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1Literature/HarryPotter [[Headscratchers/HarryPotter headscratchers]] that don't fit anywhere else.
2
3For a specific book, please go to its specific page:
4* Headscratchers/HarryPotterAndThePhilosophersStone
5* Headscratchers/HarryPotterAndTheChamberOfSecrets
6* Headscratchers/HarryPotterAndThePrisonerOfAzkaban
7* Headscratchers/HarryPotterAndTheGobletOfFire
8* Headscratchers/HarryPotterAndTheOrderOfThePhoenix
9* Headscratchers/HarryPotterAndTheHalfBloodPrince
10* Headscratchers/HarryPotterAndTheDeathlyHallows
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12----
13[[foldercontrol]]
14
15[[folder:Number of wizarding schools]]
16* Is it just me, or do there seem to be way too few wizarding schools per region? And often, they're not in the most logical places. For example, the only school of magic in East Asia is Mahoutoro, in Japan. Why isn't there one in, say, China, which is the most populous country on Earth? Not to mention that it has very hostile relations with Japan, so I doubt Chinese wizards would go to Mahoutoro. Why is Ilvermony literally the only wizarding school in North America? Given the size of the country, you would expect there would be more, perhaps one on the west coast and one in the south. In fact, boarding schools in general aren't really an American thing; why not have a wizarding public school system?
17** The number of wizards is ''very'' small, compare to muggles and they have instant transportation methods therefore they don't need to have their school in close proximity, nor do they care for the muggle politics so even if Japan and China's governments are hostile to each other the wizard communities are not.
18** It's a fairly common fanon that the official list of wizarding schools is not actually a complete list; the theory goes that Wizarding schools are typically smaller, less prestigious, and do not last nearly as long as Hogwarts has; there are likely a lot more schools than the ones listed, but they aren't big or important enough to warrant any special attention. It's also possible (and even likely) that some Wizarding Cultures prefer homeschooling.
19** I can agree with that last point. For example, boarding schools were never really an American thing.
20[[/folder]]
21
22
23[[folder:Owl abilities]]
24* The more you think about it, the more absurd the owls' abilities at transporting messages seem. They go way beyond the abilities of homing pigeons in our world. For one thing, the owls seem to understand English. For another, they obey commands to deliver their messages to specific individuals. Finally, Harry's owl is repeatedly able to track down Sirius Black when he's in hiding, when even Harry has no idea where he is, when he could be literally anywhere in England (assuming he even is in England). This suggests that the owls have tracking abilities beyond that of the most powerful wizards. It makes you wonder why they aren't used more for that purpose in the wizarding world, as a tool for finding missing people.
25** They are not regular owls, they are magical owls. And yes, is said in-universe that owls can track people, that's why Sirius has to rely in other ways to communicate with Harry as he is using especial spells to avoid get located by especial ministry owls probably use for catching fugitives.
26[[/folder]]
27
28[[folder:Dumbledore and the Dursleys]]
29* Why didn't Dumbledore do anything about the Dursley's treatment of Harry? If the goal was for Harry to not get a big ego and if Harry ''had'' to be in his aunt's home, why didn't Dumbledore just say "Oh, by the way, I'll come and check from time to time to see how he is doing." I mean, even when a wizard exploded half of their living room (tome 4), they still weren't all "They'll come back we have to be nice to Harry.". And, frankly, Dumbledore did know what was going on. So he permitted abuse for 11 years just so that Harry wouldn't be full of himself. So, why?
30** Oh, Harry didn't have to be in his aunt's home. Just in the home of a blood relative of his mother. Like his cousin Dudley. So even if Dumbledore didn't look in on Harry every couple of weeks or whatever, when they realized how bad the situation was, why not remove Harry AND Dudley from the house and find them a decent foster home together?
31** I'm pretty sure the good guys would balk at kidnapping (can you justify stealing a child solely to save him from being ''spoiled''?). Also, "blood relative" may be shorthand for "relative who is an adult" (i.e. at least 17), espeically considering that it's all about parental sacrifice. A better solution would indeed have been to have someone check in on Harry from time to time. Or in a Doyalist approach, Rowling could have made the Dursleys a lot less grotesque. Their abuse doesn't advance the plot much (hiding the school letters isn't quite abuse; it could be re-framed as having his best interests at heart because they think the wizarding world is a major threat to Harry, and in part they'd be right). An exception is when they lock Harry in his room and he's saved by the Weasleys, but they could have picked him up anyway without his being actually imprisoned.
32** First of all, considering that when Dumbledore calls out the Dursleys for their abuse of Harry, he specifically mentions something to the effect of "but at least you didn't treat him as badly as you did your own son," it's hard to call it a kidnapping if it's removing Harry AND Dursley to a save them from an abusive situation. Second of all, this is a magical community that thinks nothing of whipping out memory charms, Confunding Muggle officials for their own personal convenience, and generally using their magic to get away with whatever they like, I fail to see why they would draw the line at kidnapping.
33** As already seen, wizards put a lot of faith in the bonds of blood. They are also really backwards and probably remember times when it was not uncommon for kids to die in the first few years of their lives. Most likely, as far as they see it Potter is with his blood kin, whatever happens to him he is not dying, and thus there's no need to do anything about some discipline or something. And as for Dumbledore himself not checking, honestly ... that guy is more of a plot device than a character and the abuse or mistreatment or however you'd call it wouldn't be so noticeable had he actually visited, so there's your reason.
34** Also, to quote another page, why didn't he just said "here, take this gold and say it's because i'm an old friend of the Potters. This goes with the drawback that i can and will make your furnitures want to kill you if the boy is mistreated.
35** I always was under the impression that the Dursleys were smart enough to never abuse Harry in a way that could bring them legal problems. They always knew exactly how much squeeze him without call the attention of the authorities. Sadly, in real life you do need normally more than what the Dursleys did to take away a kid from their legal guardians. About the magic world and why didn’t intervene, probably same situation apply to some degree.
36** this bothered me, harrys' situation before the main plot should of been red flagged by at least the school he was in, seeing as he went to the same school as his cousin surely the school would have noticed that dudley was at least twice the weight of harry, always dressed in the best, while harry was clearly wearing overlarge hand me downs, im assuming dudley was always allowed ot go on school trips, whereas I think harry would of been laughed out of the room by his aunt or uncle if he ever asked, I'm suprised that harry wasn't a sociopath by the start of the books, seeing as far as we could tell a stray dog would of been treated by the dursleys better, literally the only thing the dursleys actually done for harry is give him a roof, and (barely) feed and clothe him, it also shows in how quickly and readily he disregards his muggle life and jumps headfirst into magic life, to him, life with the dursleys was nothing but a bad time, the only thing that probably stopped him becoming another voldemort was probably the fact that he quickly made friends, and one being from a family of muggle sympathizers and one being muggle born, then we discover late into the series that all the anomisity (from petunias side at least, don't know what the hell vernons problem actualy is) came fromt he fact that petunia was JEALOUS.
37*** Except cases of child abuse go unnoticed or unreported multiple times in society - and think that Harry's childhood is the early 90s. Child abuse and social services are associated with crass lower class families where the parents are alcoholics or drug addicts. The Dursleys however present the image of being a normal middle-class family, where Vernon has a respectable job and they appear to be good samaritans taking in their orphaned nephew. Harry is also seen as a problem child - due to his magic manifesting in ways that make him seem like a delinquent (turning a teacher's wig blue, ending up on the roof) so to the outside, Vernon and Petunia just look like good parents trying to discipline a badly behaved young boy. With regards to the clothes, almost all British schools have uniforms - so Harry would be wearing the same clothes as anyone else. Harry isn't coming into school with bruises or broken bones, or 'obvious' signs of abuse.
38** As to why Dumbledore didn't intervene, he's not watching Privet Drive 24/7. He's headmaster of the most prestigious boarding school in the UK and heavily involved in the Wizengamot, as well as helping out Cornelius Fudge in his early days at the Ministry. Dumbledore had his hands full helping put the country back together after a war. And considering he's nearly a hundred years old at this point, maybe think of the fact that he's from a time when we had very different views of what constitutes child abuse (in the 1950s it was common to strap boys to the bed to prevent them masturbating, because it was seen as psychologically dangerous, even as late as the 70s teachers could get away with hitting their students).
39** And Harry does display signs of being psychologically affected by the years of abuse from the Dursleys. He has an intense dislike of authority figures, and is quick to distrust many of his teachers (Snape is admittedly cruel to him, but Harry immediately jumps to him being the BigBad). He's also got an unhealthy obsession with playing the hero and craving glory - which is clearly a deep-rooted psychological desire for affection that he didn't get from his family. He also immediately assumes negative intent behind a lot of things - thinking the Sorting Hat will throw him out, or [=McGonagall=] will beat him with a cane, or he'll get expelled for the simplest of things.
40[[/folder]]
41
42[[folder: Fear of Death?]]
43It's a point made in ''Fanfic/HarryPotterAndTheMethodsOfRationality'': Voldemort's fear of death could be understandable if he really thought death was CessationOfExistence, but what is the point of making the horcruxes, since the way horcruxes ''work'' is definite proof that there ''are'' such things as souls and there ''is'' such thing as an afterlife?
44** Many reasons: he may not expect a very good afterlife after all he has done, he may not want to be a ghost if that's one of the choices as ghosts can't do really anything, and he has a very big ego and wants to rule the world, something that he needs to be alive for.
45** Alternatively, just because there are souls doesn't mean they naturally survive death. Or that, even if they do, identity is preserved - they could reincarnate, for example. Yes, Dumbledore's post-death exposition dump to Harry does imply that there is an afterlife (unless he's a projection of Harry's subconscious showing much more ability than his conscious mind at putting clues and information together), but that's not going to be general knowledge - how often do people enter that limbo state and have a convenient dead mentor, after all?
46** Voldemort appears to have a twisted idea about [[OurSoulsAreDifferent what the soul actually is]]. The series all but confirms that your soul ''is'' you, that soul and self are one and the same, but Voldemort either can't grasp that or doesn't believe it. Otherwise, he wouldn't rip his own soul to pieces because [[ItsAllAboutMe he cares too much about himself]]. If that is the case, maybe he thinks that when he dies, his soul leaves this world without him or something like that. Who really knows what he thinks?
47* What I've never understood is, if he fears death, why start a violent conflict? Why not quietly move somewhere isolated, and quietly research methods of immortality? If death is his biggest fear, he should be a hermit who never needed to steal a philosopher's stone because he has long since made one himself. Instead he behaves like someone who accepts that death is a risk, but wants to change the world before he goes. His actions are those of a fanatical ideologue, not someone terrified of death.
48** He fears death but he also wants to TakeOverTheWorld, his ambition to rule over everyone is as strong or maybe more than his fear. They can also be related but will be like the chicken and the egg. He can't control the world without conflict and his ego is to big for him not wanting to be ruler. Besides he's not dumb, if he could took the world quietly and without conflict he will, like when he just imperiused a puppet minister, is just that for obvious reasons opposition always rises.
49** He may believe that seeking immortality on his own wouldn't be very successful, and that he'll have better chances with the resources available to a dictator. Also, once he created his horcruxes, he did mitigate the risks of true death from violence considerably.
50[[/folder]]
51
52[[folder:Wizards and Muggles]]
53* Am I the only on who was bothered by the wizards' views of muggles and the Muggle world? From the book, it seems that most wizards are, at best, indifferent and ignorant of the Muggle world and, at worst, totally bigoted. In fact, the usual wizard view of Muggles seems to be a mixture of indifference and ignorance of the Muggle world and condescending attitudes. Even Muggle-borns seem to have little respect for Muggles. For example, Hermione temporarily erases her parents' memories and, while she seems genuinely upset about it, seems to have done it without their consent nor without considering the ethical problems with her actions. Now, I can understand not wanting Muggles to know about the wizarding world and that the Muggle-world must be awfully boring for the average wizard, but they generally seem to have absolutely zero interest in Muggle public affairs, technology, or culture. Most cultures in real life are somewhat insular, but not like this. Again, what bugged me was that, although there were few outright bigots (all of whom seemed to be pure bloods), even wizards with one or both of their parents being Muggles seem to view themselves as superior. Based on the way that Muggles were talked about in the books, you would think they were animals, sub-human. For a book with a major theme of unity, this seems pretty contradictory.
54** It's quite obvious that we're ''supposed'' to be bothered by the wizarding world's ignorance and bigotry towards Muggles and the Muggle world. Arthur Weasley said it himself when he mentioned a couple of wizards enchanting public toilets to spew shit at Muggles or whatever. It seems like good fun, but it's a symptom of a much deeper, much uglier viewpoint held by some wizards. As for Hermione mind-wiping her parents, that was more of a "desperate times, desperate measures" kind of situation. Hermione wanted to keep her parents safe from the Death Eaters, who hate Muggles and would ''not'' be above killing them for shits and giggles, ''especially'' if they knew they could use it to get to one of Harry Potter's best friends, so she did the only thing she could think of to keep them absolutely safe. Call it unethical if you want, but it was the best solution she could think of at the time, and she wasn't exactly happy that she had to do it.
55** That one incident with the eccentric witch who keeps getting herself captured by witch hunters and burned with fake fire is pretty telling about how some magical folk regard Muggles and their problems, even if it is one crazy person. One wonders how many Deathe Eater murders were covered up by UsefulNotes/TheTroubles...
56** That said, it's understandable just why witches and wizards would be so insular. The history of Muggle/magic interaction is a long line of "Muggles flip out and try to murder all the witches they find." Even if we were to discount all of the past history, there's a ton of reasonable fear wizards could have about Muggles. Their powers are ripe for exploitation, but Muggles would likely be utterly terrified if they knew that a minority of the population had ''literal magic powers'' and could cause serious harm or death with a small amount of will by the time they hit puberty. Then there's the Muggles who would be jealous or downright hateful of their lack of magical talent (look at how moody Squibs can be living among magical folk without powers), and I can guarantee that it would be less than a year before stories come out of gruesome murders where psychotic Muggles consume wizard organs or inject magic blood to try and gain power. Imagine all of the existing racism and genocide when people are no different other than minor physical differences, and think about how it'll be when a minority could actually be ''dangerous'' to the majority.
57** I agree that the wizards' views of Muggles were very bad. However, I disagree that the Muggle-borns shared those hatreds. Even Harry himself understood that the Dursleys were just a poor representation of Muggles. Part of this was the complete ignorance of Muggle culture, which was terrible. Muggle Studies should have been mandatory for all non-Muggle-born students and they should teach the cultures, technologies, etc. In Hermione's case, I don't think she modified her parents' memories without diwscussing it with them. I take serious umbrage (no pun intended with either word) with the movie making it seem as if she did it without their knowledge. After all, Hermione would have had to remove all traces of her own life from their home before modifying their memories. That would take a family effort.
58** That's sort of a very early hint that the system in place is flawed and needs to be changed. Hermione herself becomes a prominent player in bringing down some of the discrimination against Muggles.
59** I still don't buy that wizards wouldn't have any interest in Muggle culture. We don't really get a good idea of what wizards do for fun; there's books, newspapers, magazines, Wizard Chess, sporting events, maybe some music... and that's about it. The Muggle world has movies, TV, video games, music, internet, etc. Even if you argue that the wizarding world wouldn't have any interest in such "mundane" things (which I absolutely disagree with, since magic would be considered mundane by wizards and they would eventually get bored with it, and they would logically see Muggle entertainment as "exotic", kind of like why anime has garnered such popularity in the west), what about wizards who were raised as Muggles? One of the appeals of the Harry Potter universe is that the reader could be a wizard and not even know it, like Hermoine, but if I did get accepted to Hogwarts, eventually the whimsicalness of magic would wear off and I'd start to miss stuff like video games. I simply don't buy that there is absolutely no interest in Muggle culture whatsoever, especially among Muggle-borns who were raised on the stuff.
60** This is one of the things that has always bothered me, is that (I know it is a book about Wizards and Witches) but the lack of ANY reference to muggle culture at all, fair enough that it may be due to fear of muggles killing the crap out of them, but I can't believe that they stick so hard to their culture that they are kept in a kind of stasis, as shown from the movies they seem to be in like a early victorian standpoint in terms of aesthetic at least, but still use things like parchment and quills, but at the same time use textbooks, despite the fact that paper itself was used as early as 2 B.C by the chinese and we stopped really using quills somewhere around early 1700s, the muggles have invented things that far outstrip wizard inventions in terms of usefulness, we have airplanes and helicopters, they have broomsticks and carpets (which are illegal in the U.K) which as shown, are as succeptable to curses as muggle transport presumably is, the whole muggles may kill us thing is understandable, but apart from a few mundane utilities, they really should be making more attempts at adapting muggle inventions more.
61** This is kind of a "Depend on the Readers". It is possible that most readers (this troper included) '''do not want''' to read about mundane stuffs in a fantasy book about wizards. For this troper to be reading about a world with centaurs, giants, basilisks, quidditch, etc., and finding a reference to the latest Seinfeld episode or how the new Motorola cell phone is on sale would be definitely something that would break the spell. Besides this books begun publication in the 90s, most pop-cultural references would be dated by now. Not making any association to the muggle world allow the books to be timeless on one hand. \
62Now, regarding the use of things like quills and broomsticks, this is probably for a similar reason. For how long are ''we'' in real life keep using pens? Tablets are already making pens obsolete. So if Rowling puts pens in the story in a few decades people is going to say: What? Pens? Who uses pens? These wizards are using one of those obsolete things of the 90s. Using something like quills, again, makes the work timeless as quills are not in use for centuries it causes the same effect now than in many decades or even centuries in the future. In general the use of backward pre-industrial technology is an aesthetic choice, and a very clever one, as it gives the narrative a certain air of classic fantasy world, like if the Wizarding world is very old and majestic, having an iPod shoehorned there will feel as out of place (to me) as having it in Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones.
63
64[[/folder]]
65
66[[folder:Anniversaries]]
67* James and Lily Potter are killed, Sirius goes to prison, and Pettigrew gets away with murder but is thought to be blown up. On October 31st. Harry knows all this. Why is it that he never mentioned to think about them on this day, instead fussing about missing the Halloween feast, and when he actually manages to go, having a grand old time at it? Even if he was a baby, it stands to reason that a generally compassionate and sometimes annoyingly broody character would at least think about his dead parents on the day they died, and not be exactly cheery about it. Most people remember their loved ones on the day they died, rather than their biggest worry being missing a feast or not.
68** For that matter, other anniversaries, important dates, and birthdays seem to be completely passed over unless they're relevant to the plot. Harry's birthday is the only consistent one we see mentioned; Hermione's birthday is rarely mentioned, and Ron's only is when it's relevant. [[ButtMonkey Like when bad stuff happens to him on it.]]
69** This always, always bugged me, that Ron and Hermione's birthdays are barely mentioned. Even something in passing would have been nice.
70** Isn't it stated somewhere that Hermione's birthday is in early September, and therefore usually before Harry and Ron meet up with her? I'm sure her birthdays have been mentioned a couple of times. With regards to Ron's birthday: they're at boarding school, so it's not like they go out and celebrate. Would a paragraph saying "Happy birthday Ron, here's your present" really have made such a massive difference?
71*** Hermione's birthday is in late September according to WordOfGod, but considering they all start school Sept 1 each year, they're all clearly at school. (OTOH, it makes you realized that her first year, she had no friends for her 12th birthday.) The books generally skip right over her birthday, from 'everyone shows up at school' to 'it's Halloween, time for something to happen'. Hermione's birthday is always before the main plot starts, so it's not like they're distracted. No Chamber of Secrets yet, Sirius Black yet isn't sneaking into the school, Harry isn't in the Tri-Wiz yet, Harry's not yet banned from Quidditch, Ron's not yet dating Lavender...frankly, as things seem to go from reasonable to bad each year, you'd think Hermione's birthday would be a bit of normalcy at the start of the school year.
72*** Hermione's birthday may be overlooked because she doesn't consider it very important herself. She's probably far too busy diving into another term's course material in September to mention it to the boys. Also, she'd have had ten previous birthday celebrations before starting out at Hogwarts, and may not care to be reminded of them: either she'd had Muggle friends that she misses and would feel glum about not seeing at her birthday parties anymore, or she had ''no'' friends worth remembering and doesn't want to recall marking off birthdays where nobody came to the party but her parents.
