give shipping peace a chance [was] Real characters

[Petra Pan]

No: HPFGUIDX 50207

Amy Z:
> Ebony's post, and more
> especially Eileen's follow-up
> trashing Ron *and* Harry,
> made me think about how we tend
> to chew up characters if they
> are less than perfect.  We're
> like the Donner Party at this 
> point.  After two and a half
> years without fresh meat, we're
> reduced to cannibalism--not
> eating each other but munching
> on the characters we've got
> stashed in the hold.

Eileen:
> Oh dear, no! I was in prime
> mood for Harry and Ron
> trashing the moment I
> finished GoF! The only reason
> I haven't done much of that on
> the list is that Harry and Ron
> are so much less interesting
> than the other characters
> we could trash. 
>  
> But, really, you don't know
> what character trashing is
> until you've hung around
> with rabid Tolkien fans. The
> uninitiated might suppose
> that Tolkien fans don't like
> any of his characters. The
> truth is that the characters
> have become so important to
> fans that they take on a life
> of their own. And once they do
> that, we react to them like
> real people, by providing
> different perspectives on
> them, satirizing them, poking
> at them, trashing at them. I
> don't at all think it's a bad
> thing to trash characters.

Amy:
> I know I'm echoing what
> many have said when I say
> that I love most of these
> characters *because* they're
> imperfect.

Eileen: 
> Well, of course, PACMAN.
> Perfectly  Angelic Characters
> Make Awful Novels. The
> inconsiderateness and idiocy
> of Ron and Harry are actually
> what make me love them as
> characters, even though they
> irritate me as people.

I found Amy's original points 
to be gourmet food for thought 
<punster's leer> and why I do so 
comes from a similar place as 
that of what you're saying here, 
if I read you correctly.

Putting characters under the 
microscope for detailed 
examinations is, well, why I 
still lurk here after so many 
months.  I certainly don't 
advocate putting characters 
on pedestals and altars, but 
going to the extreme opposite 
of beatification in demonizing 
certain characters for the sake 
of winning an argument is more 
rhetorically exciting than 
textually insightful.

Can you tell which I find more 
convincing and authentic?

I'm not saying that you, 
specifically, have been so 
egregious but I do want to 
point out that there's 
trashing the characters in the 
form of examining the negatives 
as vigorously as the positives.  
Then there's trashing the 
characters for the sake of 
strengthening an argument.  In 
this fandom (not just this list 
of course) more people argue 
about ship than anything else 
that I can think of.

All too often, during the years 
that such debating have been 
going on, there's been that 
purely argumentative tone.  
This doesn't usually happen 
when there's a side that is 
clearly stronger than the other.  
No, this occurs most frequently 
when both sides of the debate 
has much going for it.

Heavy-handed attacks on rival 
ships go hand in hand with the 
practice of judging any 
observation of the personal 
dynamics in canon only in terms 
of whether it's the drag or the 
wind in the sail of one's ship 
and of its rivals.  Whether 
the observation is valid or
intrinsic to the text is all 
too often of little concern.

This aspect of this debate has 
skewed and tainted any conclusions 
to be drawn from such a debate.  
Rhetoric and the pursuit of 
possible bragging rights has 
taken precedence over the 
pursuit of fuller and richer 
understanding of the canon.  
When that happens, how fully 
informed can the end opinion be?

Can such an approach to the 
complex and ever-evolving 
cast of HP characters stand 
the test of time?  Heck, we 
don't have to go as far as 
'eternity' when the test of
new canon is only months away.

And really, does this mean that 
in a polygamous societal 
structure (where 'couplethink' * 
does not exist) no one has to 
- "just has to!" - turn evil? <g> 
remain frozen in time as they are 
at any point in the books that 
is convenient?  become celibate?

Or die?

And our influence on how people 
interpret the canon is less far 
flung than the influence of the 
makers of that fanfic, CTMNBN.  
Specifically Columbus and/or 
Heyman.  One or both of them 
(or, for all I know, it's 
Eleanor and not Chris who's 
biased) made the decisions to 
keep the complexity of Ron's 
character off the screen.  
Kloves' HPSS screenplay had 
developed Ron much more 
believably as someone Harry 
would sorely miss years down 
the line than Columbus/Heyman's 
final cut of that movie would 
have the audience believe.

'Faithful' eh?

Petra
a
n  :)

* couplethink - a phrase from 
The Elkins (who'd be the 
Laird of Clan McElkins, right?) 
that launched a thread at OT-Chatter

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