Five Things Fic(s)

[gyzym]

I'd just like to put it out there that purple_chalk made me do this, and I blame her.

Title: Five Times Draco Malfoy Was Pushed Into a Pool
Rating: PG-13

Comments

[secretsolitaire]

*claps* These were fun. I have never shipped Draco/Astoria, but after these I sort of am. O_o

And I liked the one about Anthony too, especially #5.

[gyzym]

Thanks! Draco/Astoria surprised me; purple_chalk and I started playing around with the Epilogue versions of Harry and Draco and discovered we were capable of liking their wives :D

And the one about Anthony is totally symptomatic of this season, and how WEIRD it is to be a Jew during Christmas.

[purple_chalk]

I really just can never think of anything but :D

Also omg (6. Is. So. Cute.

[gyzym]

:D back at you, then. YOUR TURN YOUR TURN

[woldy]

Ahaha, these are brilliant! I love Draco being pushed into the pool & poor Scorpius always getting into trouble with his parents, and Anthony's one is thought-provoking. I must admit I always wondered why they celebrate Christmas at Hogwarts given the diverse student body & differences between wizards & Muggles on so many issues of norms & beliefs. No doubt there is lots of meta on the issue, but I'm putting it down to a failure of logic and imagination on Jo's part.

[gyzym]

Glad you enjoyed!

And yeah, the Anthony one; it's a topic I'd like to devote some focus to, when I have the time. Part of it is just that Jews make up like 0.5% percent of the population of the UK, I think. In comparison, Jews are 2.1% of the American population; it doesn't look like much of an increase, but it IS, especially when you consider the size of the population the percentage is being taken from--that's like 300,000 Jews in Britain compared to around 6,400,000 American Jews. It's a big difference, and it's natural then that there's not much focus on it in a book coming out of the UK.

None of this is to say that it doesn't piss me off now, or that it didn't piss me off as a 12-year-old Jewish girl reading the first book, but...yes. Did I have a point?

[woldy]

Eh, I'm not sure how much the overall population percentages in a country tell you about the representation by a given author, especially when the percentages may mask big differences in religiosity (in general, Americans are a lot more religious than Brits when measured by regular temple attendance etc). I remember leaving a comment in a HP fic last year where I objected to major Christian religious themes that hadn't been warned for, and the American author had the cheek to reply saying that since 'we' lived in a Christian culture s/he took that stuff for granted & didn't think it needed warning for. I replied to the effect of 'who the hell is we? This is a big, diverse fandom!'

I grew up in an area near London that is very Jewish (we got stuff through the door in Hebrew) and had a lot of Jewish friends, so my impression is that there are lots of Jews in the UK but that they are concentrated in a few urban areas (not surprisingly, these tend to be areas with kosher food and synagogues - I was shocked when I heard that a lot of Jews

[gyzym]

Jews in North America totally walk to synagogue! But, generally speaking, only the Orthodox ones. And only in certain places; it's a mixed bag over here too. I grew up in a verrrry Jewish area, but go to college in a very rural one. Consequently, I am the first Jew most of my friends have ever met, and get all manner of really unusual questions (up to and including "Do you guys still do animal sacrifice?" and "Wait, Jews don't believe in Jesus?")

I mention the population thing only because I think the low number made it easier for her, or her publishers, to avoid considering it. Small number of Jews, smaller number of magical families and/or Muggleborn wizards, easy to just assume/claim to assume they don't overlap. No?

[prophetic]

Lovely!