73** The worst of it is [[Literature/HarryPotterAndTheChamberOfSecrets [=CoS=]]]-8. On Halloween, the trio politely attend Sir Nicholas's Deathday party, [[BlackComedy full of ghosts and comical gruesomeness]] — and it's also his parents' Deathday.
74** Maybe he didn't remember exactly which night Hagrid had said it had been (he was getting a lot of new info then), and didn't feel like asking anyone later.
75** Regarding Harry's birthday, his parents' deathday, and holidays: The Dursleys hardly acknowledged Harry's birthday and holidays, so he's used to ignoring them; I wouldn't be surprised if they never told him the exact date of his parents' "car accident" and because of that there's no emotional connection between the two. As for other people's birthdays, Harry probably didn't (couldn't?) have many friends before Hogwarts, so he's not used to that, either. In the larger narrative of the series, it could be that A) they weren't mentioned because it didn't add to the plot (from Literature/TheHobbit, paraphrased: [[GoodIsBoring safe and peaceful rarely makes for good stories]]) and B) later on they couldn't have had time to celebrate them anyway.
76*** Indeed, ''if'' the Dursleys mentioned the date of his parents' deaths at all, they'd probably have claimed that the "car accident" happened a day or two ''before'' Harry was placed in their custody. The Muggle authorities wouldn't be able to identify the bodies, treat Harry's forehead injury, and track down his relatives as instantaneously as the Wizarding authorities could. More likely, they never told him an exact date at all, to head off the risk of him someday looking into the circumstances of his parents' "fatal crash", and discovering there never was one.
77** And despite the importance of his parents and their deaths, Harry didn't really know them. They died when he was an infant, so he has to learn about his parents through pictures and anecdotes. He still obviously wishes they were here, but their loss was hardly devastating to his psyche. My grandparents died about 10 years ago, but I don't think of the date of their death every time I reach the end of May even though they were with me daily until I was about 10. That's normal for a lot of people unless the death was especially traumatic. Harry musing on the day of his parents' death instead of something more relevant would actually be highly unusual.
78** The fact that Harry isn't too aware of the anniversary is a good point. However that only leads this troper to wonder why there's isn't a wizard wide holiday celebrating the day. Or at least some kind of memorial acknowledgement. Is a pagan festival whose meaning have been completely forgotten really more important than the day the biggest threat to peace in the world was (seemingly) destroyed forever?
79** The first two or three anniversaries probably ''did'' rate some commemorative celebrations, and maybe year ten for its decade-of-peace significance. Before too long it would've dwindled in importance, however, the more so when you consider there were still several years of rounding up surviving Death Eaters to go ''after'' Voldemort went down. How long did RealLife people continue to celebrate the day Hitler shot himself, as opposed to the day WWII actually ended? Plus, there've been a lot of scary Dark wizards over the centuries; if the fall of each and every one rated its own day of partying, the wizarding world would seldom have the chance to take down all the bunting and balloons.
80** It's implied that Harry doesn't focus on it in the books because he's still a young child who often has more pressing things on his mind. In ''Cursed Child'', he actually reveals that he needs to be with his baby blanket on every October 31st now that he's grown up, in memory of the night his parents were killed. As for other people ignoring it, that's a lot more excusable. You don't see people today celebrating on the anniversary of the day WWII ended, do you?
81[[/folder]]
82
83[[folder:Galleons]]
84
85* If Galleons are made of pure gold, one Galleon equals GBL5 (at least that's what JKR says) and gold has the same value in the wizarding and the Muggle world, then a Galleon would have to be really tiny. That is: Weighing less than one fifth of a gram.
86** One theory is that over time, the goblins secretly changed Galleons and left only that one fifth of a gram of gold in the new Galleons and standardized the price with Muggle money and the price of gold.
87** Possible, although most wizards wouldn't really like that. Another possibility is that the one Galleon / five pounds conversion is one of JKR's "[[WritersCannotDoMath oh dear, maths]]" moments and that the pound value of wizarding money should be much higher. There is a scene in Chamber of Secrets where Harry sees the Weasleys vault at Gringotts, which is almost empty and contains only a single Galleon and a small pile of Sickles. The Weasleys are poor, but not ''that'' poor.
88** There are a lot of children being supported by only one paycheck. I don't think it's that odd that the Weasleys, while not being destitute, don't have the extra money to put away in their vault all that often. That just means that they use up nearly all of Arthur's paycheck each month.
89** Perhaps, over time, wizards and goblins accumulated most of the world's gold, devaluing it in their communities.
90** My pet theory is that the wizards fixed the exchange rate at some point in the medieval period (before the Spanish devalued gold throughout Europe by bringing in huge amounts of plundered gold from South America), when five avoirdupois pounds of sterling silver to a gold coin the size of a Galleon was a high, but reasonable, exchange rate, and that the wizards, in their general bigoted conservatism, haven't bothered to adjust the exchange rate. There's probably a canon way to shoot that down, but it's my theory and I'm rolling with it.
91** TruthInTelevision: U.S. pennies are so worthless that they're not actually worth the metal they are made from, which is why it's now illegal to melt down pennies for profit.
92** They weren't always like that, though. And a lot of people are calling for their removal these days. It's acceptable to have an extremely low-denomination coin be worth less than the metal it is printed on, but the highest denomination coins? When there are no bills of higher worth to take up the slack? That's the stuff failed currencies are made out of.
93** Another theory is that goblins have figured out how to make coins (or other metal objects) that weigh virtually nothing. That way, if someone tries to sell them as gold to get some Muggle money, they wouldn't get anything for them because (to the immense confusion of all Muggles involved) a heaping sack of gold coins wouldn't even tip the scale. This isn't much of a stretch when you consider that goblins have figured out how to make things indestructible.
94** The idea that a Galleon is worth L5 is ludicrous in any case. Even at 1992 prices, can you imagine doing all your shopping with a large number of low-valued ''gold coins''?
95** Where is it canon that Galleons are pure gold?
96** Another thing to consider is that in the wizarding world, gold can be manufactured. Alchemy is a valid profession, and it's unlikely that the Philosopher's Stone is the only means that wizards have of turning metal into gold. Therefore, the value of gold is decreased.
97** Here's a little something: being an insular society in which gold is stored rather than working for itself via loans, and a society in which most things are produced the same way by the same people or their families since pretty much forever, they have nil or nigh-nil inflation, and had it for the past few hundred or more years too. Imagine a few hundred years' worth of no inflation and try to compare prices with what we have. So the rate of exchange doesn't truly matter because at most it just makes it exploitable ... that is, if you dare to try and cross the goblins, and that one galleon is worth more in the wizarding world than the 5 pounds it can be exchanged to are worth in the Muggle world. A few times more at the very least, and I wouldn't be surprised if the difference was even higher.
98** Anyways, IMO JK herself never really smoothed out the details of wizarding economy. Remember that one Galleon that the Weasleys had in their vault in [=CoS=]? Now compare that to Goblet of Fire, where Ron managed to save up more than ten Galleons from his pocket money over the summer vacation, & the twins managed to save some thirty seven Galleons ( and this was before the twins were shown selling their products to the students).
99
100[[/folder]]
101
102[[folder:Ginny as a Sue]]
103
104* Why does everyone treat Ginny as a Mary Sue? If you think about it, the vast majority of the Weasleys have Sue-ish factors. Bill is described as handsome, cool, and a past Head Boy, Charlie works with dragons, Percy is smart, EVERYONE loves Fred and George, and Ron... um... you get the idea.
105** Several factors. First and most obviously, Harry/Hermione shippers hate her for [[DieForOurShip ruining their ship]]. Secondly, in the fifth book, she rather suddenly went from "background ShrinkingViolet character" to "hey, I'm an ActionGirl now and I'm cool". Sure, the hints were there all along (standing up for Harry in Flourish and Blotts in ''Chamber'', etc.) and she couldn't be the cute little sister with the big crush forever, but the transition seemed really abrupt and it did come after the Great Three-Year Gap between books four and five. (For the record, I don't think she's a Mary Sue, but I do think Rowling could have handled her character better than she did.)
106** This troper would be willing to bet that most people fall under the second category, even Harry/Hermione shippers. But that's part of Rowling's staggering inability to write female characters in the latter books: The poor weak women can't survive without their men, the stickler for the rules is okay with cheating, Harry and Ron are still so immature that this Troper doesn't see how any self-respecting girl/woman in the series could be attracted to either of them, etc.
107** Where on Earth does Harry Potter depict "poor weak women"? Women are regularly depicted as equal to or superior to the men. If you mean relationships, the vast majority of relationship drama takes place among a few characters, the majority of which is simply the three protagonists and their high school romances.
108** Okay, something that people really need to keep reminding themselves of while reading the series: '''These characters are TEENAGERS.''' They're not supposed to act like Mature Adults; they're supposed to be teenagers in a high-stress, high-pressure situation, and they're going to act like teenagers in a high-stress, high-pressure situation. ''Especially'' when it comes to issues of the heart. To be honest, it's quite refreshing to read books in which teens act like teens. (Specifically to the above poster: Why Ginny and Hermione are attracted to guys like Harry and Ron is a good question. A similar question that crops up only all the time in RealLife is - why does ''anyone'' with a functioning brain fall for someone who insults them, beats them, or uses them for sex? The easiest answer is that people will do things for love [or what they think is love] that they wouldn't do for any other reason.)
109** Not having them act like fully grown adults is fine. Having them act ''completely opposite'' to the characters we've seen so far is not. Also, that explanation completely goes against what we saw in the epilogue. Relationships based on such unhealthy foundations (jealousy, laziness, etc) are probably not going to last 20 years without one of the parties ending up dead.
110** [[SarcasmMode Because no one ever changes over the course of twenty years or anything...]]
111** It's the not being shown the change that is annoying. Why did they change, what happened to cause it, how did affect them etc etc etc.. No, we just got a *bang" they're different now"...
112** Exactly. A lot of people seem to forget that each book chronicles an entire year of Harry's life. If book characters can fall irrevocably in love with someone at first sight, then how come Harry can't develop a crush on a girl over the course of seven months or so? And Harry didn't hang around Ginny all the time, so her character development HAD to take place offscreen. It's mentioned that she has long chats with Hermione about Harry, and that her advice was to, effectively, become an ActionGirl and get over him... which she does. It seems abrupt, yeah, but it's a good reflection of real life in that sometimes people we know change without us quite realising it.
113*** Why did Harry suddenly fall for Ginny? Love potions, perhaps? ;)
114** Ginny actually didn't turn suddenly into an action girl. She wasn't in Quidditch until almost half of the fifth book was finished (and given that at least 4 of her brothers were in the Quidditch team at some time, it was bound to happen), and Harry actually preferred someone other than Ginny (along with Neville and Luna) to join them in the [=DoM=].
115** It would have been nice if it was Lampshaded in-book.
116** Ginny didn't change at all, apart from getting over her tongue-tiedness around Harry. In the second book, Ron says, "You don't know how strange it is for her to be this quiet". She was never a ShrinkingViolet, she was always an ActionGirl.
117** ''"She was never a ShrinkingViolet, she was always an ActionGirl"'' No, all that example proves is that she had a gob on her that Harry never saw.
118** Exactly, to say that line proves she was always an ActionGirl is a stretch. It might merely mean that she was more talkative, or more of an outgoing GenkiGirl. And even then, that's probably still a stretch, as the aforementioned book stated that Ginny was emotionally vulnerable, having her own fears, insecurities and weaknesses, which allowed Riddle's diary to take control of her.
119** People seem to be taking the 'She suddenly become awesome' stuff out of context. Harry does rather suddenly find himself attracted to her, but iit's meant to be sudden and out of nowhere for him - because the books are from his perspective. But they do lay the groundwork for his sudden realisation in the previous books. Harry saw her only as one of his blushing fangirls until she relaxed around him. Book 5 is full of little hints at Harry's surprise that Ginny is no longer a little girl - surprise that she's dating someone, surprise that she's good at Quidditch and surprise at how effective she is in Dumbledore's Army. Plus she's fifteen when Harry realises SheIsAllGrownUp - and it's after he spends an entire summer hanging out with her more than he has in the past. Remember that in Book 6, he is only at Privet Drive for two weeks, and spends the rest of the time at the Burrow. Before he'd only ever been there for a couple of weeks at most - and Ginny rarely spent that much time with him. So after getting to know her, they became friends and he eventually fell for her. As for the other 'Sue' traits, what are there? Popularity - she's not any more popular than her twin brothers, Harry himself or Cho Chang, just seems to be a thing with Quidditch players. Talent - she's good at one particular spell and competent at everything else, a good flier but it's never drawn attention to. Beauty - Harry finds her pretty and so do a few others, but again no prettier than others like Fleur, Cho or any girl who gets described in flattering terms. As far as beauty goes, the book is from Harry's POV so of course he'll find her pretty. To sum it up, people who call her a Sue seem to be taking the 'Mary Sue as a character you don't like' approach.
120** Consider how a many sue has many attributes described but rarely shown. How they are often forced into situations they don't fit. How they are the best at everything and rarely have flaws. How the author really really wants you to like them. Consider Ginny. Fiery, nice, funny and with a sense of justice. Except that's not how she is written. That's how she is described. She snaps at other characters, mocks them, makes fun of them (Zabini, random students, Ron, Hermione), she calls people names like Phlegm or Looney Lovegood or calls them idiots and then gets mad at others for doing the same. Hexes them for things she too engages in. She is super pretty, it is mentioned more often than with Fleur and by detractors, is a great Quidditch player (because she somehow secretly practiced during the summer and wins the Quidditch cup but we didn't see that it we were told) and gets invited to a special club all by her own merit unlike others there. What merited this was her casting her famous bat bogey hex that we as readers have not seen once. She is inserted inorganically between character dynamics and of course is the only one who makes Harry feel good. Inorganically praised by random characters. She is also very funny, we are told many times. What kind of humour does she have? The kind that is at the expense of others. She is also said to be nice. Luna mentions it many times here and there apopro nothing. She is sharp because she figures out frankly obvious things before characters like Hermione or the professors. Also she shushed Madame Pomfrey while Pomfrey was crying because she was the only one who noticed Fawks sing. However is it’s not entirely what she does as much as the way the narrative responds to her behaviour. Little she does is perceived as wrong by the narrative and little of her flaws are mentioned at all. Harry’s recklessness is mentioned often, Ron’s tripping because of his insecurities is mentioned often, Hermione’s know-it-all attitude is mentioned often. It is abundantly clear that the author wants us to like her, but it is done very unsubtly. The way the narrative treats her is what makes her a mary sue.
121[[/folder]]
122
123[[folder:Bank security and lending]]
124
125* The goblin banks have customers store their money in what ''should'' be safety deposit boxes/rooms, which 1) forces the customers to ride through in the mine carts to withdraw or deposit money instead of doing it with a teller, and 2) makes it rather hard for the goblins to ''lend out the deposited money'', one of the primary functions of a bank. I sometimes wonder if one of the reasons for the repeated goblin rebellions is that the wizards force them to do banking in such a ''stupid'' manner.
126** It is entirely possible that the bank has safety deposit boxes ''as well as'' normal deposits. We just don't see the normal deposits. 2/3 of the vaults we have things that make perfect sense for them to be safety deposit boxes; the Lestranges' have a horcrux, and there was that other one with the Philosopher's Stone. The only one that raises eyebrows is the Potter vault. That one is a bit of a mystery. Maybe the Potters just wanted a vault for the novelty of it?
127** No, the Weasley family keeps their money as a pile of coins in a vault as well: in one of the books (the second one?) Harry rides in the mine-cart along with Molly and sees her taking some coins out of a vault.
128** The key here is the bank offers very tight security. The deeper the vault, the more protections are on it. Those that just want a place to store their money are probably few and far between, what with how many magical ways there are to break into a normal vault.
129** I put a guess a long time ago on the WMG page that the vaults are only had by very established families, such as the Blacks and Lestranges, and the ancestors of James Potter and Molly Weasley (nee Prewett). It's quite possible that the families have a single secure vault and individual members can have sort of checquing accounts on the side, like how Sirius was able to mail-order Harry's Firebolt despite being a wanted criminal and the only Black alive (Goblins just don't care about human politics that don't affect them as long as the mystical thumbprint is correct), that Harry was too young for a personal account, and that the Weasleys didn't want the hassle of validating a personal checque at every stop on Diagon Alley (especially because physical money is often a better reminder of how much you have left in a budget than a number on a page, when you're not dealing with particularly large numbers).
130** Two theories:
131** We don't really see how Gringotts works, aside from the vault system, their grave-robbing expeditions, and the fact that they exchange muggle money into wizarding currency. It is entirely possible that they have a system of Bank drafts you can use to pay, credits, investments, and the like. Still, it makes absolutely no sense to put their customers' money into individual vaults where it cannot be invested by the bank, used to hand out credits, etc. But then, it may be possible that the wizarding world does not do these kind of things and the goblins make most of their money by renting out secure vaults.
132** It is much more magical for Harry to take a wild cart ride, have a goblin open a huge vault door, and find a pile of gold than, let's say, walking up to the counter and getting an account statement that says "You own xx,xxx.yy Galleons". (You might also say that the whole thing is AwesomeButImpractical ;-) )
133** I had the following rant on the Philosopher's Stone page before it got deleted: "Gringotts bugs this troper, because it behaves nothing like a real bank does. In a real bank, most people have accounts, where they store their money. This is a ''loan'' to the bank, which invests their money in businesses (such as loans to home buyers) to make profit for itself. In exchange, the bank offers people a relatively safe place to keep their savings, give them interests, and gives them convenience (several bank locations, ATM's, online payments, etc...). It is important to note the reason they can do the latter is because the bank doesn't keep your ''original'' money; a bank account is just information, a number saying how much they owe you, and when you withdraw money they simply make that number smaller. Transferring information is much easier than transferring physical items. There ARE safe deposit boxes, which you pay to maintain and which keep your valuables in an specific and safe location, but the overwhelming majority of the bank's costumers deal with them in the above basis. However, Gringotts seems to be nothing '''but''' a collection of safe deposit boxes. Every wizard doing business with them has a vault, and can store whatever they please there. Whatever they store remains there; the galleons Harry sees when he arrives are the very same ones his parents deposited years ago, and other objects of value (such as the Philosopher's stone) can be stored in vaults. It is never stated how the bank earns its money or what profit it gains from providing this service to wizards, but it can be assumed they are paid for it (it's interesting to note the Potters' vault remained in use, but there are several explanations; maybe payments are or can be done several decades in advance, maybe the goblins take gold from the vaults at regular intervals, or maybe Dumbledore or some other person made the payments before Harry arrived to reclaim the vault). Every time they want to access their money, they must travel to Diagon Alley and bring their key. Thus the bank offers no convenience and no interest, instead simply serving as a safe place to store goods - any goods - in exchange for a fee. In short, Gringotts is not a real bank; it is a glorified storage compartment center."
134** In many parts of the world, most particularly the Islamic world, banking as we know it is illegal, and what they call banks are basically places you pay a fee to hold your money. They don't do anything like interest, compound, or simple, they don't loan money in the fashion we understand it. In fact, this is how actual banks used to act in the West before the Catholic Church's ban on collecting interest was lifted. It is a real bank - it's just not a ''modern Western-style'' bank.
135** That's a stretch; most of the Islamic world has normal modern banks, since they're sort of necessary for a modern economy. The rise of specifically Islamic banking is actually a fairly recent phenomenon, and in practice, while they don't pay or charge compound interest per se, they have similar mechanisms to reward people for depositing money with them (in the form of periodic gifts when the bank is profitable), and charging for loans -- for instance, a home loan takes the form of the bank purchasing the house while contracting with the buyer to sell it to them via periodic payments that include a mutually agreed-upon profit for the bank. The time value of money is too important a concept for banks not to charge for loans or reward savings, even if they don't do it directly by means of compound interest.
136** For a modern economy, yes. The wizarding world doesn't operate on modern economics: it's a very small society, insulted from the rest of the world, and is highly traditionalist to the point of being decades or ''centuries'' behind the times on certain aspects of technology and society (thanks to both bigotry against Muggles and magic meaning less need to advance technologically). The vast majority of purchases seem to be made with hard cash or exchange of valuables, and the economy of magical Britain has little to no interaction with any economies other than the (equally small or even tinier) economies of other magical communities worldwide.
