Since Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality is apparently still a thing, I figured I’d spend a few minutes before fediverse monster-movie night to collect relevant links:

And a question dug up from one of those old threads: OK, so, Yud poured a lot of himself into writing HPMoR. It took time, he obviously believed he was doing something important — and he was writing autobiography, in big ways and small. This leads me to wonder: Has he said anything about Rowling, you know, turning out to be a garbage human?

  • Sailor Sega Saturn@awful.systemsEnglish
    13·
    20 hours ago

    This leads me to wonder: Has he said anything about Rowling, you know, turning out to be a garbage human?

    I couldn’t find anything, though I did find this thread where he ponders if the problem with police is that they just have too much gosh darn testosterone while awkwardly trying not to take a side:

    People, I said “under 100 ng/dL of testosterone” with intent to thereby short-circuit trans issues because that is the part I care about. The conjecture (though I’d consider it halfway busted at this point) was meant to exclude, eg, a trans AFAB taking testosterone.

    “A trans AFAB”. Lovely.

    Don’t worry though, nothing quite says “transphobes not welcome” like this:

    And to be explicit, we are happy to host economically literate people in favor of market solutions who politely accede to pronoun requests.

    Well OK maybe they are welcome, but at least they’ll begrudgingly use the right pronouns while they gleefully tear down all my human rights!

    • blakestacey@awful.systemsOPMEnglish
      10·
      19 hours ago

      There was just recently a dust-up wherein authors quit a romance con because it was to feature someone who published a Harry Potter fic with the serial numbers filed off, and supporting anything that keeps the brand going is putting money in Rowling’s pocket and thus actively making trans people’s lives worse. People care about this kind of thing; at least, some of 'em do. There are reactions. Some of those are talk about “reclaiming the fandom”, while others regard that as untenable self-justification… But any way you slice it, the subject is very clearly coming up.

      In the year since the Neil Gaiman unpleasantness dropped, I’ve lost count of all the threads where people have said that they can’t enjoy his work again, that they are painfully re-evaluating their relationship with Sandman or Coraline or American Gods. They can’t help but engage with the subject. And, hey, I get it! I generally liked his stuff and saw him live at a few events over the years, where he was an enjoyable public speaker. I don’t have a Death tattoo that now needs covering up, but I can still register a loss. Discovering Sandman while visiting a friend on vacation when they were checking it out of the public library… that was an uncomplicatedly happy memory!

      This kind of thing grips a person and compels a response. Even if that’s only a self-justifying rationalization of the status quo! But Yudkowsky (to my knowledge) has said nothing, none of the lesswrongs commenting on that interview said anything… I expected something, like a “Rational!Harry is the only canon now”, or a “Methods of Rationality is the greatest fic to be based on the works of Hatsune Miku”. Anything, you know? But I haven’t even seen the step that elsewhere would be the bare minimum.

      • bitofhope@awful.systemsEnglish
        16·
        17 hours ago

        I don’t think he ever cared that much about Harry Potter in the first place. Much of HPMOR has these odd little uncommented contradictions with the original books that seem to result from skimming or basing your info on fan wikis.