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Friday, May 26, 2017

Harry Potter Fandom: Why Slytherin Is The Best House, And All Others Are Stupid Mudbloods (Even You, Ravenclaw)

 Note: In case you are put off by this, I am about to be very condescending about the Hogwarts houses. I'm a Slytherin, what did you expect? It's not easy to forget that you're superior in every way.

A friend of mine recently posted a photo of himself on Facebook, saying that he was just so cool.
"You finally joined Slytherin!" I commented. "Welcome, brother, to the House of Epic Evilness."
This guy is a proud Gryffindor (even though we all know that should be an oxymoron), so he asked why I thought he had joined Slytherin.
"Because you said you were cool, duh!" I answered.
"Still a Gryffindor," he replied, "Sorry to disappoint."
And he calls himself a self-respecting supervillain. Pathetic.

There are many myths involving Slytherin House, and so I thought I would dispel some of them for you ignorant Muggles. First of all, all other houses are just stupid--even Ravenclaw, the "smart" house. Here are the reasons why. I will go house by house:
Gryffindor is supposed to be the brave house, and yet it is far more useful to overcome your fears than to try not to feel them--to feel fear, and to do it anyway. By focusing on bravery instead of courage--feeling fear and doing it anyway--they are unintentionally saying that many children are unworthy of their house, which is especially damaging because they are seen as the good house, and the one at the center of the action in the Harry Potter series.
Ravenclaw is supposed to be the smart house. But studies have shown that when praised for being smart, children's focus is on looking smart, not on challenging themselves. And so they will not attempt tasks they do not think they can perfect the first time. Ravenclaws must answer a riddle before being let in to their dorms, but if they can't, how are they to find out the answer? Are they referred to an appropriate place to look in the library, to better themselves? Not from what I've seen. If you can't answer it, and no one will answer it for you, you're effectively banished, presumably to the "dumber" houses.
By focusing on being smart, instead of growth and learning, Ravenclaw House gives the impression that hard work, especially in intellectual pursuits, is either not necessary, or does not pay off. So kids end up both lazy and easily discouraged when they are not good at something right away.
Which brings us to Hufflepuff, the "hardworking" house. There is nothing wrong with working hard--but to what end? What are they working hard for? If it is academic pursuits, then why is Ravenclaw considered the smart house? Hufflepuff is the one that should have had riddles at its door. Then we would be teaching kids that smarts and hard work go hand in hand.
But that brings up the question, what is their reward for all this hard work? Which brings me to...

Slytherin. The ambitious house. The house that is constantly being told to curb the thing it is most famous for. The house that is a cautionary tale for the houses about ambition. What other house is told not to be itself "too much"?
The other houses could do with their own caveats and cautionary tales. It is precisely these cautionary tales which make us possibly better human beings.

So that is why all of the other houses are problematic. For my second major point, there is no such thing as a Slytherclaw, or a Gryffirin, or a Slytherpuff--the "combined houses". The other houses may combine their defects, but we are pureblood witches and wizards--we don't mix well with others. You can't be half awesome. It's all or nothing.

Finally, even our villains are better. When we become evil, we become Voldemort. When Gryffindors, the "good" house, become villains, they become Peter Pettigrew. We turn into the Dark Lord Who Must Not Be Named. They turn into a disgusting filthy rat.
(And all you people who have pet rats, don't get offended yet. This rat in particular was disgusting, filthy, and pathetic. Even the little Gryffindor blood traitor who was too poor for any other pet hated him. This is your lot in life if you don't time your inevitable corruption so that you're in the only proper house for it.)

And don't forget the invaluable contributions of Severus Snape. Who could do more good than someone who is perceived as bad? Without his spying, Voldemort would never have been defeated. We don't half-ass anything--when we're good, we're very good, and when we're bad, we're very bad. In a way, we're more hardworking than the Hufflepuffs. Ambition motivates you to make an effort, and can also banish fear and make you come up with clever strategies to get to your goals. We embody the good traits of all the other houses.
So we are both better good guys, and better bad guys--always. 