137** Originally, when the Templars came up with the concept of a bank, the entire point was to keep your money safe and letting you take out said money at any city in Christendom with no handing out of interest involved (at that time, the bank client that pays for the bank services); the idea of the bank as investor came much later. Obviously, magical banking probably developed from the original bankers, and seeing that everyone can come to the bank magically in a literal blink of an eye, and ditched the second purpose of the banking system.
138** Who says that you have to move the money to make loans and transactions? That's why contracts were invented. When all the money that was available was big and heavy, IOUs and contracts were used to handle major transactions on a day-to-day basis, and the currency itself didn't make an appearance except at crucial points. That's how the modern gold supply tends to "move" - it changes owners, but it all sits in one location (like the New York Federal Reserve). The goblins could conceivably keep track of the transfers and move the physical gold every so often to reflect the end-of-month, end-of-quarter, or end-of-whatever balance.
139** Goblin culture is ''not'' like human culture (as seen by Harry Potter and friends getting into trouble during ''Deathly Hallows'' because the Goblins see the Sword of Gryffindor as belonging to them rather than to Hogwarts.) For all we know, the way Gringotts operates makes perfect sense to the goblins, and human wizarding society sees no point in trying to force them to change the system.
140** Or, perhaps, human wizarding culture ''did'' see a point to try to change them, or set up competing, less stupid banks...and six goblin rebellions later, says okay, whatever, we'll bank whatever stupid way you goblins want.
141** I'm no expert, but to me it seems highly unlikely that the goblins would entrust money that has been entrusted to them to a third party. It is, however, possible that Gringott's brokers loans rather than granting them outright. Someone comes to Gringott's and says "I would like to borrow money for X". Gringott's then sets up meetings with people who may be willing to lend money to other people for similar things, appraises your collateral or evaluates your business plan when relevant, evaluates your financial standing, suggests reasonable terms and draws up relevant contracts for a fee.
142** Remember, goblins think of property as the permanent possession of the manufacturer: if you receive it in trade, you're only ''borrowing'' it, you don't have the right to pass it on to anyone else. If that rule extends to minted coins, then it's likely that the goblins refrain from operating Gringotts as a lending bank because ''they'' don't have the right to hand over their customers' coins (which were already lent to their clients by the mint) to anyone else. They're just renting secure storage space.
143** Sounds just like a safe-deposit box to me. People put stuff in the safe-deposit boxes and the bank makes money some other way (or by charging on a per-use basis).
144
145[[/folder]]
146
147[[folder:Reading]]
148
149* How come that in a series that is credited with re-popularizing reading among the youth, ''no one ever reads?'' I mean, they read a lot of textbooks, of course, but I don't recall a mention of a single novel. The only prominent work of fiction is the Tales of Beedle the Bard in the last book (and it's only important because of the clues in it). And no other kind of fiction either: no theatre, no movies, no TV (they have radio, so why not). What do these people do in their free time, apart from sports and games?
150** This is most likely another call back to the British boarding school books that Harry Potter is (somewhat) based on. TV, Radio, and (to a lesser extent) reading aren't very popular.
151** It could be argued that Lockhart's books are more recreational literature than textbooks.
152** "Gilderoy Lockhart and the Wailing Werewolf of Wall". "Gilderoy Lockhart and the Bawling Banshee of Bath". "[[Literature/HarryPotterAndTheChamberOfSecrets Gilderoy Lockhart and the Hissing Herepton of Hogsmeade]]".
153** Still, they're purported to be nonfiction.
154** If you could do magic and entertain yourself any way you wanted, would you really be reading or watching tv? Also, we only see most of the wizards in school, when they're swamped with homework. We only see Harry in the summer, and judging from the Dursleys, I doubt there are any recreational books in the house. We see Ron and Hermione too, but they're mostly talking, playing Quidditch, and doing housework when we see them with time off. Also, I'm sure Hermione reads tons of fiction when she gets the chance.
155** ''"If you could do magic and entertain yourself any way you wanted, would you really be reading or watching tv?"'' Uh, yeah. I mean, I have access to a computer, right, so why do bother buying books when I could just write one myself? Well, I'm not the world's best storyteller (nor, I imagine, are most people), so I pay people that are good at it to tell me a story.
156** I’m a published writer and I still need to buy books to read, [[{{Pun}} because I know how my own stories end.]]
157** Writing can be personally fulfilling, but it is generally considered "work", not entertainment. There are people in the real world who never read books because they're glued to the tv. Surely there must be people in the Wizarding World who never read books because they prefer to screw around with magic spells.
158** If wizards could entertain themselves solely by doing magic, why would they need sports and games? And if Harry wanted to read books, he could buy them in the wizarding world - he has enough money for it. "they're mostly talking, playing Quidditch, and doing housework when we see them with time off" - well, that's what I'm talking about. I'm sure there are a lot of kids who don't read in their free time. But one would think Rowling wouldn't encourage this by portraying her heroes as such people. (By the way, I recall another passing mention of fiction, a comic book in Ron's room "The Adventures of Martin Miggs, the Mad Muggle" in book 2. But that's all.)
159** This troper would just like to point out that the sports they play ARE magic. You don't notice them playing a good ol' game of football now, do you?
160** Magic to them is electronics to us. We have the internet, videogames, ipods, phones, etc. Why would we need sports when we can literally do whatever we want in digital worlds?
161** And yet people still do sports in their free time. Just the fact that there are other options does not change the popularity of most pastimes.
162** "Recreational reading" =/= "Novels and comic books". There are ''lots'' of people who love reading both fiction and non-fiction but prefer the latter, usually because they enjoy learning. Also, what do you mean, "''no one ever reads''"?! [[SarcasmMode Snape has that really impressive library in his house just so he can show it off at the bitchin' parties he throws?]][[note]]Can I have a "holla" for all the book sluts who started fanning themselves when they saw Snape's sitting room in the movie, and ''not'' just because Alan Rickman was sitting in it![[/note]] Tom Riddle was reading when Dumbledore met him at the orphanage, Ron buys Harry a book for Christmas one year and Harry's shown reading it at least once, Hermione's always got her nose in a book, and so has Dumbledore. [[RunningGag And [=McGonagall=], once she's done picking them up, I'm sure.]]
163** There's nothing saying that they never read. True, it's never mentioned that they do, but it's also not explicitly said that they don't. It's entirely possible that Harry spends his summers reading novels. It's just not mentioned because it's not important to the plot. It's the same as people complaining that nobody on ''Series/{{Friends}}'' ever works. Well of course they work, it's just not shown because it's (usually) irrelevant to the plot. Remember that only bits and pieces of what's going on are actually detailed in the books. The author leaves out lots of mundane details of the day that aren't important to the story. This could very well be the case for recreational reading in Harry Potter.
164** It also barely ever mentions people going to the bathroom or bathing/showering, but are we expected to believe they were holding it in and never washing for seven years? Things that aren't relevant to the plot tend to not be mentioned.
165** This. What we be the purpose of writing "And then Harry lay on his bed and read a good book for a few hours"? That's incredibly boring to read, and doesn't advance the plot or provide the reader with any sort of enjoyment. And people are mentioned reading recreationally. Hermione gets books out of the library "for a bit of light reading", and just because they're history books and therefore educational doesn't mean they aren't recreational.
166** The point here is that the Harry Potter series supposedly got an entire generation back into reading, and yet the title character isn't into reading. The 'Friends' analogy is useless, because that's an adult show that isn't hailed as being something that sends a good message to kids. And it's not that hard to sneak in a line that tells us Harry has been reading. "Exhausted, Harry grabbed ''The Great Misadventure of X and Y'' and read some of the entertaining book before going to sleep". "The situation Harry was in was rather odd, and it reminded him of something that had happened in the book ''X and Y's Clash of Minds''". "It was incredibly boring, and at that moment Harry wished he were somewhere comfortable reading the ''The Extraordinary Escapades of X''".
167** If anything, that seems to enforce the prior point of talking about reading books being boring. Yes, it might have been nice to do once, but for me, constantly referencing other books would tend to ruin the tone the books are painting. He was shown reading Qudditch through the Ages in the first book, but had it confiscated, and that was I believe the last time we saw him reading for his own enjoyment outside of the Half-Blood Prince's book.
168** Why would people be reading fiction, exactly, when there are real life fantasy creatures and warriors having adventures like the ones Gilderoy Lockhart Obliviated. It would be far more awesome to read about adventures that really happened than to read about something some random schmuck thought up.
169** The same reason People read Creator/TomClancy novels in RealLife, the fact that similar things actually happen doesn't make it any less entertaining.
170** I wouldn't call Quidditch Throughout the Ages the most necessary book. And if I'm not mistaken, Harry does mention that he'd rather be reading it than something else (I can't rember what right now; sorry). Also, doesn't Ron give Harry a book called "12 failproof ways to charm a Witch"? (Again might not be the exact wording.)
171** The Quidditch book and Ron's book don't count, because they're nonfiction. A lot of nonfiction books are mentioned; when I asked the original question, I was talking about novels.
172** Why are you discounting anything that's isn't fictional? I know your original question was worded as them not reading fiction, but the way you worded it you act as if getting enjoyment out of reading nonfiction doesn't matter or count or something. The characters are shown to read recreationally, why should the fact that they're reading nonfiction mean that it doesn't matter as much as fiction?
173** Well, it's not just that characters don't read, but that the wizarding world doesn't seem to have any fiction aside from the Tales of Beedle the Bard. For that matter, Hogwarts teaches nothing about culture: no literature class, no music class, no visual arts class. Harry and Hermione never heard of the tales after spending years in the wizarding world, even though they're as popular for wizards as Grimm's fairy tales for us.
174** Maybe it's a case of TruthInTelevision? I love reading, I could (and I do sometimes) spend my whole day reading. However, not during the school/college terms, because I had/have a lot of reading to do there anyways, and reading a book for my pleasure feels like procrastinating.
175** If the characters think a book is way more interesting than the plot they are in, why am I not reading that book instead?
176** LawOfConservationOfDetail. The characters aren't depicted reading for pleasure constantly because it's not important to the plot or world building. A few mentions are made, but whining that they "don't count because it's not a fiction book" or "it's not enough" is showing a massive lack of understanding of how fiction ''works''. You don't include a lot of unnecessary details and show every hobby for every character because it gets boring and fills up a lot of pages with useless content. It's the same as wondering why no character ever bathes because you never see them taking a shower. Do you really think that anything that doesn't occur in the pages doesn't exist, no matter how obvious it should seem?
177** Harry and Hermione both read non-fiction rather than novels for a very good reason: they were both ''raised by Muggles'', so have so much still to learn about the realities of wizarding life outside of Hogwarts' walls that, when they have time to read for pleasure, they might as well read some non-fiction and thus become more informed about the world they've found themselves immersed in. Muggle novels are probably not something they can easily relate to anymore - if you think it's hard to sit through a horror movie wondering why the characters never bring a flashlight, how easy would it be for a Hogwarts student to read a detective story without wondering what's so perplexing about a LockedRoomMystery? - and the ''last'' thing they'd want to read from a wizarding library is a book from the Fiction section, in which they'd be hard-put to tell a HistoricalInJoke or genuine piece of wizard pop-culture from something the author made up from scratch.
178** The wizarding world is incredibly literate. Don't forget that the British wizard community has a thriving daily newspaper that's widely read (to the point where Molly Weasely reads Rita Skeever's gossip column) in addition to its alternate, tabloid papers. There's also weekly magazines (Witch Weekly), sports periodicals (Which Broomstick, which Oliver Wood was seen reading more than once), and popular biographicals (Challenges in Charing, which did the commemorative profile of Dumbledore after his death). Now you may have been focused on the number of ties the characters in the books read fictional novels, but there's more to literacy than "enjoys fiction."
179** Incredibly literate? Ha! There's a difference between a person being able to read and write and a society being literate. To item: ONE newspaper to speak of- and a newspaper so blatantly biased a prone to whimsical speculation that another newspaper would have sprung up in any literate society. A series of "biographical" novels by Professor Lockheart, containing exploits so ludicrous any experienced wizard would immediately discredit it as fiction. Absolutely no form of curriculum at Hogwarts instructing children in writing or reading comprehension, nor arts and music. Wizarding Britain, while obviously able to read and write, is incredibly illiterate, swallows whatever propaganda the Ministry puts out or whatever it is they read in a book, and unable to create something to contribute to their own culture.
180*** Sounds a lot like... the real world.
181** Some people fail to see that the books are a satire of British society and modern western societies in general. In real life we have news media that spread lies and propaganda and people buy it, governments manipulating information and people believing it (Iraq’ weapons of mass destruction, anyone?), celebrities writing “biographical” books full of exaggerations that, again, people believe, etc. Yes, it is done in a somewhat over the top comedic way but is still a satiric representation of real life situations. And yes, public education in most western countries is very deficient. Most people do believe stuffs without criticism and often thing something is real just because they read in Internet. So if the wizarding world is “illiterate” is because the real world is illiterate.
182** Your logic fails, OP, in that no one reads books just for the fact that they're books; it's for the stories that you can experience by reading them. Any book that's centered around glorifying other books (like say, ''Inkheart'' does) rather than telling an engaging story isn't going to hold anyone's attention for very long.
183[[/folder]]
184
185[[folder:Lily and Voldemort]]
186
187* It always puzzles me why Lily Potter screamed and cried and begged Voldemort to kill her "instead." Did she actually know that she was pulling a BatmanGambit, or was it a lucky break? If not, her pleas were idiotic because nothing would stop Voldemort from going ahead and killing Harry anyway. And even assuming she did know, what did she stand to lose by going MamaBear and trying to beat Voldemort to death with a pole lamp or something?
188** She was a mother pleading for the life of her child. Anyone ever hear of Sharon Tate? What happened to Lily had its parallels in real life. Sick real life.
189** I dunno, her actions indicate that she must have known something about the power of a sacrifice. Otherwise, you'd think she would have tried to fight him off. By all accounts, she was a pretty accomplished witch and she might have been able to hold her ground for a bit.
190** I don't recall, did she have a wand to hand? Without one, it seems like she wouldn't have many options.
191** It's stated in Deathly Hallows that Lily (as well as James) was indeed wandless.
192** To the OP of this: What could Lily have done? Maybe she knew she didn't have time to grab a nearby weapon and start beating Voldemort with it. That, and she probably knew it would have been futile anyway. May as well die with dignity. :/
193** In this troper's opinion, it's more dignified to go out fighting than to beg.
194** Well, for one, Lily's probably desperate. Besides, Voldemort DID give her the chance to survive, maybe she thought that if she allows Voldy to kill her instead, he won't kill her son?
195** She's a mother who loves her son. She probably knew Voldemort wouldn't spare him, but it's not like she wasn't going to try. Besides, it really would suck to have your one year old son killed while you're still alive and didn't really do anything to try to save him.
196** Honestly, I assumed from the beginning that since the term Charm was used instead of Spell, that something was up (added with how quickly everything seemed to happen concerning getting Harry out and how etc. before it was all revealed). When it came to light Lily was amazing with Charms, it made sense she was stalling for time. Now after reading the books as a mother I've changed my view that she knew about this specific charm and made damn sure she did what it took- offering herself. Worse that would happen is it failed, but she was wandless so that was nearly a given. Second worse would be both her and Harry dying, and third worse is what happened- she offered herself, and harry survived along with the spell. The thought about it being an accidentally charm is confusing to me, can someone explain?
197** Also! Serves to note the theory that Snape told Lily about asking for her survival. If that happened, then she knew there was a chance that Voldemort would give her the chance to escape, leading her to enough time to learn how the spell worked and knowing that if Voldemort *did* give her the option she could deny it thus protecting Harry (because dying when attacked wouldn't have been a sacrifice. she would have died. Offering her life *anyway* knowing she would die would be the sacrifice needed)
198** Do note that Voldemort was going to let her walk free but with the knowledge that her son would die, and if she fought he'd just take the offer back and kill them both. She wanted for her child to survive, so though it was a fairly stupid option, begging him was the best one she had.
199
200[[/folder]]
201
202[[folder:House elves and laundry]]
203
204* So if handing a house elf clothes sets them free, are house elves allowed to handle their master's laundry, or does that have to be entrusted to someone else? Or is there enough leeway between "give" and "wash" so as not to give credence to loopholes?
205** I'm pretty sure that the laundry was handled by the wizards in the house, much to their displeasure (though I wouldn't put it past the Malfoys to hire a servant just to magically clean their laundry). I recall Dobby stating something along the lines of "They made sure not to pass me so much as a sock." So, it seems that the House Elf's master(s) could free them even unintentionally, with the mistake of giving them any form of clothing. Remember, in Chamber of Secrets, Harry tricks Lucius into freeing Dobby; obviously he wasn't actively saying or thinking, "This is to free Dobby". So, the wizard doesn't even have to know there is clothing to hand it over.
206** I think that the clothes have to be physically handed to the house elves by their masters. So the family can just put the clothes in a laundry basket and then ask the house elves to wash them. Otherwise, whenever the masters ask the house elves to clean a room, they would have to go through the whole thing first to make sure there aren't any clothes not in the right place.
207** Then Hermione's plot to free the elves by hiding self-knit hats in Gryffindor tower would not have worked and the elves would not have refused to clean there. All in all, the "clothes rule" does not really make sense.
208** I had assumed the elves were just insulted by Hermione's tactic, so they refused to clean there. I never once thought that she had the authority or ability to accidentally free a house elf using this tactic. After all, the only reason Dobby was freed was because Lucius Malfoy dropped the diary with a sock and Dobby got it, twisting the rule to his advantage.
209** I always thought that handing a house elf clothes simply gives the elf the ''option'' to leave, and they can choose to accept or reject the option; since a vast majority of the house elves we've seen are happy with their lot in life, one can probably freely hand them clothes without fear of them skipping off. In ''Goblet of Fire'', Crouch hands Winky clothes and has to follow it up with a explicit order of dismissal. So the only people who need to be careful about clothing are those with really rebellious elves. Hermione's ploy to free the elves was probably more insulting than actually effective.
210** If it only gave them the option to be freed, what's the point? Why couldn't Crouch just order her to leave if it didn't break the binding? And I still don't see why Hermione thought she COULD free the house elves even if she shoved socks into their hands. She is a student. She is not an owner or part-owner of any of the elves. Maybe the other faculty members could free elves, but I'm inclined to think that's just something the Headmaster can do.
211** "Why couldn't Crouch just order her to leave if it didn't break the binding?" Tradition maybe? Logically, there's really no reason why giving clothes to a house elf should, in and of itself, set them free. They're just clothes. For that matter, there's no logical reason for house elves to eschew clothes in the first place. I therefore surmise that the house elf/clothes connection is nothing but an ancient tradition whose origins have been lost to time, not any kind of real binding magical contract or anything. Giving a house elf clothes is ''symbolic'' of setting them free.
212** But there is a magical bond between a house elf and its master that has to be broken somehow for an elf to be set free. We know there's a tangible bond because Kreacher was able to get out of Voldy's cave when Regulus summoned him. Presumably a house elf's obligation to punish itself for disobeying an order is also part of the bond. I always assumed that somehow the giving of clothes somehow broke it literally as well as symbolically, otherwise how could Lucius have accidentally set Dobby free?
213** I'm not sure there is much of a difference between symbolic and literal when it comes to magic. Dobby was able to interpret, inside his own head, that he had been 'given clothing' and hence was free. Other elves who did not want to be free presumable would be able to interpret being randomly handed a sock as 'Master wants me to hold his sock for him.', not 'Master has given me a sock, and freed me.'. Which is why Crouch explicitly states what he's doing with Winky, so it can't be misconstrued. Think of house elves as [[LiteralGenie Literal Genies]]...they must follow orders, but the normal ones follow general intent and probably don't need many orders, whereas Dobby managed to twist his master's 'orders' to freedom. (And my theory is that he does the same thing later to teleport into Malfoy Manor. He was 'freed', but not explicitly 'fired' or 'banned', and thus he still has whatever teleport privileges he had earlier.)
