What's the factual/fictional divide got to do with it? It's ego.

[dicentra63 <dicentra@xmission.com>]

No: HPFGUIDX 50495

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "ssk7882 <skelkins at a...>"
<skelkins at a...> wrote:
> 
> I imagine that those who 
> engage very strongly with the characters as "real people" likely 
> find polemic directed against them far more upsetting to read 
> when it appears on the list, just as I think that most people 
> of good will and kindly dispositions probably find polemic 
> rather painful to read in real life when it is directed against 
> people they happen to know personally.

Maybe it's just me, but sometimes when I hear polemic against a
character I like, I don't become defensive because I see the character
as "real."  I get defensive because I feel that my skill as a reader
is being challenged.  I react as if the writer of the polemic were
saying, "Check me out, I figured out the hidden truth while you fell
into the snare."  Or worse: "If you were sensitive/smart/perceptive
enough, you'd have seen CharacterX for what s/he really is."

That's not how I always react, mind.  When people
(**coughSnapefanscough**) slam Sirius, I see it merely as people
taking sides in an unresolved, ambiguous conflict (it is TOO!) that
exists within the series.  When Pippin came up with LYCANTHROPE (Lupin
is Evil), I was fascinated by the alternate reading and found it
convincing.  However, on other occasions, my ego gets bruised.

I'll have to admit, Elk, that the twins thing got to me that way.  My
reaction to your "the twins are bullies" posts was to think that if
*I* didn't see them as bullies, I must be "aiding and abetting" them
in some way.  That I'm one of those kids who stands by and watches
bullies beat up on other kids and cheers for the bullies.  That I'm
snickering up my sleeve like Crabbe and Goyle.  

Let me be clear, though.  I do not think that you were trying to
communicate *that* with your posts.  You were setting down a
disturbingly persuasive argument against the twins, not against their
real-life fans.  It's just that when I realized that I had never
questioned the twins' actions, I felt guilty, both as a reader and as
a human being.  It made me feel defensive.

That, of course, is my problem and mine alone.  I haven't gone back to
read what I said back then, but if I remember correctly, the worst I
implied about *you* was that you were sitting atop Affective Fallacy,
which was a criticism of your reading and not your character.  
I still don't think that the twins are bullies in the same sense as
Draco is, but I no longer see them as pure comic relief, either.
(Thanks a LOT.)

It might be that one of the reactions people are having to "trashing
Ron and Harry" is that they had never *noticed* how truly rotten they
can be at times.  When reading a convincing argument about their
rotten behavior, one might feel that s/he as a reader is being accused
of condoning that behavior.  

Or not.

(BTW: My reaction to reading Ebony's post wasn't defensiveness,
however--it was anger at Ron and Harry for being such insufferable
gits.  I switched off my HP wallpaper on the computer so I wouldn't
have to look at them. :D)  

At any rate, the failure to distinguish between fictional characters
and real people isn't the only reason people have strong emotional
reactions to polemic.  Sometimes (maybe just in my case, I don't know)
it's a bruised ego over not having noticed "the obvious."  Or a guilty
conscience for not recognizing bad behavior for what it is.  

Either way, I have a responsibility to recognize my subjective
responses to literary criticism as just that--subjective--and the
critiques themselves as being aimed at the characters, not at me. 
Whatever guilt they stir up is a separate issue entirely that I have
to work out between me and God and JKR.

--Dicentra, leaving the confessional now