Harry Potter does not, in fact, support slavery.

A distant prequel to my post on why the goblins aren't racist. A lot of the criticisms made about Harry Potter post-transphobia are terrible because it's people:

• not reading the text at all (or reading it solely to hate)

• making extremely shallow if not provably false criticisms to frame JK as more of a bigot than she already is

• patting each other on the back.

And it's really fricking annoying, so here we are.

The argument is this:

• House-Elves were enslaved

• They apparently like being enslaved

• Hermoine, the character campaigning to free them, is demonized for trying to free them.

Ergo the series supports slavery and JK Rowling is a racist. Hi-five!

And everything past the first point falls apart once you read the books at fricking all:

House-Elves liking being enslaved isn't a fricking fact. It's a justification put forth by Fred and George Weasley...who already think treating house elves like shit is okay. Fred and George are not, in any sense, presented as being particularly smart, nor are they meant to be experts: this is very clearly a half-assed explanation from a bunch of teenagers. But people talk about this like it was JK Rowling handwaving their exploitation with a fact. Which is a blatant lie.

Dobby, the most notable House-elf and our introduction to them, loves being free. Kreacher, the next most notable house-elf, hates being enslaved. Every other House-Elf merely claims to be loyal to their masters, but why wouldn't they be: the extreme punishments they face would obviously brew stockholm syndrome, like what happens with real slaves! House-Elves do not like being enslaved.

The next point is even dumber and has to be deconstructed on three fronts:

The characters that mock S.P.E.W. are, to my count, (a) fourteen-year-olds who don't know any better and are pretty dumb on average, (b) sixteen-year-olds who definitely don't know any better (Fred and George, their ages are placeholders) and (c) slaves suffering from stockholm syndrome. The characters that support S.P.E.W. are Hermoine--a student consistently portrayed as being extremely bright and wise in comparison to every student, much less ron, fred and george—and Dumbledore—a character who was basically infallible before the later books. People who screech about how "the characters make fun of Hermoine for it!!" ignore who the people making fun of her actually fricking are. Hermoine is clearly supposed to be in the right, and if you had any doubts, fricking infinite wisdom Dumbledore supports it.

Just because a large amount of the cast holds a belief doesn't mean the text is telling you that its' okay?? In the 2nd harry potter book, most of the characters believe Harry's connected to the snake! In the fourth Harry Potter book, nearly all of the characters, including Ron, think Harry cheated to get into the Tournament! Yet, somehow, we agree that those characters weren't correct. Why? Because you can't just say "most of the characters have this opinion gg". You have to apply context. And actually read the books.

If the underage and uneducated chorus yelling at Hermoine and Dumbledore is supposed to be right, why does Ron change his mind at the end of the books? Why is Ron lightening up to House-Elves a triumphant moment if not because Hermoine was fricking correct? Why does Harry act nicer to Kreacher after his exposure to S.P.E.W.?

We know for a fact that JK Rowling isn't racist, nor did she remotely intend for House-Elves to be racist (but don't get me wrong, the books aren't pro-slavery either). For one, the house-elves are based of fairies that would come in to assist heroes: they're no analogous to African people. More substantially, if JK Rowling's pro-slavery, it's a bit odd that she claims that Hermoine goes on to greatly improve life for House-Elves. While enthusiastically talking about the characters' futures. Even if I somehow granted you that the books were racist (they are not, see the rest of this post), JK Rowling indisputably isn't.

so yeah, the whole "house-elves are racist!" stuff is unironically lies bruh. You can't use "they only watched the movies" as an excuse, because not a single point that people bring up ever occurs in the movies—but they still go out of their way to show that Dobby loves being free, haha. please read harry potter with your eyes open bros