Gender balance/strong women/victims

[aprilgc at ivillage.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 15100

Susan wrote:<snip>

>I am also troubled that those who cannot imagine Harry as a girl talk 
about "cat fights"...fights between girls as somehow trivial and 
stupid, yet fights among boys, or Hermione slapping Draco are somehow 
more important and noble than fights between girls and women...does 
this make sense?

PS/SS
Draco and Harry nearly come to blows on the Hogwarts Express during 
their first trip to school (Scabbers interrupted.).
Draco and Harry would have come to blows (given the opportunity) during 
the incident that included Harry's first broom ride.
GoF
Draco and Harry try to curse each other – blows with wands instead of 
fists.

In the two books mentioned, and those in between, there is physical 
violence, and/or threats of physical violence between Draco and Harry.  
They have a mutual enmity.  There's nothing to suggest that their 
feelings toward each other would change if they were female (Dracolene 
and Harrieta in my example, although I do think that whoever suggested 
Dracette did a better job <g>).  Because of the running rivalry, I do 
believe that the female protagonist In This Series would need to have a 
female rival in the "Draco" character.  I don't see Draco feeling 
compelled to compete with, nor Lucius holding up as an example, "that 
Potter girl".  I would, however, see a natural rivalry between Famous 
Female Potter and "Aristocratic" Female Malfoy.

My feeling was that Hermione struck Draco, but he did not reciprocate.  
Would "Dracoline" have taken a slap from another girl?  I don't think 
so.  That's where the "cat fight" comment came from (and I did use it 
apologetically) – because I could imagine the two of them fighting, and 
the observers calling "Cat fight!" and jockeying for better viewing in 
the same way students did so when I was in school and female students 
fought.  I neither wrote nor implied (intentionally) either that "cat 
fight" implied trivia or that fights between boys or girls and boys 
were even different than fights between girls (women) except in the 
terminology.  I have never heard of a fight between boys being called a 
"cat fight".  I have never heard of a fight between girls being called 
a "brawl" or a "slugfest".  I am, of course, writing from my own 
experience – others may have a different perspective.
(see message 15037 for full text)

>If we as a society, and we as individuals were truly 'gender neutral' 
and we are not, than Harry as a girl (trivialized as harriet by some)
would not be a wrench, or a jolt, or incomprehensible, or strange, orw
weird.....

I don't consider giving a female character a female name making that 
character trivial.  It's not impossible that a girl would be called 
"Harry", it's just that generally it would be "Harry-short-for-
something-else".  Besides "Harr-ieta" is so much faster to type than 
"Female Harry" or "Harry the girl" for the purpose of making a point.
The point I was making was that many of the characters/scenes would 
change if Harry were a girl.  It wouldn't just be a matter of taking 
the exact same story and giving Harry cleavage.
Many things, even subtle things, would change.  
For instance, Harry would share a dorm with Hermione, not Ron.  Since 
Hermione went home for Christmas in PS/SS, Harry would have been alone 
when she received the invisibility cloak.  She would have then had to 
what, wait until the boys were up, smuggle it down to the common room, 
wait for Fred, George, and Percy to go out and then ask Ron if he knew 
what it was?  Or, not knowing that it was something more than just a 
piece of fabric, would she have just asked the first person she 
encountered what it was (meaning later than Ron and Hermione wouldn't 
be the only ones in on the secret)? 
In CoS, Ginny would have become a better-developed character earlier 
on, just by virtue of the fact that Harry would have been sharing 
Ginny's bedroom after being freed from the Muggles by Fred, George, and 
Ron.  I don't think Harry could have shared space with Ginny for that 
time (was it two weeks) and then relegated her to "just another first 
year" status when they got to school.  They would have developed some 
sort of a relationship. Would Harry have seen the diary and asked her 
about it?  In fact, would Lucius have given the diary to Ginny? (I'll 
save this question for another post.)
Harry is adventurous, strong, proud, curious, and potentially powerful 
– just to name a few of his attributes.  I think that those of us who 
cannot picture Harry as a girl are talking about the Harry Potter 
series, as it stands now, not that a girl could not also have those 
attributes or the same/similar adventures. 
a.