Ms Rowling: insightful critic of gender policy or myopic [insult]

[foghorn]

Actually, what many have said, going back some 20-odd years now (though not within this thread), is that both the Harry Potter books and films are filled with racist tropes. Do you honestly not see anything problematic about the goblin bankers?

The Times of Israel:

Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling said on Wednesday that it was time for non-Jews to start standing up to anti-Semitism.
In a series of tweets, Rowling expressed solidarity with British Jews, rejecting semantic arguments of anti-Semites.
“Most UK Jews in my timeline are currently having to field this kind of crap, so perhaps some of us non-Jews should start shouldering the burden,” she wrote in response to a tweet saying, “Because Judaism is a religion and not a race.”
Rowling continued, saying,
“Antisemites thinks this is a clever argument, so tell us, do: were atheist Jews exempted from wearing the yellow star?”…..


In a series of tweets, Rowling expressed solidarity with British Jews, rejecting semantic arguments of anti-Semites.
“Most UK Jews in my timeline are currently having to field this kind of crap, so perhaps some of us non-Jews should start shouldering the burden,” she wrote in response to a tweet saying, “Because Judaism is a religion and not a race.”
Rowling continued, saying, “Antisemites thinks this is a clever argument, so tell us, do: were atheist Jews exempted from wearing the yellow star?”
Most UK Jews in my timeline are currently having to field this kind of crap, so perhaps some of us non-Jews should start shouldering the burden. Antisemites thinks this is a clever argument, so tell us, do: were atheist Jews exempted from wearing the yellow star? #antisemitism pic.twitter.com/H5xLLXTdQO

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) April 18, 2018
The best-selling author, who has over 14 million followers on Twitter, said she was “so sorry” to hear examples of anti-Semitism and replied to a Jewish mother who wrote that her children experience it at school, “Know that you aren’t alone and that a lot of us stand with you.”
I'm so sorry to hear this. Know that you aren't alone and that a lot of us stand with you xx
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) April 18, 2018
She rejected all defenses of anti-Semitism, saying the response to anti-Jewish sentiment had to be the same as against any other racism or bigotry.

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) April 18, 2018
“Split hairs. Debate etymology. Gloss over the abuse of your fellow citizens by attacking the actions of another country’s government,” she tweeted. "Would your response to any other form of racism or bigotry be to squirm, deflect or justify?” ….

https://www.timesofisrael.com/jk-rowling-tells-victims-of-anti-semitism-you-arent-alone/

*********************
Jon Stewart

Jon Stewart denies accusing JK Rowling of anti-Semitism

"So let me just say this super-clearly, as clearly as I can, 'Hello, my name is Jon Stewart. I do not think JK Rowling is anti-Semitic. I do not think the Harry Potter movies are anti-Semitic."

"I cannot stress this enough - I am not accusing JK Rowling of being anti-Semitic. She need not answer to any of it. I don't want the Harry Potter movies censored in any way. It was a light-hearted conversation."

"I really love the Harry Potter movies, probably too much for a gentleman of my considerable age."

Jon Stewart denies accusing JK Rowling of anti-Semitism

The US chat-show host denies accusing the Harry Potter author of anti-Semitism in comments on a podcast.

www.bbc.co.uk

The actors Daniel Radcliffe and Helena Bonham Carter are Jewish.

 

[C C]

[...] I just heard another one on John Oliver's Last Week Tonight: "If we allow same sex marriage, then next we'll be allowing polygamy, fathers marrying daughters and farmer's marrying their donkeys." (I'm not kidding, This guy really said that.)

The level of "outrageousness" can be relative to the moral POV of the applicable generation of an era, though. Back in even the late 1940s (or certainly earlier, anyway) the majority of people would have considered gay marriage ludicrous slash offensive. Probably most humanities scholars, too (which is what actually matters here), though there would certainly have been a minority of academicians who were gung-ho for anything sex related. With the latter fully blossoming into power during the 1960s.

