[HPforGrownups] Re: FF: Pretty stereotypes (some SHIP too)

[Ebony Elizabeth Thomas]

No: HPFGUIDX 20486

Amber wrote:
>
> > Hrm, I thought the reason people usually bash Cho in fanfic is
because they either want Harry to end up romantically with someone else in 
the canon or because they're *jealous* that Cho has captured Harry's 
attention.  Has nothing to do with Cho personally, the authors just don't 
want Harry to end up with her.

Amy Z wrote:
>No doubt.  It's still not nice to deal in stereotypes, though.  Those
>who don't want Fred to end up with Angelina can just give him another
>partner--they don't have to throw in racist slurs about Angelina.
>
>Now I might be slamming these authors unfairly, because I have read
>almost no fics with Cho in them at all and really can't judge what
>trends there might be in Cho-portrayal.


You know, I think I may one of the only people who likes the idea of 
Harry/Cho much more than Harry/Ginny.  At this point in canon, I think Cho 
would be a much better match all things considered (I'm in the middle of 
re-reading CoS today).  And I think there's stronger canon evidence for 
Harry/Cho than there is for Harry/Ginny.  (I have an idea that the 
Harry/Ginny ship's biggest supporters come from Ron/Hermione shippers 
that... never mind.  <eg>)

I don't have a problem with Cho at all, and while it was funny reading about 
her playing the you-know-what in fanfic at first, after a while it gets old 
fast.  Cho is not one of my favorite characters, but she seems like a nice 
enough girl.  The way she deals with Harry in GoF showed that.  She doesn't 
get on my nerves nearly as much as Fleur does.  She's an excellent Quidditch 
player.  She blushes when Harry asks her to the Yule Ball, and grieves over 
Cedric... so she's capable of showing emotion.

I think that Harry could be very happy with a Cho-type who he meets later in 
life in the long run.  They have common interests, and since she is in 
Ravenclaw, she does have at least *some* brains.  (DISCLAIMER FOR PENNY'S 
SAKE:  Though of course he would not be as happy with Cho as he'd be with 
Hermione.  (The previous statement was included so I don't get cast 
overboard without an inner tube.))

To tell you the truth, I don't care all that much about the future outlook 
for Fred and Angelina.  (See?  I can easily separate fanfic reading/writing 
from canon!)  Chances are they're just friends, and let's just leave it at 
that.

What annoys me are several fanfics that I have read in which the author has 
decided to make Angelina white on purpose, saying, "I always saw her as 
being white in my head... I identify with Angelina a lot, so I'm making her 
white."  (I am not making this up--this was found in an actual author's note 
on ff.net.)  I've also seen Parvati, Dean, and others similarily 
whitewashed.  When I first started writing a fic from Angelina's PoV last 
Christmas, there was a thread over at HP_FanFiction that was started when a 
certain writer admitted that they'd never pictured her as being "really 
black".  Which brings to mind my post from yesterday--what is it about 
characters of color that makes certain readers and fan writers so darn 
uncomfortable?

Imagine the cries of "sacrilege!" there would be if one made Hermione out to 
be biracial, the Weasleys Hispanic, or the Malfoys Asian with 
bleached-platinum hair.  I do understand that fanfic writers take creative 
license, but there *are* limits.

Maybe I'm weird, but I don't have to *look* like a character in order to 
identify with them.

--Ebony AKA AngieJ
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