This thread is to discuss the many concerns and issues with this franchise, the problematic nature of supporting it, and the indoctrination of fascism and white supremacist dog-whistling within it's content as well as the beliefs and behaviours of it's creators.
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19 hours 39 minutes of film, and all the POC speaking lines are in a 6 minute video.
Like the entire 1st minute of that is just narrating what the white people are doing.
I'm pretty sure his character on Community had more depth, and the entire joke there was that he was all about his catchphrase.
19 hours 39 minutes of film, and all the POC speaking lines are in a 6 minute video.
So what? The books (and films) are focused mainly on the three main characters (Harry, Ron, and Hermione) who all happen to be white characters. The action is so heavily skewed towards these three that the main student antagonist (Draco) only has a little over 30 minutes of screen time in the entire series.
I agree with you that neither the books nor the movies show a lot of diversity. It would have been better to have more diversity. But, not all lack of diversity is inherently racist. The books were published between 1997 and 2007. According to the 2001 UK census over 90% of the UK population identified as either British white (85.67%) or Other white (5.27%) so it is not altogether surprising that the three main characters are also white.
sometimesdee wrote:19 hours 39 minutes of film, and all the POC speaking lines are in a 6 minute video.
So what?
In and of itself, maybe it's not much. But it's another data point about the HP franchise that points to a bias.
It's true that similarly short compilations could be made of other films/shows, like The Brady Bunch, for example. And that in and of itself doesn't mean that the show is bad.
I see this as similar to the Bechdel test, which is also often similarly misunderstood. In that test there's a question asked of a piece of media: "Do two, named, female characters have a discussion about something other than a man?" If the answer is no, that's not saying that the show itself is bad. But in seeing exactly how many shows fail that simple test exposes a bias in the media that most people are exposed to. It shows we're constantly presented with the bias that one perspective is normal and anything else the exception.
That doesn't mean that a movie like, for example, "12 Angry Men" (1957) (which fails to have both women and people of color) is bad. But being aware a bias just allows us to be more conscious of the way that media frames the world when we watch it.
And it HP's case just reinforces what else we know of the author's biases.
As with all fictional characters, they do not just happen to be white.
As with all fictional characters, they do not just happen to be white.
Yes, but you see, including POC would ruin the verisimilitude of this story about wizard kids and fantasy monsters. We need to keep things realistic here.
Given that the POC she did include are widely critized as problematic, I am not sure people would want more POC in Harry Potter...
The larger point I would make is that authors & screenwriters generally write what they know (and some people argue that they should only write what they know, to avoid bad portrayals of foreign cultures - topic of another discussion perhaps).
There needs to be a shift in societal perception of what kind of manuscripts are deemed profitable, so more works by diverse people are published and adapted in movie and TV.
This seems to be happening - e.g. the fantasy literature I read as a kid was written by a quite narrow demographic, whereas if you look in the fantasy section of a book store nowadays, there is more diversity.
As with all fictional characters, they do not just happen to be white.
Well, in a way, they did. When the Harry Potter play was first in London's west end, Hermione was played by a POC. If she were similarly cast in the movie franchise, it would certainly "solve" the six minute thing above. However, people would then be upset that it is the POC character that gets called "mudblood".
There needs to be a shift in societal perception of what kind of manuscripts are deemed profitable, so more works by diverse people are published and adapted in movie and TV.
I certainly agree with this. The world is a lesser place when all we get to see are either massive CGI extravaganzas or small indie projects. It is my perhaps naive view that people will want to see interesting stories with interesting characters, regardless of whether a hollywood star is in it or if it is populated by POC or white people. For example, look at the recent Everything Everywhere all at Once - original, well received, and successful. More like this please.
As with all fictional characters, they do not just happen to be white.
It's not JKR's fault that the writing stork only brought her white characters.
sometimesdee wrote:19 hours 39 minutes of film, and all the POC speaking lines are in a 6 minute video.
So what? The books (and films) are focused mainly on the three main characters (Harry, Ron, and Hermione) who all happen to be white characters. The action is so heavily skewed towards these three that the main student antagonist (Draco) only has a little over 30 minutes of screen time in the entire series.
I agree with you that neither the books nor the movies show a lot of diversity. It would have been better to have more diversity. But, not all lack of diversity is inherently racist. The books were published between 1997 and 2007. According to the 2001 UK census over 90% of the UK population identified as either British white (85.67%) or Other white (5.27%) so it is not altogether surprising that the three main characters are also white.
