Objectively intelligent.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Specifically as to Rowling, this is the best thing I recall reading about the contretemps, but it's been a while and I don't recall much of what it said. In any event, it refutes Sebby's characterization of her critics.

Not sure I get your approach to what culture Tiny gets to like. You are going to keep the books away because of things that Rowling said later?

She will love them unconditionally. Then she’ll get older and realize that she can’t love Rowling unconditionally. Why would I set her up for that?

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Adder

She will love them unconditionally. Then she’ll get older and realize that she can’t love Rowling unconditionally. Why would I set her up for that?

She "will?" Dude. You got some years ahead of you. Ain't no way to predict what a kid will do. I don't give a shit what kind of genitals people are attracted, either for sex, or to have. But I have no sense of what makes a person Trans. Shouldn't one try to educate JKR instead of killing her, and her books?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Adder

She will love them unconditionally. Then she’ll get older and realize that she can’t love Rowling unconditionally. Why would I set her up for that?

Because that is how it goes. And she can love the books unconditionally without needing to love Rowling. If Thomas Pynchon has taught you nothing else, it is that it should be possible to consider literature on its own, without considering the author.

But also, which classics are flawless? Why not love them with their flaws?

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Because that is how it goes. And she can love the books unconditionally without needing to love Rowling. If Thomas Pynchon has taught you nothing else, it is that it should be possible to consider literature on its own, without considering the author.

But also, which classics are flawless? Why not love them with their flaws?

PS sebby ain’t won too many, but adder kind of gave this one to him?

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

PS sebby ain’t won too many, but adder kind of gave this one to him?

I have some really bad news for anyone who enjoyed reading their kid The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

PS sebby ain’t won too many, but adder kind of gave this one to him?

One side of the debate is: J.K. Rowling can say what she wants about trans people and sue people for libel, but the real problem is other people on the internet. And the other his, J.K. Rowling said something I didn't like, no one should read her books without adult supervision and instruction. We're one side short of a three-way tie for last.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

She "will?" Dude. You got some years ahead of you. Ain't no way to predict what a kid will do. I don't give a shit what kind of genitals people are attracted, either for sex, or to have. But I have no sense of what makes a person Trans. Shouldn't one try to educate JKR instead of killing her, and her books?

Yeah, in the near term, she will love unconditionally what we share with her. I’m
gonna wait to share content that needs her to understand things that are more complex. Even if it takes awhile, she doesn’t need to deal with a favorite author not believing her family member’s existence. She can skate until she understands the complexity for those books.

JKR is alive and well and super rich. How do we educate her? We can’t educate kids who are too young go understand.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Because that is how it goes. And she can love the books unconditionally without needing to love Rowling. If Thomas Pynchon has taught you nothing else, it is that it should be possible to consider literature on its own, without considering the author.

But also, which classics are flawless? Why not love them with their flaws?

Yeah, this works for people who aren’t 3.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Adder

Yeah, this works for people who aren’t 3.

Three-year-olds know even less about Pynchon. They are more able to take a text on its own, in my experience.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Adder

Yeah, in the near term, she will love unconditionally what we share with her. I’m
gonna wait to share content that needs her to understand things that are more complex. Even if it takes awhile, she doesn’t need to deal with a favorite author not believing her family member’s existence. She can skate until she understands the complexity for those books.

JKR is alive and well and super rich. How do we educate her? We can’t educate kids who are too young go understand.

My kids loved when we turned them on to Seinfeld. You gonna show her that when she’s 15, or does the Michael Richards’s melt down makes that a no go?

[LessinSF]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

I have some really bad news for anyone who enjoyed reading their kid The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe.

Lewis Carroll.

[Icky Thump]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Specifically as to Rowling, this is the best thing I recall reading about the contretemps, but it's been a while and I don't recall much of what it said. In any event, it refutes Sebby's characterization of her critics.

Not sure I get your approach to what culture Tiny gets to like. You are going to keep the books away because of things that Rowling said later?

Am I the only one who thought the Harry Potter stories were an epic load of shit? The thing I liked best about taking my family to see those movies is I had a good three hours to sack out in the theater. And the books were even better. Two pages and ZZZZZZZ.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Icky Thump

Am I the only one who thought the Harry Potter stories were an epic load of shit? The thing I liked best about taking my family to see those movies is I had a good three hours to sack out in the theater. And the books were even better. Two pages and ZZZZZZZ.

