Okay, I'll be serious now.
Oct. 21st, 2007 01:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lls_mutantFirst of all, thanks to everyone so far who's filled out my movie poll, and if you haven't and wouldn't mind, I'd really appreciate it if you would!
So, I posted the other night with my LOL post about JKR's Dumbledore announcement. I have a few minutes before I get painting, so,
When I read it, I burst out laughing. I really did. I think just because I knew the utter havoc this was going to cause. (Not that that makes me special- you don't need a crystal ball to know that!) And yeah, the purple suit in HBP totally jumped to mind, but that was a silly thought. Especially in the Wizarding World, where Fudge wears lime green and one it was fashionable to wear dress robes with lace if you were a man. Lace, I tell you. But honestly, it wasn't a shock.
Would I have preferred it if she'd outed Sirius and Remus? Sure! But really, only for one reason: I have something invested in that pairing. I LIKE that pairing. Dumbledore/Grindelwald came late, and while I snickered and saw it with slash goggles, I also knew that my time in heavy fandom was coming to an end. Not because of DH, not because of JKR, not because of wank, but because of Baby #2. So, I didn't get invested in the idea of Dumbledore/Grindelwald, even though I could completely see it. But although I like Sirius/Remus, I'm completely content with their fandom, canon-compatible status for a number of reasons.
When I first fell in love with Sirius/Remus, one of the biggest attractions for me was that I didn't see them as a gay couple first and foremost. I started liking both of them in PoA, but I saw nothing slashy there. Heck- I STILL see nothing slashy there, except maybe Remus dropping his briefcase. For all that we all joke about the hug, I think most of my f-list agrees that it means nothing in terms of sexuality. The Shrieking Shack scene is a very emotional scene; it just drips with it. (It was also some of JKR's best writing ever.) But seriously, given the extreme circumstances that were happening, I just can't read anything sexual into the interactions there. The most I WILL do is smack down naysayers who say that Sirius and Remus weren't even that close as friends, because I really think they were. And, of course, "lie low at Lupin's" is really completely benign. Where else WOULD Sirius go? I began shipping Sirius and Remus in OotP, when their characters were already established. In my non-expert opinion, the world is ready for gay characters as long as they fit neatly into the stereotypes and exist in comedies. God forbid they should actually have personalities, and I thought, "wow. If this was canon, JKR made a pair of gay men who actually had personalities identities that were NOT related to their sexuality! Awesome!"
That's the thought that holds over to Dumbledore being gay. Yes, it never came up (more on that in a minute), especially in the first six books. But that's part of the attraction for me.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
gehayi put it best when she said Before, I thought he was an arrogant, self-righteous, manipulative son of a bitch. Now, he's an arrogant, self-righteous, manipulative son of a bitch who happens to be gay. (gehayi, I hope you don't mind me quoting you. I don't have quite the loathing for Dumbledore that she does, but I think the key aspect here is that his personality, attributes, and flaws do not stem from his sexuality, but that Dumbledore is all of these things regardless of his sexuality. And that's what I want to see, more and more. That's how we know the world is truly accepting differences in sexuality; when they can accept that a person with a different sexuality is a person first, and that their sexuality is a facet of who they are, not the defining factor.
Plus, come on. Dumbledore is brilliant. He's powerful magically. He's powerful politically. He's the most beloved Headmaster Hogwarts ever had, according to Doge (who might be a bit biased ;) ). He's supposed to be an excellent teacher, I guess. He definitely has a dark past and made mistakes, but there's a reason Dumbledore is all about second chances, and that's because he turned his life around on one. He's flawed- very much so- but because of that he's a character. And he's one that many people- especially outside our obsessive little fandom world- love and respect. He's a good choice.
So why'd she say it in an interview? Why not in the books?
Well, the first six books... forget it. For most of the text, Dumbledore exists in his main capacity as a Headmaster of a school. Now, I don't care if you're straight, gay, bi, or asexual, or any other orientation you can come up with. And I don't care what your students are, or how close you are to them. If you are a teacher, your love life is inappropriate for discussion with your students. Period. It's partly a privacy thing, partly a sexual harassment issue, but also that there's a line there you can't cross. You need to maintain authority over your students, and discussing- in any way- your love life makes you on their level, and diminishes respect. And I suspect many teachers would argue that the closer you are to a student, the less appropriate it becomes to discuss your love/sex life.
Sure, there are scenes where Dumbledore is not acting as Headmaster, but they're few and far between. The first chapter of PS/SS (where he completely sets the stage for just how manipulative and arrogant he is, really), the parting of ways, the interrogation of Barty Crouch, Jr., the duel with Voldemort... but those are, again, times when other aspects of Dumbledore come to the forefront and sexuality again has nothing to do with what he's doing. Only in book 7 do we really begin learning about Dumbledore as a man, and not just as Headmaster.