Yeah, but when most of the POC speaking in the third film is a f*cking shrunken head with an atrocious Jamaican accent?
The larger point I would make is that authors & screenwriters generally write what they know (and some people argue that they should only write what they know, to avoid bad portrayals of foreign cultures - topic of another discussion perhaps).
I can buy that for the book, especially the first one, but by the time it was a series of major motion pictures with the big Hollywood budget to match, they could have invested in editors and consultants or whatever the the terminology is for staff to ensure the portrayals weren't offensive.
And if you want to throw numbers out, 9.06% of 19 hours is way more than 6 minutes. The problem with systemic racism is that we tend to make excuses for all of these examples of discrimination, claiming that they're not "inherently racist," when in fact they are. Racism (or any kind of discrimination, really) isn't just limited to people with burning crosses and white robes. It's manifest in unconscious bias all the freaking time.
I was going to also follow up that if your defense of JKR is that only 10% of the British population identifies as a poc then the movies still fail miserably to even represent that 10%.
If you look at the collected works of the books then the % are even more miserable.
18% of the UK is non-White, according to the UK government.
Yeah, but when most of the POC speaking in the third film is a f*cking shrunken head with an atrocious Jamaican accent?
Yeah, as I agreed above - not good. Not a lot of diversity full stop, and really no meaningful diversity. All I was saying was that when you have a story that is so heavily focused on three characters its easy to get get skewed numbers. And given the ethnic backdrop when this was written, not a surprise that those three are white. I think it is folly to think that every piece of entertainment reflect perfectly a diverse ethnic mix of wherever it is from.
Do you think it would be better or worse if they had cast a POC for Hermione given that this character is the one that gets called "mudblood"? I think that there would have been a cascade of claims of racism for that one. I don't think that it is as easy as people seem to suggest to bring diversity in for the sake of diversity.
But, having said that, I agree that they really could have done more. For example, the rotating role of defence against the dark arts teacher - each one was an opportunity to add diversity without causing a "mudblood" or similar problem.
It didn't take me any time to google that there are 96 characters in the first book alone. 96.
Most stories have protagonists. (And usually just one!) So "well, there are three white protagonists what can you do?" is a pretty meaningless point.
Generally speaking, when multiple people post something here that's germane to the topic, I think it is extremely poor behavior to dismiss their points, ad nauseum, and continuously bend over backwards to defend a property that is very clearly falling short (to put it mildly) on multiple fronts.
I'll leave this article here, again, but one relative quote from it:
Firstly, acknowledge that the thing you like is problematic and do not attempt to make excuses for it.
The rest of that article is good/interesting too. You don't have to make excuses for Rowling, who is, let's not forget, a fascist.
Do you think it would be better or worse if they had cast a POC for Hermione given that this character is the one that gets called "mudblood"? I think that there would have been a cascade of claims of racism for that one.
Wow, yeah, its almost like the idea of a "mudblood" is revealing of some really toxic racism in and of itself! I wonder if anyone has talked about how Rowling constantly creates in groups and outgroups before?
I don't think that it is as easy as people seem to suggest to bring diversity in for the sake of diversity.
Who is bringing diversity "for the sake of diversity," or asking for that? The world is diverse. Reflecting that is the default. It takes EFFORT and WORK to deviate from that and create things as nakedly white supremacist as the world of Harry Potter. Especially in a book, where the author has total control of the content.
I can buy that for the book, especially the first one, but by the time it was a series of major motion pictures with the big Hollywood budget to match, they could have invested in editors and consultants or whatever the the terminology is for staff to ensure the portrayals weren't offensive.
I agree, they should have. A big budget movie has so many people involved, it's really not comparable to a single artist's work - it's a very collaborative process.
Regarding books, it's interesting how an author can choose whether the characters have a clear ethnicity, or whether to leave it up to the reader's mind (especially in Fantasy). You don't need to describe skin tone, or choose obvious names, etc. I am curious how people view this approach. The Harry Potter books with it's very class based urban fantasy would've never been able to do this effectively, but other fantasy literature can.
Not quite equivalent but we should also consider more recent popular literature like the Expanse series by Abraham and Franck. Science fiction aimed at a more mature audience, I can't comment on whether its LGBTQ+ portrayals are performative or substantive. What I CAN say is that as an Aussie from a multicultural background I noticed they had quite a diverse cast (sure, Holden is a white dude from memory) and I struggled with the Spanish interspersed frequently in the text. No doubt that's homage to the diversity and demographic you find in the US.
I mean, if you're struggling to find a good example of strong representation in diversity then it speaks for itself.
