[ SECRET POST #2015 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2015 ⌋

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

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 04 pages, 085 secrets from Secret Submission Post #288.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 1 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[rtydmartel]

Me too! It's interesting to realize how differently, say, Harry Potter, would be treated by the Dursleys if he was a girl. Dudley probably wouldn't get away with hitting her, so there would be more of a focus on verbal abuse.

Petunia and Vernon might not dare lock her in a cupboard (because I can see them being the kind of people that think that girls are more fragile than boys).

And heaven help Snape if girl!Harry winded up looking more like Lily. He might even have to treat her, gasp!, decently!

I liked Harry Potter and the Mysterious Curse of the Girl Who Lived because it actually explored (with varying degrees of competence/stereotypes) how differently everyone would treat a Girl Who Lived.

Anyway, I really like genderswaps.

[thene]

The opening of Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone is really reminiscent of Book 2 of Les Miserables, which does indeed involve a maltreated girl being made to live in an understairs cupboard by her foster family. In both cases the underlying dynamic is class satire - Harry's the poor cousin who's wearing hand-me-downs and being sent to the local comp while Dudley goes to private school, because Harry's deemed lower-class than Dudley and therefore doesn't deserve nice things, and that can be as easily levelled at girls as at boys imo (in Les Mis it's bastardry that renders Cosette lower-class and therefore maltreatable).

Also, I just want to say that 'Dudley probably wouldn't get away with hitting her' is a weird statement for me to read as a domestic violence survivor. I do understand your point about gendered double standards but I have also learned that when it comes to dv standards are already out the window. I guess the real difference would be that if Harry were a girl, JKR would have been less able to write about domestic violence in a children's book? Given that violence between boys is considered a way more acceptable topic than dv.

[rtydmartel]

My apologies!

What I meant is that I always got the impression that Dudley and his friends got away with "Harry Hunting" Harry all over the neighborhood under the pretext that "boys will be boys" (plus the reputation that the Dursleys made for Harry with all the false rumors of him being a delinquent).

They would have to get more creative if Harry was a girl, and Dudley didn't strike me as the patient, careful planning type.

Also, yes, to JKR not being able to write about it so easily.

I'm sorry that you went through all that, I did not mean to disparage survivors. In real life things aren't quite so simple as in children's books. :(

[thene]

Please don't be sorry - I just wanted to share that perspective, even though it's massively awkward to talk about. I do think you're right - violence against women is often more private than violence against men, and it's minimised in a different way.

[rtydmartel]

c:

[rtydmartel]

Thinking on it, they probably could have gotten away with the cupboard if Harry was a girl, too.

I ought to read Les Miserables one day. It sounds depressing but interesting.