The seventh book... well, a lot of us did pick up on it. The Dumbledore/Grindelwald ship totally took off. I think a lot of us thought that she didn't really mean it, especially since in my world "us" is largely R/S shippers and we'd already been burnt by thinking there was a genuine chance at canon, and finding out that JKR didn't consider them canon.
But why didn't she just out and SAY it? I have a couple of theories. One is nice, one is cynical. The cynical theory is that she was scared, or that she did want to make the announcement after sales and after the dust settled, to stir things back up. I can't deny that either of those are possibilities. I also won't say that I believe (or don't believe) that she planned DD's sexuality from the beginning, but I do think she knew it as she wrote book 7. The nice theory is that stating DD's sexuality just didn't fit. You couldn't do it too early (like with Doge), because it revealed too much about the Grindelwald plotline. You couldn't do it through Skeeter, because to do it in character would make the accusation of homosexuality look like it was icky and bad. Kings' Cross would have been... well, the whole thing was focused more on Harry. There might have been spots to put it in, but would it have completely jerked non-slash fans out of the narrative? Very likely.
In an idealistic way, I'm glad she didn't put it in the book, although I wouldn't have minded. In my world, it just shouldn't be anyone's business. I mean, I'm married, but how many people REALLY want to hear much about it? Sure, you might want to hear about the wedding, if you're into girly things. Or if you're my friend, you might not mind me talking about my hubby because it affects my life. But if you've just met me or I'm your teacher or colleague? Why should you really care? Dumbledore's sexuality is really only important in how it affected the plot, which is why his specific relationship with Grindelwald is important. Dumbledore would have acted the same towards Harry if he was gay, straight, or, like Aberforth, into goats :)
Anyway. That's all my opinion, naturally. I know not everyone agrees with it, and hey, that's fine. But hey, a little meta is always fun, and so is procrastinating! :)
So, I posted the other night with my LOL post about JKR's Dumbledore announcement. I have a few minutes before I get painting, so,
When I read it, I burst out laughing. I really did. I think just because I knew the utter havoc this was going to cause. (Not that that makes me special- you don't need a crystal ball to know that!) And yeah, the purple suit in HBP totally jumped to mind, but that was a silly thought. Especially in the Wizarding World, where Fudge wears lime green and one it was fashionable to wear dress robes with lace if you were a man. Lace, I tell you. But honestly, it wasn't a shock.
Would I have preferred it if she'd outed Sirius and Remus? Sure! But really, only for one reason: I have something invested in that pairing. I LIKE that pairing. Dumbledore/Grindelwald came late, and while I snickered and saw it with slash goggles, I also knew that my time in heavy fandom was coming to an end. Not because of DH, not because of JKR, not because of wank, but because of Baby #2. So, I didn't get invested in the idea of Dumbledore/Grindelwald, even though I could completely see it. But although I like Sirius/Remus, I'm completely content with their fandom, canon-compatible status for a number of reasons.
When I first fell in love with Sirius/Remus, one of the biggest attractions for me was that I didn't see them as a gay couple first and foremost. I started liking both of them in PoA, but I saw nothing slashy there. Heck- I STILL see nothing slashy there, except maybe Remus dropping his briefcase. For all that we all joke about the hug, I think most of my f-list agrees that it means nothing in terms of sexuality. The Shrieking Shack scene is a very emotional scene; it just drips with it. (It was also some of JKR's best writing ever.) But seriously, given the extreme circumstances that were happening, I just can't read anything sexual into the interactions there. The most I WILL do is smack down naysayers who say that Sirius and Remus weren't even that close as friends, because I really think they were. And, of course, "lie low at Lupin's" is really completely benign. Where else WOULD Sirius go? I began shipping Sirius and Remus in OotP, when their characters were already established. In my non-expert opinion, the world is ready for gay characters as long as they fit neatly into the stereotypes and exist in comedies. God forbid they should actually have personalities, and I thought, "wow. If this was canon, JKR made a pair of gay men who actually had personalities identities that were NOT related to their sexuality! Awesome!"
That's the thought that holds over to Dumbledore being gay. Yes, it never came up (more on that in a minute), especially in the first six books. But that's part of the attraction for me.
gehayi put it best when she said Before, I thought he was an arrogant, self-righteous, manipulative son of a bitch. Now, he's an arrogant, self-righteous, manipulative son of a bitch who happens to be gay. (gehayi, I hope you don't mind me quoting you. I don't have quite the loathing for Dumbledore that she does, but I think the key aspect here is that his personality, attributes, and flaws do not stem from his sexuality, but that Dumbledore is all of these things regardless of his sexuality. And that's what I want to see, more and more. That's how we know the world is truly accepting differences in sexuality; when they can accept that a person with a different sexuality is a person first, and that their sexuality is a facet of who they are, not the defining factor.Plus, come on. Dumbledore is brilliant. He's powerful magically. He's powerful politically. He's the most beloved Headmaster Hogwarts ever had, according to Doge (who might be a bit biased ;) ). He's supposed to be an excellent teacher, I guess. He definitely has a dark past and made mistakes, but there's a reason Dumbledore is all about second chances, and that's because he turned his life around on one. He's flawed- very much so- but because of that he's a character. And he's one that many people- especially outside our obsessive little fandom world- love and respect. He's a good choice.
