Fascism is Heroarchy

[CharlesPhipps]

A funny conversation I had in RL was discussing the role of fascism in Harry Potter as related to conservatism:

I used to use Harry Potter as a way of illustrating this to my students before the books creator ruined them as an example. The conservatives lay the seed for all the racism and authoritarianism and worship of the wealthy but then the fascists go, "Yeah, let's DO something about it."

Essentially the lesson is that Voldemort is considered a Wizard Nazi in-universe and demonized by the public (for good reason) but the ideology of his organization (The Death Eaters) isn't actually anything new or even abnormal in wizarding society. Rowling did a decent job of making it clear that the prejudices of the Death Eaters like anti-Muggles, Anti-Muggleborn, and worship of the rich Pureblood families was always there as well as continuing on even when the Death Eaters are defeated. Lucius Malfoy is a respected member of society and has the ear of the Ministry of Magic (which leans conservative regardless of surviving a civil war with the Death Eaters) despite Lucius' terrorist sympathies and wiggles out of any legal problems on the basis of his pedigree/money.

Basically, this parallels the similarity between conservatism and fascism in RL. Fascists are anti-democratic, racist, and violently zealous in their ideology but their ideology is pretty much the same as the conservatives. The rich and powerful scapegoat minorities as well as the outsiders until eventually they whip their base up into such a frenzy that they explode out to take over. When the dust settles, the conservatives try to distance themselves but never really change their position.

[MithrandirOlorin]

A funny conversation I had in RL was discussing the role of fascism in Harry Potter as related to conservatism:

I used to use Harry Potter as a way of illustrating this to my students before the books creator ruined them as an example. The conservatives lay the seed for all the racism and authoritarianism and worship of the wealthy but then the fascists go, "Yeah, let's DO something about it."

Essentially the lesson is that Voldemort is considered a Wizard Nazi in-universe and demonized by the public (for good reason) but the ideology of his organization (The Death Eaters) isn't actually anything new or even abnormal in wizarding society. Rowling did a decent job of making it clear that the prejudices of the Death Eaters like anti-Muggles, Anti-Muggleborn, and worship of the rich Pureblood families was always there as well as continuing on even when the Death Eaters are defeated. Lucius Malfoy is a respected member of society and has the ear of the Ministry of Magic (which leans conservative regardless of surviving a civil war with the Death Eaters) despite Lucius' terrorist sympathies and wiggles out of any legal problems on the basis of his pedigree/money.

Basically, this parallels the similarity between conservatism and fascism in RL. Fascists are anti-democratic, racist, and violently zealous in their ideology but their ideology is pretty much the same as the conservatives. The rich and powerful scapegoat minorities as well as the outsiders until eventually they whip their base up into such a frenzy that they explode out to take over. When the dust settles, the conservatives try to distance themselves but never really change their position.

The books were however always dismissive of actually trying to do anything about all that. It was always a fundamentally Centrist narrative.

[CharlesPhipps]

The books were however always dismissive of actually trying to do anything about all that. It was always a fundamentally Centrist narrative.

Mind you, I find the fact that the books don't try and pretend that everything magically gets better with the overthrow of the dictator at the end to be very refreshing. ALL OF FANTASY sells this bullshit narrative and it's kind of sickening.

Part of what works is that overthrowing the Dark Lord does nothing to solve the fundamental structural problems and the fact that they'll have to continue dealing with that throughout the rest of their lives (aurors continuing to exist means that dark magic doesn't go away after all).

It's a lie sold to the public that revolutions magically end the problems that led to their result. Centrism is something deserved critical reaction but people confuse incremental change with the idea that revolutionary change simply happens and doesn't take decades to become ingrained within the public and social structures.

I think the criticism of the books for "the world doesn't reform and become awesome" is wrong because it's a feature not a bug that our heroes can't just wave their hands and, "Bigotry is solved tomorrow."

But that's just my opinion.

[clearspira]

The wizarding world is an analogy of and Rowling's criticism of the conservative values of the British middle-class of the 1980s and 1990s. It kind of went away from that as time went on, but there is a reason why the Dursley's get the whole opening chapter to themselves. It tends to get lost on newer or foreign readers. The moment you think of wizards as the sort of people that might vote in Margaret Thatcher it starts to make a lot more sense.

But yeah. The absolute best thing about Harry Potter is that ultimately its PEOPLE who cause the problems. The world isn't seperated into ''good people and Voldemort''. I think that's why she goes out of her way to make James Potter a bully, Dumbledore a manipulative prick and Snape at least partially redeemable. Its because good people are complex and bad people are complex.

[MithrandirOlorin]

That's the excuse for a lot just maintaining the status quo at the end. The problem is to many change not being simple is the excuse to not change at all. I want to at least see the hint of changing starting.

If you don't want it be as simple as defeating an obvious supervillain then don't include the obvious supervillain in the first place.

