When I’ve written about the Harry Potter books I haven’t really reviewed
them so much at found something that annoyed me and ranted about it. I am
pretty sure I had thought about something I wanted to write about Deathly Hallows, but my brain has stopped working, so I have no idea what it was. I’m a
functional adult. Supposedly.
Since I can’t remember what I wanted to write about, and since I’ve
already been furious with Snape, I guess I’ll just, rant about random things
that I find annoying in the books. And also. I love Harry Potter. I love
Deathly Hallows. It makes me cry. I love Hermione being a badassador. I love
that Harry has to deal with finding out his hero isn’t perfect. I just, well I
grew up and got more aware, and now I hate everything.
So J.K. Rowling said after Harry Potter wrapped up that Dumbledore is
gay, and people were either freaked out and grumpy, or happy that Dumbledore
was gay. There was a twitter exchange where someone said something like they
didn’t see Dumbledore as gay, and Rowling said that’s cause gay people are just
like everyone else. Now that is true, and it is a good put down, except the
commenter has a point. I also never saw Dumbledore as gay. I always thought he
was asexual. Because he’s never been married it seems, he doesn’t have kids,
and he is never outed in the books. Now it is nice that people get to see
Dumbledore as this amazing authority, a kind, intelligent man who is the most powerful wizard in the world,
and he isn’t judged for being gay. He’s just… Dumbledore. But if he was just
like everyone else, then he should have gotten a love story. You should watch a
video by Ron Lit about this very topic. But everyone else gets a love story.
Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Draco, Hagrid, Lupin, Snape, they all get love stories,
so it’s not a teacher-student divide. It’s a gay-straight divide. There is a
lot of other things in HP, there’s bestiality (Aberforth), there’s a, well
let’s just say it, a date-rape drug (love potions). But there’s only one gay
character, and he stays in the closet the whole time? Thank you J.K. gay people
get to be closeted in fiction too. Yay. There are like… 300(?) students at
Hogwarts. And like 10-ish% of people are on the LGBTQA+ spectrum. (Probably
wrong, but I was too tired to research properly.) And there are no gay
students? Which is… that sucks. Anyway.
So here is something else that annoys me: I know I said I’d lay off
Snape, but fuck it. He’s not romantic, he’s a piece of shit. He’s brave, yes,
he died for peace, but he’s an ass.
I have a thing. The Houses, and the… I find it annoying that the Houses
are so black and white. Like, I wish Harry Potter was set in like college age,
because I feel like the houses might be a bit more nuanced. There is a scene in
Deathly Hallows where Harry is in Snape’s memories and Dumbledore tells him
that he thinks they might sort too early at Hogwarts. Now presumably, he is
implying that Snape should have been in Gryffindor…? Because Slytherins are
inherently evil? Maybe, instead, Dumbledore should get over his fucked
prejudices of Slytherin? Because yes, Voldemort was in Slytherin, as was Horace
Slughorn, who is brilliant. But if everyone else judges Slytherin for one
fascist psychopath then that’s not really going to help Slytherin. The fact
that Snape is doing something brave or self-sacrificing doesn’t mean he belongs
in another house. Snape is still brave, ambitious, smart and resourceful.
Slytherins have great qualities: ambition, resourcefulness, self-preservation,
fraternity, fucking brotherhood guys! There were dark wizards, yes, most of
them were affected by Voldemort, right? And if people keep telling you that
your house is dark and everyone is evil, isn’t that going to affect the people
in that house? Maybe you should try to lift up the good qualities of the House,
instead of vilifying them for the actions of some assholes. And maybe they
should look long and hard at Gryffindor and realize that brawns isn’t the
end-all and be-all. Like, Hufflepuff guys, it’s all about the Badgers. And I’m
a Ravenclaw. Hufflepuff are the shit. They are fucking awesome. I’ve been
swearing a lot. I’m not drunk, I’m just very tired and very passionate
apparently.
These are my grumpy, I’m-an-old-lady, thoughts about Deathly Hallows. It
is a lovely book. HP is awesome, Rita Skeeter is a horrible human being. Go
Badgers.