214** I also don't know whether a house elf could do laundry, though the masters could just tell them to do the laundry instead of saying take the clothes. It would seem to be a tricky thing, though. Hogwarts house elves did the laundry, but as was stated, students giving them clothes wouldn't necessarily free them, showing Hermione's ignorance. Dobby was freed by Lucius accidentally. All Lucius did was to toss Harry's sock that was wrapped around the diary and Dobby caught it.
215** Perhaps there's a loophole that the clothes can't be their master's. The clothes have to be someone else's for the law to work, meaning the Elves could do the laundry without worrying. Or the whole thing could be up to interpretation. If the Elf knows their master is giving them laundry to do, they know they're not being dismissed. But they can interpret being given clothes as a dismissal if they want (and Dobby is the rare exception who wants to leave his master).
216** Hogwarts' house-elves don't seem to have a human master at all, but instead regard ''the school itself'' as their "master". Notice that they didn't leave the school ''en masse'' when Headmaster Dumbledore did, or transfer their servitude to Aberforth when he died. Rather, they serve the ''institution'' which is Hogwarts, no matter who's in charge at the moment. Presumably they can't be freed if anyone except the incumbent Headmaster gives them clothing, and even the Headmaster would need to specify that the clothes are being granted ''on Hogwarts' behalf'', not handed over because Albus D. needs his underpants washed.
217*** At least when it comes to the subplot in Book 6, Dobby says that Hermione's hats for the elves are seen as insulting by the elves themselves. Hermione might not have the authority to set them free, but they understand what she's trying to do and feel offended by it.
218** Here's a more mundane suggestion: washing baskets. Wizards who have House Elves put their clothes in a washing basket, and the elf understands that this means laundry and not sacking.
219[[/folder]]
220
221[[folder:Punishing the Dursleys]]
222
223* Why aren't the Dursleys punished for what they did to Harry at some point? Okay, revenge isn't exactly nice, but they abused him practically the whole time he lived there. So at least some payback would not only be in order, but downright mandatory.
224** You're complaining because the hero was able to show restraint and ''not'' abuse his power?
225** Is it abusing one's power if the target deserves it? Being kept in a cupboard, starved, beaten by his cousin's gang... In most jurisdictions, it is a crime to neglect and/or abuse a child, yet they seem to get away scot-free.
226** What exactly are you looking for here? Dudley gets a pig tail that they have to surgically remove, Vernon's sister gets blown up like a balloon and nearly floats away, Dobby pooches Vernon's big business deal, their house gets invaded by owls repeatedly, Dudley's soul nearly gets eaten by a Dementor, and they have to flee their own home and live on the run for all of Book 7. It would have been nice to have Harry throw some of their abuse back in their faces, but they did take their share of lumps. Um hello? Doesn't any realize that the entire reason Dudley got fat is "Karma" abuse to the Dursleys (for not treating Harry like a son). I wish we could see exactly what was in that letter Dumbledore left for them (Petunia especially)
227** First of all, exactly how many of those are intentional on the part of any of the protagonists? For it to be payback, you have to be fully aware of what you're doing, and do it ''with'' the intent to hurt/get revenge on the other party. Otherwise it's just karma.
228** Karma and payback go almost hand in hand. Even if it's unintentional, Harry would still be happy to know that the Dursleys are suffering.
229** No he wouldn't. That would completely go against all the CharacterDevelopment he had in the series. And at the risk of sounding preachy, I'm going to point out that in real life, [[RevengeTropes hurting someone because "they deserve it"]] is still wrong. It just makes you a cruel person as well. Besides, why does Harry even ''need'' payback? He gets to live a life of adventure and excitement. The Dursleys are destined to live dull lives in suburbia.
230** And torturing someone who was nasty to your teacher '''wouldn't''' go against said character development? That's not hurting someone solely because "they deserve it"?
231** Why do people insist that Harry was serious when he said he attacked Amycus because he disrespected [=McGonagall=]? Neville explicitly told the trio that the Carrows had been actively torturing students all year. If we know anything about Harry, it's that he has a bit of a hero complex. He feels guilty for not being there when his friends needed help. Amycus should've got far worse than a quick blast of the Cruciatus Curse.
232** It didn't even seem to be a full ''Crucio''; it just hurled Amycus backwards. it didn't drop them to the floor screaming in pain. Besides, personally, if I was a wizard in a fight, I'd just scream the first spell which came to mind, and be hard pressed not to accidentally AK the enemy. Harry's thinking of Amycus torturing students, the Cruciatus Curse springs to mind, and BAM!
233** Alright, I have an inverse problem - what is the deal with Dursleys? I'm trying not to see their characterisation and very existence as a terrible error, but I can't really find a good excuse (or any, for that matter). They start a bit extreme, but as part of a standard fairy-tale-like "evil stepmother" deal. This is fine. But they progressively get worse, past extreme, past over-the-top, well past ridiculous. They hate Harry with a passion that can't be explained by the fact that they consider him a freak, that they are afraid of him, and that they regard him as an unwanted burden. They really, really go out their way to abuse him. And it actually gets even more inexplicable later(!). We are given a HandWave that Mrs. Dursley is resentful about her sister and that Dursleys abuse Harry because of their fear and resentment for wizards. It is implied, strongly, that at one point they just try to pretend he doesn't exist as much as possible. Why, then, their downright bizarre Christmas "gifts"? It's not that they just send him crappy gifts (which they shouldn't, because they are said to want to forget Harry even exists). They send him stuff like napkins, toothpicks, and used socks. This is ridiculous and looks like an exceedingly cruel mockery and insult. It's far, far worse than giving no gift at all. So, to sum it up: their behaviour is extremely grotesque. It seems hard to find an explanation for it other than it being a childish fantasy about evil, evil step-parents, but taken to proportions that would make Cinderella wince. Given the message of the books (Muggles are not that bad, and wizards are sometimes silly in their ignorance about them, to the point where they behave stupidly just because of their aloofness and arrogance), the fact that the only Muggles we get to see are too over-the-top for even parody... it seems kind of strange, and difficult to explain. Also, no evil wizard could possibly be worse for Harry's well-being than Dursleys, the way they are shown mid-way through the series. They act positively psychotic, they could kill him in his sleep for all we know. Is there any reason or explanation for this other than Rowling being uncharacteristically Anvilicious about the "bad guys"? Nothing else in the series turns out to be THIS black-and-white.
234** About the presents, I read on another JBM page that it was [[WordOfGod implied in an interview]] that every Christmas, Hedwig would go to the Dursleys and harass them until they gave her something to take back to Harry, even if it was something crappy like a tissue.
235** Ok, hands down, that one deserves Hedwig a place on the SugarWiki/HeartwarmingMoments section.
236** Really, I think the Dursleys are only bearable ''because'' their behavior is so over-the-top, unrealistically violent. If Jo had toned them down, it would have been much less "ha-ha, stupid Dursleys" and more "HOLY FUCK! WHERE'S CHILD SERVICES WHEN YOU NEED THEM?!?!?!" We got a glimpse of toned-down (and much, much scarier) parental abuse in [=OotP=], when Harry accidentally saw Snape's memory of his father yelling at his mother. It was horrible for the half-sentence of page time it got, simply because [[TruthInTelevision it happens far too often in far too many houses in the real world]]; why on ''Earth'' would anyone wish for two or three chapters of ''each book'' to be devoted to that? Also, notice that the older Harry gets, the less afraid of the Dursleys he is, despite the fact that they get more and more over-the-top as the series goes on. In the first two books, he's a little kid and hasn't seen some of the horror that exists outside Number 4 Privet Drive, so the Dursleys are legitimately scary. By the third book, Harry has faced down and defeated Voldemort twice, so Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia don't appear to him as much more than bags of hot air (notice this is the first book where he actually mouths off to Vernon's face?) and Dudley is a minor, if persistent, annoyance. Harry only gets less and less afraid of them from there, until Book 7, where he carries on an entire conversation with him in which he's nothing less than sarcastic and condescending the whole time. It's probably an allegory for overcoming your fears, as much as anything else in the books.
237** My issue is specifically with Aunt Petunia. It's revealed in ''Deathly Hallows'' that the reason she hates the magical world is that as a kid she was jealous that she wasn't a witch and that jealousy turned into bitterness and eventual hatred over the years. Even so, don't you think that she'd be at least a little bit sad that her sister died? Just a teeny tiny bit? I can see jealousy over wizardry being a reason not to talk to someone for years, but to show such open apathy over their death feels like a severe {{moral event horizon}}.
238** Unless, [[AlternateCharacterInterpretation of course]], she was hiding how she felt about her sister ''because'' of the hatred-turned-jealousy, burrowing it down inside of herself until she didn't think about it much at all. Granted, that's not really a good way to live, but...
239** Or she may have reacted with far more sadness originally, but has had many years since to put her initial grief behind her, while her bitterness festered. As for her reaction to Harry turning up on the doorstep in the first place, we don't actually see Petunia's personality in that scene, only Vernon's, and at that point the Dursleys aren't even aware that the Potters have died until (presumably) they read Dumbledore's note.
240** Harry's situation may not have been told to the Muggle Child Services, but there are wizards - decent adult wizards - who know of how he is being treated. I get that the wizarding bureaucracy is rather incompetent, and Dumbledore knows about the spell keeping him safe, and Sirius is on the run and helpless to be his godson's new guardian, but you would think that Molly or Arthur Weasley, given that they were told that the Dursleys were starving Harry, would do something more than offer to let him stay with them for the summer. Is there no one they can report this to? Once again, not the Muggle Child Services, but given that it's famous Harry Potter, you'd think it would be easier to get the wizard government to intervene, even if they have non-interventionist ideas about private family matters. Maybe Dumbledore told them about the spell, given that they are members of the Order, but they don't seem to have been too heavily involved in that until Voldemort's return.
241** How about Sirius? I can mentally picture him standing there firing hexes at the Dursleys and screaming something about how he's already got the Dementor's Kiss waiting for him if he's ever recaptured, so why the hell not? I mean, what ''are'' they going to do, send him to Azkaban?
242** Um, guys? You do know why Harry was living with the Dursleys in the first place? It was because ''regardless'' of how badly they treated him, they were his only living blood relatives, and therefore they continued on Lily's whole HeroicSacrifice blood protection thing. Yes, living with Sirius or the Weasleys would probably have been pleasanter for Harry psychologically, but this way he was permanently protected from Voldemort attacks while on the property. Guaranteed. I assume that even if there ''was'' some way to remove Harry, Dumbledore would have interfered somehow in order to keep him where he was safest, if not happiest.
243** Solution: Petunia and Vernon go to jail for child abuse and neglect, and Dudley AND Harry go to live with the Weasleys, Tinks, Sirius, or your guardian of choice here. Dudley has Lily Potter's blood in him, same as his mother, so the protection is intact. What's wrong with that as a solution?
244** What bugs me about the Dursleys' behavior is that they're so convinced that magic is an unbearable source of shame, that they think it's better for everyone to believe they have a ''dangerous criminal'' for a nephew than a wizard. They actually claim that they're sending Harry to a reform school rather than Hogwarts. Yet wouldn't most people conclude that raising a kid who needs to go to such a school is, in itself, a black mark against the Dursleys as parents?
245** The Dursleys are abusers. Real-life abusive parents will frequently make their own children out to be dangerous criminals, so that any attempt to fight back or escape will be twisted into a tales of criminal behavior. Harry spends the books either locked in a bedroom (and in the first book, the cupboard) or away at school- he has no way to defend himself against the Dursleys' allegations, and if he tried to correct anyone's beliefs that he was a criminal, the Dursleys could just as easily say that he's a pathological liar (which I'm pretty sure they do at one point). It's a very common tactic to isolate the victim and prevent them from ever getting help, and a way to deflect suspicion of abuse. Again, it happens frequently in real life, children are often found chained up or locked in rooms or even ''cages'' but when the parents claim it was because of the child's wild behavior, many news readers not intimately familiar with the case will defend them. Yes, it's disgusting, but that's ''exactly'' why Harry is never removed from Number Four by Muggle authorities nor are Vernon and Petunia ever called on it my any Muggle relatives or neighbors.
246** As for Wizard authorities/allies, nobody seemed to know of his treatment until Hagrid came to pick him up, except Dumbledore, who I don't think even knew the full extent of the abuse until later. It's very likely that Dumbledore absolutely hated himself for sending Harry to such an abusive home for any length of time during Harry's years at Hogwarts once he did know, but still didn't have a choice because of the protective magic keeping Harry alive. At least Harry gets to run off to the Burrow after, like, a week or so in later books.
247** So why not punish Petunia and Vernon in some way, and take Harry AND Dudley away from them? As long as Harry lives in the same home as his cousin, he still satisfies the demands of the protection spell.
248
249** So I disagree with the idea that Harry should get revenge on the Dursleys, but I'm all for punishment (of Petunia and Vernon at least, I'm not sure how much you can really blame Dudley). I mean, they abused Harry, they should go to jail for child abuse.
250** Or, if not jail, at least someone from ''their'' world should've called them out on it. It's one thing for Dumbledore -- a wizard, hence someone they can always dismiss as a "weirdo" and opt not to listen to -- to chew them out, and quite another for their fellow-Muggles to do so ("You did ''what'' to your nephew? That poor kid! A wizard? I don't care if he's a space alien, you bastards locked up an eleven-year-old and starved him!").
251** Alternate theory: In the first book, they talk about "squashing it out of him." Perhaps they ''don't'' hate Harry as much as it seems, and they are trying to give him what they honestly see as the better life. Maybe if his eleventh birthday had passed without event, they would have eased up and things could have been salvaged a little, but when it didn't, they got desperate and started trying harder despite knowing they were bound to/had already failed, and it was a convenient way to vent whatever frustration they had in their lives that they were already used to. Love will make you do much worse things than hate, and it gives the Dursleys and the series another dimension. I will grant that the Dursleys kind of have to be hateful, bitter, narrow people anyway, but someone can be hateful and bitter and narrow without being cartoon evil. I will also grant that there's no canon evidence for this, but I'll chalk that up to a) it's a children's series, and thus I don't expect moral ambiguity, and b) JK seriously sucks at writing believable villains (seriously, ask any fanfic writer/roleplayer who tries to write from the villain standpoint. It's nearly impossible to do without just giving up and doing it ForTheEvulz).
252** Another theory: Dumbledore, through Harry's life, ''has'' been intervening and keeping hidden from Harry. The Dursleys slip some abuse beneath the radar, though: Dumbledore's not omniscient.
253** Theory not tenable. In the beginning of book 6 Dumbledore tells the Dursleys "[Harry] has never known anything but neglect and cruelty at your hands." Dumbledore ''did'' know what was going on, and ''still left Harry there''.
254** The logistics required to take away both Harry AND Duddley (in order to kept the blood protection thing running) probably would be enormous even for wizards. It will require to magically brainwash the Dursleys, and don’t forget, they also have families, friends and neighbors that know of the existence of Duddley (like Vernon’s sister) so some elaborate excuse for them to not having their son around would have to be created. Also you’ll have to give both Harry and Duddley to some wizard family and I doubt Duddley will be a nice adoptive kid to raise. And, as said before, sadly you do need more than what the Dursleys did for child services to take away a kid, probably for wizards’ standard is the same, so to make all this elaborate scheme that requires so many time and resources just what happens to him wasn’t still enough. I’m pretty sure that if the Dursleys were, for example, beating up Harry or something like that, then would have intervene.
255** Well Dumbledore is quite old. So he is technically from a time where what we would consider child abuse was more accepted. In the 40s and 50s there was strong emphasis on obeying your parents and discipline for misbehaving. Spanking for instance was still seen as somewhat acceptable even as late as the 80s. He may not have realised just what Harry had faced at the Dursleys' hands until he actually met him - or at least what kind of effect it had. His reluctance to tell Harry the prophecy could have been borne from realising just what Harry has gone through already because of his actions, and him eventually calling out the Dursleys for their behaviour in Book 6 could come from some HeelRealization.
256** And by the end of Book 5, a good portion of members from the Order of the Phoenix basically threaten Vernon and Petunia to behave themselves or else they ''will'' intervene. You'll notice that in the next book, Dumbledore has Harry taken away from there after only two weeks of the summer holidays - possibly as a way of making it up to him for forcing him to stay there all the previous years.
257* A wrench in the 'punish Petunia and Vernon, take Dudley to live with Harry' idea is that every time Dumbledore brings up the spell protecting Harry he brings up Petunia specifically and how the spell only worked in the first place because she chose to take him in. Petunia and Harry are Lily's direct blood relatives, Dudley is likely not enough to keep the magic going since he's just a cousin.
258[[/folder]]
259
260[[folder:Born wizards]]
261
262* What's up with the 'wizards are born not made business'? It sounds something a racial eugenics doctor came up with!
263** And the problem is? The way JKR defined her 'world', the ability to control magic is based on a genetic trait, like e.g. hair color. If it were just a matter of learning, it would be a wholly different world: no {{Masquerade}}, no FantasticRacism... Overall, the whole plot of the series would not make sense any more, as the main reason for the war is said racism.
264** A lot of things are determined in large part by genetics at birth, like height or intelligence. Why should it be surprising if magical ability is, too? What seems odder to me is that there seems to be a bimodal distribution of inherent magic ability, with most people being Muggles (no magic ability).
265** The wizard gene is recessive, which explains the significant amount of Muggleborns. Squibs come about because somehow inbreeding makes the gene more easily mutated.
266** Indeed — somehow, wizard genes remain an extreme minority, yet clearly are dominant (nearly all half-wizards are fully magical themselves). [[WritersCannotDoMath Go figure…]]
267** Well, actually it is quite possible that magic is a dominant trait. A trait can be dominant but still rare. Dominant just means, if you have the gene, you're going to show the trait. That doesn't mean that the gene is very ''common'', however. For example, it is theorized that the genotype for having six fingers is actually a dominant gene. The gene in question still happens to be incredibly rare, so unless you have the gene in the first place, you won't be born with six fingers. With the magic gene, only a few humans have it, but those that do have a very high chance of passing it to their offspring. In the case of Squibs, they were just unfortunate enough not to get the magic gene, therefore they show no magic qualities.
268** Given the propensity that wizards and witches in the series seem to have for messing themselves up with botched spells, getting maimed by magical creatures they're trying to wrangle, or being killed outright in covert civil wars against the latest Dark Lord, one could argue that magical ability is being selected ''against'', not selected for. Consider how many Muggle deaths vs. how many wizarding deaths take place in the seven years of the series, and then ask yourself if natural selection is really on the "magic gene"'s side.
269** The problem with this, however, is the fact that we've been told that all 'Muggleborns' are actually descended from squibs at some point so it's not like all of the Muggleborns have the same DNA mutation that their ancestors didn't have. If that were the case then they wouldn't need to be descended from Squibs. It has to be recessive because there ''was'' magic in their line somewhere and yet their parents themselves didn't have magic.
270** This troper doesn't know much about genetics, so feel free to tell me how wrong I am, but I was thinking that because the wizards have such a separate society, only a tiny minority would marry Muggles (I don't like the series, agree wholeheartedly with most of the stuff on this page, and find it very difficult to get 'inside' a world which just ''makes no sense whatsoever'', but I would say that this one might be explicable.) So most wizards would have two magical parents and there would be a high proportion who had two dominant magic alleles, which would account for the fact that most half-wizards had a magical gene - one parent has two dominant alleles = all children have at least one dominant allele. Okay, that's the amateur genetics explanation, you can disagree now.
271** Two other possibilities. First, genetics isn't so simple as dominant/recessive. It may be that magical ability in the Potterverse requires some combination of genes, which is why it acts kind of dominant (noticeably runs in families) and kind of recessive (can pop up in children of parents who don't have it themselves.) Wizards wouldn't understand this, since they simply haven't studied genetics as much as Muggles. The second possibility is WMG, and Fridge Horror: consider Memory Charms, Polyjuice, and magic like that. Perhaps there isn't really such a thing as Muggleborns, only Half-Bloods.
272** A surprising number of people have had this problem with the series… at some level, we bring to our books the assumption that "wizards" (in any context) are "better", so when we read that they are born-not-made, it [[UnfortunateImplications feels morally wrong]]. The whole point in the Potterverse, however, is that ''even though'' they are physically capable of more than Muggles are, they are ''not'' "superior" in a racial sense. If this makes sense: eugenics would be wrong even if it were right.
