Ok, so I've been wondering for a while now about one of the most common clichés in fandom. Why, in AU fics where Harry's parents survive does Harry always have a sister? Seriously, is it just that important that the writers have a chance to utilize the "Rose Potter" cliché that they must have the "never got to be born" little sister?


Edit: Hmm. Forgot to put the " 's parents survive". I think it'll make more sense now.

 

Well, it's a fairly common practice amongst the wealthy and nobility--to have an heir to carry on the line, and to have a daughter to marry off, though not necessarily in that order. It just seems to be common sense that they'd have at least one kid, and a daughter makes sense.

Most of the time, You create a sister for Harry to provide an additional venue for him to be loved; a brother would be more appropriate for those that want to create conflict, as anyone who has a little/big brother can attest to.

 

If you create a younger sister, you can quite easily have Harry grow learning to both be loved from above, and love those below, so to speak.

If you create a younger brother, there are three things that can happen. They can hate each other intensely. They can love each other dearly. Or they can be moderately good friends. Each has upsides and down sides. If they hate each other then you get lots of conflict, lots of tension and also a good piece of rivalry that you can use as a drive for Harry to learn more, faster. If they love each other dearly, then you have the potential to have an excellent fighting team. If you grow up with someone, you generally understand them, and if you are very close to someone, you understand them even better. You also have the opportunity to include Harry learning more so he can do nice things for his brother.

If they are fairly good friends, but still have arguements, like friends do, (which is how I am with my older brother. We can have brilliant conversations that last hours at a time, but we can the most vicious of arguements) can increase his capacity to forgive and forget if you're going for that sort of fic. It also creates friendly rivalry, as well as that edge of tension that makes a good fic.

On the downside, for hating each other, if two brothers hate each other, then the fights are tremendous and horrible, and would really be the centre of the fic, because its the centre of Harry's pre-occupation.

If they love each other dearly, it could easily become far too mushy.

If they are good friends, there are fewer downsides, but there is the possibility that they would exclude others from their friendship in an effort to keep it intact.

With a sister, whilst those options still exist, there is a far easier one. A doting brother who is aloof and "cool" in the eyes of the sister. Authors write this sort of thing because a) its easy and b) in hopes that the sisters opinion of Harry translates into the readers opinion of Harry.

 

It's the fact that it's so cliched that's annoying. Kender is right, every time an AU wth live Lily and James happens, Harry ends up either loving his little sister or bonking her in some fics. A brother would be a lot less cliched in my opinion, but the fangirls would make them fall in love and have gay incest so I'm not sure I want that.

I think the Potters would go a little bunny rabbit style if they survived the war, as she was pregnant right after school, but you could always stop that for a few years with Lily's aspirations to get a job.

 

Or you could not, since she's usually portrayed as a spell creator or charms tester of some sort. She could work from home and be pregnant at the same time.

It would be original if there was a whole brood of kids all loved equally. I think Thor Nairda tried it, but the rest of the fic sucked balls.

 

Most authors usually add more than one sibling, so it is quite likely that there is also a sister.

Sadly all those authors are female ... I'm male and I have a sister. We annoyed the shit out of each other and brawled often and fiercely. I know enough other families to say 'my' situation is far more believable than the love displayed between Harry and "her". That's the reason why I don't like these fics.

 

I actually laughed when I saw that, but you're right. Just me being immature

 

Minion has a point there, most Harry has a sister, brother, sister dynamic you see is an idealized version. Which is typically not the case. In reality I think one where its a realistic depiction could be more enriching.

Yes, you could have unconditional love and a lot of rivalry, annoying, fighting etc <-- which is something that sets a sibling relationship apart from other relationships in general. And, yes, here I too am looking at an idealized version of a real life sibling relationship. Not all of us are friends with our siblings.

I personally prefer Harry getting a sister, because I am more curious about her point of view than a brother figure that Ron Weasley already fills in the books for me.

 

I've never seen a story where there were more than 3 kids in the Potter family. I think that it has to do with the fact that they're both rich and pureblooded, which (with the exception of the Weasleys) tend to imply smaller families (according to current trends). I think it has to do with discouraging competition amongst heirs, at least for the pureblooded part.

