could only notice her, Mrs. Weasley's "no-big-deal"-ness regarding love potions is much, much worse.
Middle school (i presume you mean ages 13-16 and grades seven to nine) had been pure hell for me, I barely made any friends, schoolwork was tough in many ways and the classmates did their best to drive me bonkers with their general loudness, disrespect of most of the teachers and their incapability to talk about serious topics, not even once in a while. I pity the poor teachers, I really do; I didn't get a Snapish teacher until high school physics.
(Thank you so much for reccing Notwolf's fic! What site is it posted on? And what's the title? I'd love to read it; I read about the plot somewhere - perhaps on this very site - but didn't have enough info to find the fic.)
I know that RL date-rape drugs are mostly about incapacitating the victim (doubly dangerous when used in pubs or nightclubs, since the onlookers might mistake hir for just being drunk) so he/she wouldn't be able to protest the un-consenting sex; but HP love potions actually make the victim want to jump you. Even fantasizing about that effect makes me highly uncomfortable.
~*~
On an unrelated subject, is that a Sherlock Holmes icon? I like it a lot.
Bingo, indeed it is! He's very distinctive when he's all introspective while imbibing nicotine, eh? Thank you for saying that, I made the icon myself. In fact, the only two icons I didn't make myself are the Joker one and the Lucy Van Pelt Quoting Nietzsche one. You can steal this if you like, although I suggest you do a mirror-flip of it so we won't look entirely the same on this community. This icon came from a Chinese translation of SH that I own (well, the PDF files, at least), it was done back in 1979 and the quality still stands to this day. If you ever want to learn Chinese I recommend you read this version of SH instead of Harry Potter, the Chinese translation of the latter was rubbish. This translation if Sherlock Homes also had the most *gorgeous* set of illustration sketches in the opening of every book; they're original sketches done by a native artist using Chinese ink-brush techniques, and one day I might be able to send you the files so you can see for yourself. :-)
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There is no "we" bashing Ginny for dating multiple boys. There was one poster, Madderbrad, who refused to stop criticizing her dating despite being called out for the slut-shaming sexism of that criticism multiple times. Unless you agree that a female dating multiple males when all parties freely consent is immoral and should be punished, THERE IS NO COMPARISON TO BE MADE with the willful violation and rape of someone's mind and body.
If you do disagree with the idea that a girl dating multiple boys is worthy of censure, you shouldn't have made the comparison in the first place. If you agree with it, there are multiple, very long threads laying out in detail why those sentiments are sexist and unwelcome in this community. The most recent was in Mary_J_59's "A plea for tolerance?" Please do not bring this up again. I, and others, come here to relax, not be hit over the head with more bigotry and casual hate.
Also, FREE SPEECH!11!!!1eleventy1!!!! is not an excuse. Yes, you do have a right to free speech. You DO NOT have the right to an ***AUDIENCE***! Unless you are the owner of livejournal or moderator of this community, you have no more right to subject us to your bilge after being asked to stop than you do to harass someone in their private home, hijack a classroom to pontificate on your preferred topic, or graffiti your views on public walkways. Please. Just. Stop.
___
I don't expect children like Hermione and Ginny were at that time to know instinctively that Love Potions are immoral, especially when they are so romanticized by their culture. That cultural indoctrination is also important to remember when judging Molly.
Our current Enlightenment/Humanist value system is a recent development that grew out of centuries of activism and debate and struggle. People living in the millennia before that did not, by and large, treat their fellow humans with less dignity and deny them their freedom and rights out of willful ignorance and malice (there were exceptions). They did so because that was all they had ever known, and the assumptions on which that inequality was built were so ubiquitous they seemed as unobjectionable as pointing out that things fall to the ground when dropped. This is why visionaries who can imagine a more just and equitable world, and convince others to join them in creating it, are so rare and valuable.
Getting back to Molly, it's clear the WW has no problem with love potions. Unpleasant if YOU'RE dosed with one behind your back, perhaps, but generally silly and harmless. They seem to follow the reasoning that if you felt pleasure at the time, it couldn't have been that bad, rather like the people who still claim that if someone orgasmed, than obviously they couldn't have been raped. Which is harmful and toxic and just wrong on every level. Because Molly grew up in this toxic environment and was never really exposed to other viewpoints (nor did she realistically have an opportunity to be without expending massive resources and time - which she might never have had available - to research outside of her community), I don't fault her as harshly for not realizing how problematic love potions are as I would someone who grew up in a first world muggle country and should be well aware of the importance of consent (Rowling). That doesn't mean she's blameless for not looking at the matter critically and coming to her own conclusions. On the other hand, I don't think Molly is the type of person who is psychologically capable of that level of self-awareness, in which case it's rather unreasonable to demand of her something she just. can't. do.
If Rowling had deconstructed the use of love potions later, then I would have no problem with this scene. What we got instead in book 6 was... problematic at best, and thoroughly inadequate to the issues raised.
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If this particular issue doesn't apply to you, then it doesn't apply to you. There are far too many people who don't share your enlightenment to take that as given.
The criticisms you made came naturally and practically wrote themselves, how could I be asking for them if (until the point of posting my last comment, at least) I thought of my words as OK?