273** Well, wizards in the Potterverse are physically capable of a lot more than Muggles, so "superior" is a reasonable term for them. This is explicitly because of genetics, so "racial sense" applies. Potterverse wizards are not necessarily *morally* superior to Muggles--quite definitely not so, by most moral standards--but they are genetically superior to us. In the Potterverse, eugenics is "right" (meaning true or correct) even if it is "wrong" (has undesirable political or moral implications.) Though the Purebloods appear to be wrong in thinking that Purebloods are automatically more magically powerful than Half-Bloods or Muggleborns.
274** I always assumed that magical ability was less about genetics and more about pure luck. If you're born of muggles, it's just some sort of magic that comes out of nowhere and has nothing to do with genetics at all. As if there was just some sort of spare magic or something in the air that gravitated towards the parents of the soon-to-be born child and made them magical. If you're born of one or two magical parents, you're much more likely to take in this magic ability and be born with powers because it's more likely that this magic that floats around naturally is around the places you frequent (i.e. the magical world) and you have an easier time taking in this magic than some. Of course, in the case of Squibs or even some potential muggleborns or half-bloods, it could be that something within them or their genes makes it so that the magic doesn't take and they are left with no powers. In short, my idea is that your powers are "born-not-made", but it's not something about your genes or your parents, but something that is pretty freak and random. People have no control over it and can't learn it, but it's also not something that's passed down through DNA or something. It's just this weird aura that acts up sometimes and creates these witches and wizards.
275** "Born, not made" is ''meant'' to be an intentional comparison to real life bigotry. Discrimination against people who are a different race, homosexual, etc. come out because the person was born in a different way, not because they somehow chose to be different. Magic users are a minority that suffered from what were essentially hate crimes in the past and would likely be subject to similar bigotry and fear if TheMasquerade was dropped in modern society.
276** I agree that magic has to be mainly an environmental issue, because of the sheer randomness of wizard births; squibs being born to families that have been pureblooded for generations; muggleborns popping out of nowhere from families that have no connection whatsoever to the magical world; no consistency in the magical ability of half-bloods, purebloods, or muggleborns. Maybe there is some genetic factor, but overall, I don't think it's genetic. Of course, wizards are idiots and have probably never carried out any sort of study to prove or disprove any sort of theory, so...
277** And they probably don't care enough to go around proving or disproving theories as the scientific method can't be apply to magic anyway.
278*** Well, actually, it can. Even if magic doesn't follow the same laws of physics that ours does, the scientific method is basically, "form a hypothesis, find a way to test that hypothesis, analyze the results". It's still applicable, and it's the same way you would create a new potion or a spell. (Hypothesis: ground moon dust will have an aphrodisiac effect when added to sleeping draught. Experiment: add ground moon dust to sleeping draught, feed to cat, observe.) Just because magic doesn't follow the laws of physics, doesn't mean it doesn't have ''rules'' of some sort.
279[[/folder]]
280
281[[folder:Magical rarity]]
282
283* Why are magical creatures (including humans) so rare? They seem to be far more capable of surviving, yet evolution seems to have favored the non-magical creatures. In fact, it's apparently possible to duplicate food using magic. You'd think once something works out how, it would take over the world.
284** It seems that the non-magicals out numbering the magicals is a factor as much as the magicals being content to not advance their way of life. It also comes down to wizarding kind trying to separate the worlds as much as possible by trying to keep the magical creatures secret.
285** Given that many mythical creatures, including Rowling's, are MixAndMatchCritters, ordinary evolution wouldn't account for their existence anyway. However, it does seem that however they first formed, they should subsequently outcompete non-magicals. Maybe they need to be in the presence of wizards to survive?
286** That could very well be. Indeed, in many cases it's speculated that certain magical creatures were ''created'' by wizards long ago in the dimmest mists of time. Hell, maybe they all were.
287** At least in the case of humans, it could be related to the ImmortalProcreationClause. Dumbledore was over 100 when he died, and Bathilda Bagshot was even older (she was an adult when Dumbledore was young) and died ''after' Dumbly. It's possible this applies to other species too, the only magical creature we see dying of old age was a fifty-five-year-old acromantula. Add in various recent wizarding wars and the Ministry's regulation over magical creatures, it's not that far-fetched that populations would be kept small.
288** Also, magic users likely have a population problem due to the inherent danger of their lives leading to very sudden and unexpected deaths. Despite having extra resilience and extremely good medical care thanks to magic, wizards and witches need to regularly deal with highly dangerous creatures, potions, devices, and spells. Their very powers are dangerous enough that one can kill with a simple bit of will if they so desired. While they may be superior on paper, they live in a much more dangerous environment than Muggles.
289[[/folder]]
290
291[[folder:Detecting magic]]
292
293* How do wizards tell the difference between magical and non-magical creatures? It seems unlikely that they understand the Van der Waals force, so they'd think geckos are magic, but they haven't hidden the existence of geckos.
294** Perhaps there are ways to sense the innate magic of such creatures.
295** They don't hide each and every magical creature. Kneazles can pass as highly intelligent cats, Mail-Owls look like regular owls. Overall, it is possible that they only hide those creatures that would endanger TheMasquerade when they are seen by Muggles.
296** Of course, at some point, this gets circular — in the case of many of the creatures, they would endanger the masquerade ''only because Muggles have never seen them before''.
297** I think the idea is to hide magical creatures that can't be explained by Muggle science, and everything else they just count as Muggle animals, like goats. They produce bezoars, which are classified as magical but goats aren't, and I know people will say "how do they know what muggle science can explain when they don't know about muggles?" Well, that's simple, there's a whole section of the Ministry for people who know about muggle things. How else could you explain Muggle Studies teachers?
298** For that matter, how did flobberworms ever get on the list of magical creatures? By their description in ''Literature/FantasticBeastsAndWhereToFindThem'', there's nothing magic about them whatsoever. Granted, their secretions get used in potions sometimes, but so do bits of mundane animals, like cricket wings or snake scales.
299** There might be a bit of a desire by the magical community to keep valuable creatures not yet discovered by Muggle science to themselves.
300** They also seem to apply the magical creature thing to animals that are very dangerous to muggles, like if they were trying to protect muggles in general; dragons, sea serpents, trolls, things like that. Other magical creatures are sentient and seem to agree that keep hiding is the best like goblins and centaurs. So probably is something more like an effort to protect muggles and magical creatures from each other. Also, is possible that when they decide that an magical creature is no longer a risk for normal humans can become public knowledge and probably that’s how the Kraken is currently known for muggles as the giant squid.
301[[/folder]]
302
303[[folder:Hagrid and magic]]
304
305* Okay, this also has to do with Hogwarts, but mainly the series in general... why the heck is Hagrid not allowed to use magic? The first book establishes that it's because he was expelled. However, once he turned seventeen, he should have been able to use magic regardless of whether or not he finished Hogwarts. Harry, Ron, Hermione, Fred, and George also did not finish Hogwarts, and they're still allowed to do magic. Granted, he was accused of summoning a monster that killed someone, but even after his name was cleared and he got a cushy teaching job, they still didn't allow him to go to Ollivander's and get a new wand. If it has to do with the fact that he was expelled from Hogwarts rather than dropping out like the protagonists did, it still seems like {{disproportionate retribution}}. Also, Sirius and Bellatrix ''broke out of jail'' and still manage to do magic just fine, so what gives?
306** Half-breed prejudice, maybe?
307** He is not ''allowed'' to use magic, as in, it's against the law for him to be caught using it, otherwise he is physically able to do it. They took that right from him because of the circumstances of his expelling, as was shown in Chamber of Secrets. Then, when his name was cleared, he probably got the right back, but by that time he was so unused to not using magic normally that he didn't bother with difficult stuff. It's probably illegal for Sirius and Bellatrix to use magic too, but since there is no way to actually take their powers without taking their wands...
308** Possibly he would have to make a legal appeal to the Wizengamot, or whichever body he would appeal to. At which point he would say, "No, I didn't release the creature from the Chamber of Secrets, that was You-Know-Who. All I did was illegally raise an acromantula which escaped into the Forbidden Forest. Then I found it a mate and now there's a whole pile of 'em living in there."
309** Do we know for sure that he wasn't ''allowed'' to go get a new wand? Perhaps he just chose not to. He's been living without the legal right to use magic (but physical ability to) for 50 years. I'm sure he's gotten used to living without it. On top of that, the characters we know who didn't FINISH school DID take their [=OWLs=], which may be part of a legal issue about adult wizards and witches being allowed to use magic. Hagrid was expelled as a third-year and never took any of the standardized tests. One last thing may be how, exactly, the 2nd book was resolved in terms of Hagrid. We know, as the readers, that Hagrid is innocent. Dumbledore knows this, and presumably most of the faculty do as well. It's suggested that he presented SOMETHING to the Ministry that allowed them to hire him on as Professor, but we have no idea how this was accomplished. Showing that the Basilisk is still in the Chamber and presenting an (empty) diary with a basilisk fang stuck into it won't definitively prove Hagrid innocent - particularly since so many people believed the Chamber of Secrets was a myth that they probably never suspected Hagrid killed Myrtle by actually using the snake, which would make it hard as hell to connect his expulsion with this other incident 50 years later. Sadly, the good guys knowing that Hagrid is innocent doesn't mean that the Ministry would give him full wizard rights back, even if they did let Hogwarts employ him as a teacher.
310** Um hello?? Hagrid HAS used magic even though he isn't allowed too. 1) Dudley's pig tail, 2) fire in the hut-on-the-rock, 3) those giant pumpkins. What do you think the umbrella is holding is?!!
311** Hagrid does said in the first book he is not allowed to use magic, and I think that's what the troper meant. Allowed and unable are two different things.
312[[/folder]]
313
314[[folder:Securing wands]]
315
316* Since wizards are practically powerless without their wand, why don't any of them use wrist straps?
317** There probably are wrist straps or wand holders of some sort; it's just never touched on in the series. It's quite common in fanon that most adults have a wand holder that allows for easy access of their wand.
318** Then you would think they would be more common, if not obligatory. What with the fact thay they should be able to prevent wizards from getting disarmed in combat and all.
319** Speaking of wand holders, Lucius Malfoy in the films is depicted as hiding his wand in a cane. It's just that most wand users never really think about having a lanyard or similar method for keeping their most vital tool safely on them.
320
321[[/folder]]
322
323[[folder:Dursleys and glasses]]
324
325* This could probably fit with the Dursley entry above, but if they have been shown to not give a shit about Harry, why did they give him glasses? We've seen what the world looks like to him without his glasses (It's a slight blur), so it's not like Harry's BlindWithoutEm. And giving a kid glasses to correct his vision implies you care enough about that kid to help him see a bit better. If anything else, it'd probably amuse them to see Harry struggle to read small print (very small print, like on a ketchup label or something). Did the school force them to give Harry glasses or something?
326** The school theory is entirely possible. At least here in Germany, you have several medical check-ups during primary school. Usually at least one Tetanus vaccination, one or the other dental check-up, and a general physical examination before you start swimming lessons in fourth grade. The latter one includes, among other things, an eyesight test.
327** (OP here) Interesting. But could a school really force the parents to give their kid glasses? What could the school board do if the Dursleys, say, refused and kept sending Harry to school w/o glasses? Sue them? Call Child Protection Service on them?
328** The latter possibly. Keep in mind, though, that their whole charade was they were taking in their 'good for nothing' nephew and helping him out of the goodness of their hearts. To the neighbors, he was a troublemaker that wasn't thankful for the things his aunt and uncle did for him. It would look bad if suddenly he was complaining about being unable to read as well and his aunt and uncle didn't give him some corrective lenses. Someone might start to think "maybe the Dursleys aren't as perfect as they look" and call child services.
329** Except the Dursleys can just lie, "We gave our ungrateful nephew some contacts!" and they would think nothing of it.
330** Were contacts popular/viable in the 80s and 90s? I wouldn't know.
331** [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contact_lens#History I'm pretty sure they were.]]
332** Except for the fact that opticians won't allow contact lenses until you're old enough. I wasn't allowed to get contacts until I was fourteen or fifteen.
333** The problem with this is that you can see contact lenses in people's eyes if you look close enough and know what to look for. Also, it would look strange to the teachers when Harry still cannot read small stuff on the blackboard with his 'shiny new contacts'.
334** As far as the quality of Harry's eyesight goes, it was established in book 7 that it's actually pretty bad without his glasses. After [[spoiler:Ron, Hermione, and the others take polyjuice potion to turn into decoy-Harries in chapter 4; Hermione comments that Harry's eyesight "really is awful," before putting on glasses.]]
335** [[spoiler:I think it's because compared to her perfectly normal 20/20 vision, Harry has bad eyesight. We've seen the world through his eyes w/o glasses and it's just a fuzz. It's not like he's totally blind without it.]]
336** [[spoiler:If you're talking about the movies, that doesn't count. A movie can't show what it's like with ''really'' bad eyesight because the audience has to be able to recognize what they're seeing. So the movie makers have to tone down the blurriness so that things are fuzzy but still recognizable.]]
337** Thus, I suppose it was a minor case of EvenEvilHasStandards. Malnourishing and mistreating Harry is one thing, but leaving him without a mean to properly perceive the world is another altogether. What if he gets hit by a car because of that? Dumbledore would be most certainly not amused.
338** Lenses, and certain frames are free on the NHS for those under 18. The Dursleys are likely to get Harry the cheapest frames possible (rather than ones he likes), which would be free under the NHS. Given that they expect Harry to do a lot of the household chores, they likely got them for him so he can actually see what he's doing and make sure he doesn't burn the food, or miss spots when dusting.
339** Remember, they had him doing all the housework. They might've been annoyed when he started dropping/breaking things because he couldn't see.
340** I totally agree that the Dursleys were terrible monsters, but to some extent they did provided Harry with the basics; food, water, shelter and medical attention, and I assume they also pay for the things he needed for school, like books. Yes, they later in the series even stop giving him food (although I’m pretty sure they’ll probably would have feed him before the lack of food represented a real danger for his health) but probably they were more careful -especially when he was younger- to provide him with appropriate medical care, I doubt they didn’t take him to a doctor if he got sick at 9 and he also seem to have normal teeth so he probably went to the dentist as any normal child.
341** Their neglect of Harry seems to have gotten worse once the Dursleys started to notice how random magical events kept happening around him. It's likely that, although they'd always favored Dudley over Harry, they took better care of their nephew ''before'' such mishaps as the Incredible Shrinking Sweater started to occur, when they still had hope that he'd grow up to be a Squib instead of a wizard. And getting him something as mundane as glasses would help to immerse him in the role of an ordinary non-magical boy who does homework and housework by hand, the Muggle way.
342[[/folder]]
343
344[[folder:Disabled witches/wizards]]
345
346* Something just occurred to me. What if a witch/wizard were born blind or deaf or paralyzed? What happens to them? Do they learn magic that enables them to see/hear/move? Or are they just SOL in the magic department?
347** There does seem to be a treatment available for blind wizards, as Moody has a magic eye. Presumably it's not the only one. Deaf wizards may have a similar treatment available. Wizarding medical technology seems far and away superior to our own -- Harry was nearly killed on more than one occasion playing Quidditch, but he walked away unharmed, so it's probably safe to say that it's pretty unusual for someone to have a condition that's not at all treatable.
348** Not just nearly killed, but had ''all of the bones in his arm disappear completely.'' All it took was a few days of bed rest and drinking what looks like a commercially available potion. How long do you think it'll take Muggle technology to reach the point where over-the-counter medication can generate bones out of thin air and put them in the proper place in your body?
349** Blind? Magic eye. Deaf? Reparo on eardrum. Paralysed? Reparo on spinal cord. These guys can heal shattered skulls in seconds, it's not hard for them to repair disabilities.
350** They're trained to deal with [[BrownNote Basilisks, Mandrakes, and Fwoopers]]!
351** And elsewhere in the series, do we ever really hear of wizards getting ill or suffering from human diseases or conditions that might cause disabilities? Lupin claims to be ill in the third book to hide his transformations, but that seems to be it. So maybe the magic gene makes the wizard or witch immune to such conditions (while of course leaving them open to magical diseases and ailments). The only disabilities or disfigurements we see are those caused by dark magic - Bill getting savaged by a werewolf, George losing an ear - and it's said there's no cure for them for that reason. It's reasonable to assume Mad-Eye lost his eye because of dark magic too.
352
353[[/folder]]
354
355[[folder:Easter and Christmas]]
356
357* Why do wizards celebrate Easter and Christmas? Surely as religious holidays, those events have no significance for wizards. I can understand Christmas, since, hey, free presents, but Easter shouldn't be celebrated by wizards since they don't really have any religion (certainly not Christianity, anyway).
358** You have to step back and remember that this is a magical world. In this universe, any historical/religious figure could have been a wizard or witch (a common idea in fanfiction is to have the Greek Pantheon based on Witches and Wizards). Perhaps due to the various actions of wizards and witches, the magical world still celebrates certain holidays for different reasons than Muggles. We never see much about religion besides Dumbledore's belief in the "next great adventure", but that doesn't mean the magical world doesn't have a religion of some sort. It's entirely possible that the religious holidays are various magically important holidays as well.
359** Not to mention the fact that many of the students are Muggle-born. If nothing else, they have holidays so that the wizard child can go celebrate religious holidays with their still-Christian parents.
360** Besides, how do we know that they're not Christian? The characters in the books don't go to church, but neither does most of the UK most the time, and the Muggles and Muggle-borns seen in the story don't make any mentions of faith either. Sure, you could make the argument that they might hold a grudge over the whole burning/hanging/torture hullabaloo, but the various monarchs of England did more to Catholics (then Protestants, then Catholics again) than they ever could have done to wizards without wiping them out. That doesn't mean that all the Catholics (then Protestants, then Catholics again) up and left and said that they weren't going to be English anymore. They probably just subscribe to a version of the faith that doesn't say mean things about witches, in the same way that modern LGBT faithful mentally edit out the Old Testament bits about gays and shellfish.
361** Jesus was actually a wizard who wanted to help the Muggles. But, some of the them didn't like what he was doing and so, instead of the boring standard burning, they hung him on a cross.
362** Given the time period that the wizards chose to withdraw from the world, I've wondered if they might be gnostic. It wouldn't conflict with their practicing magic, and the above explanation would fit as well, just add he made them think that he was on the cross.
363** Ron actually says "Thank God" in [=OotP=] when he's talking about Snape not staying for dinner, and a few chapters later Sirius sings "God Rest Ye Merry Hippogriffs". As mentioned before, much of the UK isn't particularly religious, and a phrase such as "thank God" would be thrown around fairly casually. Plus there's a church in Godric's Hollow, a mixed Muggle/Wizard community, so it's a stretch to say that wizards don't go to church. It's likely that there are Christian (or Gnostic) wizards, but for the most part they're fairly apathetic to religion, only keeping up Christmas and Easter traditions.
364** More definite examples are the St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries. But most importantly, the quotes on the tombs in ''Deathly Hallows'' are from the Bible: "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also" (Matthew 6:21) and "The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death" (1 Corinthians 15:26). So Christianity certainly exists among wizards.
365** Uhm. It's easily forgotten sometimes, but both Christmas and Easter are originally ''pagan'' holidays, that have been around since well before Christianity... and were adopted (and adapted) by the church. Perhaps the Wizarding world celebrates both holidays in their more traditional ways (opposed to the Western Religious one).
366** It is certainly possible. The most common explanation that I've seen is this: look at what the Bible actually forbids; conversing with demons to gain these powers. Wizarding traits are genetic in Rowling's world, and would most likely be seen by Christian Wizards as a gift. You wouldn't burn Samson or the the Saints as witches for doing supernatural things.
367** Most people don't give any religious significance to religious holidays after all. The wizarding community probably thinks one set of reasons for sweets, fatty foods and alcohol is as good as another.
368** Also, it's very common for non-religious institutions (including public schools, theme parks, and entire cities) to celebrate Christmas and Easter. When you walk into Walmart and see loads of Christmas decorations, does that mean that your state is 100% Christian? Of course not. It's just that holidays like Christmas, Eastern, and Halloween have become heavily secular and are celebrated by people of the "wrong" faith or even no faith at all. Seeing a Christmas feast wouldn't be any more unusual than seeing Christmas decorations in town.
