Discover and read the best of Twitter Threads about #harrypotter

there's something I'd like to point out about @NateSilver538's recent behavior. it's important when trying to understand these awful people just how they *disguise* themselves. the excuses they utter, and in _what order_, matters a lot in understanding them.

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nothing @NateSilver538 *ever says* in public ought to be taken at face value. he's a bigot; he tells whatever lies are necessary to protect that. but there's a _pattern_ to the lies. there's a kind of boom-and-bust pattern to bigoted behavior. I'll try to explain.

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the general behavior of a bigot is compelled to *oscillate* between two poles. it's a bit like being addicted to a drug, or to gambling, or some other similarly addictive activity—for wallowing in bigotry is, for people like @MattWalshBlog and @mtaibbi, *addictive*.

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Cory Doctorow (@pluralistic@mamot.fr)

argh! I forgot the most important bit! because it's about Baldr and Hoðr and Loki—and a very *particular* version of their story, the one that most people know, which comes from Snorri Sturluson and the "Prose Edda" and which then got picked up by English poets.

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https://twitter.com/KrisAtLarge/status/1632260753788141568

#CSLewis cites Matthew Arnold's "Balder Dead", a retelling of the story of Baldr's death from the "Prose Edda", as one of his early influences in his semi-autobiographical work "Surprised by Joy".

now I speculate: Jack Lewis probably had Baldr in mind when he converted.

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for it's been *noted* that the narrative about Baldr's death from Sturluson's "Prose Edda" is *almost* like the Christian narrative. Baldr is impossibly beautiful and impossibly pure, with amazing powers, then treachery lays him low—but he'll be coming back after Ragnarok!

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@doctorow

The classic #trilemma goes: "Fast, cheap or good, pick any two." The #ModeratorsTrilemma goes, "Large, diverse userbase; centralized platforms; don't anger users - pick any two." 1/

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

pluralistic.net/2023/03/04/pic… 2/

The Moderator's Trilemma is introduced in "Moderating the Fediverse: Content Moderation on Distributed Social Media," a superb paper from @ARozenshtein of @UofMNLawSchool, forthcoming in the journal @JournalSpeech, available as a prepub on @SSRN:

papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf… 3/

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Peter Pischke-Friendly Neighborhood Journo

let's talk about the wacko racist crap a little bit. it's not just @NateSilver538 farting out tales of Chinese evil scientists creating all the world's diseases. the whole @elonmusk / @mtaibbi / @MrAndyNgo / QAnon-ish set is super into whackadoo nonsense about "cabals".

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https://twitter.com/KrisAtLarge/status/1631346346874777600

the "gender critics" of the @bindelj / @Docstockk camp are super into conspiracy theories of their own; @HJoyceGender copied antisemitic fantasies from Jennifer Bilek into her own work, blaming the existence of "TRAs" on some murky Jewish doctors' plot or other.

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@HogwartsLegacy is an *entire game* pitching antisemitic blood-libel trash to the fascıst #JKRowling / #HarryPotter / @RGalbraith fandom—bigots are Rowling's chief base of support, and the Rowling fanbase no doubt overlaps heavily with the @mtaibbi / @NateSilver538 fandom.

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@HappyWarriorP

Okay, I'm now up to the Deathly Hallows films
I think my fav film so far is Half-Blood Prince

it's the most film-like & still balances the "yar a wizard harry" aspect of the series with the serious dramatic tension.

Great film; I would actually watch it again.
#harrypotter… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…

Jim Broadbent plays Professor Slughorn & totally nails the role.

He is actually likable & relatable without the script telling you this is the guy you are supposed to like

He brings in the sense of a deeper philosophical world in Harry Potter & makes it feel more lived-in.

When people talk about the Harry Potter movies & the best talents, they rarely bring up Broadbent,

Usually, it's Gary Oldman or Alan Rickman, sometimes the 2 actors that played Dumbledore

But Broadbent's Slughorn holds my attention & makes me want to see more of that character.

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Alex Gopoian

@HumblyAlex

To formally end my involvement in the #HarryPotter drama (rather than let it be easier to get sucked back in) I'm going to tell a relevant story about when & why I rebranded my Twitter account almost a year ago. Not relevant for the trans person involved, but for the groupthink.

I used to be part of a large private Facebook group where people posted screenshots of the messages they would receive from creeps that slipped into their DM's. The group included the intent to shame them in its title.

Now, I used to be one of those creeps awhile back. I can now see both sides of that experience a lot clearer (especially after remembering some messages I've received from people asking if they could give me a massage on another site and not taking no for an answer).

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itaker.rital

@attaquederital

Die ganze Debatte über #HarryPotter beweist aus literaturwissenschaftlicher Perspektive schlichtweg wie wichtig der #ToddesAutors bzw. die Trennung zwischen Werk und Autor für die Analyse von künstlerischen Werken ist. Die obsessive Fixierung auf Rowling als Person führt dazu...

