Sexist JKR? Was Re: ESE!McGonagall (not what you think)

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 164755

> Pippin:
> JKR has herself worked as a teacher, a stay-home mom, and has
> said she put a lot of herself into Hermione and Ginny. Maybe what 
> concerns her is not seeing women as limited to traditional roles 
> but raising our consciousness about the way we view traditional 
> roles for women as limiting.  
> 
> For example, just because Molly isn't Stepford perfect
> doesn't mean she's a desperate housewife who would rather
> be doing anything else. 

Magpie:
She clearly wouldn't rather be doing anything else, as I read her. I 
expect if she had to she would get a job or whatever, but there's no 
suggestion to me that she feels unfulfilled in her role. She's a 
character who could fit just as easily into a story from a 19th 
century world where women's roles were more limited--but I don't 
think she's being set up as bad because of that. 

Pippin: 
> Ginny was shy in CoS, but canon never said she was
> sweet, simple and unassuming. In fact there are things in CoS
> that can't be explained except by Devious!Ginny. But the
> assumption that shy little girls must be sweet and simple
> is so powerful that many people complained that Ginny 
> had a personality tranplant.

Magpie:
She did have a personality transplant.:-) IMO, of course--but my 
opinion had nothing to do with my thinking shy little girls must be 
sweet or simple. I based my idea of Ginny's personality on the 
things she actually did and said, which are slightly to the left of 
PS-GoF in OotP/HBP. Starting with the fact that the "real" Ginny 
isn't shy (I would say Ginny I was sweeter than her counterpart, but 
sweeter doesn't have to mean simpler. I actually find this version 
flatter and simpler).

I think Ginny was meant to be a humorous portrayal of the way girls 
grow up, fitting neatly into most of the stuff JKR says about 
girls/boys in the books. She was clearly banking on surprising us 
with Ginny's personality--how could she not when it was purposefully 
hidden from our pov character and he comments on it in canon?--so I 
don't think that can come down to any faults on the reader's part. 
One could just as easily say that it's JKR who has negative 
associations with shy girls given the change in the character. We 
don't know.

Pippin: 
> Swottiness and being a goody two shoes don't necessarily go
> together, but the assumption that they do is so powerful that
> some readers are wondering whether JKR thinks everything
> Hermione does is okay.

Magpie:
I don't see that being the reason people think JKR thinks everything 
Hermione does is okay. They think that because some of Hermione's 
actions that they consider the most disturbing aren't things she's 
called on and for a lot of people they're something to cheer. The 
fact that they wonder if they're wrong about that suggests they're 
giving JKR a chance there. I don't think anyone's ever argued that 
Hermione's being a swot or a goody-two-shoes means she ought to be 
morally superior. (Though I have heard people argue that she is 
morally superior as evidenced by her occasional interest in rules.)

Pippin: 
> As for McGonagall, I think the possibility of ESE!ness is 
> a red herring for the real ESE!Character.  But though it's
> easy to see her as limited to the role of Dumbledore's faithful
> second (as Umbridge did) I think we're going to see now that 
> she has ideas of her own. She seems to have a more collegiate,
> consensus building management style than Dumbledore did.
> 
> If she starts warming up to Slughorn or Slytherin House in an
> attempt to unite the Houses as the Sorting Hat advised,  I
> can see Harry starting to suspect her of ESE!ness. But
> it may be left to McGonagall to do what Dumbledore, with
> his (as I see it) rather rigid heirarchical approach, could not.

Magpie:
If that red-herring is something the author put in on purpose, that 
is. It might just be another "Snape's a vampire." But I would guess 
JKR sees McGonagall as a perfectly strong character without being 
ESE, if by "strong" one means a person able to take care of herself 
and deal with stressful situations. She's shown to be better at her 
job than plenty of male characters, and to be able to hold authority 
over male characters. She has a soft spot for some, but so do most 
people in the HP-verse. She's just not so far a very important 
player in the story.

-m