reenka

It just occurred to me as a sort of struck-by-lightning thing, that I -can-, in fact, see why/how someone would dislike Luna on principle. It's that whole loopy-but-with-no-real-substance thing. Like, those people who prance about spouting nonsense and acting oh-so-silly-and-odd with those over-the-top outfits and multi-colored beads and ten necklaces and five Zulu charms and three rabbit's-feet and eleven little mice strung on a string around their waists or whatever. I myself would probably avoid that sort of person if I saw them on the street. This reminds me of BtVS, y'know, with that vision of Andrew and Warren prancing around in 'heaven' singing 'we are as GODS', etcetc.

I think it's degrading and a silly stereotype of what 'wild' or weird girls are like, really. Of course they're crazy, moon-mad, completely out there swinging from clouds and eating daisies. Oddness, weirdness, intuitive brilliance-- that's one thing. Acting like you're on crack and happy about it is another thing altogether. I don't nod and smile if people eat daisies and sing silly songs in make-believe languages, I wish they'd get some sort of help.

Insanity is a touchy subject with me, of course.

On the one hand, I'm deeply fascinated with madness and particularly its connections to genius and 'truth', as well as truth-seeking. For instance, you could see a character like Fox Mulder as being 'mad' by societal standards, but he's not, really. The point of Luna, to me, and why I identify with her, is that she's not mad, not that she is. Sure, people think (perhaps even the author thinks) that she's loopy and 'out there' and so on, but she just sees things in a different way-- she doesn't sing at shadows and prance about with some wild light in her eyes.

It just bothers me because I keep seeing Luna portrayed with an emphasis on her 'madness', her complete goofy untetheredness, and it sort of hurts because I was a lot like Luna (as I imagine her) when I was a child. The funny thing is how little that sort of behavior-- distant gazes, non-sequiturs, idiosyncratic beliefs, a sort of otherworldly calm-- has to do with madness, really. It's a dreaminess, instead, really. A real Luna type isn't that loud, mad, raving hippie-- she's more of a quiet childlike fey creature, paying attention to invisible things and not quite touching the world and drawing her own conclusions. In the quiet of a childhood spent in isolation-- especially without one's mother (or father, in my case)-- the whole world silently blossoms into strangeness. Things acquire layers of make-believe 'secret' aspects where flowers talk and the moon shows you the path into faery and the dark is full of unnameable, glorious monsters.

Honestly, I don't know anything about these bright, falsely happy empty-eyed people that pass for Luna for so many people. Do they really exist? They probably do. I have had no traffic with them, and want none. Quiet doesn't mean dull; alone doesn't mean insane; different doesn't mean one's mind is scattered to the winds but rather often that one's mind is overly focused on the things others don't bother paying attention to, instead.

I don't care about Luna's earrings or her odd eyes, but it seems that's all most people notice. People are so distrustful of belief, even when the person is on a search for their own truth, while most of them simply accept a whole array of stranger and more frightening dictums as Truth, completely wholesale. I myself spent a childhood lost in a sort of twilight forest of fleeting beliefs and daydreams, picking things up and abandoning them. I know what it's like to see things and want to see more, no matter how strange. Luna is not mad. It's more like Luna is saner than the rest of her peers, maybe.
~~

EDIT - Er. I am interested in what other people think of Luna, positive and negative, btw....

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From:

go-back-chief.livejournal.com

As for reasons for why someone would dislike Luna on principle, it makes me think of something I read once on the site "Television without Pity". The recapper said that she didn't like characters like Willow (BtVS) or Phoebe (Friends), because their respective "ditziness" were "pasted on", in order to make them "cute" and "endearing" to the viewers. Instead, the recapper liked Drusilla, whose paceyness "had a real reason", aka, she WAS insane. Now, I don't necessarily share the views of this recapper, but I could most definitely see where she was coming from. And I imagine she'd have the same reaction to Luna, thinking that JKR has made her "dreamy" to make her cute and endearing. This is not how I see Luna, but I can understand that other people may see her like that, and if they do, I can definitely see why they'd dislike her.

I guess, the reason why I don't see her like that, is because to me, she
-like many of JKR's characters- seems real. That is, I can agree with Luna-critiques that there are stereotypical things in her characterisation, but I think she exceeds the stereotype. (I fully understand that she might not do so for everyone, though).

I remember when we read OotP, my sister said Luna reminded her very much of me. I could understand what she meant, but it annoyed me to a certain extent, because of the stereotypal aspects of the character. Also, it annoyed me, because though I can understand that there are similarities between the two of us, there are also great differences (I don't have the faith Luna has for instance, and I think I'm much more logical and skeptic, read cynical;-)). Likewise, I remember when we started watching "Friends", my sister said Phoebe reminded her of me. This annoyed me even more, because I percieve Phoebe as more of a stereotype and comic relief, but yeah, I could see where she was coming from even then.

What I think my sister referred to, in both these cases, was something these two characters seem to have in common; they're both absentminded, live a bit in their own world and they think in a way that's different to others. Like, from other people's POV, Luna may say something that seems to be completely out of the left field, but it makes perfect sense to her, and the point is, it would make sense to most people, if we only could follow her thought-process. We can't, therefore she doesn't make sense. But if we could, she would, and I think that's extremely important to remember when you write fics that's from Luna's own POV; no one sees themselves as weird, and thus, Luna shouldn't either.

