An interesting article...

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

So I was perusing the intarwebz and I found this website with this article about heroes, victims, and self-sacrifice, which has some ideas that seemed relevant to what we discuss on this comm.

It's interesting because it occurs to me that Harry does seem to switch between playing the hero card and the victim card throughout the course of the books (particularly the last three), and so do most other characters we're supposed to admire, either on Harry's behalf or their own (such as Lily begging Voldemort to spare Harry's life to no avail). And the narrative never really attempts to reconcile the two sides of that coin at all--we're just kind-of supposed to think that Harry is so noble and virtuous that the decisions he makes are always right and when things go wrong he's never to blame and always deserving of all the sympathy.

Some of the quotes that most stood out to me are as follows:

"[a] person that chooses to play the hero should not simultaneously be allowed to receive the benefits of being seen as a victim. It needs to be one or the other. A victim is someone who is to be pitied because they didn't have a choice in the matter."

"When someone does choose to play the hero, we should not get outraged because they had to suffer for it. We should not rail against the obstacles that stand in their way, or suggest that the opposition that they were against should've made it easier for them.... An attitude of victimization just cheapens the value of being a hero and suggests that they weren't responsible for their own decisions. That adversity is the only thing that gives the word "hero" any value at all and stands to separate the real heroes from the wannabes."

I bring this up only because it provides an interesting counterpoint to the way that Harry, for all he suffers, doesn't actually have to face the consequences of his own actions unless it's convenient to the plot--it seems like always finds someone to rescue him whenever things get really bad, and reassure him that he's totally right about everything.

And finally:

"Of course there is a whole other category of people who are even less sincere and who try to look like they're playing the hero in order to put themselves into a victim position later. These people are called attention hogs, masochists and martyrs; but that's an entirely different topic."

As to whether that last one applies to Harry or anyone else...eh, I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

Comments

[annoni-no.livejournal.com]

I'm not quite as comfortable with this article. It comes dangerously close to victim blaming, if it doesn't cross the line outright, with its insistence that one cannot be both a hero and a victim. For example:

If a person is willing to risk or sacrifice something of themselves for a cause or issue that they believe in, that is their choice. But it must be emphasized that it is their own decision to stand up and fight for something that they believe in and anything bad to that happens to them during their struggle is a result of that decision.

Also:

We must remember that many of the things that most people might consider "brave", "honorable" or "righteous" can also be seen as being incredibly stupid. And when someone deliberately does something that results in their detriment, it's still their own fault regardless of how "noble" the reasons were. Doing "what's right" is never an excuse for doing something stupid.

Does this mean that, for instance, champions of oppressed groups aren't allowed to decry the inevitable backlash and attacks just because that was the expected consequence? By this reasoning, the civil rights workers who were lynched in the South can't possibly have been victims because they knew going in that they would provoke hostile reactions. Really, their horrific murders and subsequent mutilation were their own damn fault because what other reaction did they expect? Flowers and gift baskets? Or were they not really heroes because their actions (at least, black participants native to the south) were all about decrying their very real victimization, e.g. 'playing the martyr'? Recognizing one's own suffering shouldn't disqualify one from being a hero. They aren't mutually exclusively categories, and insisting they are reeks of sophistry to me.

On the other hand, I do agree that if the negative consequences are a direct and logical result of one's chosen actions, then one has no right to play the victim. But that applies regardless of whether those actions were heroic in nature or not.

In regard to Harry Potter, I agree that Harry has a rather self-contradictory perspective on being the center of the prophecy V. is acting on. On the one hand, he has every right to feel victimized. He is a victim! He was an infant when V. decided he had to die and nothing Harry did subsequent to that changed V.'s opinion on the matter. A number of the incidents he's involved in fall under the same category; they were attacks on his person that he in no way provoked, including multiple incidents on the quidditch pitch and more serious attacks like Barty's rigging of the Triwizard Cup. Harry has every right to feel like a victim when he is one.

On the other hand, their are several instances where the situation was Harry's fault, things went south, and he blamed everyone but himself for what happened, acting as if he was the victim and not the perpetrator. The most egregious instance of this was Ministry of Magic debacle that got Sirius killed. For those particular instances, Harry is out of line and has no right to be *demanding* sympathy of anyone.

