LOLLIPOPS, Draco, and Preference vs prediction

[ssk7882 <skelkins@attbi.com>]

This is all getting rather dangerously on-topic, thanks to
David and his sneaky ways, but since we're still talking more
about reader desire than canonical plausibility, I guess it
can stay here for now.

I sighed in resignation over the canonical likelihood that Snape
Loved Lily, and Acire hastened to reassure me:

> There's still hope! Maybe he just didn't know Lily at *all*, so 
> doesn't feel he's justified to criticize her in front of her son. 
> Maybe he's just completely indifferent to her! 

<clings to Acire in desperation>

Yes, yes!  He didn't even *know* her!  He...

<sigh>

It doesn't really seem very likely, does it?

Tabouli smirked:

> Heh heh heh. Resistance is useless. Even those who detest the very 
> idea of LOLLIPOPS have to admit it fits very neatly with the 
> evidence (eyes Elkins suspiciously, searching for telltale pockets 
> bulging with spray paint). 

<opens eyes very wide and starts whistling innocently>

> I've never thought there was any *actual* sexual relationship 
> between Snape and Lily. Even I would find that a bit icky. 

Really?  

<Elkins pulls her can of spray paint out of her pocket and eyes
the bowsprit contemplatively>

Oh, I'd find that a lot less ewwwww, myself.  I wouldn't mind seeing 
Lily toppled from that Ever So Irritating pedestal.  In fact...

<closes one eye and tilts her head to the side, then holds up a hand, 
thoughtfully framing the canvas of the timbers>

In fact, we now know that Dumbledore is going to be revealing *some* 
important news to Harry in Book Five, do we not?  Something that 
he hesitated to share with him before?  Something that he *should*
have, perhaps, but wanted to spare the poor lad?  

<begins slowly shaking can of spray paint>

Have you ever thought it rather *suspicious,* Tabouli, the way
that Harry looks so *very* much like his father?  I mean, what 
*are* the chances of that, anyway, when ones mother is a redhead?  

Do the chances go up when said redhead excels at Charms?

<Elkins gives her can of spray paint it one last shake, then sighs, 
shrugs, and puts it back in her pocket>

Nah, not in the mood.  Besides, I agree with you that Tortured 
Yearning Unrequited Snape is far more canonically defensible,
and it's the only version of Snape Loved Lily that I'm really
expecting to see in canon.

Not, of course, that I couldn't be surprised.

> As for the driving force of Lurv, like it or not, it *does* happen, 
> as well you anti-romantics know. Eros is a powerful force. 

Yes, of course it is.  But it's not the *only* powerful force out 
there.  It's just the one of the very few that our society happens to 
have deemed *acceptable.*  It's also, unsurprisingly, the one that 
tends to play that role ad nauseum in our fiction.  It's the socially 
acceptable motivation, the "approved" one, and I tend to agree with 
Amy here: just because it really does happen doesn't mean that I've 
any desire to see it promulgated yet *again* in a work of fiction.  
I'd rather see something else for a change.

Really, to give up ones home or inheritance or family or friends for 
eros is rather smiled upon in our culture, isn't it?  It's the stuff 
of our fantasies, of our films, of our fictions.  Some people may 
cluck and shake their heads, but others will smile indulgently.  All 
the world loves a lover, right?  People don't often get locked up on 
mental wards or abducted and maltreated by "deprogrammers" for making 
those kinds of decisions because they fell in *love.*

The same, sadly, cannot be said for those who make similar decisions 
for other reasons.  We don't call those people "romantics."  All too 
often, we call them "schizophrenics," and then we seek to "cure" them.

> I don't think having a crisis of conscience and swapping sides 
> because your political leader has ordered you to kill the woman you 
> secretly loved in high school is beyond the bounds of plausibility 
> at all. 

No, it's not beyond the bounds of plausibility.  What disturbs me is 
that we seem to have reached the point at which some people believe 
that it is the *only* explanation which is not beyond the bounds of 
plausibility.

Eros is the ubiquitous explanation given for such characters' actions 
in fiction, and not only does this bother me on philosophical 
grounds, but it also means that I've come to view it as rather, well, 
trite.

I would personally prefer for canon to give us just about *any* other 
explanation for dear Severus' actions.  Frankly, I'd rather learn 
that he switched sides because he hallucinated his neighbor's dog 
*ordering* him to do it than that he did it because he loved Lily.

But hey.  That's just me.  Tastes differ.

> The bounds of taste, of course, being rather more subjective.

Precisely.

> (Hmmm. How often do people do such radical things under the 
> influence of one of the other three loves? Any thoughts?)

Oh, I think that happens more often than one might think.  You tend 
to meet a lot of such people if you spend any time on mental wards.  
Or involved with psychiatric survivors' organizations.  Or with 
childrens' rights organizations.