My personal pet-peeve about Luna, is when people think she's stupid. I've seen threads questioning why she is in Ravenclaw, and that completely drives me up the wall. She's NOT stupid!!!! (Here is, of course, where I start project my own issues.;-)) She thinks in a way that's different from others, but she's very much capable of thinking, in fact, she probably uses her brain more than many people. But I think she uses all of her brain, or at least more of it than is common. It's hard to explain, but I think she often thinks one step ahead of others, as well as from the sides, and looking back, and thus it may take a little longer until she draws a conclusion. Reversely, I think it also happens that she draws her conclusion far too quickly for others to follow, because she doesn't work herself through details first, but she begins, rather than ends, with the broad perspective, and thus she might throw out the conclusion at a time when other people, who haven't been following her line of thinking, aren't ready to recieve it. I think the forrest-scene, where she suggests they'll fly to MoM, is an excellent example of that, in fact.

The thing is, if someone tends to say things that seem (but really aren't, once you've given it some thought) completely out of the blue, and if you're not always focusing on the "here and now", and if you sometimes answer questions when the person who asked them has already forgot they posed them, many people can mistake that for stupidity.

From:

yourpoison.livejournal.com

Heee! Yes :D I totally nodded throughout your take on the Luna Issue, hehe, probably because it's mostly (only?) the people who're something like that who-- er-- 'get' that sort of person. *bonds*~:))
That's what I was getting at with the crazy-bead-lady imagery in the beginning-- I suppose Phoebe strikes me as as the crazy-bead-lady type much more so than either Luna or Willow ('cause she doesn't have that all-important component of actual-- er-- rigorous thought to accompany the wackiness), so yeah, if you compared me to Phoebe I'd be offended too, but all right, I could see where you're coming from :D I mean, when I think 'Phoebe', I think 'cat song', which is... all right, something I might do, BUT STILL :D :D I always identified with Ross more ^^;;;; (*is so lame, omg*)

I think the thing about using all of her brain is right on-- it's very much in the tradition of INFP-type thinking-- intuitive rather than linear. Linear (rationalist) people just kind of blink and go 'uh... right' because they don't even -recognize- it as -thought- 'cause basically they don't think that way. Recently it hit me that like, 'normal' people actually think like 'a-then-b-then-c-then-d-then...' which... hurts my head. I never think like that, and it's kind of like, well, I know that sort of thing is normal but it still boggles the mind. The difference is that, erm, 'our kind' has always had to understand the majority whereas the majority has never felt any obligation to understand -us-.

I totally agree about Luna making sense after more thought... er, mostly 'cause that's my experience with how people react to -me-. Like... it's a question of context. People seem to understand what I mean quite perfectly if they know exactly where I'm coming from, and be utterly confused if they don't. And... I often forget to say where I'm coming from; it like -hurts- me to explain myself the 'normal' way a lot of times. Heh. Though I can do it! It's just like porting Windows to a Mac, ahahahahah. It can be done! I can isolate the logical part of my brain and off I go! Er, so yes, people often confuse 'linear logic' with 'intelligence', which makes me all 'grrr' and so on :>

Well... this is funny, about people not seeing themselves as weird. I think a lot of people claim to be weird (I do, for fun), but anytime I say I'm weird (since I realize most people would think I am) I feel like I'm lying. I feel like it's not true, I'm -not- weird (enough) 'cause I make perfect sense to -me- :D Yesyesyes re: beginning with the broad perspective. That's what -I- always do, anyway. Hahahah man, projection issues ^^;;;

From:

go-back-chief.livejournal.com

('cause she doesn't have that all-important component of actual-- er-- rigorous thought to accompany the wackiness)

Thank you, I think you highlighted the issues I've always had with this character there. It's not like I didn't like her as a character -in fact I could often find her funny- but I was never really able to identify with her. Can't really say who I identified with most on that show, I only know Phoebe and Joey were the ones I identified least with, probably because the two of them were the ones who came across most as "types" rather than real persons.

I mean, when I think 'Phoebe', I think 'cat song', which is... all right, something I might do, BUT STILL :D :D

Hee! Not just "Cat song", but a badly written and sung one!:D

Recently it hit me that like, 'normal' people actually think like 'a-then-b-then-c-then-d-then...'

Exactly. Whereas if I'd describe my thought-process, it'd be more like I get all these undefined, shapeless things, that are initially more like feelings, until they start to take shape, and they take a fuzzy shape at first, and then a slightly less fuzzy shape, and then they're almost formed, and then, finally, I can begin to dress them in words, and I might try to dress them all at once, or I'll begin with whichever come first, which might as well be "C" as "A", etc. But some people seem to need to fully dress one thought in words, before the other one can even begin to form. Yeah, I can express my thoughts linearly as well, especially in writing, but it took some time to develop that. (Heh, it was sort of funny, but on a thread by

sistermagpie, quite a long while ago, she asked which characters we related to, and I answered Luna and Zacharias, and it was kind of funny how I got some surprised reactions by people who could only see the Zacharias-part. The funny thing is, many people I know in real life, would, if they'd read the books, have the complete opposite reaction. Sometimes "writingselves" can be quite a bit different from "talkingselves", I think!:D)

I think a lot of people claim to be weird (I do, for fun), but anytime I say I'm weird (since I realize most people would think I am) I feel like I'm lying.

Oh, I know what you mean, I've done that too. That is, I say "I'm weird", either as tongue-in-cheek, or with self-irony, because I know there are people who perceive me that way. But I never really agree with it. To me, it's always other people who are "weird", not me!:D