So why'd she say it in an interview? Why not in the books?
Well, the first six books... forget it. For most of the text, Dumbledore exists in his main capacity as a Headmaster of a school. Now, I don't care if you're straight, gay, bi, or asexual, or any other orientation you can come up with. And I don't care what your students are, or how close you are to them. If you are a teacher, your love life is inappropriate for discussion with your students. Period. It's partly a privacy thing, partly a sexual harassment issue, but also that there's a line there you can't cross. You need to maintain authority over your students, and discussing- in any way- your love life makes you on their level, and diminishes respect. And I suspect many teachers would argue that the closer you are to a student, the less appropriate it becomes to discuss your love/sex life.
Sure, there are scenes where Dumbledore is not acting as Headmaster, but they're few and far between. The first chapter of PS/SS (where he completely sets the stage for just how manipulative and arrogant he is, really), the parting of ways, the interrogation of Barty Crouch, Jr., the duel with Voldemort... but those are, again, times when other aspects of Dumbledore come to the forefront and sexuality again has nothing to do with what he's doing. Only in book 7 do we really begin learning about Dumbledore as a man, and not just as Headmaster.
The seventh book... well, a lot of us did pick up on it. The Dumbledore/Grindelwald ship totally took off. I think a lot of us thought that she didn't really mean it, especially since in my world "us" is largely R/S shippers and we'd already been burnt by thinking there was a genuine chance at canon, and finding out that JKR didn't consider them canon.
But why didn't she just out and SAY it? I have a couple of theories. One is nice, one is cynical. The cynical theory is that she was scared, or that she did want to make the announcement after sales and after the dust settled, to stir things back up. I can't deny that either of those are possibilities. I also won't say that I believe (or don't believe) that she planned DD's sexuality from the beginning, but I do think she knew it as she wrote book 7. The nice theory is that stating DD's sexuality just didn't fit. You couldn't do it too early (like with Doge), because it revealed too much about the Grindelwald plotline. You couldn't do it through Skeeter, because to do it in character would make the accusation of homosexuality look like it was icky and bad. Kings' Cross would have been... well, the whole thing was focused more on Harry. There might have been spots to put it in, but would it have completely jerked non-slash fans out of the narrative? Very likely.
In an idealistic way, I'm glad she didn't put it in the book, although I wouldn't have minded. In my world, it just shouldn't be anyone's business. I mean, I'm married, but how many people REALLY want to hear much about it? Sure, you might want to hear about the wedding, if you're into girly things. Or if you're my friend, you might not mind me talking about my hubby because it affects my life. But if you've just met me or I'm your teacher or colleague? Why should you really care? Dumbledore's sexuality is really only important in how it affected the plot, which is why his specific relationship with Grindelwald is important. Dumbledore would have acted the same towards Harry if he was gay, straight, or, like Aberforth, into goats :)
Anyway. That's all my opinion, naturally. I know not everyone agrees with it, and hey, that's fine. But hey, a little meta is always fun, and so is procrastinating! :)
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-10-21 09:22 pm (UTC)But it *does* point out that yet again, as you say, most people are only comfortable with gay characters if there are poor consequences to that choice.
So the HP universe does have a gay character. A gay character whose big love affair is also the closest he ever got to the dark side, and which destroyed what was left of his family. A gay character who then had to defeat and symbolically castrate his lover and then repudiate and disavow the relationship in order to return to the light side, and whose life ever after is as far as we know one of complete celibacy, and who could only be revealed as gay outside of the narrative proper and after the series was over.
And I hope she doesn't mind me quoting her. ;^D
But this is the kind of thing that "The Celluloid Closet" talked about quite a bit. Gay characters couldn't be part of the mainstream, they had to be harmed or hurt or even die by the end of the story (film, in this case), to underscore the "danger" of non-conformity.
And even though an R/S confirmation would have basically the same consequences, especially if she hadn't changed anything else about their stories, at least one could make a stronger argument that his marriage was an attempt to grab the heteronormative life...and that it ultimately resulted in only one happiness: the birth of Ted.
