Personally I don't care who is fucking whom in a story, but what makes most slash intolerable for me is how it fetishizes helplessness.


(this might be how many american women's sexuality is expressed considering the success of twilight and 50 shades of grey, but it really bugs me)

 

:facepalm

Is the concept of female sexuality really that confusing to you?

Accept the following truths and move on with your life:

• Straight ladies fantasize about men the same way straight men fantasize about ladies.
• The vast majority of women prefer mental and emotional stimulation over visual, so softcore media dominates expressions of female sexuality.

Ergo, concordantly, vis-a-vis, fics about guys having sex with each other = double the material for lady-fapping.

If the HP fandom consisted primarily of teenage boys who preferred emotional stimulation to visual, I guarantee you that femmeslash would be a thousand times more prevalent.

 

Is there any canonical reason why the unforgivable curses aren't placed under taboo like Voldemort's name is in the 7th book?

 

There's no indication that the Ministry knew how to do this until it was under Voldemort's control- I would infer that the Taboo is an innovation of his.

 

I don't think the Taboo is of Voldemort's own making, given the vague familiarity with which Ron spoke of it in DH. It seemed to me like he'd heard of it before.

There are a number of other logical reasons though:

Merely speaking the incantation of an unforgivable isn't a criminal offence. Perhaps the DMLE doesn't take action until proof of criminal activity is established.

Or perhaps they don't have the time or resources to track every instance of spoken incantation.

Or maybe the taboo is an obscure bit of dark magic. Maybe it's really complex. Maybe it's both.

 

There's no real reason to believe it, but I'd like to think the taboo was a contributing factor to an entire generation having grown up afraid to speak his name. The constant threat of the Dark Lord appearing and killing you as you say his name during his first uprising would do that.

 

Mmm... that's definitely possible. Then again, if that were the case, Dumbledore constantly encouraging people to say the name when there's a legit reason to fear it doesn't really make sense.

 

The easiest way to make the Taboo useless would be to have everybody say Voldemort's name all the time. Unless you literally had more people policing the Taboo than people trying to fight against Voldemort, you'd easily be able to setup ambushes and take them out.

 

Canonical? As others have said, no. Logical? I think so. At least, I've assumed that making the utterance of his name taboo falls more into a type of Speech-Act magic. By uttering a name, you gain authority in or over the name (it's one of the reasons why YHWH is always read ADONIA in Hebrew scripture. It's also part of the idea of "I come in the name of...").

Since the unforgivables are mastered by quite a few people it just wouldn't make sense for them to be taboo in speech as well.

At least, again, that's how I've read it.

 

Well, first of all you have the existence of non-verbal magic, which would reduce the effectiveness of the law. Second you have the problem of education.

Thirdly, and most significantly: imagine what would happen in the real world if your nation's government suggested that a certain set of words were to be made illegal, and that nationwide monitoring would be set up - including inside your own home - to catch you if you said them.

Don't see why wizards would tolerate it any more than Muggles.

 

About having the Unforgivables under the Taboo, imagine a grampa telling a story to the kids in a family gathering: "And now the bad wizard raised his wand and Avada Kadavra'd the...", grampa stopped talking, hearing the pop sounds of several appartions.

"DMLE! Dropped your wands and get on the floor!"

 

There was a short story or plot bunny I once read, where Harry & co. used the Taboo to bring in and ambush snatchers. Later, when they were on a rescue mission at Malfoy Manor, they used it again to bring down the wards preventing their escape. Don't remember the name of the story, though.

 

You don't have to say the words out loud in a conversation. You can say "the Killing curse", "the Cruciatus curse" or "the imperious curse".

Sure it will make things a little complicated, there will be fuck ups, but wouldn't it be worth knowing if a person gets imperio'ed, killed or is being tortured repeatedly? Especially in a time when Voldemort was at his height. I'd wanna know if a family member of mine is coming home under the Imperious curse to kill me.

About silent casting, have we ever seen any of the unforgivables being used without an incantation, even from Voldemort?

 

There really isn't anything seperating any spell at all except for laws...

And obviously spell effects, but we've seen dark spells thrown around without an incantation haven't we?

 

Is there any canonical evidence that the ministry is in fact competent enough to think about such things?

The unforgivables themselves could easily be a ploy by dark wizards to shift attention from other dark magic to three relatively "harmless" spells. The Killing Curse is pretty humane as far as killing goes, and the Imperius uses carrot instead of stick to force compliance. The Cruciatus Curse seems to be the most malevolent of the three, and even then any self-respecting sadist could come up with multitude of more damaging and "entertaining" alternatives to use to torture his/her victims. I mean, it doesn't even leave permanent scars...

I could easily see some snobby pureblood lobbying against the unforgivable curses because they would be too effective in the hands of the plebeians against the centuries of dueling tradition and secret family spells the old families would have amassed. Think about how gunpowder made armored cavalry obsolete; there was a lot of protesting about how guns were against the "sportsmanship" of warfare.

 

The Cruciatus Curse wouldn't be such a big deal if any sadist could outdo it. As for it not leaving permanent scars? Frank and Alice Longbottom disagree. Also instantly killing someone or stealing free will is pretty terrifying :/

 

The AK is far and away the least scary of the 3 unforgivables. The Cruciatus basically turns on every single one of your pain nerves, while preventing you from passing out. Imperius is a complete domination of someones free will. Both of those are very very scary things. AK's may as well just be being hit by a truck. There are thousands of ways to get the AK effect. The other 2 are so much more unique and scary.

 

Voldemort used a silent Killing Curse in OotP against Dumbledore; Bellatrix used a silent Killing Curse to kill a fox in HBP.

 

Quote on that silent one from Voldemort? i seem to remember him saying it aloud in that duel.

 

Oh my god... this.

And, if I had a nickel for every summary that mentions slash and hurt/comfort in the same breath, I'd be playing the special edition of Bioshock Infinite right now. If fan fiction were any indication of what's going on in real life, you'd have no choice but to draw the conclusion that overwhelming trauma (is nearly the only thing that) makes one gay.

Odds are, I still wouldn't read slash, but could we not have one or two Harrys that are gay because... they're gay, instead of because they're fucking pathetic? A strong, gay, Harry: Apparently that is a harder concept to fathom than thestrals, horcruxes, Ron successfully completing the Rosetta Stone course on Parseltongue, and (in the fanfic world) Harry falling for the racist prick who made it his life's purpose to be Harry's enemy. :facepalm

The fact that it's almost always Draco, Snape, or Voldemort also makes it profoundly unpalatable, and adds to the dissonance created by the whole helpless, hurt/comfort angle, by creating an implicit (and laughably blind on the part of the short-sighted author) subtext of victimization, imposition, and advantage taking.

It is telling, perhaps, that people often don't seem to be able to pair Harry with these odious bastards without placing him so low that he can't get back up on his own. It's like even the people writing it know, deep down, that Harry wouldn't be with these assholes except under the most extreme duress.

Of course, that 'author's subconscious' angle doesn't apply to the people who seem to purposely and very conciously glory in bringing Harry low before these villains in, as you say, a fetishistic eroticizing of his helplessness.

The vast majority of homosexual Harry Potters in fan fic apparently have no spine at all, but try to compensate by having access to two or more pricks...