369** Don't forget, there is the "tufty-haired wizard" in HBP and DH: we never know his name, but he conducts Dumbledore's funeral and Bill and Fleur's marriage. It looks clear that he exercises some sort of religious function.
370** I’m more amaze on how no one complaint about this fragrant breaking of the church/state separation; the Patil Twins are probably Hindus.
371*** Uh.... separation of church and state is an ''American'' thing. In case you've forgotten, the Supreme Head of the Church of England is the freaking Queen of the United Kingdom, because the UK ''does'' have a state religion. At this point said state religion matters only when you're born (baptism), married (wedding) and buried (funeral), but it's there, and has been since well before the Statute of Secrecy was implemented.
372** And let's not forget that there are lots of Muggle-born students at Hogwarts. By Harry's time, Muggle borns and half bloods probably outnumber the pure bloods. So even if the idea of Christmas and Easter holidays comes entirely from Muggles, it's not unreasonable to think Hogwarts would have adopted holidays inspired by those from their education. The reason we have school holidays around Christmas and Easter is because it conveniently divides up the school year: four months from September to December, then a break, three-four months from January to March/April (depending when Easter falls that year), another break, and then three more months from April to June until the summer break. Hogwarts doesn't appear to have half term in October or February like other schools do, so it's not completely like Muggle schools.
373** Fun fact, lots of actual RealLife Occult authors and Ceremonial Magicians were actually Christians. Figures like John Dee, Edward Kelly, Paracelsus, Eliphas Levi, Saint Martin and the like. Some even were Muslims like Rene Guenon. Christian Esotericism is a thing, Rosicrucians are mostly based on the Christian Occult system. Some Masonic orders actually ''require'' to be Christian in order to be a member (particularly in the Scandinavian countries), there's a very popular Sub/reddit about Christian magick. In general, Christian Occultism is a very important part of Occult tradition. So yes, for centuries practicant Christians have been dueling in magick, even Catholic and Protestant '''priests'''. The anti-magic backlash mostly comes from (as usual) US-influenced Evangelical Christians. Is hard to believe why would a UK Christian wizard see a conflict when another Christian like John Dee was actually one of the Queen's closest advisors (the Queen been the head of the Anglican Church). How do Christians occultists rationalize the apparent contradiction of the biblical prohibition on sorcery is another matter, however as mentioned before the prohibition is more onto dealing with demons. Theurgy (the use of God's names, magical words, divine powers and angels to do magick) and other forms of Christian esotericism may not count, in a similar way how the Kabbalah exists in Judaism and Sufism in Islam.
374** Given that Real World Britain didn't experience the decline in relgious participation among the general public until the 1960s, and the Wizarding World seems stuck in the 19th century at the latest (some of the pure bloods seem to have never left the Middle Ages), it would almost be strangers if the witches and wizards weren't celebrating Chrsitian holidays, getting their children baptized, etc.
375[[/folder]]
376
377[[folder:Choice]]
378
379* Rowling insists that choice is what matters in her universe, but what she writes seems to contradict this. Firstly, the sorting hat. At eleven years old, you are defined. Even things that are choices, such as loyalty, courage, and hard work, are treated as innate qualities, and your fate is decided. I think it's fair to say that, if choice is in any way relevant, eleven year old children cannot make an informed one. There's a reason, after all, that eleven year olds are hardly ever tried for crimes in adult court. So how exactly can the hat tell who you will become at that age if you have any choice in the matter? Look at Harry. He chose Gryffindor, not because of any overriding principle, but because of trifling eleven-year-old reasons and the House's reputations. Voldemort provides another example. His chance of redemption comes from Harry's blood. Why is this? What choice do you have in your blood? Do choices affect your blood? If Harry's blood is innately good, then so is he and therefore chose nothing. In fact, the oft-cited statement "It is our '''choices''', much more than our abilities, that show who we really are" demonstrates this even more starkly. Rowling seems to be saying that choices matter, but she is in fact saying the opposite: that who you are determines your choices rather than your choices determining who you are (see Rachel Dawes conversation with Bruce Wayne in ''Film/BatmanBegins'' for comparison). In the Potterverse, your choices only illuminate your true nature, they don't really affect anything. Now this would be fine, if Rowling believes in determinism and writes to reinforce that, bully for her. The Fridge Logic comes in because she proclaims the virtue of choice and free will but writes things in a way that makes them irrelevant. I'm not sure if she's simply philosophically muddled or intentionally contradicting herself.
380** The idea with his choice in the Sorting was that Harry was rejecting everything that Voldemort symbolised. He wasn't rejecting it because 'Oh yuck Slytherin!' but because 'That's where Voldemort came from.'. The Voldemort's redemption thing doesn't mean that Harry's blood is innately good, it means that it contained an innate good force (i.e. Lily's sacrifice) that didn't affect Harry, but offered a way to repair the damage to Voldemort's soul, if he chose it. And I don't really see anywhere in the series where someone isn't able to choose differently, no matter who they are. Malfoy is offered the choice to turn away from Voldemort, repeatedly.
381** It wasn't just Voldemort. It was the fact that Harry was faced with all sorts of negative information about Slytherin, real and propaganda, and thought the other, less-maligned houses would be better. He knew that Draco, who he didn't like, wanted desperately to be in Slytherin and was sorted there before him. He knew that his new friend Ron hated Slytherins. He heard Hagrid's clearly exaggerated claim about every evil wizard ever being from Slytherin. He knew that Voldemort had been in Slytherin. He thought that (though he admitted this might just be his newfound anti-Slytherin bias) they looked like an unpleasant lot. If it was just the Voldemort issue and he hadn't heard everything else, he might not have been so keen to end up somewhere else. And really, who ''would'' want to end up in the evil house full of future murderers that contains someone you don't like and is hated by your one wizard friend that also contained the wizard who killed your parents? Under those circumstances, I think it was a choice anyone would have made.
382** It wasn't ''just'' Slytherin that Harry had heard bad things about: he'd heard a disparaging remark or two about Hufflepuff as well, and withheld judgement until he'd actually met a few of them. And his initial dislike for Slytherin came as much from the bad attitude he'd sensed in Draco in the robe shop and on the train as from what Hagrid had to say about that House. Remember, Draco was trying to be ''friendly'' on the train, at least to Harry; it's because he was also rude to Ron that Harry decided to believe the criticisms of Slytherin were justified, not just talk. '''There's''' where he made the (Lampshaded!) choice of whom the "right sort" were, and he made it on the basis of direct observation of Draco's and Ron's behavior, not just dissing between the Houses.
383** Dumbledore does believe Hogwarts sorts too soon, but then the Hat is an ancient magic artifact, not something which can just be overruled. Also, Harry's blood was not inherently good ''per se'', but the light magic enchantments on it meant it could somewhat counteract the effects Voldemort's Horcruxes had on his soul, which he chose to make. Voldemort would still have had to choose to feel remorse, the blood just gave him a second chance.
384** Correct. The only true way for a person to save themselves from being locked into limbo in the afterlife after creating Horcruxes is to feel true remorse for what you had to do to create them (which involves murder). However, many people obviously don't do that (it takes a hell of a guy to kill people and fragment their soul to try and gain some kind of immortality) and the pain of reconciliation is typically fatal.
385** Sorting doesn't define a person's "fate", just their school life. There's no indication that school house has any impact on adult life (beyond, perhaps, mundane networking, but even then The Slug Club is house-neutral and seems far more effective). The houses only seem important in the series because it takes place almost entirely in the school itself.
386*** Yeah, it ''just'' defines your school life, in the same way that your parents being murdered will ''just'' affect your family life, not your fate. Especially considering this a boarding school, which students attend for seven years, during an incredibly critical time in their physical, mental, and emotional development. This is actually one of the main concerns about boarding school; by placing students in the hands of an institution that will teach, feed, and board them for more than six months out of the year, they had gosh darn better be responsible for that development.
387*** Still, you are giving more importance than it's show about the houses and how much they define a person's school life. As mentioned before other than probably have the fellow house members in the Wizard's equivalent of a Facebook group, it doesn't seem to really affect their friendships, career choices or marriages. Even during school year we see them having friendships and romantic relationships inter-house.
388** Fine about the school, but what really bothers me is the constantly stressed distinction between Harry and Voldemort. So our hero and our big bad had pretty similar starting conditions, but they made drastically different choices which proved one of them good and one of them bad. But why did Voldemort act the way he did? Because he was unable to love. ''Unable.'' Due to the love potion and lack of mother's love and so on, but in the end it was the ''inability'', contrasted with Harry's ''ability'', the influenced his choices and made him what he is, not the other way round.
389** To a lesser extent, is there ever any mention of a student who got put in a house they didn't want? Ron wants to be in Gryffindor like his brothers and that's where he ends up. Hermione likewise says she hopes that's where she goes. Everyone ends up in the house they want.
390*** False: Neville Longbottom BEGGED the hat for Hufflepuff. Obviously, that didn't work out.
391** When did Neville beg for Hufflepuff? If you go by WordOfGod he thought he was best suited to there, in the same way Hermione thought she was suited to Ravenclaw. But they wanted to be in Gryffindor. Neville just didn't think he was brave enough to be there - which as it turns out he was. It's the same way that Harry did have some qualities best for Slytherin, but Gryffindor was what he wanted.
392** Going off of [[https://www.pottermore.com/writing-by-jk-rowling/hatstall this Pottermore article,]] the hat didn't seem to care much for what Neville ''wanted''. "In Neville's case, the Hat was determined to place him in Gryffindor: Neville, intimidated by that house’s reputation for bravery, requested a placing in Hufflepuff. Their silent wrangling resulted in triumph for the Hat." However the hat chooses your house, I don't think that choice is the decisive factor. Not saying that it's completely disregarded, but the hat clearly has some other sorting standard.
393** Possibly the Hat takes both choice and ''need'' into account, by assessing which House will let the students make the most of themselves. Harry could have potentially thrived in any of the Houses, so the Hat honored his choice; it ''could'' have opted for Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff, but it put him in Gryffindor because that's the House where someone who rejects Slytherin's philosophies would be most likely to achieve success. Neville's self-doubt led him to request Hufflepuff over what he really wanted, but the Hat discerned that if it let Neville give in to those self-doubts, the boy would most likely never achieve his true potential. Putting him in Gryffindor, as Neville desired deep down, would let him grow into a brave young achiever rather than the self-effacing bumbler he'd convinced himself he was. So it went along with what Neville ''really'' wanted, not what he'd thought he ought to settle for.
394[[/folder]]
395
396[[folder:Gun versus wizard]]
397
398* I know that a gun would never turn up in the books and are exceedingly rare in the UK, but purely hypotheticaly, how effective would a gun be against a wizard? Personally, I just don't see a wizard being able to react fast enough to defend themselves, but I've had several people disagree and I'd like to see some other opinions on this.
399** Muggle vs. wizard combat has been discussed extensively above and elsewhere, with no clear consensus emerging. Personally, I am of the opinion that it would look something like Literature/TheSalvationWar: individual wizards might be able to cause a lot of damage under the right circumstances, but there is no way their flashy powers would enable them to overcome our collective advantages or their collective cluelessness.
400** To paraphrase wizard Winston Churchill: they may be clueless, but Muggles have no magic. One day they may ''not'' be clueless, but Muggles will never have a wand. In other words, a Muggle may be able to take a wizard now, but if it came down to open war between mage and man, I wouldn't be surprised to see a come-from-behind victory for wizardkind.
401** You're assuming muggles don't vastly outnumber wizards worldwide, which is strongly implied throughout the series. So if you had a fight between, say, a few dozen wizards with wands and a few hundred Muggles with machine guns and heavy artillery? Yeah, I'm betting on the Muggles.
402** A-a-a-nd then the wizards turn invisible and teleport behind the Muggle lines and right into their HQ, and the Muggles are fucked, and then the wizards Imperius the Muggles and order them to turn on each other and the Muggles are properly fucked, and then the wizards summon some Dementors, and the Muggles are completely fucked.
403** I don't think you quite understand how small the wizard population is in comparison to muggles. I don't quite remember where I read this, but I believe the ratio is like 1000:1. So yeah, the wizards are fucked.
404** Even if the muggles declare war on the wizards simply for existing so it's a completely justified war for the wizards (which is unlikely), the plot to kill six billion people and commit the biggest genocide in human history is not going to meet approval from all quarters. You're going to have some wizards fighting no the side of the Muggles in order to stop them from being completely wiped out and casting protections. Not to mention that once the wizard starts casting spells, people will notice and those who are armed can take the wizard down, no matter how many Muggles are also killed.
405** The above depends on assuming that a Muggle-Wizard war would be fought like the conventional, big battle-field style battles of WWII. This is patently ridiculous. Magic in Harry Potter is perfect for non-conventional, asymmetric guerrilla warfare. Think about it, your soldiers, vehicles, and bases can become invisible, they can be teleport instantaneously between remote locations, and everyone in the population is trained in the use of a weapon that can heal, incapacitate, maim, and kill. Not to mention that in a real war, you do not need to kill everyone (or even 99% of the population) you just need to do enough damage to awe your enemies into surrender, and Shock and Awe is the Wizard's strong suit ("Listen up, we can bend the laws of physics and reality by talking fast, so submit to us before we turn your extended family into gerbils."). With good planning, Wizards can do pretty well in a war. And if all else fails, they still have Dementors and the Inferi.
406** You want to talk shock and awe? Sure, wizards can do some damage with their pretty little sticks, but until they prove that they can take out an entire city in one go whenever they want, they won't be scaring any major world power into surrender. The Muggles have had [[NuclearOption that capability]] for nearly seventy years. Facing that kind of power, I guarantee the wizards would surrender first.
407** They can, for instance, light a fire that cannot be put out and will burn as long as there's stuff to burn. There goes your city. And they have an army of invincible demons that suck people's souls out. There goes your city's population. As for the nukes, yes, they're awesome and terrible. Where are you going to launch them? There's no enemy nation or country - the enemy is right here, except you cannot see them and they can hide entire buildings from sight.
408** And Muggles, despite the purebloods' claims, still give birth to and/or father a healthy percentage of the next generation of wizards. Yes, wizards ''might'' be able to conquer the Muggle population, but how much good will that do them in the long term, if all it achieves is to make Muggle-dom so hateful of their kind that every Muggleborn kid in future generations is going to get put down like a rabid dog by his or her own family, terrified of the "monster" they've produced? Sure, Voldemort's fans might convince themselves that's a good thing, but check back in a few hundred years and all you'd have left of wizardry would be a few pathetic, inbred remnants like the Gaunts.
409** It is interesting how the people rooting for the Muggles in the war almost entirely depend on the argument of Muggle numeric superiority. In real life we know about examples of smaller forces defeating much more powerful enemies (the Americans in Vietnam, the Soviets in Afghanistan, the French in Indochina, etc.) by the use of guerrilla warfare and intelligence. Also we know about minorities ruling over majorities like the Sunni over Chiites in Hussein’s Irak, the Alawites over Sunni in Syria and the Whites over Indigenous in Bolivia. You don’t need to be the majority in order to be the one in power, you just need to have certain strategic circumstances at hand like control of the army, control of strategic resources like water and the like. \
410So, what can the Wizards do in the war? Easy; control the world leaders and generals and make the soldiers go into suicide mission, for the time the soldiers realize the President and the Prime Minister are under Imperius spell valuable resources are lost, using small guerrilla-like magical attacks to disable key weapons and military positions also would work (with Aparicio would be pretty easy to put a bomb in the Pentagon) and at the end if the Wizards win the war, they can hold control over Muggles societies in a similar way on how other minorities hold control over certain countries (or if you believe conspiracy theories how some people thing certain Elites control the world in real life) thus avoiding Muggle parents to kill their magical children when they born, not only because they can know when a baby is a Wizard but also because they can apply exemplary punishments to those who kill such babies (some people will kill the baby even so, but some, probably most, would not take the risk).
411** Sometimes gets really scary to read the things some tropers write. I really doubt most Muggle parents will kill their son or daughter when they discover is a wizard even if the world had recently go throughout a global war against wizards. Most parents love their children. Yes, it is possible that they would have to protect them from angry neighbors and the (if still exists) Muggle government, but killing your own kid because he/she makes magic spontaneously? Also the idea that Muggles have an advantage out of numbers depends on the case that even civilians Muggles would want to go to war and start killing Wizards, something unlikely, it is more likely that civilian Muggles would start killing other Muggles accused of “wichtcraft” like Wiccans or Tarot readers causing havoc and chaos, forcing the Muggle Army to invest valuable resources, time and manpower in controlling Muggles from harming each other (I can picture a clever wizard infiltrating Muggle neighbors and accusing some people of Witchcraft and then watching said area fall into chaos).
412** In all honesty, they're just following on the portrait of non-wizards pictured in the books. Remember that little backstory of how a few village boys met a witch girl and instantly raped her into catatonia? It's not a stretch to presume that ''those'' monsters would happily murder their own children if they turned out to be witches.
413** Sadly that story of the raped witch is not farfetched. Similar things happened in real life. Of course, not every Muggle will do that. So, we are back to the point; some wizards are good, some are evil, some mugles are good, and some are evil. In a war scenario, like in all war, ones and others will take different stances. Now, call me optimistic but I'm pretty sure that none of both sides would want genocide of the other except for some very extremist marginal groups. Eventually two things will happen; both sides are unable to win so they make a truce or one side wins over the other and a peace treaty is sign. After that, probably the relationships will improve. For us who live in the Americas most of our countries were at war with Germany and Japan (mine included, I'm tico) and we don't hate Germans and Japanese anymore nor will kill one on sight.
414** Point is; the troper seems to imply that all Muggle parents will kill their children if they turn out to be Wizards. I can believe some would but, every single parent? I doubt it, especially because magical powers appear later in childhood. Is not the same to kill a baby than to kill a 7 or 8 year-old.
415[[/folder]]
416
417[[folder:Dumbledore and Dementors]]
418
419* Does anyone else think that Dumbledore hating Dementors is fantastic racism? I mean, sure the Dementors eat happiness, but it's just the way they evolved. Similarly humans and many animals eat meat because our metabolic processes were designed to do so, and eating meat requires the animal to die, while all Dementors do is make people unhappy for a bit. While it is true that the Dementor's kiss is truly a horrifying experience, it is once again on par with humans and animals killing for food. Dementors only do their kiss on people who they happen to know are evil, they never do it on someone innocent (unless they were told the person was evil); in this sense, Dementors can be seen as lawful neutral, they do what they do to survive and kiss those who their boss tells them to. And it's not like a person who was kissed can't be put out of their misery. Because they feed on happiness, that means that working as Azkaban guards must really suck. They really put their well being on the line for the people they work for.
420** How can that be 'racism' if they're only doing what they have to do? If lions regularly leap out of the woods and ate people, at what point does 'racism' come into a dislike for them?
421** Actually, I think the Dementors ''eating souls'' means that those souls are destroyed. They aren't just sucked out, sustain the Dementors, and then pass through them to the afterlife. Those souls are gone forever. Those who have lost their souls don't ''need'' to be put out of their misery because they aren't in misery, they just no longer exist. This may be how the Dementors evolve but it's the worst thing that could happen to anyone. Ever. Far worse than simply dying. And the Dementors ''don't'' only destroy the souls of the evil people. We know that Sirius, at least, was imprisoned unjustly and I highly doubt that he's the only one this has ever happened to. Crouch Jr. was not ordered to be kissed and Harry and Dudley certainly didn't deserve to have their souls destroyed. Not to mention that the Dementors get to do whatever they want to once they side with Voldemort again.
422** We've seen the Dementors attack innocent people. The only time they've made people mildly unhappy is on the train to Hogwarts, and that was because the people were children who didn't have unhappy memories. People with unhappy memories are basically reduced to gibbering wrecks around them, and that's just from their mere presence, not their Kiss. "And it's not like a person who was kissed can't be put out of their misery."- I find this a pretty disturbing viewpoint, to be honest. It's fine that the Dementors give a fate worse than death to people, since we can just kill those people if it happens. And the fact that they attack on command doesn't make them lawful neutral, it makes them "just following orders", which most humans would agree is no justification for evil deeds.