Thursday, May 11, 2017

Some Christians Think We Want To Kill Them

I recently came across the Christian Harry Potter fan fiction, Hogwarts School of Prayer and Miracles. (It is online, freely available, and short, and I have a slow-ish computer and don't feel like linking to it.) There is so much wrong with the writing, and even more troubling things about the theology of it.
I thought at first that it was just bad writing, rather harmless, but then I realized just how dangerous this story really was. In the story, Voldemort is an atheist who wants to outlaw Christianity. Hermione is afraid, and cries, "I don't like lions!"
I remembered that because apparently a member of Gryffindor House doesn't like lions. You can probably guess what the Gryffindor symbol is, if you don't already know. And Gryffindor in this story represents "True Christians" (registered trademark). (Although Hermione, in the fan fiction, has a kitten on her hat instead of a lion, because apparently there is no such thing as lionesses, and I guess all the lions are gay. I don't think the author thought through the implications of denying this mighty symbol of Christ to Christian women. If I suspected she was more thoughtful, I would have assumed lionesses were objectionable because they were females and provided for the Pride. But in any case, we should have known Aslan was in the closet.)

But Hermione's comment makes me wonder: Does the author think that that's what atheists want to do--feed them to the lions? I was on atheist forums for a while a few years ago, and still read stuff written by atheists such as Libby Anne of the blog Love, Joy, Feminism (though she doesn't really talk about atheism specifically very often).
But even when I explored the more anti-religion aspects of atheist media, and even when some people were mocking religion and Christians, I have never seen anyone even joke about feeding Christians to lions. If some people do that (and I'm sure there are some, since rape jokes also exist), they're not trying to make it legal to actually do it. (Ironically, there were people trying to make it legal to kill gay people--not only in Uganda, but in California. And I'm too lazy and don't want to upset myself by linking to it.)
But no bills have been introduced to make it legal to kill Christians. Not even from LGBT people, which I'm sure the author thinks just as bad or worse than atheists.

How many conservative Christians think that the days of the lions will soon return? My own family has been paranoid of this happening, and I live in Oregon, not the Bible Belt. A great aunt euphemistically said, "I think things will just get harder and harder."
My uncle has said that Obama was setting himself up as God, and that the government would soon want chips implanted to track people. "But not the gay couple down the street," he added bitterly. I'm not sure there was a gay couple down the street, or if the phrase was a rhetorical device. Either way, he's eventually going to find out that that's good news for me. Apparently I don't have to choose between keeping my soul or my head.
(This was a few years ago, and I recently worked up the courage to tell him that I was afraid of him as a child. He responded surprisingly well, and hasn't said homophobic things around me in a while, so he may or may not have changed in his hostility.)
 Comedian Cody Melcher, in his podcast about strange books, has said what my own experience has proven too: That Christians were also afraid after the marriage equality ruling of 2015. He also says that Christianity as a religion relies on the concept of persecution, that they tell themselves they are the underdogs even when they are in power, and that that is also how they gain power. This is a particularly fascinating episode, if you can stand to hear Melcher and his guests talk about the homophobia in the book they are reviewing (Melcher and guests are all gay):



This is the episode reviewing Counterfeiting The Rainbow by Beverly Rachel, and just to warn you, it is an hour and a half long.

Evangelical Christians think atheists and gays want to kill them. Gays, and maybe atheists (I'm not sure), think that Christians want to kill them--indeed, some do (and just because they're not "true Christians" doesn't mean they're not trying to kill us in the name of Christ).
So we have two groups who are afraid of each other. They can't show compassion to us and give us rights, because they're too scared. And we can't overlook what they're doing to us (out of fear), because it affects our lives. We have to take our rights that they won't give, which scares them even more. What a sad state of the world.
And ironically, anything I say to comfort my group--that their numbers are shrinking, especially among young people, for example--will only strike fear in the other group. So I will leave it at that. Fortunately for them, I have not heard talk of political revenge on my side. If we are vigilant and current trends keep up, I do think things will very slowly, over decades (two steps forward, one step back), get better and better for LGBT people. I believe we will have progress, if we vote, even if it's all-too-frustratingly slow and halting. And I don't think evangelicals will be in danger because of it.

Tuesday, May 9, 2017

Complimentarianism's Fatal Flaw: The "Natural Laws" That We Have To Impose

I recently came across a Christian Harry Potter fan fiction, Hogwarts School of Prayer and Miracles. (I'm too lazy to link it. You can easily look it up online. It has only fourteen chapters, which are only about one page long.)
Other than being insulting to every other type of Christian than herself, possessing terrible grammar even though she condemns bad grammar and spelling in the story, the characters not being realistic, how prayer works not being realistic, getting details of the Harry Potter universe very wrong, and little rants which make you wonder if there's supposed to be a narrator when there's not...
The author is really into gender roles. All the good Christian women and girls wear pink dresses, cry demurely, and are not very brave. (Like being brave is a sin for a woman?) Hermione, who is a Christian all her life, has to be comforted by Harry, who got saved literally a few hours ago. (But could mysteriously quote the bible, complete with chapter and verse, seconds after Hagrid helps him get saved.)

