Put a sock in it
No motivation is too tiny and trivial and self-centered to justify trashing a woman for no particular reason and without even knowing enough to back up the trashing.
Staggering, isn’t it. He doesn’t know much about it, but he flings the casual smear anyway, because he wants to take a picture of his socks.
what kind of precious flower experiences pain and anguish because a wealthy sci fi author questions…a teeny bit…their self defined delusions?
But, he seems to want his cake (100% Woke status) and to eat it, too (wear VERBOTEN! socks from a Thought Crime Author).
The easiest way to stay out of a potential debate when doing something innocuous like photographing socks or planting flowers or grilling hot dogs is to announce that you’re not getting into any debates. If you do it in a very loud, hoarse voice it will sound like you’re using parentheses, and thus making a humble little admission and asking some indulgence from your audience.
“I thought I’d make us some Belgian waffles for breakfast (YES I KNOW ABOUT KING LEOPOLDO II OF BELGIUM AND HIS FORCED SLAVE LABOR IN THE CONGO BUT IM ONE OF THOSE WHO SEPARATE BREAKFAST FOODS FROM IMPERIALIST TYRANTS. AND ALSO, YES, I AM HUNGRY.)
It of course helps if King Leopold II actually did something wrong — but, either way, you’ve successfully avoided wading into any controversy.
Yup. Also, the whole “Because I’m not a Hufflepuff—sadly, I’m a Gryffindor—but would like to be.” — WTF. My ex was like that. “I’m a Hufflepuff!!” Constantlly. “Please take this test to see what house you are in!” I really didn’t want to, but I indulged her, and took the idiotic test, which was almost certainly written by someone younger than 11 years old. I came out “Ravenclaw”, and she said: “I knew it! I knew you were a Ravenclaw!”
Speaking of delusions and fantasies…
Lordy. The Harry Potter cult is just embarrassing.
Sastra – ha!
This is bullshit. If you identify as a Hufflepuff, then you are a Hufflepuff. Fucking gatekeepers. Do they want Seth to kill himself in despair?
And I thought the Star Trek cult was bad…I’m a Vulcan! No, you’re a Romulan! I speak Klingon! I never got it, I thought it was silly, even though I did enjoy Star Trek some of the time. I mean, seriously? The problem isn’t when 11 year olds do it; it’s that they don’t stop doing it when they grow up…in short, they don’t grow up.
At least Star Trek existed when most of these people were 11. Harry Potter didn’t even exist when my ex was 11 (no idea about this Seth). So this isn’t a continuation of a childhood fantasy, but something adopted in adulthood.
Sure he’s virtue signalling, but another reason for his little disclaimer?
Fear.
But a careful, selective fear he’s betraying. He’s not afraid of pissing off GC people: look at the ratio. But he is afraid of wokebeards and TAs. He’s likely seen what they do. Hell, he’s doing it himself with his little unevidenced parenthetical dig. His protestation is another addition to the pile-on, passing along the “fact” of Rowling’s transgression. Why bring it up at all, unless the dig was the point itself?
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s/Sorcerer’s Stone was published in 1997. Someone who was 11 at that time would turn 35 this year. It seems to me possible that many of the people seriously into these kinds of personalized attachments to Harry Potter are adults aged 35 or less. I do know people older than that who used to do the whole “which House are you” thing back before they rejected JKR, though.
The whole “fandom” concept is strange to me; identifying with an alien culture or a Hogwarts house? Really? Not, like, just reading and discussing critiques and analyses and extrapolations, but personally inserting yourself into that world? I know people who are fans of Austen, Asimov, or Philip K Dick, and none of them attempt to make the fantasy world their reality.
“I don’t want to bring up anything contentious, and that’s why I am indirectly bringing up the dispute over Rowling’s various statements in a manner that makes it appear that I am not bringing it up. Please don’t pillory me for still liking her work!”
Two flavours of cowardice for the price of one.