I'm not sure what you mean by this. Do you mean you didn't expect anyone to object since you thought you were correct, and thus we would agree with you? Or did you think people might object but not be irritated at needing to deal (AGAIN!) with the same sexist sludge we had to wade through extensively less than a few months ago? Did you expect only a particular type of criticism? If so, how did you expect us to respond?
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I am now aware that the points I'd made before are sexist and wrong. Ridding myself of such a mindset, however, would not be so instantaneous (otherwise I'd just be a troll); so for the time being I shall try my best to never talk like that on LJ anymore, and if I'm lucky, I'd might have some real improvements in how I think. If I have any future lapses or display any other types of prejudice or bigotry, far be it for me to protest any of you calling out on my BS. It was not my intention to not let you critisize me, it's just that I'm not comforable with the usage of "preemptive" 'And don't say that-' kind of reasoning. I've used it on other people before and the results were never good. But maybe it's due to my fluctuation of empathy, most of the time I can't even attempt to understand what other people feel. And I have to change that.
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I'm not sure they were. But if annoni_no had her way only her opinion as to 'right and wrong' would matter in this community, no other perspective would be necessary or welcome. Thankfully that's (currently) not the case, as far as I'm aware.
I came across this post only a few days ago and saw that my name was mentioned. You'll see that I expressed my disgust with annoni_no's attempts to lay down the law (all over you) in a comment below. As far as I know people are still allowed to express their opinions in this community ... even if they are not personally approved by annoni_no.
As to what you said originally:
This is boardering on slut-shaming, perhaps, but even the non-flattering evaluation of Ginny being "the girl who dates" has nothing on her dear mother.
'Slut shaming' is only vaguely connected to Ginny's title of The Girl Who Dates. annoni_no has to make several huge leaps to grant them equivalence. She's confused, I believe, thinking that a view of Ginny as The Girl Who Dates being *consistent* with (i.e. a 'subset of') 'Slut Shaming' means that one who holds the former view must surely agree with the latter. Whereas that is, of course, not the case. But annoni_no can't understand that one can see Ginny as The Girl Who Dates without making all of the jumps in illogic that she personally does to arrive at SLUT SHAMING OMG MUST SUPPRESS.
I have to agree with you and oneandthetruth and others that "a middle-aged woman with grown children giggling about rape drugs is really sick and completely inexcusable." Well, perhaps not with quite the same vehemence as per oneandthetruth's statement. I suppose a Rowling apologist could try and 'weaken' the efficacy of love potions, try and make out that it wasn't a big deal. And yet we know, from HBP, how seriously mind-altering they can be, viz Romilda's potion's effects on Ron.
HP love potions actually make the victim want to jump you. Even fantasizing about that effect makes me highly uncomfortable.
Yeah. Rowling just *didn't think* about what she wrote. I guess when she wrote the line with Molly - in PoA, you said? - she hadn't worked out how *strong* love potions could be (as was the case for most of the series, which she was making up as she went along). And then by HBP she'd probably forgotten what she'd written in PoA, given as how she's said how she's never re-read any of her books.
Ultimately, if the Imperius Curse is held to be an Unforgiveable, I'd say love potions should be put in the same category. And not sold in joke shops. :-)
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On Rowling's love potions, ugh. They're date-rape, nothing less. She's got a few little mean scenes involving unequal relationships - remember the guy who was his wife's coffee table? In fact, it seems to be a bid at a pseudo-feminist power play - I don't recall a man using a love potion, or forcing his wife to be a coffee table.
Why I say 'pseudo-feminist' - the women aren't winning the love game by being smart, personable, alluring, or even sexy, they're winning with an underhanded trick that only losers would use. That isn't feminist, it's despicable. Yes, I think that only losers would use something like a spell, love potion, or date rape drug to possess the object of their obsession.
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Or slapping a boy (like Hermione slapped Draco) or attacking a boy with killer canaries (Hermione and Ron) or assaulting a boy behind his back in sneak attacks (Ginny against Smith times two). Girls get away with assaults that we never see boys even try to attempt, it seems. Rowling's old school double-standards seeping through?
Yes, I think that only losers would use something like a spell, love potion, or date rape drug to possess the object of their obsession.
Which is definitely the case for Merope; she's portrayed as close to a squib and can't survive in her own in the Muggle world. (Not that I don't feel sorry for her, being raised with her father and brother. Ugh.)
On the other hand, Molly Weasley?!?!???
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If Tom had ever realized this, he should have recruited preferentially among witches to give them an edge!
One exception, however: I can't find my COS, but isn't there a Quikspell testimonial featuring a gentleman who turned his wife into a yak?
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"My wife used to sneer at my feeble charms, but one month into your fabulous Kwikspell course and I succeeded in turning her into a yak! Thank you, Kwikspell!"
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Yes!
I can't find my COS, but isn't there a Quikspell testimonial featuring a gentleman who turned his wife into a yak?
What brilliant memories you folk have! (Thanks Lynn!)
Okay, so Rowling can't be accused of having gender inequality entrenched (subconsciously) within the background of her universe, given James and the Yak.
But when it came to the overt acts featured in her story she made women a protected gender every time. Even Bellatrix had to be finished off by a woman; I wonder if that's the real reason Molly was unbelievably promoted to dueller extraordinaire in the final battle?
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