I read them all, and saw the movies, but I think mostly to have a thing in common with my (then) tween to teen daughter.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I have not gotten too far into the Rowling/trans thing, but I've gotten far enough into to know that many people have stated why they think she's wrong without calling for her head, resulting in the sort of extensive debate that you think should be happening. She has views, they have views, views are exchanged, other people form views, everything is awesome. I'm not clear who has asked whom for her head, or to boycott her books, or not watch the films, but so what? She still has her head, you can buy her books and watch her films, and she is emphatically not silenced. If that's "cancel culture," it's not different from the way things have always worked, and it's not harming anyone. If you want to roll your eyes at her critics without reading what they think, go nuts, but you don't need to get on a high horse about free speech and cancel culture to do that.

But here's the irony. While you are waxing rhapsodic about the threat to free speech from the critics of Rowling, who is still one of the richest women in the UK and has absolutely no problem speaking freely, she is using lawyers to silence others.

A news website aimed at British schoolchildren has agreed to pay an unsubstantiated amount after it implied that JK Rowling’s comments on gender caused harm to trans people.

The Day, which is recommended by the Department for Education and is designed to prompt teenagers to discuss current affairs, faced legal action from the Harry Potter author after publishing an article entitled: “Potterheads cancel Rowling after trans tweet”.

In the article, which some schools issued as homework, children were told that Rowling had objected to the use of the expression “people who menstruate” in place of “women”. It also referenced objections to Rowling’s recent comments from Harry Potter actors such as Daniel Radcliffe.

The original article in the Day asked teenagers to consider whether it is possible still to enjoy great works of art by “deeply unpleasant people” such as Pablo Picasso and Richard Wagner.

It said: “Since the 1950s, the civil rights movement has used boycotts to take money and status away from people and organisations harming minorities and shame them into change [sic] their behaviour. Online it is often called ‘cancelling’.”

The Day, which was founded and is run by the former Daily Express editor Richard Addis and is sold through subscriptions to around 1,500 schools, has now apologised after Rowling hired libel lawyers. The Day said: “We accept that our article implied that what JK Rowling had tweeted was objectionable and that she had attacked and harmed trans people. The article was critical of JK Rowling personally and suggested that our readers should boycott her work and shame her into changing her behaviour. Our intention was to provoke debate on a complex topic.

“We did not intend to suggest that JK Rowling was transphobic or that she should be boycotted. We accept that our comparisons of JK Rowling to people such as Picasso, who celebrated sexual violence, and Wagner, who was praised by the Nazis for his antisemitic and racist views, were clumsy, offensive and wrong.

“Debate about a complex issue where there is a range of legitimate views should have been handled with much more sensitivity and more obvious recognition of the difference between fact and opinion. We unreservedly apologise to JK Rowling for the offence caused, are happy to retract these false allegations and to set the record straight. We shall be making a financial contribution to a charity of JK Rowling’s choice.”

So Rowling is a great example. Your "cancel culture" is not silencing anyone, but Rowling, signatory of the Harper's letter and a leading "victim" of "cancel culture", is.

ETA: "She didn't write anything controversial"? Ah. That word means something different than you think it does.

There is a very good twitter thread that breaks down her open letter, if you're interested.

I loved the Harry Potter books (not so much the recent movies or the play) and I was rather looking forward to the next Robert Galbraith book, but I have difficulty reconciling the person who wrote about Pure Bloods vs. Mudbloods and the person who has chosen this particular hill to die on.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally Posted by Adder

Yeah, in the near term, she will love unconditionally what we share with her. I’m
gonna wait to share content that needs her to understand things that are more complex. Even if it takes awhile, she doesn’t need to deal with a favorite author not believing her family member’s existence. She can skate until she understands the complexity for those books.

JKR is alive and well and super rich. How do we educate her? We can’t educate kids who are too young go understand.

My favorite author at one point was Anne McCafferty. I have a gay brother. I still have a fondness for the Dragonriders of Pern and have rewritten the blue and green dragons sex stuff in my head canon.

OTOH, I was a huge Piers Anthony Incarnations of Immortality series and now cannot reconcile the sexism in there. I don't think I can go back.

Everyone can be problematic, even and especially the people writing books we enjoy as kids. As I said before, JK Rowling's decision to die on her TERF hill is a questionable one at best*, but there are a hell of a lot of redeeming qualities in her writing and her actions as a person. It's going to be up to your kid to figure out how to parse that out as time goes on. And if you think she'd love the books, read them to her and put them into context insofar as essentialism can be explained to a kid.


*I get the feeling that it's like one of those knots that gets tighter the harder you try to get it undone. She seems to be going down deeper down the path the more people push back on her.