(Now, why am I beginning to feel that this conversation is rapidly 
becoming *WAY* too self-revelatory?)

> Liking it or not is not the issue here. You can board the Good Ship 
> while hating every timber, if you like. 

Why, of course you can, Tabouli!  But when you do so, it is generally 
in the best interests of the Captain to wonder just precisely *what* 
you may have in your pocketses...

Seriously, though, it's always seemed to me that the entire "ship"
metaphor represents a bit more than merely finding a purported
future romance canonically *plausible.*  Those who board 'ships
are, generally speaking, also *promoters* of said 'ships, are they
not?  In other words, they not only perceive that the romantic spec 
is canonically defensible; they are also willing to go to all the 
trouble to actively *man* said can(n)ons to defend said 'ship.  
"Shippers" aren't just analysts.  They're *rooters.*

I do think that LOLLIPOPS is an eminently defensible speculation.  
I'd just far rather spend my time and energy spray-painting graffiti 
on it than defending it.

But that brings us to David's comments...

David, rapidly succeeding in his latest ulterior agenda of blurring 
the distinction between on-topic and off-topic, wrote:

> Now, I do think most LOLLIPOPS sailors like their ship. 

I think that's likely because only those who actually like
the ship declare themselves "members of its crew."  That's 
just the way the shipping metaphor is constructed within the 
fandom.  

I think that R/H is more canonically plausible than H/H, for 
example, but I would hardly describe myself as an R/H "shipper," 
or describe myself as sailing around on the Good Ship R/H.  The 
metaphor implies to my mind not only an acceptance of canonical 
possibility, but also a more generalized sense of reader 
approval or reader desire.  

Which gets us back to what happens when these do not 
intersect.

David (on redeemable Draco):

> I just can't remember it, and have to confess I don't know which 
> way round she means. Who thinks Draco is an abominable little tick 
> who deserves the Dementor's Kiss but just knows that softie JKR is 
> going to have him throw himself in front of the AK intended for 
> Harry? Who feels Draco is really a complex misunderstood and 
> tortured soul who will never be allowed to do more than lose 
> Quidditch matches and fail to get the last taunt?

Any takers?

It does seem to me that whenever redeemable Draco comes up on the 
main list, you tend to see a lot of statements that at least 
strongly *imply* these positions.  People write things like, "Gah, 
I sure *hope* that Draco won't be redeemed -- I just loathe him!" 
or "I would just *love* to see JKR push Draco in a more sympathetic 
direction...but I really don't think that she's going to."  What
such statements always imply to my mind is that the writer fears
that canonical plausibility may actually be weighing against her 
personal preference.

In fact, this past summer, there was that entire thread on which 
people were talking about the book burning party that they were 
going to throw, should JKR redeem Draco in death.  What else could 
that have been but an expression of reader anxiety?  It doesn't 
seem to me that people talk in quite the same way about how upset
they will feel should JKR ever decide to make Harry evil, or redeem 
Voldemort, or hook Draco up with Ginny.  I suspect that this is 
because very few people seriously entertain the notion that any of 
those speculations will ever become canon.  In contrast, I'd say 
that many readers do feel a strong sense of uncertainty about 
where the author plans to go with Draco.

Now me, I'm a Draco Agnostic when it comes to canonical 
plausibility.  I really can see the author going a number of 
different ways with the character at this point in the story, and I 
wouldn't be willing to lay any bets at all on that outcome right 
now.  But there's no doubt or ambivalence at all in my mind about 
what I would *prefer.*  I would very much *like* it for JKR to give 
us a Redeemed!Draco scenario.  I'm actually rooting for the little 
brat, God only knows why.  But that's just my reader desire, which 
isn't at all the same thing as my evaluation of canonical 
plausibility.

Back to LOLLIPOPS...

> Personally, I never thought it very plausible, and once Elkins 
> suggested the *Pettigrew/Lily* possibility LOLLIPOPS took a hit 
> below the waterline as far as my own estimation was concerned. 
> I mean, how *many* life-courses are going to be reversed by 
> desire for her?

<slow smile>

Weeeeeeell... 

You see, David, since as we all know, *only* the Love Of A Woman 
could *possibly* ever lead *any* man to do *anything* radical or 
unpredictable or unexpected or foolhardy, then naturally we must 
assume that both Lily and the future Mrs. Lestrange must have been 
quite the little heart-breakers in their day, no?  After all, why 
else would poor widdle Peter or darling Barty Crouch or Our Dear 
Severus or my boy Avery have ever done *anything,* were it not for 
the love of one of those two...Smurfettes?

Oh, who *is* Florence, what is *she,* that all her swains commend 
her? 


Elkins

who thinks that if you really want to bring down a ship, then blows 
below the waterline are absolutely the way to go, and who suspects 
that David, too, appreciates this as a truism