Coming from an Asian background, I don't think I've seen or heard of compelling Western content on Asian culture except for a few isolated instances (Crazy Rich Asians, and Shang-Chi which I've not watched but heard good things of). The Asian dudes are usually geeks or awkward comedic characters.
I can buy that for the book, especially the first one, but by the time it was a series of major motion pictures with the big Hollywood budget to match, they could have invested in editors and consultants or whatever the the terminology is for staff to ensure the portrayals weren't offensive.
Yeah I'm guessing at least that's why the "house elves are slaves and love being slaves" subplot was all dropped from the movies. But it was horrible reading all that in the books, and everyone making fun of Hermione trying to help free slaves.
Seth wrote:As with all fictional characters, they do not just happen to be white.
Well, in a way, they did. When the Harry Potter play was first in London's west end, Hermione was played by a POC. If she were similarly cast in the movie franchise, it would certainly "solve" the six minute thing above. However, people would then be upset that it is the POC character that gets called "mudblood".
Harry Potter is white because Rowling didn’t have the originality or vision required to picture a nonwhite British hero. She picked the most banal milquetoast Joe Boringname because that’s the extent of her imagination. It did not just happen. It was the result of the kiddie pool that is Rowling’s creativity, and then every “creative” after her just followed her cues because to them, white is the default.
And I’m suspicious that the people shouting that Hermione can’t be nonwhite because reasons would outnumber those incensed that a poc would be called a mudblood since that’s, umm, in the script. I could use black Ariel as my evidence but instead, I’ll bring up Rue from Hunger Games, who was actually written as having dark skin and eyes but still aggravated the racists when played by Amandla Stenberg.
Avatar, the Last Airbender, and Ursula K. LeGuin's "Earthsea" adaptation both suffered from the problem of taking POC main characters and assigning them to White actors, which in the time frame of these movies were absolutely ridiculous, unnecessary choices.
Thankfully, we now have "Everything, Everywhere, All At Once" to show how representation really works. 
Avatar, the Last Airbender, and Ursula K. LeGuin's "Earthsea" adaptation both suffered from the problem of taking POC main characters and assigning them to White actors, which in the time frame of these movies were absolutely ridiculous, unnecessary choices.
Thankfully, we now have "Everything, Everywhere, All At Once" to show how representation really works. :-)
Michelle Yeoh only get the role after Jackie Chan turned it down, so even those filmmakers could have done better. But it is definitely progress.
I think casting her required everyone in the production team to be more creative. Good for them.
The movie is just overwhelming. I will need to watch it several times to take it all in. So many Easter eggs, callbacks to famous people and stories, little changes that flash by in a scene... I love it but my ADHD was completely overwhelmed by the time the first section was over. I still need to finish it.
I can understand the concerns of casting such that demographics are relatively accurate when we're talking about a film striving for historical accuracy, but we're talking about a series of fantasy stories here. And not even "high" fantasy like Lord of the Rings (where the characters' phenotypes are inconsequential to the story), but pulpy cheesy fantasy. I think realism went out the window when the story kicked off with a half-giant riding a flying motorbike left a baby on a doorstep overnight in a populated area.
There are plenty of important characters whose ethnicity is never really described in the books. No reason someone like, say, Neville couldn't have been a member of a UK minority group. His ethnicity is completely inconsequential to his character, so having representation via someone who is both important to the story and present throughout the series, as well as serving an important heroic role multiple times, would have been a great choice.
But no, let's make the sport-obsessed loudmouth a token minority, that's much better.
On the topic of mudblood, racism, and black Hermione: this article has a good analysis IMO
Harry Potter and the contradictions about racial justice
From my vague recollections of the books, I think "mudblood" is a clear racial slur used by the evil wizard supremacists, and abhorred by the good guys. So in the context of the books, the term itself seems fine to me.
Rowling certainly doesn't tackle complicated subjects with nuance. Someone pointed out earlier that the racism against muddles doesn't make any sense to them. Actually, I would expect it, i.e. you have a small superior group of people. They'll want to protect their status and prevent others from getting it -> wizard supremacists aka Voldemort and followers.
From the article:
The problem is that the good guys in Harry Potter also treat Muggles as inferior.
As Hogwarts is a fantasy version of elitist Oxford, that sounds pretty accurate to reality.
Not to pivot, but it is worth noting that at CPAC, a speaker explicitly called for the eradication of “transgenderism.”
This is why it’s important not to mince words and excuse who Rowling is and what she’s about. This is why we used the word “exterminationist” on the podcast, because the mainstream conservative position on this issue is exterminationist.