I was never taught that I had to wear a dress and act emotionally weaker than I felt, in order to be good or righteous. And I'm so glad. I have enough to deal with already.
But this story got me to thinking...if men and women are so different and complementary, why does one have to submit to the other? Wouldn't a couple agree on everything, or easily come up with a solution in which both are happy?
Or alternately, why does one partner have to try so hard, to submit to the other? Why isn't submission so easy, if it's natural to women? Wouldn't the average women not have preferences at all, and just be happy doing whatever the husband wants? (Without having to work so hard at trying to be this way, that is. There would be no pain in submission at all.) In a world where men and women really complimented each other perfectly, as God designed, there would be no need for the likes of Michael and Debbie Pearle (fundamentalist "family" gurus whose books describe abusive behavior on his part, and for both of them towards their children--I have read excellent review series of them by Libby Anne of the blog Love, Joy, Feminism, and Samantha Field of the blog...Samantha Field.)

And most might say that it's our sinful nature or the devil who makes submission hard. But if God designed women for submission, wouldn't we take fulfillment in submitting to our husbands or fathers, without being told to? Why is there a need for books telling women and girls to take joy in submitting? If gender roles are so natural, why do we have to enforce them?
Just like homosexuality is called unnatural, and yet to many people--and animals--heterosexuality is unnatural. Complimentarianism (if I'm spelling that right, because apparently it's a sin if I spell it wrong) and compulsory straightness both say, "Be yourself--but not too much! Our imposed standards are much more natural to you than your natural state."
I am very grateful not to be caught up in either belief system. There are so many more benefits to freedom than wearing pants. There are even more benefits than potentially falling in love or doing what I want. I don't have to try to be anything. I can just fully be myself--accept myself--and that is the best gift that life could ever give me.

Why I Talk So Much Here About Being Bisexual

I feel sometimes like I talk "too much" about being bisexual on my blog, though it may be just my own insecurities. And I may be a little obsessive about it right now, because I only had an inkling three years ago--until then I had thought I was straight. And by "inkling" I mean I had an instant crush on another girl, the same way I had had instant crushes on some guys. She was a stranger, but she was just that good-looking, to me at least. So that was a very frightening experience, because I had never thought of myself having that side before, and now here it was, so obvious it was practically slapping me in the face.
I also recently discovered that I could find cheap queer books online, and so for the first time in my life, I can dive into that subject like I have never been able to before. I love it! It is so hard to find queer books where I live, much less find them cheaply or find good ones. I hardly even care about being a "prepper" for potential personal hard times anymore, except when it comes to hoarding good (queer and neutral) books, so there goes another subject I used to write regularly about.

I talk about being bisexual a lot here. But that's partly because almost all of my interesting (to me) thoughts relate to it or touch on it, at least at this point in my life.
But I have a whole life, too. I get up and feed my chickens just like anyone else. I've recently found a podcast on Youtube, Tomefoolery, that talks about very strange books. (And yes, the host, Cody Melcher, is gay, but gay issues specifically don't come up very often in the show. And it still has some interesting episodes.) I really like to go through my things and get rid of some of them, to the point that most people would probably think that's strange. I just got done with tax season as a tax preparer, and that was very hard on an introvert like me.
But all of these other things that make up my life don't make me say, "So that's why some gay men don't like feminine men--misogyny is part of it! It's considered dishonorable for men to be like women," and, "So that's why that other book said that raids on gay bars considerably increased in the fifties--after the war, there was pressure on everyone to get married and have children--the baby boom!"
I make so many discoveries when reading about queer stuff. And I may go into these subjects more in-depth later.
But I guess my blog is mostly a gay blog for now. I would feel a little better about that if it had a gay title, but then that would constrain me to queer subjects, which I also don't want. Straight people may not realize it, but there are a lot things about being bisexual/queer that I find fascinating. Maybe they're not as interesting if one is straight, but there's still an audience for these themes. I guess I'll just have to find the right audience, if I don't have it already.
So please be warned, this blog is very gay. Thank you. :)