Harry does also have occasions where he rises to the challenge without either aggrandizing himself or playing the victim. His efforts to save the Philosopher's Stone in his first year come to mind. Yes, it would have been safer without his interference, and yes, he definitely should have listened to his teachers and kept himself and his friends out of harm's way. Quite frankly, I don't expect an 11 year old to have very good judgement on such things, period: I blame the whole fiasco on the staff for devising traps so stupid an 11 year old get past even one of them in the first place. None of this changes the fact that he tried to do something to protect others that he knew would be risky for himself. Nor did he ask for any recognition for his actions - he enjoyed what he got, but he didn't set out looking for it.

Other characters are also mixed bags, though some are worse than others (Lupin and Hermione come to mind as noteworthy here).

There's plenty of room for criticism in HP, but the terms presented in the post strike me as a very poor metric.

[skull-bearer.livejournal.com]

I think it's notable that the writer is a self-confessed villian, and seems to be using the mindset to be expected with one.

[annoni-no.livejournal.com]

If it is meant to be some sort of parody or satire, it fails. The voice is weak and the perspective isn't distinctly 'villainous' in any particular way. If anything, it reminds me of the arguments of the 'white moderates' MLK railed against in his Letter from a Birmingham Jail. The types who define peace as the absence of violence rather than the presence of justice. A good representation of the banality of evil, to be sure, but because of its very commonality it can't support a satire on its own. Nor does this excuse the fallacious reasoning involved.

Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal works as satire because 1) the view presented is extreme enough that (almost) no one could mistake as a serious proposal while 2) containing enough truth to hit uncomfortably close to home and 3) the arguments, once you accepted the obscene premises, were natural logical outcomes. The article linked lacks 1 and 3, and while it is true insofar as many people make such arguments, it doesn't comment on them in any way so I'd say it fails 2 as well.

If it's a parody, what's it a parody of?

If it's just general humor, I'd still say it fails because it's neither dark enough for black humor nor is it particularly silly, given that nearly identical arguments are made all the time in all seriousness.

If it's an essay written from the in-character perspective of the villain of another story, the argument still fails on merits.

I think I'm just not seeing the point here.

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

ITA with this comment. Whilst I agree with the article that too many people portray/see themselves as victims when they aren't (or at least not the degree they make out), this doesn't change the fact that there are people out there who have actually been victimised, nor does it justify treating people badly when they stand up for the victims. Also, the statement that "Self sacrifice, whether it takes the form of death or discomfort, for a 'greater cause' than one's own self serving priorities is not something that I find very admirable or smart" strikes me as a very solipsistic comment, if not downright psychopathic.

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

Actually, browsing through the rest of his articles, I came across this:

"No doubt my personal views on the idea of evil are largely influenced by the fact that I not only have trouble with the idea of all encompassing standards for morality (right and wrong) on a logical level; but I'm unable to understand it on an emotional one as well." (http://www.twistedjenius.com/rants/?id=35)

So maybe he is a psychopath after all.

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

Actually, browsing through the rest of his articles, I came across this:

"No doubt my personal views on the idea of evil are largely influenced by the fact that I not only have trouble with the idea of all encompassing standards for morality (right and wrong) on a logical level; but I'm unable to understand it on an emotional one as well." (h tt p:/ /ww w.twisted jenius. com/rants/?id=35)

So maybe he is a psychopath after all.

(Added spaces to the URL to stop it getting marked as spam.)

[mary-j-59.livejournal.com]

I agree, annoni_no and for diddled. Certainly, we've had problems with the type of "heroism" on display in the Potterverse, but I'm not comfortable with either blaming the victim or stripping characters - whether literary or real - of their complexity. It is absolutely possible for a victim to be a hero. It is possible to be a bully, and then reform. It's possible to be a flawed human being and still to sincerely try to do good. And so on.

I do agree that characters who are constantly self-pitying and whiny don't make very good heroes (Harry, I'm looking at you!). But this person overstates his case.

Oh - and Harry, in the first couple of books, really did act brave and selfless. Thoughtless, also, of course, but he was a kid!