423** Except for when they commit them. (This Troper has read TheLuciferEffect.)
424** Except that's not true. The Dementors allied themselves with Voldemort at the first chance they got. From what we can tell, the Dementors don't guard Azkaban and restrict Kissing to the guilty because of any moral or ethical obligation, they do it because it's currently in their best interests to do so. Once Voldemort makes them a better offer, they scarper. As far as it being natural for them... well, maybe it is. That doesn't mean we have to like it. They're our predators. If the food that we ate was clever enough to figure out that we eat them on the daily, they probably wouldn't like us much either.
425** The Dementors don't seem to be living creatures. A Patronus is the only thing that can keep them at bay, and there doesn't appear to be a means of killing them. This leads me to believe that they are originally wizard-created beings, or at least are dark spirits who were raised by wizards. Their purpose is explicitly to cause misery, and Dumbledore disagrees that they should have existed in the first place. What is more distressing is that they are nowhere to be found in ''Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.'' That book explicitly lays out that the Ministry classifies all life in the wizarding world to be either "Being" (wizards, ghosts, goblins, house elves, etc) or "Beast" (Acromantula, Kneazles, Basilisks, Flobberworms, etc). The book makes special mention that centaurs and merpeople are classified as beasts by choice. It features an entry on werewolves that makes no similar distinction (although they mention that they only got the second highest danger classification, rather than the highest, because they are only active once a month). The distressing part is: The Ministry of Magic writes off werewolves as animals, but ''Dementors'' are beings.
426** "Being" only means "sentient", not "nice" or even "civilized". There are plenty of evil creatures that aren't in ''Fantastic Beasts'', and werewolves ''in human form'' are classed as "Beings".
427** I always thought of the Dementors as a NeutralEvil / TrueNeutral WildCard, myself. You know, as if switching sides instantly because the other faction has better prospects, draining positive emotions and ''eating souls'' wasn't at least ''some'' evidence for BlueAndOrangeMorality. Or possibly [[BlackAndWhiteInsanity Blue And Orange Insanity.]]
428** Dementors are viewed with such hatred because they're essentially the worst kind of predator: not only do they attack innocent people if it suits them (and cause emotional problems to anyone who's even around them), but their method of killing literally ''removes the person's soul.'' In the Potterverse, it's established that souls exist and the afterlife exists. Consuming a person's soul is even worse than killing them, because they don't get to live on after death. They're just ''gone.'' Dementors guard Azkaban because that's where the food is, and (as said) they started working for Voldemort when they got a chance. They're apparently sentient since you can make deals with them and give them orders, but whether or not they're "evil" it doesn't change the fact that they're extremely dangerous and vicious predators that are only kept at bay by offering them a supply of people to torture and drain so they don't run out to do it to innocents.
429** I don't see Dumbledore as hating Dementors, just the way the Ministry used them to guard Azkaban. He wanted them to be freed to go about the country instead of keeping them all together and guarding who Dumbledore knew would be their allies.
430** Our first encounter with Dumbledore hating Dementors in the books was POA, when they started guarding his school. He doesn't want the soul-suckers anywhere near HIS GODDAMN KIDS! For all of his ethically-questionable acts, DD really did care about his students.
431** And Dumbledore is not calling for them to be rounded up and killed. He just doesn't want them guarding the school, for good reason, from the amount of times Harry was nearly kissed. The thing seems to be that they've only been guarding Azkaban for years - so no one knows exactly how they'll be at guarding a school.
432[[/folder]]
433
434[[folder:Important services not in Diagon]]
435
436* Why the hell are the Ministry and St. Mungo's not in Diagon Alley? The Ministry in particular is a challenge -- every morning and evening, hundreds of witches and wizards have to enter and leave, and we can see how much special effort has been made to conceal its entrances, and given how totally incompetent wizards are at concealing themselves among Muggles, I can only imagine how many incidents they have to handle every year where some wizard accidentally does something to reveal themselves and the Obliviators have to come in and deal with it. What kind of sense does that make? If the entrance were in Diagon Alley, people could just apparate into the Alley, or get there via Floo Powder, and just walk right in via, you know, a door. Come to think of it, how does Arthur get to London every morning anyway?
437** About St. Mungo's, its explained why it's NOT in Diagon Alley in [[Literature/HarryPotterAndTheOrderOfThePhoenix OotP]]. Moody explains it when they go to see Arthur there. It's because there was no place in Diagon Alley big enough for St. Mungo's.
438** We only see the hard way to get into the Ministry and St. Mungo's because Harry can't apparate yet. At the age of 17, most people have an apparation license and can teleport instantly. I'd assume there's a designated area before the entrance to apparate in, and then they get their wand checked at the Ministry or go to the front desk at St. Mungo's. Keep in mind that Wizarding transportation is a lot more advanced in some ways, so they don't usually have to worry about going in the Muggle way.
439** I don't think that's true, after seeing how many of the employees are going in via the bathroom in Deathly Hallows.
440** Except it's specifically mentioned in the book how only the highest ranking officials (read: Death Eaters) are cleared to use the Floos or Apparate and how big of a hassle and irritation it is for everyone to have to use these weird guest entrances.
441** Turn it around: why do all of London's wizarding businesses cluster in their own neighborhood (Diagon Alley) rather than alongside the Ministry or St. Mungos? Because for small shopkeepers like Diagon Alley harbors, doing business is more profitable in a lighthearted, casual atmosphere where customers can go out for a pleasant day's browsing, dining, socializing and entertainment, not in the strictly-regulated environment of a government district or the glum proximity of a hospital.
442
443[[/folder]]
444
445[[folder:Wizard lemmings]]
446
447* Wizards really are the most easily brainwashed people in the world. The general wizarding public seems to do a complete 180 on their opinion of Harry Potter about once every other year. Yes, there seems to be only one "real" media source in the Daily Prophet and only one big tabloid in the Quibbler, and the Ministry's making a concerted attempt to shape public opinion, but really. After 12 years of thinking of someone as a hero and savior, then flipping to thinking he's responsible for killing muggle-borns at Hogwarts, then back to thinking he's a hero, then to thinking he's a lying attention-whore, then back to thinking he's the chosen one, then back again, all in the space of 7 years?
448** This troper finds it unlikely that those sources are taken totally seriously. There are more magazines, plus Wizarding radio, so it's fairly likely that the Prophet isn't everyone's main source of news. I also think that The Ministry and the Death Eaters massively underestimated the intelligence of wizards or people in general. Also, major news networks will run a blatantly biased piece one year and then run another that contradicts the first a year or two later, in Real Life... though they get called on it. Other characters (than those closest to Harry) mention that the Prophet's view of Harry doesn't add up, so wizards probably aren't that easily brainwashed... just those who are stupid enough to only read the Prophet and then take it seriously.
449** You're also assuming that every wizard even pays much attention to the news.
450** Also, just think how the media influence people's opinions in real life.
451** Thew only people who seemed affected by Harry in his second year were the students. They had a fear of Parseltongue users, especially since the "Heir of Slytherin" was threatening the students. The fourth yeat, Harry was more hated by the students again for what they perceived as cheating. Only in the fifth year was the majority of the wizarding involved in the hatred of Harry due to the government's misinformation campaign, though even with that it wasn't known how many normal wizards were influenced.
452
453[[/folder]]
454
455[[folder:Dursleys keeping Harry out of school]]
456
457* If the Dursleys hate Harry so much, why do they go through great measures to make sure he doesn't go to school? Wouldn't that mean he'd be out of their hairs for 10 months?
458** It's more about their fear of wizards and Harry learning to be one, plus just enjoying Harry's misery at not being able to go. They would rather have him with them and have all of them be miserable than have him go and let him have a good time.
459** I believe it's because he's the one who does most of the household chores? With Harry gone to Hogwarts, the Dursleys would have to do their own chores for a whole 10 months.
460** I think their fear of magic has a lot to do with it. Looking at it from a naive Muggle perspective, magic is an unknowable force that lets even a child do great harm to people and property if they so desire. Sending the orphan that they abused for years to a school that teaches him more magic is understandably a terrifying thought.
461** Actually, they'd already been planning to send him to a Muggle boarding school in Book 1, so he'd be out of their hair for 10 months no matter what. It's only him going to a school that would ''encourage his use of magic'' that Vernon and Petunia were dead-set against.
462** They certainly did not plan to send Harry to a boarding school (which are private and thus expensive). He was going to go to Stonewall High, the local comprehensive.
463*** It's Dudley who goes to boarding school.
464** Also Petunia doesn't appear to work herself. You think she wants Harry around the house with her all day? And she might also be thinking of what the neighbours might say if her son goes to school but her nephew doesn't.
465** And the Dursleys don't try to keep Harry out of school; they try to keep him from finding out he's a wizard. As mentioned above, he was planning to go to a local school.
466** It's also the ''law'' that as his legal guardians, they'd have to send him to school.
467[[/folder]]
468
469[[folder:Fear of name]]
470
471* Where did the fear of Voldemort's name come from? It's handwaved as saying that names contain power, but no one else's name seems to carry that sort of stigma, or have any kind of power to speak of.
472** Two words: The Taboo. Of course it makes DD an even bigger idiot for insisting that Harry uses it.
473** Not really. The Taboo was only possible because Voldemort controlled the Ministry, something he never managed to pull off in the first war. Additionally, in the second war everyone (well, everyone not off hiding in the woods with a limited source of information about the outside world) knew about the Taboo so it stands to reason that everyone would know if that had been the case in the first war and yet no one mentions it. When Harry asks Hagrid why people don't say it, he doesn't say anything about how in the old days saying it would get you killed. Dumbledore mentions that he's repeatedly tried to get [=McGonagall=] to say 'Voldemort' the very day after he disappeared when their dialogue indicates that this is the first time she's seen him since hearing the news. And maybe if there was a Taboo Dumbledore would say it anyway and feel perfectly safe doing so but he certainly wouldn't encourage the practice and get his allies tortured and killed. The Taboo in the second war does ''not'' make Dumbledore an idiot for encouraging - not insisting - Harry to say 'Voldemort' because he had no way of knowing that Voldemort would take over the Ministry one day and decide to take drastic measures to stop people from saying his name.
474** Yes, really. You don't know that - it's just as possible, that he could use it any time, but didn't see the need prior to DH, because he already knew where Harry was, but couldn't reach him. Harry's isn't told a bajillion other important things either, so it is not a valid argument. "If it was a good idea DD would do so" is not a valid argument either - that is what we call a PlotHole. If DD didn't expect V to take over the Ministry (which is, I remind, completely incompetent, helpless and corrupt), then he's an even bigger idiot and a lousy strategist. The Taboo wasn't meant to stop people from saying V's name - it was to track down those few who, by courtesy of DD, were dumb enough to use it.
475** When Ron tells Harry about the Taboo he says "The name's ''been'' jinxed, Harry, that's how they track people! Using his name breaks protective enchantments, it causes some kind of magical disturbance - it's how they found us in Tottenham Court Road!" and "It was only people who were serious about standing up to him, like Dumbledore, who dared use it. ''Now'' they've put a Taboo on it, anyone who says it is trackable - quick-and-easy way to find Order members!" The Taboo was not solely for the purpose of catching Harry. It was for the purpose of catching any of the people who were seriously opposing him. Harry isn't told lots of important information, true, but surely if all the adults, at least, knew about the Taboo and Dumbledore knew that Voldemort was coming back one day, he wouldn't tell Harry to say 'Voldemort' all the time. If saying 'Voldemort' does nothing then using the name is a nice way of being brave. If it DOES still break all enchantments and make you easily findable, then saying his name is a stupid thing to do. Dumbledore, again, could get by doing it but he's not going to get an eleven-year-old boy to do it. That would be criminally stupid. I never said that "If it was a good idea DD would do so" ''was'' my argument, you know. I know he makes mistakes but telling Harry to say a name that will make it so he can be found by Voldemort any time the subject of Voldemort comes up (and if he's on the run from Voldemort, this will be a lot) without telling him the risks...NO ONE would be that stupid and a lot of the people who just say 'oh, don't say that name! It's scary!' would really have a better reason if saying his name was literally dangerous and they have no reason to hide this information from Harry. And I also didn't say that Dumbledore never expected Voldemort to take over the Ministry, just that he never expected him to take over the Ministry ''and then make his name Taboo so that anyone who used his name could be tracked.'' It's the second, italicized, part that Dumbledore didn't expect. Ron only finds out about the Taboo after he's away for awhile and he acts like it's something completely new whereas (even if it was in place beforehand but Ron didn't know until now) if it was explained to him then it would have been explained in terms of 'the Taboo is back' or 'so now we need to start worrying about the Taboo again' instead of 'there's this new Taboo' which it clearly was. Remus ran into them and didn't tell the about the Taboo even though he gave them a lot of other information. Kingsley was apparently almost caught by Death Eaters after he said Voldemort and there's no way ''he'' knew the Taboo was going on beforehand and yet was still stupid enough to invoke it after the Ministry fell. Plus something as wide scale as the Taboo really is going to require the use of the Ministry and its resources. The only way that underage childrens' magic can be tracked is through the Ministry, after all, and that's just as widespread and large-scale as the Taboo. It really makes no sense on a number of levels for the Taboo to have been in place all this time or in place during the first war and now in place again and the fact that Dumbledore makes mistakes and Harry isn't told everything doesn't change this.
476** I always wondered how the students and children ever learned to be afraid of the name of Voldemort as shown in the first books. I can understand the adults being afraid, but in order for the kids to have that same visceral fear, they would have to learn to be afraid, but the only way to do that would be for their parents to pass this on. That would be impossible as no one who said the name would fear it and no one who feared the name would say it. That means the children would never learn to fear the name.
477** It's just a repetition of the parents' language and awkwardness, as with any other euphemism. (And many of them might not even know the real name anyway.)
478** It's a lot like how smaller and more conservative areas will have their own superstitions because the children will have grown up with only their parents' examples and those of their similarly-thinking neighbours. Notice Ron in particular demonstrates a lot of narrow-minded superstition because he's grown up with these old wives' tales from his mother.
479** And don't we teach children that there are some words you don't use out of fear of offending people?
480** Bit of Wild Mass Guessing, but in the fifth book, Bellatrix flips out when Harry says his name. The Death Eaters only call him 'the Dark Lord'. So it's possible in his heyday, there were consequences to using the name, and that influenced the older generation not to say it even after the war was over. The younger generation then grew up not being used to hearing or saying the name, which is why they're startled by Harry saying it so openly. Perhaps they're not so much afraid of the name as uneasy about using it. Some children raised in conservative households will be uncomfortable using or even hearing curse words - so a ClusterFBomb is going to be a startling experience.
481[[/folder]]
482
483[[folder:Economy]]
484
485* How on earth is the Wizard Economy supposed to work? Unless I'm mistaken, it seems like transfiguration lets wizards either create or duplicate whatever they want. While there might still be a demand for things such as, say, Ollivander's wands, because they're unique, how do they deal with the fact that a wizard has little to no need to actually purchase things?
486** Because Transfiguration and Conjuration is hard, and Wizards are lazy. They could make it themselves, if they took the time to remember how, or research it to learn how, or they can go down to the store and buy one, ready made and probably of better quality than whatever they cobble together.
487** Not sure about Transfiguration, but I don't think conjuration is permanent?
488** It isn't. JK explained that conjuration is not only difficult, but that objects created tend to fit a general specification instead of a precise one (so creating something detailed and unique would be extremely tricky) and that conjured objects don't last for long. This explains why Wizards don't just create clothes and food out of thin air (in fact, they can't conjure food at all).
489** There's probably also a limit for how much food can be duplicated without causing more and more imperfections in each copy. So a wizard traveling out in the boonies could multiply his rations to let him travel longer on the cheap, but he couldn't indefinitely sustain himself on his own cloned food because each duplicate would be worth less and less until finally it's inedible. Transfigured objects also likely change back within a short time, which would make transforming inanimate objects into food a.....risky proposition, to say the least.
490** Let's take a look at what's being sold in wizard shops. Gobstones - which shoot a nasty smelling liquid at the loser's face. Animated wizard chess pieces. Flying broomsticks. Wands. Food - which is subject to Gamp's Laws of Elemental Transmutation. Potions and potion ingredients. A moving model of the galaxy. I'm having trouble thinking of a case which ISN'T either enchanted or with magical properties not present in magically replicated copies. Wizard shoppers aren't paying for the material value of the items they purchase (because with transfiguration there is nearly none), they're paying for the labour cost of the enchantments placed on them, or the rarity cost of unmagickable items.
491* I'm more surprised that wizards haven't screwed up the Muggle economy by using magic to easily steal things. Need new furniture? Just apparate into the furniture store when it's closed, shrink any furniture you want down to pocket-size, and then screw up any video cameras that may have recorded you before disapparating. Or use magic to make perfect counterfeit money and "buy" anything you want from Muggle stores.
492** Because there are probably departments of the Ministry regulating that kind of behavior.
493[[/folder]]
494
495[[folder:Wizard jobs]]
496
497* Another question about the Wizard economy ... what is it exactly that all these graduates are supposed to do once they graduate? Hogwarts, and other schools, faculty and the ministry of magic seem to be the only real places of employment for specifically taught Wizard talents (as the curriculum doesn't seem to include things math or science).
498** Presumably they would be told all that when they enter their seventh year. Since Harry and co don't, they never find out.
499** Minerva does mention in Harry's career advice session that becoming an Auror meant extra years of study. So presumably yes there are extra places to learn their trades.
500** To be honest it seems that if you don't work for the Ministry, St. Mungos, Hogwarts or Gringotts, generally you either go to a family business or start one up, we don't really learn much about the wizarding world outside of the POV of a teenage boy, he doesn't care about the econamy and latches on to becoming an auror, despite probably having a promising quidditch career (seriously The boy who lived, teams would be lining up to have a seeker like that) most of the jobs seem to be startups for peoples specific talents outside of the big ones.
501[[/folder]]
502
503[[folder:Hogsmeade]]
504
505* If Hogsmeade is the only all-wizarding town in ''England'' how come it's right next to Hogwarts which is in ''Scotland''?
506** According to [=PoA=]: " 'Do you know much about Hogsmeade?' asked Hermione keenly. 'I've read it's the only entirely non-Muggle settlement in Britain -' "
507
508[[/folder]]
509
510[[folder:Wizard treatment of Harry]]
511
512* This might be a bit of a weird one, but it always irked me how the wizarding world treated poor Harry throughout the series. For the first few books, they treated him like a hero (when in reality, he was just lucky), but after the fourth book, they suddenly start looking down upon him because they refuse to believe that Voldemort had really returned. And it gets ''really'' bad in the last book, when the ''whole government'' (under Voldemort's control, mind you) is actively persecuting him! Then I realized that much of the wizarding world (the older inhabitants, at least) are a bunch of hypocrites who really don't care about Harry, and are more interesting in following the crowd! ...Sorry, I just needed to vent about something that's been bothering me for quite a while... and perhaps JKR did it on purpose for us to really side with Harry...
513** Their behavior is completely understandable. Voldemort was essentially the greatest terrorist most wizards and witches had ever seen in their lives, and many lost friends and relatives (and possibly nearly themselves) to his attacks and assassinations. When Harry tells them that he's back, nobody ''wants'' to believe him because it's an utterly terrifying thought. The Ministry thinks the same way, so they begin a smear campaign specifically to try and stamp out this thought and keep the populace from panicking. Then again, look at it from the crowd's perspective: a 14-year-old Parselmouth (a trait associated entirely with Dark wizards) who apparently tricked his way into a magical contest teleports away with the person tied with him for victory, then teleports back with his corpse, covered in injuries and screaming hysterically that Voldemort has returned. There's not actually any evidence for anything that he says, and it would be trivial to interpret it as a lunatic student killing another one and blaming it on the Dark Lord.
514** You've seen how easily the public can turn on a particular celebrity due to overexposure or just getting sick of them.