[hammerofglass]

The worldbuilding in that series is so obviously made up as she goes along with a focus on whimsy for whimsy's sake that the idea any of it means anything seems like a stretch.

Other than the heroes cheerfully putting Christmas decorations on the mounted heads of dead slaves, that part is deeply fucked up even if you accept the "they like slavery actually" explanation.

[clearspira]

The worldbuilding in that series is so obviously made up as she goes along with a focus on whimsy for whimsy's sake that the idea any of it means anything seems like a stretch.

Other than the heroes cheerfully putting Christmas decorations on the mounted heads of dead slaves, that part is deeply fucked up even if you accept the "they like slavery actually" explanation.

I think the TVTrope in this instance would be "What Measure is Non-Human". Wizards recognise slavery - human slavery. Their attitude towards house elves is similar to that in the real world of beasts of burden. Dobby is a mule that cleans your house. Plenty of people in the real world treat their animals like shit, even the "cute" ones. Plenty of people mount their heads too. This is a far more complex subject than is being made out here.

There is also the obvious fact that house elves love being slaves. They consider being released an insult. Maybe they covet the idea of having tinsel on their severed heads. That was where Hermione principally failed with SPEW and why any real life parallel with slavery breaks down.

[MithrandirOlorin]

The worldbuilding in that series is so obviously made up as she goes along with a focus on whimsy for whimsy's sake that the idea any of it means anything seems like a stretch.

Other than the heroes cheerfully putting Christmas decorations on the mounted heads of dead slaves, that part is deeply fucked up even if you accept the "they like slavery actually" explanation.

I think the TVTrope in this instance would be "What Measure is Non-Human". Wizards recognise slavery - human slavery. Their attitude towards house elves is similar to that in the real world of beasts of burden. Dobby is a mule that cleans your house. Plenty of people in the real world treat their animals like shit, even the "cute" ones. Plenty of people mount their heads too. This is a far more complex subject than is being made out here.

There is also the obvious fact that house elves love being slaves. They consider being released an insult. Maybe they covet the idea of having tinsel on their severed heads. That was where Hermione principally failed with SPEW and why any real life parallel with slavery breaks down.

That is exactly what the problem, imagining a species that wants Slaves like that is recreating real world Slavery ideology in a context where it's true.

[hammerofglass]

The worldbuilding in that series is so obviously made up as she goes along with a focus on whimsy for whimsy's sake that the idea any of it means anything seems like a stretch.

Other than the heroes cheerfully putting Christmas decorations on the mounted heads of dead slaves, that part is deeply fucked up even if you accept the "they like slavery actually" explanation.

I think the TVTrope in this instance would be "What Measure is Non-Human". Wizards recognise slavery - human slavery. Their attitude towards house elves is similar to that in the real world of beasts of burden. Dobby is a mule that cleans your house. Plenty of people in the real world treat their animals like shit, even the "cute" ones. Plenty of people mount their heads too. This is a far more complex subject than is being made out here.

There is also the obvious fact that house elves love being slaves. They consider being released an insult. Maybe they covet the idea of having tinsel on their severed heads. That was where Hermione principally failed with SPEW and why any real life parallel with slavery breaks down.

That is exactly what the problem, imagining a species that wants Slaves like that is recreating real world Slavery ideology in a context where it's true.

Even had fantasy drapetomania to dismiss that Dobby didn't enjoy being enslaved.

[clearspira]

The worldbuilding in that series is so obviously made up as she goes along with a focus on whimsy for whimsy's sake that the idea any of it means anything seems like a stretch.

Other than the heroes cheerfully putting Christmas decorations on the mounted heads of dead slaves, that part is deeply fucked up even if you accept the "they like slavery actually" explanation.

I think the TVTrope in this instance would be "What Measure is Non-Human". Wizards recognise slavery - human slavery. Their attitude towards house elves is similar to that in the real world of beasts of burden. Dobby is a mule that cleans your house. Plenty of people in the real world treat their animals like shit, even the "cute" ones. Plenty of people mount their heads too. This is a far more complex subject than is being made out here.

There is also the obvious fact that house elves love being slaves. They consider being released an insult. Maybe they covet the idea of having tinsel on their severed heads. That was where Hermione principally failed with SPEW and why any real life parallel with slavery breaks down.

That is exactly what the problem, imagining a species that wants Slaves like that is recreating real world Slavery ideology in a context where it's true.

Even had fantasy drapetomania to dismiss that Dobby didn't enjoy being enslaved.

The narrative as presented makes Dobby out to be some kind of deviant in house elf society. Winky absolutely detested being free and Kraucher took his freedom and immediately went to seek another master. The Hogwarts house elves began to absolutely loathe Hermione after a time.

TL;DR you cannot base anything on Dobby. It is like basing your interpretation of Klingon honour on Worf.