fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #4053 ]

[ SECRET POST #4053 ]

⌈ Secret Post #4053 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 16 secrets from Secret Submission Post #580.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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Not to mention the fact that, in the time period we're talking about, being openly gay was actively dangerous. He'd risk imprisonment or worse if he was fopping about with another guy out in public. But making him secretly gay comes with its own set of problematic aspects. They can't win no matter what they do.

He's a fuckin wizard

Magic is actually real and there's hundreds of cute little magical creatures running about, but having someone be gay is unrealistic!

Dumbledore (who can literally teleport at will) would definitely be worried about getting arrested by the police and taken to prison

That's assuming the cops in question are muggles, though.

If homosexuality isn't tolerated in the muggle world at that time, why is it a stretch that it wouldn't be tolerated in the wizarding world?

If the movie showed a wizard as openly gay, thereby confirming that there's no homosexuality taboo in the wizarding world, you'd be screaming about backpedaling because if it's not taboo then why weren't the books full of openly gay characters.

+1

This is a no win situation. People who have already decided JKR is a hack and a shitty ally will never change their minds no matter what. Never. Nothing will ever be good enough.

I'm still on the fence. If you have a character you declare, post-end, was ~gay the whole time~ and now you have a chance in a prequel to actually show it, I'm gonna side-eye it if you don't take that chance. Like... even if we're going down this meta road of homosexuality being a taboo, people were still gay back then, they didn't just disappear. There's history in gay decorum while under intense scrutiny. Research it.

There's history in gay decorum while under intense scrutiny. Research it.

Excuse you? That's pretty condescending. Why don't you chill?

Anyway, this bears repeating: there is no pleasing everyone. Someone is going to be critical. Someone is going to bitch. Someone is going to make a mountain out of a mole hill. It always happens. Large fandoms are shit like that. No matter what move is made, someone is going to be pissed. Someone is going to accuse JKR of something crude, or unsavory. Whatever move she chooses to make, it might as well be whatever move fits the narrative best. I don't know what that move is, because I lost interest in HP after Deathly Hallows.

It'd be awesome if we get even a hint of Dumbledore's sexual orientation. Absolutely! But wouldn't it be jarring and awkward if it just got shoehorned in for the sake of being PC? If it's meant to be, let it happen naturally. Also, as other people have pointed out, JKR may only have so much control over this. There are still soccer mom types that pitch fits over LGBTQ+ representation in popular media. And that's just in countries where LGBTQ+ tolerance is relatively high. Let's not forget the plethora of countries where LGBTQ+ content is just straight up illegal. No, it isn't right. Yes, it does suck. Sure, they could do more to combat intolerance. And OK, maybe JKR tweets about her own damn books too much. But I suspect the problem here is more mutli-faceted than simply refusing to make a character explicitly gay. What's wrong with suspecting that?

Why would depicting/mentioning on-screen a character's canon sexual orientation by jarring, awkward, or shoehorned? I think it's awkward to /avoid/ showing a gay Dumbledore in a prequel--with the man he was in a relationship with, no less!

(no subject)

(Anonymous) - 2018-02-08 02:35 (UTC) - Expand

If it's meant to be, let it happen naturally.

This implies that the reason it's not happening is because it wouldn't be natural, like it wouldn't be creatively appropriate or something (I assume). I strongly suspect that's not the reason it's not happening. I am dubious.

But I suspect the problem here is more mutli-faceted than simply refusing to make a character explicitly gay. What's wrong with suspecting that?

I think people are pretty familiar with the general idea that there are financial reasons behind it. They just don't find that an especially compelling excuse. Particularly for a billionaire who is in charge of one of the most valuable intellectual properties in the world.

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(Anonymous) - 2018-02-08 02:46 (UTC) - Expand

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(Anonymous) - 2018-02-08 03:01 (UTC) - Expand

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(Anonymous) - 2018-02-08 03:23 (UTC) - Expand

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cbrachyrhynchos - 2018-02-08 12:16 (UTC) - Expand

I mean, some people are going to still think she's a hack, probably. People are always going to have different opinions. If what you're demanding is that there's something JK Rowling can do and then 100% of people on earth are going to think she's awesome, then no, that's obviously never going to happen.

but I do think that many people, maybe even most people, would actually just, you know, be happy about it and think it was cool.

I'd be happy about it, too, and it would be cool. Maybe there's still room for it to happen. I don't know, because I don't keep up with the HP world anymore. Stopped caring a long time ago.