[...] fathers marrying daughters [...]

Sexual revolution-wise, akin in magnitude to how Allen Ginsberg was a supporter of NAMBLA even well after the 1960s. Some rebellious intellectuals of that decade were also a lot closer to becoming paladins of incest than the staid or conservative critics/bashers of Theodore Sturgeon's short story (below) and various other publications were:

If All Men Were Brothers, Would You Let One Marry Your Sister?
https://everything2.com/title/If+All+Men+Were+Brothers%2C+Would+You+Let+One+Marry+Your+Sister%3F

Ultimately, it took movies/television and the press, over the 1970s and 1980s, developing a heightened preoccupation with family molestation incidents... To firmly revive the horror of the general taboo enough to emotionally beat down any argument that "it was okay" in consensual context. Or IOW, thoroughly eradicate that tentative social justice ripple from '50s and '60s trend of unbridled thinking.

[...] and farmer's marrying their donkeys."[...]

Which Peter Singer opened a can of worms on a couple of decades ago. The best defense was apparently the sexual abuse of animals angle. But in terms of consistency or coherence, the lattter falls apart with regard to how the human community approves the rest of the spectrum of atrocities it commits against other species.

So while incest is hopefully off the table with respect to future activism (that could actually be potent), items like bestiality, necrophilia, etc might still loom as crusader possibilities, but wholly lack significant weight because their practitioners are so small in number (thereby being useless for supplementing a politician's base support).

• No heavy petting
  https://reason.com/2001/04/11/no-heavy-petting/
  
  EXCERPT: Singer's essay has been roundly denounced. Interestingly, however, many of his critics suggest that what makes sexual activity with animals immoral is not that it degrades humans but that it exploits animals: Since animals cannot give meaningful consent to sex, bestiality is akin to pedophilia.
  
  Such an argument, however persuasive, raises inevitable questions about other human uses of animals (isn't being butchered worse than being sexually abused?)
  
  It also poses problems for animal rights advocates: If animals can have sex with each other but not with people, that means drawing a clear line between humanity and other species and denying the moral autonomy of animals.
  
  Surprisingly few commentators have challenged Singer's dubious basic premise: that human beings have no special status or worth and that ''speciesism'' is a prejudice not much different from racism. This premise is shared by the animal rights movement, even if Singer's endorsement of bestiality generally is not. But the notion of moral equality between humans and animals is pernicious even if it's not extended to the bedroom.
  - - - - - - -
  
  Bestiality: Animal Liberation or Human License?
  https://www.upc-online.org/010422bestiality.html
  
  EXCERPT: Most people who "raise" animals and who eat them and the products of their bodies, including their young, do so with no more remorse towards their victims than the acknowledged hen rapist feels towards his victim. This connection makes bestiality a core moral issue.
  
  From animal agriculture to zoos, the core of our relationship with the animals we use is our invasion of their sexual privacy and our physical manipulation of their sex, reproductive, and family lives. Historically, animal agriculture has facilitated bestiality, not simply because of the proximity of farmed animals, but because controlling other creatures' bodies invites this extension of a license that has already been taken.
  
  Humans engage in oral intercourse with unconsenting nonhuman animals every time they put a piece of an animal's body inside their mouth. Partly as a result of such eating, people over 50 with enough money in Western culture will soon be, if they aren't already, walking around with half their internal organs having been taken by force from creatures they think it demeaning of our species to have sex with.
  
  Instead of trivializing the case for animal rights or seeking to degrade humans, as some have asserted, Peter Singer's essay on bestiality helps to make the banality of what is truly bad as clear as the fact that parents who know that by feeding their children animal products they are setting them up for preventable health risks and medical bills are practicing child abuse.
  
  The taboo that needs to be shattered is not the prohibition against bestiality, but against caring about nonhuman animals in a respectful, nonpatronizing, and unapologetic way, and against starting one's kids off the right way at breakfast, lunch, and dinner, no matter how much this causes people to talk.

