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PaperclipPerfector  8mo ago (text post)   25769 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 26, 2024

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Sure enough, Rowling sits on Twitter shitposting at trans activists all day like it's 4chan

I do have to laugh about that. It may not be edifying, but she didn't buckle to the pressure to self-flagellate in public as a wicked sinner and change all her views. She leaned into "okay, if I'm Lady Hitler, let me do that!" I think that's why the aggravated are throwing "she's anti-Semitic, the goblin bankers* are Jewish caricatures! she's pro-slavery, look at how the books mock Hermione trying to free the house elves!" accusations at her. Anything at all to pull her down and let them be the victors. And it's not working, and it's driving them nuts.

*They're not caricaturing anything but the gnomes of Zurich, and if you want to tell me that Swiss bankers are famously Jewish, uh I don't think so.

she's anti-Semitic, the goblin bankers* are Jewish caricatures!

I think that argument has been quietly dropped since Oct 7. Its very difficult to argue that *she's * dog-whistling by setting the goblin uprising during a year when something bad happened to a Jewish community elsewhere in Europe, but that chanting a slogan used by an openly genocidal group isn't an anti-semitic dogwhistle.

It will, of course, still be vaguely remembered on the internet that of course she's been proven to be anti-semitic and that the details don't matter, but that's just the way things always work. (And, as an aside, that sort of thing really pisses me off in a general way - that the accusations are bunk, but get forgotten and stick regardless)

I think that argument has been quietly dropped since Oct 7.

I've still seen it in the wild.

"Thou calledst me dog before thou hadst a cause. But since I am a dog, beware my fangs."

The house-elves could have been an interesting discussion; what obligation do we have to beings that are as sapient as humans, but aren't human, and have very different preferences to humans?

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