I just don't see Lily Potter as a Molly Weasley-type mother, who can just pop out a bunch of kids (I think that the Weasleys were all born within a 10 year span; can you imagine Lily Potter like that?).

 

I think it has something to do with keeping the family fortune intact as much as possible. If Malfoy, for example, had a sister, who married some bloke, a certain portion of the Malfoy Family assets would be hers upon her marriage and the death of Lucius, rather than Draco getting it all. When the female Malfoy dies, the money is given to her children, meaning a good portion of the family money is in the hands of non-Malfoys.

Of course, I could be dead wrong. It might just be a trend carried over from the Muggle world. There are exceptions, but rich upper-class families tend to be much, much smaller than middle- and working-class families.

 

Vash's Oedipus Flower is perhaps the best reason for such a cliche? Not much more needed to say...

 

Ugh. ...ugh. Haha.

ANYWAY--I think that it's more a matter of Dowries, less so of inheritence. And, I'm pretty sure that even the purebloods would see the need of having daughters to marry off, lest they completely deplete the number of women who could be married. I doubt it's a matter of money, really, because old world inheritence didn't really work that way, at least not in practice.

I think that it's a sign of the patriarchal system that's prevelent in the pureblood world, in stark contrast to the much more equal 'real' world. Women do not hold positions of power in families, unless their husbands had died and no heir was of age to take over the family. The majority of wives of pureblooded wizards do not hold jobs, at least none that are mentioned (and we see plenty of examples of non-pureblooded women in positions of power), and instead seem to frequent more social functions, as such things went in social circles in the 1600's and 1700's (and, the wizarding world does seem to be stuck in this time period, remember).

 

Evidence, please. To be honest, we don't know anything about the way families in HP really work. We've seen the Weasleys. That's it.

 

The Weasleys aren't exactly the best example as they aren't the typical pure blooded family with Arthur's tendencies to muggle items and all. I'd say that they are a lower-class family without greater care for tradition.

The Black family (if I remember well) wasn't described as much, all we know is that Walburga Black was the dominant person in the household.
We know as well that Molly Weasley is more dominant in Weasley's home, as Arthur would rather not do sth against her. I'm not sure how the situation looks like with Malfoys, however Lucius seems to be the head of family with Narcissa being the house-wife for display.

I'd guess that the wizarding world with it's ties to Merlin could be partially celtic, meaning that the position of men and women is equal in some situations. From what I remember, if a woman brought more money while marrying a man, her voice was more important in financial matters and vice versa. It all depended on their relation with each other as well...

 

Do you seriously think that any of the fanfiction writers who use this cliché think about dowries or inheritence? I'm going to go out on a limb and say, "NO".

 

Good point.

I'm gonna take another stab and say 'Mary Sue'. These 14 year old fangirls love Harry soooooo much that they want him as a big brother. Bam, self-insertion as a little sister.

 

Yeah, that's it.

Some certainly simply want to avoid the usual American-exchange nearly-emo Mary Sue who spreads her legs at first sight of messy black hair and green eyes and instead they choose the 'little sister' to insert themselves and adore their idol in a less sexual manner.

Some stories focus on the whole 'Harry has a family'-AU and their (also usually female) authors just use the sister as a convenient concurrent to insert themselves. But that's only slightly less annoying.

 

I dunno about all that - but don't forget that there are many "Harry has a brother or twin who is the REAL Boy-Who-Lived - or is he? Or is he not? OR IS HE AGAIN? OR DOES THE AUTHOR HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THEY ARE DOING"? stories out there. The ones where Harry finds himself on an alternate history world where his parents are alive, those are the ones where I've seen sisters more than brothers, at a ratio of about 10:1. There's a good story out there where Harry is pretending not to be the real Boy-Who-Lived, but helps protect his brother who everyone thinks IS the real BWL - but I can't remember the name...

-J

 

I've always loved, in the fics where Harry has a sibling that is the B(G)WL, the fact that the Potters survive because "they weren't home that night".



Yes. EVERYONE leaves their 1 year old children home alone...when Voldemort is after one of them.

Edit: Bah...off topic there sorry. Just couldn't help myself after Jeram's post.

 

I think it far more likely that they'd have left them in the care of Peter, or something. I'm really surprised that that isn't in more fanfics.