 

[billvon]

The level of "outrageousness" can be relative to the moral POV of the applicable generation of an era

Hence - the Overton window.

 

[billvon]

Actually, what many have said, going back some 20-odd years now (though not within this thread), is that both the Harry Potter books and films are filled with racist tropes. Do you honestly not see anything problematic about the goblin bankers?

Because they are anti-Semitic? Goblins have been around for over 600 years, and have featured prominently in literature and media from Tolkien, Gygax, Pratchett, the Spider-Man series, Robinson and several others. I think that's the basis of their inclusion in Harry Potter, rather than any creation in order to be an anti-Semitic trope.

(I mean, I guess every single one of those authors/sources could also be anti-Semitic - but it's unlikely IMO.)

 

[C C]

Hence - the Overton window.

And consequently undermining an objective basis or overarching, immutable authority for social prescriptions. As if such could ever be the case in a natural world that allows an array of conflicting animal strategies to evolve. Just the particular preferences of a human era reigning as the result of a competing set of presuppositions having achieved successful indoctrination of a population, over the others (temporarily).
_

 

[billvon]

And consequently undermining an objective basis or overarching, immutable authority for social prescriptions.

Yep. There is no absolute standard for morality. Fortunately for us, in GENERAL we are moving in the direction of more individual rights.

 

[James R]

Do you honestly not see anything problematic about the goblin bankers?

Please explain what you see as the problematic aspect of that.

Does JKR identify goblins with Jews in the Harry Potter books? Are goblins Jewish?

Is JKR just being racist against goblins?

Is it racist to say a goblin can be a banker?

What's the problem, parmalee? Explain.

 

[Sarkus]

Because they are anti-Semitic? Goblins have been around for over 600 years, and have featured prominently in literature and media from Tolkien, Gygax, Pratchett, the Spider-Man series, Robinson and several others. I think that's the basis of their inclusion in Harry Potter, rather than any creation in order to be an anti-Semitic trope.

The issue is not the inclusion of goblins per se, not even that they are in line with Western cultural norms in terms of description (Western culture is littered with anti-Semitic tropes that have become accepted and, mostly, divorced from the antisemitism for anyone not studying history of art etc. just look at witches, gargoyles, etc), but it's with having them in charge of the bank, and being almost exclusively about the money / finance.
Did Tolkien or Gygax have the race being focused on finance?
Now, whether this is JKR being deliberately antisemitic or just lazy enough in her characterisations to not care that it might be considered as such, I think I'd plump for the latter.

[And, fwiw, I hadn't even considered goblins being based on Jews until I saw the HP films. My internal image of a goblin is somewhat less... specific]

You could look at how wonderfully she characterises all the other minorities: I mean there's the only Asian character, who she called Cho Chang. The only black adult who she called Shacklebolt. The Irish pupil Seamus Finnegan, who always tried to blow things up and turn water into alcohol.

I think what I'm saying is that I don't think Rowling is racist, antisemitic etc. No more so than Joe Public, at least. She's just lazy with regard characterisation, and happy to rely on stereotypes, that may or may not have arisen due to racism in the past. Racism, as I understand it, would require the deliberate use of stereotypes to damage, harm, discriminate. And I don't think she did that. I don't think she used Goblins, whose description in the West evolved from antisemitism, being in charge of banks because she wants to insult, or discriminate, but because, well, she's lazy.
I mean, it's not as if she's using the stereotype to shine a light on the fact that it's a stereotype, and to say anything profound about it. There's no mesaage there. Just... laziness. I mean, it's easier to tap into the cultural acceptance of the goblin than to redesign the creature from scratch, right?
But, then... why have them in charge of the bank? If not to reinforce that she really did mean people to lean into the characterisation as Jewish?

So when does perpetuating a description (if that's what she's doing) that has been built on a history of racism, itself become racism, rather than just laziness?

Meh. A tangled mess.
Just my thoughts on her writing.

