The Dresden Files

Mind you, the Winter Court being in a state of perpetual eternal war to prevent the apocalypse is something Santa/Odin/CEO would find fairly appealing.

The question is whether Ragnarok was inspired by the Forever War against the Outsiders or whether it's just coincidence his Ragnarok resembles it.

Off-topic to the current discussion, but you know that effect where you trust an author right up until they mention something that you happen to know a lot about? And you see their mistake?

In one of the early books, when Harry's talking about how magic screws up technology, he mentions avoiding mechanical pencils. Come to find out (being a writing-instrument nerd), they're quite old. You can buy Victorian-age mechanical pencils on eBay.

Though that's not something Harry would know about, I'd imagine.

Eh, I'm a programmer. If I stopped trusting every writer that got computer science wrong, I might as well be illiterate.

Now, if a topic is a big part of what the story is about, then I expect the writer to have done a reasonable amount of research; if it's just something mentioned in passing or for flavor, I don't mind at all.

An acquaintance of mine who studies mythology as a job mentioned that he quit the series over an inconsistency like this. It was the Mayan woman in Changes wearing a deerskin robe more specifically that did him in. Well, that and the treatment of a certain native American monster in the preceding book.

Edited by math792d on Jan 1st 2019 at 10:05:23 AM

I was under the impression skinwalkers were pretty nasty bastards in actual Navajo myths. Is that wrong?

Oh no, the depiction of them as vicious bastards is correct, the Navajo people just don't like outsiders talking about them. They have a very culturally specific place in their history that intersects with a lot of other cultural concepts in their traditions, and it's simply not something outsiders should be telling stories about.

Edited by math792d on Jan 1st 2019 at 11:07:50 AM

Color me curious. Could you tell me more, or at least point me in the right direction for more info?

I found out in the context of an essay about the American Wizarding World in Harry Potter, but the post in question is written with some pretty solid scholarship, and I highly recommend you check the Audra Simpson paper that the article links as well to get more context.

The tl;dr answer is that I can't point you in a direction for more info than the above post because, really, it's not up for debate, it's just a thing the Navajo don't want to talk about.

Edited by math792d on Jan 2nd 2019 at 3:37:17 PM

Well, that’s disheartening but I suppose is their prerogative.

Is it skinwalkers specifically, or do they really just want people to stop stealing their cultural heritage in general?

I feel that's not on Butcher. In the absence of information, people ARE going to make stuff up. He can't be compliant if there's no information to comply with. You don't want people to mess with it or mess it up, teach them the right way to go about it.

Edited by SCMof2814 on Jan 2nd 2019 at 10:39:37 PM

My understanding is that it's a bit like if people kept going to the Catholic Church asking for info on performing a Black Mass and summoning demons.

He could have used Literally Any Other Shapeshifting Monster In The History of History instead.

The Navajo don't like to share these stories because they're core to their culture. Shouldn't people who are not Navajo respect that they have a desire not to see this part of their culture get commercialized and widespread, especially if it, in the process, becomes ripe with misrepresentation.

Isn't the respectful thing to do in that case to just not do it and find some other monster from a culture that's cool with that kind of commercialization?

I normally would be all behind that but....Jim Butcher uses demons and Satanist monsters all the time in his book.

Any time you use a mythological creature, you are very likely using something central to someone's religion.

It's also a monster in a funny book. A lot of people objected to American Gods putting in "Hispanic Jesus" but I think that making mythology proprietary in terms of fiction is a dangerous precedent.

Because it's sacred.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Jan 3rd 2019 at 8:15:43 AM

Is diferent, being a majority religion and being about evangeligation make the more public.

I will said there is a value dissonance here: we expect those things to be fair for everyone so the whole "not, you cant use it" come for many as weird and insular.

Edited by unknowing on Jan 3rd 2019 at 12:18:42 PM

Ah, missing arrows there, friend.

But Butcher is white and (I presume on law of averages) either Christian of some denomination or possibly atheist but with knowledge of what satanic beings and demons mean to the mainstream majority faith. He can't appropriate his own culture, basically.

So is Mouse being a Tibetan guardian spirit appropriation?

You can call this the rule of ficcional representation.

In general, christian are like public property by being a majority religion and by being so public, meaning people get less annoying by altering stuff, so constantine, evangelion and other dosent bother so much.

"Dead" religion like nordic, egyptian or greek pantheon get a pass because very little people workship them in a sustancial way anymore, you can get a groan by cringe worthy ways but that it, they are pretty much public domain figures.

Now, minoritiry religion with little representation.....here is the tochy subject, First nation dosent get enough representation so their concept in general are not "public" so to speak.

I find that attitude problematic because Christianity isn't "just" a majority religion but a collective term for many-many smaller religions from a shared belief pool.

I also find the idea of "it's big means its good to be protected." Because that means Scientology would be immune to usage.

I actually think they have every right to raise a stink and Jim Butcher should have left it out if it would have caused this but I don't think "the bigger groups are fair game" and "smaller ones are off limits" is a good strategy to follow. It should be a matter of respect period.

I think that if one's fair game all should be, but it's really not my call to make.

Sure but their number and influence allow them to be portray in diferent manners, from good to bad, something other religion dosent have.

Scientology dosent go protection becauser well....they are dicks who have scam to many people so people dosent see it as religion.

Is my opinion too but well, thing are more complicated than that.

Edited by unknowing on Jan 3rd 2019 at 4:23:17 PM

I don't know about his current religious affiliations but I do know that he was raised in an evangelical or similar church. I've seen a few stories he's told about being part of a youth missionary group in his teens.

I file Scientology under Scam Religion but the fact is that at least its believers include some poor sincerely misguided souls. Which, depending on your beliefs, may be every religion or none of them.

I practice a variant of Christianity that believes all religions are shaped by creating faces for God (or as I call it "Nyarlathotep Christianity" much to the annoyance of my Baptist mother).

But in any case, Jim Butcher also included Kenku (a non-existent monster that was a misspelling of Tengu) in his books.

So Critical Research Failure happens in the DF.

Mind you, I don't know if there's any truly original monsters in DF, but I don't see why there shouldn't be. Well, the Baka Baku, I suppose.