But even if it happens, some self-righteous asshole will mount their high horse and piss all over it no matter how it's done. Classic large fandom attention whoring. Which is where I'm struggling to see the point in even trying to please people anymore. Way I see it, people don't even deserve to be pleased.

The only point I ever agreed on in this whole years long diatribe is that Dumbledore, having no unmistakable indication one way or another with his sexual orientation, doesn't really count as gay representation. It's more like random trivia that does fuck all for the world of Harry Potter as a whole. Even so, iirc, I thought JKR revealed his sexuality only because they were trying to arbitrarily give him a female love interest in the movies, not because she was fishing for PC brownie points? I could be wrong, though. Again, stopped keeping track long ago.

But even if it happens, some self-righteous asshole will mount their high horse and piss all over it no matter how it's done.

Ergo, they shouldn't do it?

Which is where I'm struggling to see the point in even trying to please people anymore. Way I see it, people don't even deserve to be pleased.

Well, first of all, I don't see why it even needs to be about pleasing people. It's also about doing the right thing. Second, even setting that aside, this still seems kind of over-the-top. Some people won't be pleased, therefore fuck everybody?

Like, yeah, some people will disagree, like they do about literally everything that's ever happened in the entire history of the world. Why would you expect something to be universally beloved? Nothing, ever, in the history of the world, has been universally beloved. There has been some equivalent of a person in the fandom willing to piss all over it for literally everything in history. I don't think that's a reasonable expectation.

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(Anonymous) - 2018-02-08 03:01 (UTC) - Expand

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(Anonymous) - 2018-02-08 03:04 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

(Anonymous) - 2018-02-08 03:35 (UTC) - Expand

Boy, you're sure assuming an awful lot about me.

NAYRT but... not really

I already think that the books should have had openly gay characters. I don't really need a canonical justification for them to do so. They don't, and that was JK Rowling's choice, and I don't think it was the right choice even then but I accept that, you know, it was the choice that she made. How would a different canon justification change any of that?

I don’t think he’d be concerned about the danger, but this is Albus “secrets and lies” Dumbledore. I’d be baffled if he casually dropped mentions of his romantic life into conversations.

exactly this. Rita Skeeter couldn't even get this information out of anyone who ever knew him using memory charms and Veritaserum, why would he just. tell someone casually in the 1940s.

NAYRT

I think the difference between you and me is that I don't think of that as good, in-character writing that Dumbledore's sexuality was never addressed. Rather, I mostly think of it as a failure on Rowling's part.

So you think all characters' sexualities should always be explicit in every story? Even if there is no narrative reason for it?

No. That is not what I think at all.

I do think that there should be more stories including LGBT people in general, told in a wide variety of ways. I'm never really sure what "narrative reason" actually means. The idea that there's some universal narrative reason that consistently makes it impossible to have LGBT characters seems like such a strange think to invoke. There's such a wide variety of ways that narratives can work and individual stories that can be told. I'm not interested in dictating any specific way it has to be done, but I think we should see more of it in general.

And then also, in this specific instance, I don't think that the choice that was made was a particularly good one in terms of the narrative, and I think it was also a missed opportunity that they didn't have an LGBT story in the books themselves. That doesn't mean that there's any one specific way that it needed to be done. But, no, I don't think that the choice not to say anything about it in the book itself was a good choice.

And I don't think the new movie should feel tied down by something that I think was a mistake in the first place.

Well, in this case the intense emotional relationship between the two is the elephant in the room of the advertised conflict around the title character of the film.

You really don’t believe they’re going for a slow build, huh? You’re just willing to write all 4 coming movies off based on the 2nd?

Re: +1

cbrachyrhynchos - 2018-02-08 18:25 (UTC) - Expand

Re: +1

(Anonymous) - 2018-02-08 23:53 (UTC) - Expand

Re: +1

(Anonymous) - 2018-02-08 22:25 (UTC) - Expand

Because film has never before seen a character who's portrayed as explicitly gay but in the closet...

But making him secretly gay comes with its own set of problematic aspects

You just assumed that people would take issue with this. How do you know? And even if it is considered problematic, it is way less of a cop-out than sidestepping the issue altogether.

Dumbledore doesn't have to be openly gay in 1920's Europe, fine. I'd even say that would be out of character for him. But he is appearing in a movie where the main villain is a former love interest, and he's going to be associating with close allies (Newt & co) so there is no reason why his sexuality can't be explored in a private context.

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