 

[ольга]

The issue is not the inclusion of goblins per se, not even that they are in line with Western cultural norms in terms of description (Western culture is littered with anti-Semitic tropes that have become accepted and, mostly, divorced from the antisemitism for anyone not studying history of art etc. just look at witches, gargoyles, etc), but it's with having them in charge of the bank, and being almost exclusively about the money / finance.
Did Tolkien or Gygax have the race being focused on finance?
Now, whether this is JKR being deliberately antisemitic or just lazy enough in her characterisations to not care that it might be considered as such, I think I'd plump for the latter.

[And, fwiw, I hadn't even considered goblins being based on Jews until I saw the HP films. My internal image of a goblin is somewhat less... specific]

You could look at how wonderfully she characterises all the other minorities: I mean there's the only Asian character, who she called Cho Chang. The only black adult who she called Shacklebolt. The Irish pupil Seamus Finnegan, who always tried to blow things up and turn water into alcohol.

I think what I'm saying is that I don't think Rowling is racist, antisemitic etc. No more so than Joe Public, at least. She's just lazy with regard characterisation, and happy to rely on stereotypes, that may or may not have arisen due to racism in the past. Racism, as I understand it, would require the deliberate use of stereotypes to damage, harm, discriminate. And I don't think she did that. I don't think she used Goblins, whose description in the West evolved from antisemitism, being in charge of banks because she wants to insult, or discriminate, but because, well, she's lazy.
I mean, it's not as if she's using the stereotype to shine a light on the fact that it's a stereotype, and to say anything profound about it. There's no mesaage there. Just... laziness. I mean, it's easier to tap into the cultural acceptance of the goblin than to redesign the creature from scratch, right?
But, then... why have them in charge of the bank? If not to reinforce that she really did mean people to lean into the characterisation as Jewish?

So when does perpetuating a description (if that's what she's doing) that has been built on a history of racism, itself become racism, rather than just laziness?

Meh. A tangled mess.
Just my thoughts on her writing.

А русские там есть? Если есть, то в виде кого? (Я Гарри Потера не читала).

 

[parmalee]

The Times of Israel:

https://www.timesofisrael.com/jk-rowling-tells-victims-of-anti-semitism-you-arent-alone/

*********************
Jon Stewart

Jon Stewart denies accusing JK Rowling of anti-Semitism

The US chat-show host denies accusing the Harry Potter author of anti-Semitism in comments on a podcast.

www.bbc.co.uk

The actors Daniel Radcliffe and Helena Bonham Carter are Jewish.

Not wasting my time on this illiterate fuckwit.

Read what I fucking said:

Actually, what many have said, going back some 20-odd years now (though not within this thread), is that both the Harry Potter books and films are filled with racist tropes. Do you honestly not see anything problematic about the goblin bankers?

Do you understand the difference here?

 

[parmalee]

Because they are anti-Semitic? Goblins have been around for over 600 years, and have featured prominently in literature and media from Tolkien, Gygax, Pratchett, the Spider-Man series, Robinson and several others. I think that's the basis of their inclusion in Harry Potter, rather than any creation in order to be an anti-Semitic trope.

(I mean, I guess every single one of those authors/sources could also be anti-Semitic - but it's unlikely IMO.)

Your question is more reasonable, but I think that Sarkus' post pretty much covers it.

 

[parmalee]

The issue is not the inclusion of goblins per se, not even that they are in line with Western cultural norms in terms of description (Western culture is littered with anti-Semitic tropes that have become accepted and, mostly, divorced from the antisemitism for anyone not studying history of art etc. just look at witches, gargoyles, etc), but it's with having them in charge of the bank, and being almost exclusively about the money / finance.
Did Tolkien or Gygax have the race being focused on finance?
Now, whether this is JKR being deliberately antisemitic or just lazy enough in her characterisations to not care that it might be considered as such, I think I'd plump for the latter.

Precisely. And this, for the most part, is what people have been contending (re: Rowling) for a couple of decades now.