Disney's Andor is a pretty good recent example of moving towards greater cast diversity. Lots of white actors, sure, but it was also noticeable in the extras. Unfortunately they were Empire extras so cast in an indirectly negative light but I welcomed it nonetheless.
Thinking of diversity and fruits of a rotten tree like Harry Potter I did find it interesting that Foundation is so effortlessly diverse.
It just takes a bit of effort from an institution like a production team or studio to improve things, rather than sit on their hands and claim 'authenticity to the source.'
Some of the more interesting discussion about Hogwarts Legacy was on the Triple Click podcast where, aside from the game sucking on its own merits, they pointed out that 19th century Hogwarts was so diverse it was disconcerting. Between that and the more modern versions of the setting it seemed like something bad happened at the school.
On a earlier topic of can a goblin sometimes just be a goblin: the NPR podcast, Code Switch, did an interesting episode on D&D a few months ago. They just touched the tip of the iceburg in pointing out how "humans" (who are generally, by default, white) are what's considered normal in that game. And then all other races have stats (intelligence , charisma, etc.) that are modified from normal. And go a bit on how players today can modify the game to help correct that bias. Of course a huge difference is that the creators of D&D aren't alive and campaigning for ending some peoples human rights and those that are currently involved in making D&D are interested in making it more inclusive.
I'll have to listen to that episode, but my immediate reaction to that is, "lol nobody plays human, they're boring." Which is not entirely true; in my experience everybody plays human for their first-ever character because it seems like the safe default choice and there are SO many choices to make, and then never again.
But besides the cultural and racial coding, the fact that default humans are generalists, with a small bonus to everything, means that they suck mechanically anyway, because D&D rewards specialization and min-maxing. And then nobody plays variant human because they're OP and banned or nerfed at every table.
Bringing it back to "your fave is problematic," the last I checked in with D&D's "race" system it was undergoing a major identity crisis because everyone suddenly woke up one day and realized, "wait, isn't giving racial stat bonuses kind of racial essentialism?" but the easiest band-aid fix for that, letting you pick your stat bonus irrespective of your race, just makes everyone functionally identical which maybe isn't great either.
Bringing it back to "your fave is problematic," the last I checked in with D&D's "race" system it was undergoing a major identity crisis because everyone suddenly woke up one day and realized, "wait, isn't giving racial stat bonuses kind of racial essentialism?" but the easiest band-aid fix for that, letting you pick your stat bonus irrespective of your race, just makes everyone functionally identical which maybe isn't great either.
This is something that I think is super pertinent to JK and the invisible work of activism.
People did not just wake up one day and realize the issues with racial essentialism in D&D. Many folks flagged it immediately and most of them opted out of a hobby they might have enjoyed. There's a myriad of reasons D&D and tabletop RPGs in general became predominantly white spaces, and this is one of them.
Fortunately, lots of folks worked hard and pressed the conversation in the face of being ridiculed, dismissed, harassed, or ignored. There are people who have had these conversations and done this work for decades, and the reason D&D is evolving on this issue is because of the activism and work those people did in articulating the problem and slowly getting people to think about it and begin to do the work of repair.
This is one of the reasons I have a pretty short fuse with folks who want to dismiss criticisms of HP (and other creative works, frankly). This work need not take decades, it can happen far faster if we have less bad actors sucking up all the oxygen.
You are of course correct. I was using cheeky phrasing, but that's probably a bad idea in a thread where it's often so difficult to tell who's operating in good faith.
Looking in from the outside, it really can seem very sudden, but that's like when you come back from summer vacation and suddenly your friend who'd always been the chubby kid is looking slim. You just see the end result, not all the hard work that went into it.
Browsing through some of the links in the OP and reading about some of the issues with Harry Potter as text, apart from JKR's troubling real-world history of bigoted statements and activism, I'm struck by how many I noticed at the time but was willing to forgive or dismiss. Why was I willing to do that?
I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that a lot of the issues are buried deep in the subtext and/or backloaded in the last book or two, and so much of the on-the-surface text really does have some very good themes. When the text is telling you, "the Malfoys hate muggles and call them slurs like mudblood, isn't racism bad?" it's easy to miss, "wait... are the goblins Jews?" or give it the benefit of the doubt and assume it's unintentional if they are. First impressions count for a lot, and color your impression of even the very problematic things that come after.
Still need to listen to the podcast about D&D, I'm saving it for my workday today. I may just be hashing over points that they've already addressed there.
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