On Harry Potter Fandom, or Why I Hate H/D Slash

by Ketan (at thefannish.org for email)

Okay, so this rant is going to be somewhat long, based almost entirely upon personal opinion, and most likely incomprehensible. Watch me dance.

First, I would like to say that I love Harry Potter, and JKR is a genius, and many fanfics in the HP fandom are perfectly lovely tributes to her genius, etc.

BUT.

The Ships. Dear lord, the ships. Why? Why on earth would anyone be so adamant about shipping two (or even three) characters that have absolutely no romantic potential in the books? Why? I mean, yes, I can understand the attraction, if you're into that sort of thing, but there is just so little foundation for any of it.

Even worse, to me, are the slash ships. Now before anyone starts yelling "homophobe", keep in mind that I've had my share of gay sex. I've written slash, and read slash, and enjoyed it. But for Christ's sake, if you love the books enough to write impassioned, novel-length romances at least have the decency to remain somewhat true to the characters involved. Doesn't it sort of defeat the purpose of fanfiction of the characters are acting ENTIRELY DIFFERENT from how they do in the original works? You might as well give them completely different names and it would hardly impact the stories.

Right, back to HP slash. To my mind, the worst example (and most dominant in fandom) is Harry/Draco slash. Does anyone else wonder why these two characters, who in the books are extreme mortal enemies, would all of a sudden decide to fuck like deranged rabbits? Or have enormous schmoopfests of drippy romance in which both of them act so different from their original characters that they would probably be sent to St. Mungo's if they actually behaved like that in the books?

It boggles me that so many fanfic authors in HP fandom seem obsessed with this pairing. Almost every time I read one it's as if Draco has seemingly forgotten that he really cares about blood, hates Harry and that his father is a Death Eater. Instead he and Harry act like flamers. Christ.

I will not get into my theories on straight women and their flamerizing of characters (see other rants here, especially on "queer het" for that topic), however I will say that even for me, as a gay male, it is ridiculous that these characters (and other pairings as well) are so popular in fandom for being so off the mark from the books.

Maybe it's because my first fandom was Lord of the Rings. You see, in that fandom, all the pairings are already there in the crazy gay subtext of the books. Especially the hobbits.* There is so much Frodo/Sam and Merry/Pippin subtext that you hardly need to come up with much of a premise to get them to shag, unlike Harry and Draco in which you must explain away five years or more of animosity, competition, and straightness in order to get them to hook up. So it's hard for me to understand how HP shippers can come up with these pairings.

Other fine examples of HP slash madness: Harry/Ron (friends. JUST FRIENDS), Neville/Anyone, Hagrid/ANYTHING EVER EW EW, Snape/Harry, Snape/Draco, Snape/Random Male Members of Staff, Dumbledore/Anyone (he stands alone. ALONE I SAY**), and anything even a little related to bestiality, bondage, or wand rape (this exists).

But I will say that with most of the characters mentioned in the list above, it's the slash that seems the most out of place as opposed to het fics. Let's take Neville's case, for example. Neville has made some (rather feeble) advances on some of the girls in the books (Hermione, Ginny, etc.), but none on any of the guys. So if a fic author decides to write a Neville/Draco OTP fic, it sort of jars me because in at least two instances Draco has either made fun of or implied hatred towards Neville (and his fellow Gryffindors, see above), and so the author must now conted with Neville's advances on girls and Draco and Neville's animosity/fear.

In fact, I will say right now that there is only one HP slash ship that I even remotely understand, and that is only because there is some present subtext already in the books supporting it, and even that is somewhat of a stretch. You can probably guess what it is.

Even with all of my belief in the above, I don't think that all HP slash is poorly written, or all Harry/Draco fics are badly supported. I have read quite a few fics by great authors who pick this ship and make a convincing and lovely story out of it. However, I just can't shake that awful feeling in the back of my head that these two characters, no matter what crazy or convincing backstory the author comes up with, would never, ever have sex. Ever.

*Okay, let me quantify this. I don't actually believe that Tolkien intended for his characters to be gay or sexual in any way, however because of the way he wrote those characters, and because of how modern society views male gender roles, Sam is just a bit too devoted to Frodo and Frodo is just a tad too free with praise on Sam. So subtext results, and becomes part of how we read it. Right.
**And Jinx, I know how you feel about Dumbledore/Snape. But no. Just no.