, dass keine objektive Lektüren mehr stattfinden, die sich am Text orientieren. Im Gegenteil: man projiziert nun alles Negative auf diesen, obwohl ein vernünftiges Close Reading die Absurdität dieser Deutungen, die auf Social Media verbreitet werden, schnell offenbaren würde.

Dann wird da ein unschuldiger Text plötzlich antisemitisch, kapitalistisch, verherrlicht den Neoliberalismus und verfügt auch noch über eine transfeindliche Treppe. Alles Unsinn, der aber von (jungen) Journalisten, die scheinbar nicht lesen können auch medial verbreitet wird.

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Western culture does not regard children as human beings. the values of "the West"—the values instilled by authoritarian #Christianity—do not permit children to be respected as human beings who deserve to have their feelings and wishes respected, like any other person.

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no better example of the general Western *contempt* for children can be imagined than the "gender critical" cult—the @bindelj / @Docstock / #JKRowling brigade—which functions almost entirely as a kind of support group for abusive parents who loathe their LGBTQ+ children.

(2/x)

they cling to the faded celebrity of @jk_rowling as a shield against the charge that they despise children—after all, #JKRowling is the Best Fantasy Writer in the Universe, according to the @HJoyceGender / @AbigailShrier gender theorists. she's the friend to all children!

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Western #education is in abysmal state, and #capitalism is to blame.

the noisemakers at all levels of the #conservative noise machine, from the august @AEI propagandists (like "race scientist" @charlesmurray) to circus sideshows like @Timcast, try to blame "woke", but...

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that "woke" game is extremely thin by now. really it's just rebranded Red Scare nonsense. in 1950, it was Commies who were "destroying our youth" with virulent ideas that right-wing ideologues didn't like, like abstract algebra; now @mtracey and @DouthatNYT blame "woke".

(2/x)

but ask any low-level right-wing expert on "woke"—ask @realchrisrufo or @ConceptualJames what "wokeism" actually *is*—and you'll get the word "Marxism" in no time: "woke" is, in other words, nothing new at all. it's the same old paranoia about pinko Rooskies in closets.

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I am a #unicorn! you may believe that, or not.

my sense of self isn't dependent upon outsiders' scorn; in any case, I'm quite content to be regarded as a mere figment of a crazy person's imagination. that's little impediment to my life and purpose in the Pnictogen Wing.

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I daresay that I'm unusually *practical* for a unicorn. my interests are mundane ones; I like science and engineering and working in shops and keeping things running as smoothly as possible, and while I'm no atheist or positivist, I leave magic and religion to others.

(2/x)

all the same—it's a painful thing, being a unicorn in a world that has attempted to *wipe out* creativity and mysticism and magic—a world that embraces cruelty and casual sneers at suffering and death. I may have been ethereal once; I am not, now.

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let's try again. I wanted to write more *specifically* about Mr. @elonmusk—speculating about why he's the catastrophic person he is, based on what's popularly known about him. everything I'm going to mention is something reported in the popular press (not by @mtaibbi.)

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https://twitter.com/PnictogenHorses/status/1619558112171810819

we know that Mr. Musk had an abusive father, whom @elonmusk has had little good to say about. the man was typical colonialist trash—a South African grifter and speculator who *got lucky*, making a lot of money quickly with a partial share in an apartheid-era emerald mine.

(2/x)

Mr. Musk (and certainly his #ElonMusk fan club) has tried as hard as possible to suppress any chatter about the emerald mine; Mr. @elonmusk himself, a prolific and habitual liar, has even tried to pretend that the press made it up. but it's too broadly reported to deny.

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Chara, at @KrisAtLarge, has been talking about @mtaibbi's #marketing and #branding; I'd like to talk about a *specific* aspect of Western society's obsession with "personal brands".

it's simply this: in marketing, _censorship is the norm_.

censorship is *expected*.

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https://twitter.com/KrisAtLarge/status/1619458019565371392

it's fully expected; #capitalism depends upon #marketing to censor the truth.

they've normalized the practice: corporations (and @elonmusk and @mtaibbi) never tell the truth about themselves, nor do they feel the slightest need for it—they need to maintain the *brand*.

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the trivial nature of #marketing culture dictates that people like @elonmusk and @mtaibbi (and @pmarca and @ID_AA_Carmack and literally everyone else who has *marinated* in this culture) think of their own crimes and sins as trivial. "bad publicity", at worst.

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oh right! we were going to write something about the power of language.

hm, how to start.

let me begin with talking about a concept that I learned from classes in ancient Greek: the *grammatical particle*. it's a type of word, in linguistics.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatic…

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I remember being impressed during @SDSU Classics classes by this entire book on ancient Greek particles: abebooks.com/book-search/ti…

*particles* are words that have no inflection or clearly defined "part of speech" in a sentence.

"um" and "er" are particles in English.

(2/x)

we could regard "um" and "er" as linguistic filler—words with no real meaning, merely taking up space—but the insertion of such particles does give us some information about the *mood* or *feeling* of the person speaking.

here, "um" and "er" convey a sense of uncertainty.

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