Lots of writers are guilty of this. Stephen King, considering the sheer volume of his writing, has done this a lot. He's also gotten a lot better about it, and he graciously acknowledges his laziness in the past. (A lot of people have a problem with that part, for some reason.) I mean, how many times has King used the magical black man (sometimes woman) trope? Or the epileptics with crazy ass "powers"? (Actually, that one's real.). Or the multitudes of stereotypical nationals, even second or third generation "nationals"?

[And, fwiw, I hadn't even considered goblins being based on Jews until I saw the HP films. My internal image of a goblin is somewhat less... specific]

You could look at how wonderfully she characterises all the other minorities: I mean there's the only Asian character, who she called Cho Chang. The only black adult who she called Shacklebolt. The Irish pupil Seamus Finnegan, who always tried to blow things up and turn water into alcohol.

An aspect of laziness is simply that it's familiar. It takes a lot of work to convey that a character is very... whatever without relying upon stereotypes to an extent. And this goes for the real world, as well. People who know me are, bluntly, not surprised that I complain a lot, that I'm... frugal (and rather good with money), etc.; in fact, they kind of expect it.

 

[parmalee]

Please explain what you see as the problematic aspect of that.

Does JKR identify goblins with Jews in the Harry Potter books? Are goblins Jewish?

Is JKR just being racist against goblins?

Is it racist to say a goblin can be a banker?

What's the problem, parmalee? Explain.

Figure it out, troll.

And maybe, read what I actually said--have you ever considered trying that?

 

[parmalee]

Anyway, this discussion was already had (kinda) with respect to Nosferatu--see here. Was Stoker an antisemite? Don't know, but probably, kinda. How about Murnau? Schreck? Gets a little more convoluted there. Conversely, much of Herzog's film was about addressing the overt antisemitism of the original, and how better to do that than to employ a loathesome prick who's also a genius like Klaus Kinski? Eggers' film... frankly, I thought it was kind of lame; maybe I was jusy expecting something comparable to The Witch.

 

[Sarkus]

А русские там есть? Если есть, то в виде кого? (Я Гарри Потера не читала).

Nothing significant about Russia itself, although mention of Russia having a similar school of Wizadry to Hogwarts.
The closest she gets is with Viktor Krum, a Bulgarian Quidditch player, but other than the name evoking some Eastern European, I don't recall there being anything in either his description or his actions as being particularly stereotypical. Another point raised against Rowling's writing, and whether this is a further indication of laziness or a deliberateness on her part, but she quite often has these people from other cultures yet, beyond the name, there is often little to suggest anything "otherness" about them. I.e. the "diversity" of the characters is really only skin (and name) deep. Maybe that's Rowling saying that wherever we come from, we're ultimately all the same, or maybe it's a lazy attempt to add diversity, or perhaps a deliberate attempt to add diversity without then playing on the stereotypes one might expect.
Again, I'd put it down to laziness. After all, while immensely popular, the books aren't exactly high-brow literature. They're much better than the awful Twilight series, but the actual writing is... sufficient for purpose. I think the first book was aimed at the pre-teens, so one shouldn't expect too much, and then maybe it gets better the longer the series goes on. Whether this is because she's becoming a better writer, or maybe she's writing to reflect the year-group that Harry is in at the time, i.e. gets older with each book? (I haven't seen any analysis of that, so can't tell, but would have been quite a feat to pull off.) But it's a long time since I read the books.

 

[parmalee]

Are there Russians there? If so, in what form? (I haven't read Harry Potter).

Not sufficiently familiar with the Harry Potter universe, but when it comes to Russian stereotypes generally, we in the West do not hold back. It's weird, with respect to Irish, Italians, basically every other national, people have come to exercise some restraint; but when it comes to Russians? Maybe it's because you're technically an "enemy", but we've got other enemies as well, and we try to show a little more "sensitivity" to them. Also, historically in cartoon soundtracks, we rely heavily upon Russian composers. I don't know if that really has anything to do with anything, but it's significant in some way.

