[HPforGrownups] Re: Snape/nasty teachers/m-f friends

[Caius Marcius]

No: HPFGUIDX 3816


----- Original Message -----
From: "Susan McGee" <Schlobin at aol.com>
To: <HPforGrownups at egroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, October 14, 2000 11:31 PM
Subject: [HPforGrownups] Re: Snape/nasty teachers/m-f friends


> >
> > >
> >
> > I see nothing odd in Hermione's friendship with Harry and Ron.  My
> > understanding of Susan's phrase 'male-identified' is that it refers
> to  Hermione being "one of the boys" and denying herself the chance
> of female
> > bonding experiences. I do think that's an incorrect assumption. If
> JKR had
> > not made Hermione a close friend of the two boys, she may have
> ended up as
> > another extra in the story or as one of a pair or threesome of girls
> > involved in some side-plot. By making her a platonic, close friend
> of
> > Harry's JKR ensured that at least one girl was central to the
> action.
>
>
> Ah, but that's the point.....If JKR had not made Hermione a close
> friend of the two boys, she would have ended up as another extra in
> the story......Neil, I'm afraid you have made my whole point here,
> that girls are relegated to second class....JKR is in control and she
> could have made it possible for girls to be NOT extras or side plots..
> She could have made the Snape, Lupin, Dumbledore, Voldemort, Malfoy,
> Black character a woman....
>
> You know, I'm almost sorry I started this, because it becomes clear-er
> and clear-er that women/girls are second class citizens still,
> although better than 1940..and I don't want to dwell on it. I'd rather
> have mostly ignored that fact

Oh, now, Susan, we all regard you as a first-class citizen at HP for
Grownups.  And do you really think that making Voldy or Snape or Malfoy
female would mollify the Gender Critics?  "Rowling displays her gender-based
self-hatred by displacing what she concieves of as Evil onto the diabolic
maternal figure of Voldemort, in which the archetypal Female is inextricably
linked as the castrating antagonist opposing the so-called protagonist,
whose usurpation of the antique matriarchal symbol of the Broom in which to
cavort in his Male Competitive Power Games, blah blah blah......."

Besides, CS Lewis' Narnia and Disney (to cite but two examples) have
super-matriarchal evil characters, and last I checked, the Feminists were
somewhat restrained in their enthusiasm for them.

    - CMC