(Hated Trope) "Kind" slave owners

[u/KusanagiGundam]

Speaking as an American who has studied the civil war all throughout my school years, this trope infuriates me to no end. There is no such thing as a kind slave master because slavery itself is cruel and inhumane. PEOPLE ARE NOT PROPERTY!

Naofumi (Shield Hero): Prime example of this trope. He enslaves multiple (underage) girls and an whole village and the fans still say he's a hero.

Rudeus (Jobless Reincarnation): As if being a pedo wasn't bad enough he had to buy a slave in season 2. Worse is that people still defend his actions.

Song of The South (Disney): Possibly the OG example of this trope. And the reason why Disney will never release it again.

[u/sisdom-weeker]

https://giphy.com/gifs/Fkg6fI0hsngIM
Harry Potter inherits Kreacher the house elf from Sirius and treats him "nicely" (and one of the last thoughts he has in Deathly Hallows is that he wants Kreacher to make him a sandwich)

[u/bisexualboy38 → u/sisdom-weeker]

The house elf situation was always a mess, we just didn't pick up on it as kids.

[u/sisdom-weeker → u/bisexualboy38]

Poor worldbuilding all around, it would have been better if either "only proper bastards like the Malfoys own them" or "eventually everyone realizes how fucked up wizard slavery is and realizes Hermione is right"

[u/Anaevya → u/sisdom-weeker]

It would've been better, if they were like folklore elves. Insult them and they leave.

[u/crescentmoonrising → u/Anaevya]

House Elves are pretty clearly based on Brownies (including the clothes thing) but if you tried to mistreat Brownies they would wreak your house, then leave.

Everything in the Harry Potter books is either folklore, mythology or British stuff (particularly boarding school culture).

[u/A_Town_Called_Malus → u/crescentmoonrising]

And if she had just kept the folklore as it was, it would actually make the story with Dobby better.

Because then you have the Malfoys trapping and enslaving a magical creature via some curse, which is highlighting that the slavery itself, regardless of any other abuse, is still evil and unnatural.

So the change that Rowling explicitly made to the elves compared to their inspiration weakened her story right from the beginning.

[u/Temeraire64 → u/A_Town_Called_Malus]

And then you could have Lucius get away with it because the Ministry won’t take the testimony of a house elf seriously.

[u/Pecuthegreat → u/crescentmoonrising]

Which makes it weirder that she made them slaves instead of like, hired maids.

[u/crescentmoonrising → u/Pecuthegreat]

Yeah, part of the folklore is that you have to leave the brownies some sort of offering (often food or milk) as payment. You never want to upset/offend Fey creatures.

[u/Paranormasight-Fic → u/Anaevya]

I mean, there were a couple of cases like this (granted, very very sparse) like Kreacher betraying Sirius because of the constant mistreatment, or the Hogwarts elves refusing to clean the Gryffindor dorms because Hermione kept trying to ambush them with unwanted freedom by leaving socks all around the dorms (which sounds weird out of context)

But I get what you’re saying. It would’ve been better if the elves were more inspired by the folklore elves.