Of course, we can argue this *anyway*, it's just harder without confirmation. And Dumbledore's confirmation is disappointing not because it wasn't confirmed in canon, but because it's another in a long string of characters whose attraction to their own gender led them down a dubious path.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-22 03:05 pm (UTC)A friend of mine wrote an essay on portrayals of sexuality and consequences in Western literature(I think he eventually used it as a thesis). I wish I had a copy; it was brilliant.
We'd started a list of books and films in which gay/potentially gay characters get killed off(usually in some fashion related to their moral 'failings') and it blossomed from that, as did Alex and Jules' Theory of Sexuality and Punishment in Popular CultureTM, an in-joke that proved vaild fairly often.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-22 03:25 pm (UTC)And in its way, the reveal of Big Gay Dumbledore is not very different.
Makes me want to write otherwise normal gay characters into EVERYTHING I write. Heh.
(Of course, the original piece I just started writing over the weekend features not only rampant bisexuality, but also homoerotic incest, and are the characters normal otherwise? Um...no... but they are anti-heroes and the tale will be told from their perspective, so they're sympathetic. Just not exactly...respectable.)
no subject
Date: 2007-10-22 03:46 pm (UTC)When Doctor Who returned to the screen and we were first introduced to Captain Jack Harkness, I went nuts. Absoutely mental. A bisexual character with personality? One who isn't a two-dimensional stereotype? Hot damn!!
I've always disliked shows like Will & Grace and Queer as Folk because I think they perpetuate stereotypes about gay people, and mostly negative ones at that. We deny kids depictions of them as normal, average people but happily offer portrayals of them as sex-mad and shallow which is a hell of a cheat.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-22 05:18 pm (UTC)I've never watched QAF (either UK or US versions) but I liked the early seasons of Will & Grace because okay, yes, Jack was the flameyest of flaming homosecksyooalls, but Will himself was *not* - Eric McCormack didn't use any of the "tells" that actors so often rely on. Later seasons just got more and more ridiculous, but I think at least at the beginning they *tried* and that counts for something.
Another character who does have a few traits of the "stereotypical" but who was not treated as a stereotype is John Irvin in "NYPD Blue," played by Bill Bochtrup. I think what made it work was that the character grew so organically based upon the rapport that they all had on the show, and as he took on more and more importance to the squad (and to Andy and his family in particular), you got to see more and more of this competent, sensitive, careful man, who just happened to also be gay.
But NYPD Blue is hardly a kids' show! So, yeah, that problem perpetuates itself yet again.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-22 05:48 pm (UTC)We've been given spotty info about one relationship Dumbledore had, and yes, it did end in disaster. But consider that Dumbledore eventually did triumph over Grindelwald and ended up quite high-powered in British society. Also consider that this relationship happened 50 years prior to Dumbledore's death. JKR mentions this one because it had direct consequences on the plot, but we have no idea what other relationships Dumbledore had after Grindelwald. Frankly, I thought Elphais Doge was acting very much like someone who'd lost a partner of many years at the Bill/Fleur wedding. It's very possible that after Dumbledore settled down and got his life back on track, he wised up and got into a loving relationship with Doge. (Although why Doge isn't mentioned at the funeral does beg a question ;) )
But another point I'd like to make is that plenty of het relationships- even in HP- end in disaster, as well. To me, the fact that DD had one terribly bad relationship in his past is not a comment on his sexuality (especially given his age), but how impressionable he was and how hard he fell, and how dangerously charismatic and compelling Grindelwald could be.
For the first six books, we see a Dumbledore who is wildly successful. He's powerful, he's acknowledged as the epitome of all that's good, he's beloved by the British Wizarding society, he has every appearance of being happy in his profession, and he clearly has many friends. Even when we start to see his fall from grace in OotP, it's not at all based on anything sexual but entirely on his (correct) insistence that Voldemort is a threat again. I think Dumbledore is highly successful, and while he certainly had a relationship that had massive negative consequences, it's hardly the defining aspect about his character, or even necessarily making a statement about his sexuality.
I can't make an argument about literature as a whole, but given Dumbledore's age at the time of his attraction to Grindelwald, and his subsequent successes in life, I don't think that I can agree that his attraction to his own gender led him down a dubious path, especially since so many people have relationships that do that anyway.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-22 08:32 pm (UTC)John Barrowman is gay.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-24 03:21 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-03 01:43 am (UTC)To me, the fact that DD had one terribly bad relationship in his past is not a comment on his sexuality (especially given his age), but how impressionable he was and how hard he fell, and how dangerously charismatic and compelling Grindelwald could be.
I agree, and I do agree that plenty of other relationships (both of Remus's, if we still support Sirius/Remus) end not very well. And yes, it's cool that D was portrayed as a character to be admired. I do get all that.
The point remains, though, that he - and if we believe in S/R, they - wind up dead. To me, it's progress, but for small values of progress.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-03 01:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-03 01:59 am (UTC)