Jews have always been a little more complicated, because, well, there's a lot of Jews in Hollywood, in writing, and in the arts generally, and Jews, frankly, have a much better sense of humor about themselves and about pretty much everything generally (possibly because they are also considerably over-represented in comedy, as well, for a host of historic reasons). Bluntly, the "best" Jewish stereotypes originate with Jews themselves.

So when someone considers it so significant that Helena Bonham Carter and Daniel Radcliffe are Jewish that they need to point this out twice, I'm completely at a loss as to what he seems to think that that means. Anyone?

 

[ольга]

Not sufficiently familiar with the Harry Potter universe, but when it comes to Russian stereotypes generally, we in the West do not hold back. It's weird, with respect to Irish, Italians, basically every other national, people have come to exercise some restraint; but when it comes to Russians? Maybe it's because you're technically an "enemy", but we've got other enemies as well, and we try to show a little more "sensitivity" to them. Also, historically in cartoon soundtracks, we rely heavily upon Russian composers. I don't know if that really has anything to do with anything, but it's significant in some way.

Jews have always been a little more complicated, because, well, there's a lot of Jews in Hollywood, in writing, and in the arts generally, and Jews, frankly, have a much better sense of humor about themselves and about pretty much everything generally (possibly because they are also considerably over-represented in comedy, as well, for a host of historic reasons). Bluntly, the "best" Jewish stereotypes originate with Jews themselves.

So when someone considers it so significant that Helena Bonham Carter and Daniel Radcliffe are Jewish that they need to point this out twice, I'm completely at a loss as to what he seems to think that that means. Anyone?

Я думаю, это из-за многолетней пропаганды с обеих сторон. В СССР, а теперь и в наше время, нам годами вбивали в голову, что американцы тупые, помешанные на деньгах, малоразвитые, и половина из них, если не большая часть - педики и извращенцы всех мастей. Вот этими "западными ценностями" и сейчас пугают доверчивых граждан. Есть даже уничижительное название на сленге для конкретно американцев - "пиндосы". А как называют русских в Америке?

 

[foghorn]

Not wasting my time on this illiterate fuckwit.

Read what I fucking said:

Do you understand the difference here?

Maybe it’s a case of the film company reverting back to its earlier 30s and 40s racist Warner Bros tradition. Back then it was kosher ok to be racist.

Censored Eleven - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The Censored Eleven is a group of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons originally produced and released by Warner Bros. between 1931 and 1944. All of them have been withheld from syndication in the United States by United Artists (UA) since 1968. UA owned the distribution rights to the Associated Artists Productions library at that time, and decided to pull these 11 cartoons from broadcast because the use of ethnic stereotypes in the cartoons, specifically African and African-American stereotypes, was deemed too offensive for contemporary audiences.

An old can of Hollywood worms.

 

[Pinball1970]

Jews have always been a little more complicated, because, well, there's a lot of Jews in Hollywood, in writing, and in the arts generally, and Jews, frankly, have a much better sense of humor about themselves and about pretty much everything generally (possibly because they are also considerably over-represented in comedy, as well, for a host of historic reasons). Bluntly, the "best" Jewish stereotypes originate with Jews themselves.

Yes Mel Brooks spring ( times for Hitler) to mind. He took racism head on and made fun of it with another Jew Gene Wilder.

 

[Sarkus]

So when someone considers it so significant that Helena Bonham Carter and Daniel Radcliffe are Jewish that they need to point this out twice, I'm completely at a loss as to what he seems to think that that means. Anyone?

Well, dur! If JKR was an anti-semite then she would certainly have ensured that the person playing the hero would be non-Jewish, right? I mean, can't have a Jewish person being the saviour, right? Being killed but then rising again to defeat evil? So clearly JKR is not an anti-semite!

More seriously, why they mentioned HBC and Radcliffe specifically, though, and not Jason Isaacs, Miriam Margolyes, or Zoe Wannamaker...??