At the risk of getting into the weeds here, by Woke standards, the only Inclusive House is Hufflepuff; all the others discriminate. Ravenclaw takes only the most intelligent; Gryffindor takes only the brave; and Slytherin takes only pure bloods. Helga Hufflepuff, founder of Hufflepuff House, was the only one to declare she would take any student at all, and treat them all the same.
So, him wanting out of Hufflepuff is really questionable, by Woke Ethics. Why would he want to join an exclusionary House?
@Sackbut
When I was around 15 or 16 I and almost all my friends were avid readers of LOTR trilogy, I had already read it 3 times.One day I was out for a walk with my girlfriend and she was identifying all our friends by LOTR characters. I was Samwise Gamgee, dull, boring, loyal. She broke my heart.
Turns out she was right, for with a few exceptionally crazy moments, I lived my next 50 years exactly that, dull, boring, loyal. :-)
I recently watched a Johnny Harris video about language learning, which attempted to present “practical immersion focusing on communicating with native speakers in the beginning until you start to comprehend media and intuit the grammar” as a revolutionary alternative to the University-based “master all the rules with canned conversations before you try to communicate with native speakers”…which isn’t actually a new, revolutionary idea at all.
And, as part of his presentation, he spoke of listening to Harry Potter audiobooks in his target language.
If I told you that Johnny Harris until quite recently worked for Vox, that he is a millennial in his late 20’s or early 30’s, and that he’s a University-educated denizen of the New York area, I’d be willing to bet you could reproduce his exposition verbatim without having seen a single video of his.
For the record, it went something very close to the following:
“I’m a big Harry Potter fan. *pause, slightly-laboured sigh* Not a big fan of J. K. Rowling, but I love Harry Potter.”
I’m not sure anything more really needs to be said.
If I may join Arcadia amongst the weeds: Gryffindors are supposed to be brave. They do what’s right, and they don’t throw others under the bus to save their own hide. This Bloke is no Gryffindor.
I saw that and, not that it matters to anyone but me, immediately unfollowed someone whose work I’ve been reading for years. (Probably a net benefit to me by reducing my screen time.) I’d like to think a lot of people will do the same, but suspect that if his follower count noticeably reduces he’ll attribute it to the fact that he dared bring up That Woman at all.
Roj:
But Sam’s the hero of the story! He literally carries Frodo to the volcano on his back! And he’s the one working class character in the entire book, who not only saves the whole of Middle Earth without much help from that workshy fop Frodo, but goes on to rebuild the beauty and peace of The Shire afterwards.
Having said that, I’m obviously Gandalf.
@Roj Blake
I agree with Iatsot: In my eyes, Sam is the hero of the story. He is the only one who is down-to-earth enough to resist the temptation of the ring because he has no pretenses of being a ruler, just being a gardener. (He is also the only one to resist Old Man Willow, BTW.) Yes, he blundered a bit with Faramir and at Shelob’s lair. AFAIK, he was modelled after a soldier who saved Tolkien’s life during WWI. So being Sam in my eyes is just the best.
Sam was an upper-class Brit’s image of how the lower classes should act around their betters. If Sam had any class solidarity, he would’ve shoved Frodo into the Cracks of Doom and gone off with Gollum for a pint in his local.
Sackbut:
Since becoming an Ishiguro fan, I’ve cultivated a fondness for willful ignorance to the point of numbness of the unpleasant realities of the faults of myself and society, and a palpable yet mysterious sense of foreboding.
@17 & 18, I agree with your analysis of Sam, but that is not how 15 year old me saw Sam. I wanted to be an heroic hero, not just a plodding one. :-). I always liked Strider before his reveal as Aragorn; the mystery, the sitting in a corner, smoking and people watching. Had she identified me as Strider I would have been wrapt!
Roj, agreed. That’s why I’m Gandalf (as should be obvious to all. I shouldn’t even have to say it, really. Stop mischaractering me.)