this post was submitted on 13 Sep 2023
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i love asoiaf but it's hard to start rereading atm of course

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[–] rab@lemmy.ca -4 points 1 year ago (4 children)

You will be offended for your entire life if you can't separate art from artist

[–] foo@programming.dev 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

On the other hand, Rawlings uses her success as a public validation for her bigotry. So it is fair to opt out of supporting her artistry.

Secondly, bigotry is layered in her books.

  • family is better than being free of abuse
  • slavery is funny, also they like it
  • goblins are a terrible caricature of Jewish people
  • general acceptance of eugenics in daily society
[–] Andjhostet@kbin.social 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Ok there's a bit here I disagree with.

  1. I feel like one of the messages I got out of HP is that chosen family means more than given family. Such as when Harry gets sweater from Mrs Weasley and nothing from Dursleys

  2. Just because slavery exists in the story, doesn't mean it's treated positively. There's an entire revolutionary movement for them in one of the books and Hermione is active in it. And Hermione is often a pretty safe moral compass.

  3. No defense of the Goblins, this one is pretty bad.

  4. Again, just because this idea exists doesn't mean it's supported. In fact, the bad guys are the ones always supporting it so it's pretty clearly a villainous idea.

Your arguments remind me of the illiterate folk who claim that Lolita supports pedophilia when the opposite is true. Just because something is present in a story doesn't mean it's presented as a good thing, or something worth supporting.

For the record, I do not support JKR and kind of wish HP would fade into obscurity, even if it was a defining moment of my childhood/generation.

[–] Shalakushka@kbin.social 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Hermione is constantly made fun of for being anti slavery and her movement does nothing. The whole thing is treated like a joke, a pie in the sky fancy of someone who doesn't understand how the real world works.

[–] Andjhostet@kbin.social 4 points 1 year ago

Which is true in real life too so I don't see the issue. Think of climate activists and how they're treated in the US. Or those supporting socialist policies like right to housing or food. They are treated as an absolute joke, just for wanting to do the right thing at the expense of those in power.

If I had to pick a character who does the right thing more often than anyone, it's probably Hermione.

[–] toastus@feddit.de 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

What if I am not offended at all, but am very content with my decision not to consume art by certain artists?

[–] BEZORP@kbin.social 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Why I would separate the artist from what they made? I'm interested in what they have to say about the world. That's the point of art.

It's not just content to make me happy until the next hit. Like, it has meaning.

[–] rab@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

What if the art has nothing to do with the artist's views?

For example, Burzum

[–] BEZORP@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago

I think we have very different ways of enjoying art. I don't really understand how it's possible for at to have nothing with the artist's views, unless it were totally random. Actually, even that would be saying something.

But I get the feeling that we look at art pretty differently.

[–] Shalakushka@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago

Go back to bed, Orson Scott Card.