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user-inactivated  ·  1873 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: The wonderful, weird world of wizard rock

    You, King Rebel of all Rebels, have internalized the idea that it's better to suck it up than fight for your right.

    And I blame Harry Potter.

Part 1 is correct and Part 2 is incorrect. Part 2 is wrong not because Harry Potter doesn't have authoritarian themes but because no kids are reading or watching those films and getting the takeaway that "authority is cool" and applying it to their personal lives. You're reading too much into it. You're doing literary criticism that 94% of the population isn't. You might be right but kidzz are not disempowered by Harry Potter any more than I was beating a hooker to deathed by GTA: Vice City. GTA is less popular but you see my point.

Kidz are in the tank because like you mentioned, their issues are blacked out. Check it.

    This ignores the fact that adults in general care about adults, that generally whatever hardships kids are suffering are opaque to adults, and that even if you were to ask for things to be better, suck it up, buttercup.

That's the problem. Nobody, nobody has less freedom or power or anything in the society than kids. They can't do shit. You fight back and you won't graduate. And everyone around you is so scared shitless that if you raise your voice you probably won't inspire another to action, they'll just vilify you. I did it, it worked, they agreed, but fewer and fewer agree every year.

I liked your story because it worked. Me, I tried to run for president of the student council at my school and I would have won until the teachers blocked me because they didn't like me. The next year they picked the council. The year after that they got rid of it entirely. The year after that they cancelled even sports because they were worried kids were going to show up drunk.

I wish kids would fuck up the plan. That's what I did, that's what I want, that's what I encourage. But fuck if we don't ever live in a disempowering time and it's not because of JK Rowling, even if she sucks. It's because of adults, bitch. Uptight assholes at the school board. Part of being able to fight back is believing you can and even that's been taken away from kids. By school, by parents, by law, not by media. Her crimes are aesthetic.