515[[/folder]]
516
517[[folder:The Power of Love]]
518
519* Ok, the theme of the books is that the PowerOfLove is the most important/powerful thing and Dumbledore is the main advocate for this, who goes on and on at length about how incredibly important it is and how Voldemort's evilness stems entirely from his inability to love. And then Rowling's WordOfGod about his backstory states that he had one bad experience with love, decided that it makes you [[LoveMakesYouEvil evil]] and [[LoveMakesYouStupid stupid,]] and avoids it like the plague for the rest of his life, all the while still preaching to everyone else about how great the power of love is. [[FlatWhat What?]] Granted, it was the mother of all bad experiences, so his reaction is fair enough, but it doesn't mesh well with the theme of the whole series. Did Rowling drop the ball on that one, or am I just missing something?
520** And to think that some people seriously accuse Rowling of fawning to the gay folk. The actual message seems to be the polar opposite.
521** This is how I see it: Dumbledore realizes how being in love affects ''his own decisions'' and decides to avoid it entirely. That's his individual decision, though. He also realizes that it can make people do great things and is overall a powerfully positive force, and therefore continues to advocate love as the most powerful thing ever. Besides, it's not like he avoids all types of love entirely, just romantic love. He obviously loves Harry and [=McGonagall=] and plenty of others, it's just that it's not romantic love, because not all love IS romantic.
522** Agreed. One of the most powerful and often-mentioned loves there was in the series was Lily's very-much-not-romantic love for Harry that saved him and it wasn't Harry's love for Ginny that threatened Voldemort.
523** And wasn't it Dumbledore's love for his sister and brother that prevented him making that mistake again?
524[[/folder]]
525
526[[folder:Bertie Bott's popularity]]
527
528* Why exactly are Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans popular at all? Regular companies without magic can create candy that tastes like vomit or earwax but don't. Why? Because no one wants to eat something that tastes like that. Companies make candies that people actually want to taste like chocolate and cherry. Admittedly there are people who like mouth-watering candies that make your eyes water, but they aren't a majority and those candies aren't stocked in large amounts.
529** But that's the appeal! You buy chocolate, you get chocolate. You buy a bag of Bertie Bott's, you could get anything. Could be chocolate, could be toast, could be ants, could be boogers. Every bean is a gamble. They also seem to be more popular with kids (the one time Dumbledore ate one, he had his NostalgiaGoggles on), who can appreciate the "danger" and the grossness. There is a social factor too: You can't say much about sharing a chocolate bar, but with the Beans you and your friends have something to talk about with every bite.
530
531[[/folder]]
532
533
534[[folder:Apparation]]
535
536* Why didn't any of the characters simply apparate out of tight situations? I can understand Dumbledore and Snape, since it's impossible to apparate in/out of Hogwarts, but what about Lily, James and Harry? If she heard Voldemort coming, she probably had more than enough time to grab Harry and just apparate to a safer place, and I don't seem to recall there being anything mentioned about how "they couldn't have done that because so and so".
537** They didn't have their wands with them (established in DH). Unless you are crazy powerful and can do wandless magic (i.e. you are Dumbledore/Voldemort), you need a wand to Apparate.
538** The usual MO seemed to be putting up anti-Apparation wards.
539** I'm willing to bet that there were anti-apparation wards around the Potter house specifically as a security measure (it's easier to take care of or flee from intruders if they need to walk up to the house personally instead of just teleporting inside).
540** And not only does it require a wand, it also needs the person to be in the right frame of mind. The 'Three [=Ds=]' is what gets a person safely from point A to point B. If you try to disapparate in a panic, you might end up splinching yourself - which is what happens a few times in the last book.
541[[/folder]]
542
543[[folder:Ending Quidditch matches]]
544
545* How did Quidditch matches end before the introduction of the Golden Snidget and later the Snitch? Current rules only allow the game to end when either the Snitch is caught or the two captains agree to end the game. So before the Snitch, were all matches won by forfeit? Or was there a score or time limit for the game to end that was eliminated when the Snitch was introduced?
546** Having a match decided by who gives up first sounds like a really stupid thing to do as then it's not a matter of who is the better team but by who is more stubborn. The teams could just glide around not doing anything and waiting for the other ones to quit. The first-to-whatever would work best for an elimination-style tournament because teams that often won would have around the same point total and it would mean that some teams only got to play one game a season. I think the most likely and sensible answer is that before the Snitch there was a time limit.
547** Having every match won by forfeit before ''is'' stupid and illogical... which considering how we know the wizarding community acts most of the time, means that is the most likely option.
548** I vaguely recall something in Quidditch Through the Ages about games in the pre-snitch days ending when one team reaches a certain score. But even if that wasn't the case, the current model is hardly any less stupid or illogical. A modern match between two teams whose seekers are particularly inept or are stuck riding shoddy brooms could conceivably never end. In fact I think there was a mention in the first book of a famous match that continued non-stop for ''days'' because nobody could find the snitch.
549** After one game with an inept seeker, said team would be quick to fire him for someone else. Both of them having shoddy brooms seems like a big coincidence, especially since the Seeker most needs the best broom the team has.
550** ''Quidditch Through The Ages'' provides a lot of history for the sport, and indicates that it evolved gradually rather than simply starting as "Quidditch today, but missing an endgame." That would be ridiculous anyway, but Quidditch started out without any Snitch and was just a regular ball game like soccer or basketball on brooms. Snidget hunting became popular eventually, and the Chief of the Wizards' Council offered a 150 Galleon reward to the player at a particular Quidditch match that caught the bird. It made the game much more exciting and added a new element to it.
551** ''Quidditch Through The Ages'' states that a quidditch match ends when a) the snitch is caught '''or''' b) by mutual consent of the team captains. So, there is no "the game goes on forever" even if the snitch is never caught; once both team captains agree that there's no point in playing any further, the game ends.
552** What if the captain of the losing team refuses to let the game end?
553** It probably means that he will need a really sturdy codpiece after the match lest he gets certain body parts hexed off by annoyed teammates.
554
555[[/folder]]
556
557[[folder:Quidditch rules]]
558
559* I can't find this anywhere: Why is quidditch have rules that mean that if you play seeker for team Awesome, which has fifty points, and the other team, team Goblin, has four hundred points, then you can either catch the snitch and lose or do nothing? Why did Krum catch the snitch in Goblet when he doomed his team that way? And how many beatings did he receive for that by his angry teammates?
560** Presumably none. As was explained in the book, Krum knew that his team was getting hammered and couldn't win. He had the choice of catching the Snitch as soon as possible so that he could end the game on his terms or waiting until they were losing by an embarrassing degree...which also risked the other Seeker catching the Snitch instead.
561** The opposite team was outscoring them ''17 to 1''. If Krum didn't catch it right away the score would have been even more embarrassing.
562** Possibly: it's not unheard of for a star athlete to do what makes him look good, or makes his stats better, even if it's not the best for his team.
563** A Seeker whose team is badly behind doesn't do ''nothing'': it's their responsibility to ''foil the other Seeker'' while their teammates struggle to catch up, or to end the game with the honor of a Snitch-catch if they have no chance to do so.
564** Keep in mind that right after Krum took a Bludger in the face, the Irish Seeker Lynch went diving for the Snitch. At this point, Krum's only options were to do nothing (other than get his injury healed) and let Lynch get the Snitch or go after it himself in hopes of catching it and minimizing Bulgaria's point loss.
565
566[[/folder]]
567
568[[folder:Quidditch points]]
569
570* Why do all means of scoring in Quidditch grant points in multiples of ten? Chasers get 10 points for scoring a goal with the Quaffle, and Seekers get 150 points for catching the Snitch. How is that any better than having a Quaffle-goal win 1 point and a Snitch-catch, 15? Unless there used to be another means of scoring single points, or of ''losing'' single points as a penalty, using multiples of ten just seems like unnecessary score-inflation.
571** Because this is the ''wizarding world''. Seriously, this place runs on applied illogic and wishful thinking. We should be glad it runs on a base-ten system at all, and doesn't award 74 points for each Quaffle score and 93 for each Snitch or something.
572** Quidditch cup points translate directly into house points, and Rowling designed the sport to fit the school, rather than logic. Having the snitch only be worth 15 house points would make the whole thing seem pointless (whereas having the protagonists auto-win by saving the day at the last minute makes everyone else's struggle for points all year really meaningful.)
573** They don't. That's pure Fanon.
574** Because 10 is a cooler number than 1. A lot of real-life games score things in multiples of 10 or 100 or 1000. Pinball machines, for example. Getting 100 points for hitting the bumper just feels better than getting 1 point.
575** The game has changed quite a bit over the years, as all the various Noodle Incidents show, and there may have been any number of other scoring plays before it was pared down to just goal + snitch. Also, sport scoring systems don't have to be logical. See: Tennis.
576** They DO. Philosopher's Stone has a line after Harry and the others get caught out of bed that losing 150 points at once would lose them the lead he won for Gryffindor in the Quidditch match. That establishes that Quidditch points do factor into House Points.
577
578[[/folder]]
579
580[[folder:Auror training]]
581
582* What's the point in training to become an Auror? The ones we saw seemed no more competent at defeating Death Eaters than normal Hogwarts students.
583** The six people who went to the Ministry are hardly 'normal Hogwarts students' and Aurors are more competent than them, if only by virtue of knowing more magic. Aurors also don't exist solely for the purpose of catching Death Eaters or else there would be no Aurors when the books start. Asking why bother having Aurors if there are stronger Death Eaters is like asking why bother having police if a criminal could still shoot them.
584** There were twelve DEs (a few of them done in by the DA) against two Aurors (Tonks and Kingley), one former Auror (Moody) and two civilians (Lupin and Sirius). The Aurors and Order members were outnumbered. Then came in Dumbledore...
585** And if you go by Literature/FantasticBeastsAndWhereToFindThem, Aurors could also be used to subdue particularly dangerous dark creatures.
586** Also the normal Hogwarts students had been training for about six months in defensive spells. Most of the stuff they learned they didn't appear to know from regular DADA (as Hermione looked up a bunch of spells for Harry to use in the Triwizard Tournament). Tonks also gives a bit of background info on Auror training - and that involves stealth training (which she nearly failed because she's such a clutz) and disguise (which might include knowing how to brew Polyjuice Potion, and how to use magic to change your appearance).
587** And Auror training seems to be a lot like the military. You can get all the training you need - but one stray bullet and you're toast. It's a game of chance a lot of the time.
588[[/folder]]
589
590[[folder:Dark names]]
591
592* And what kind of people call themselves "Dark" without irony? Light makes sense because anyone could call themselves that? Humanity's worst monsters typically either think they're saving the world or don't care what anyone calls them.
593** Maybe an outbreak of ThenLetMeBeEvil. Maybe they tried to give themselves a badass-sounding intimidating name and failed. Maybe they were given the moniker by a newspaper and it stuck.
594** Might also be a social construct result of a "hiding=good" mentality since the Witch Hunts. Light is metaphorically associated with knowledge, openness, lack of secrecy, discovery, while dark is associated with concealment, hiding, safety. Makes sense that a society in hiding might develop strong LightIsNotGood and DarkIsNotEvil tropes, starting to break down with the recent-to-the-long-lived-Wizards Enlightenment but engrained enough to have symbolic significance to the traditional crowd.
595** Healers, for example. You could have a healer with dark ties who thus has some darker knowledge and is not afraid to use it if it means saving someone's life, as opposed to a "light" healer would would shy away from it even if it means that someone dies. In other words, "dark" people would be those who, at least to a certain degree, can accept "the need can excuse the methods".
596
597[[/folder]]
598
599[[folder:Unbreakable Vow retroactive]]
600
601* Could the Unbreakable Vow work retroactively? I mean, could you use it to confirm that you're telling the truth about something you said or did in the past, as opposed to what you will or will not say or do in the future?
602** Presumably, as long as the wording of the vow included a phrase that was some kind of variation on the theme of "Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth for the next ''x'' minutes?" Admittedly the punishment - death - would be a little harsh, but yes, I think it would be possible.
603** Considering that Unbreakable Vows are dark magic, this is rather likely to be the case.
604
605[[/folder]]
606
607[[folder:Longbottoms Fidelius Charm]]
608
609* Why weren't the Longbottoms under a Fidelius Charm? If Neville was one of the possible Prophecy targets it would seem that they would have gotten all the protections afforded to the Potters.
610** They probably were, and when Voldemort was defeated, they dropped the charm. Then Bellatrix attacked in the chaos and confusion and let-down-their-guard celebration, or some point a few years after, as a revenge strike before her capture.
611** And since Voldemort had very publicly gone after Harry instead of Neville, they had good reason to believe their child wasn't in danger any more. With Voldemort gone, they were probably out there with the rest of the Aurors trying to round up the remaining Death Eaters.
612[[/folder]]
613
614[[folder:Mrs Weasely's job]]
615
616* Why doesn't Mrs Weasley get a job? Constant reference is made to the fact that the family are super poor, but one of the two possible main providers stays at home? This becomes especially apparent in the second book, where all the kids have either moved out or are at Hogwarts. Even a few days a week could possibly make a difference.
617** She's spent the last two decades taking care of children full time. Sure, she's strong and can whip up a great meal and clean a house pretty well but what other skills does she have? Maybe she was planning on getting one, or training for one, but was just taking a break after all the years of child raising? Then the war started.
618** Is it ever stated outright that she ''doesn't'' have a job? She might take seasonal employment while the kids are away at school, that we just don't see.
619** The Weasleys farm their own food partially. Ever tried farming? It's bloody hard work. So Molly has to make sure that the animals are routinely fed and cared for, and that the house doesn't fall into disrepair. It's implied she and Arthur married very quickly because of the last wizarding war - so she might have become a housewife immediately and had a child or two to take care of before long. So she might just not have had time to have a job.
620** And the family may be poor but are they destitute? They know how to stretch their budget, so to speak. The younger children get hand-me-downs and Molly always keeps them fed. It's said that she's quite talented at magically making food - from what they farm and what she's able to reproduce - so that Ron is actually used to three delicious meals a day. By the time Harry meets them, they have two children successfully employed and living away from home. Through a windfall in book three and Arthur's promotion in book six, they do well enough to not need Molly working. And perhaps Bill and Charlie send some money their way too?
621** The Weasleys are not wealthy, but they're only really 'poor' by comparison with the other characters. Ron's two closest friends are Hermione, the only child of two Dentists, which is a well-paying job; and Harry, the sole heir of the fortune earned by his grandfather. The only people who make any reference to the Weasleys being poor are the Malfoys, who are wealthy enough that buying seven international-standard racing brooms is a trivial expense. The type of poverty the Weasleys have is something that thousands would ''kill'' to upgrade to. They own their own home, in which each of the five children living at home (in Ron's second year) have their own bedroom (well, the twins share, but that is probably by choice as much as necessity). The house might be cluttered, but it's always clean and warm. Their house has a significant amount of land, allowing them to keep chickens and grow at least some produce. They ''always'' have enough to eat, and can feed extra guests as much delicious food as they can eat. The depths to which they're forced to plummet in order to survive their crushing poverty are...buying second-hand books and dress robes for their younger children. Granted, they don't have much in savings, meaning unexpected expenses (like buying Ron a new wand when it gets broken) hit them hard, but their main disadvantage is a lack of disposable income for expensive luxuries.
622** It's like what we can call "Hollywood Poverty" maybe? They are call poor in-universe but in reality they'll be considered low middle class.
623[[/folder]]
624
625[[folder:Dementor reproduction]]
626
627* How do Dementors reproduce and what does the fog have to do with it?
628** It conceals the disgusting details of their reproduction process.
629** [[http://www.accio-quote.org/articles/2000/1000-canadianpress-moore.htm According to Rowling here]], dementors spawn like fungi.
630
631[[/folder]]
632
633[[folder:Parseltongue]]
634
635* How does Parseltongue work? In ''The Chamber of Secrets'', I believe, we are told that this is a super-rare ability, and a big deal is made about Harry being a Parselmouth. Then in ''The Half-Blood Prince'' we see three members of Gaunt family talk in Parseltongue to ''one another''. What's the point of speaking an animal language to a human? Dumbledore, who is present during the scene with Gaunts, seems to understand what they are speaking, too. And in ''The Deadly Hallows'' Ron learns Parseltongue... by listening to Harry talking in his sleep. So, if you can just learn Parseltongue, why is the society afraid of Parselmouths, as we see in ''The Chamber of Secrets''? And why is it considered so rare? All the people mentioned above, Voldemort, and, allegedly, Salazar Slytherin, - that leaves us with eight Parselmouths in the series.
636** The point of speaking it to a human is that you cannot be eavesdropped on. DD knows it because he's the goddamn Dumbledore. Ron manages to reproduce one word from many tries. Just because it can theoretically be learned, doesn't mean it's not insanely difficult, hence the rareness. Slytherin's kin apparently had to as an innate ability. They were afraid of it, because V could do it.
637** Dumbledore doesn't understand Parseltongue, he just can recognize it.
638** In sort, no one seems to know very much about Parseltongue or those that speak it, but the only time anyone was really ''afraid'' of it was during ''Chamber of Secrets'', in which Harry speaking the language was seen as a sign of him being descended from Salazar Slytherin - in reality, this was only due to [[spoiler: Harry being the last of Voldemort's Horcruxes]]. Voldemort, through his mother and the Gaunts, ''was'' descended from Slytherin, which allowed him to speak the language, and Ron may have just been the first person who'd learn to speak it from someone else.
639** People don't seem to know how it works because it's so rare that there hasn't been sufficient enough study of it.
640[[/folder]]
641
642[[folder:Talking to other animals]]
643
644* On a somewhat related note, why do we hear about people talking with snakes, but not with other animals, like, say, owls? Owls are pretty big deal, they are vital to communication. You'd think that talking to your pet would be useful. And what are snakes good for, except for being used as Horcruxes, killing people and supplying a half-dead psychopath with venom?
645** Owls can clearly understand human speech.
646** Harry talks to his owl all the time, and she can clearly understand him. It's more because of her intelligence, though; wizard owls seem to be smarter than common wild owls. As for what snakes are good for, well, killing people is a pretty big deal. I can't see a covert assassination going well when attempted by owl.
647** For all we know, there ''are'' other kinds of animal-speaker in the Potterverse; it just happened to be snake-speakers that had starring roles in this particular series of adventures.
648** The reason talking to snakes was important was because it was what Salazar Slytherin was known for, and even then, it was really only ''very'' important in the second book, when everyone thought Harry was his heir since he could speak the tongue. After that, it's really just that Voldemort happens to be the last of the Gaunts who are descended from Slytherin and can speak Parseltongue - he had an affinity for snakes even when he was young, so they're important to him.
649
650[[/folder]]
651
652[[folder:Hagrid with the muggles]]
653
654* Why doesn't anyone ever suggest to Hagrid (who is treated as an oddity and failure by several wizards for his lack of magic and what not) to go live with Muggles? Hagrid lives in a shack and constantly praises Dumbledore's generosity for making it happen despite his expelling. Amongst Muggles, Hagrid would be a ''celebrity'' and richer than the Malfoys. His strength alone would let him win like, any sport ever. No one there would give a crap about his heritage or lack of magic since no one would know about it. He'd just be a tall, super strong dude and a celebrity. Amongst humans he'd be a legend. Since he's not allowed to use magic (And most seem to assume he doesn't), its not like they'd expect him to blow TheMasquerade open. And it's not like there's rules against him interacting like muggles, since they let Squibs do it all the time and several wizards live smack dab in the middle of muggle communities.
655** Because he's a good groundskeeper. He still has plenty of magical knowledge, especially when it comes to magical beasts and Giants, and can provide a good service to the school. And Hagrid doesn't ''want'' to leave. He's not just out for fame and fortune, after all. He heavily respects Dumbledore almost to the point of blind loyalty, and remaining on the school grounds lets him reclaim a little of his lost magical schooling; you ''know'' he's likely still upset about being expelled. Being the groundskeeper lets him be around the community that he's a part of. He's not going to run off to the Muggles just because it might get him more cash.
656** Joining Muggle society would mean leaving behind all the magical creatures that fascinate Hagrid, not to mention everyone he's ever known or respected. He can't legally do magic, so he wouldn't be allowed to keep fantastic beasts in a Muggle community: he can't conceal such animals' presence, or erase witnesses' memories if anyone caught a glimpse of his "pets". Besides which, he's such a terrible liar that he could potentially spoil the Masquerade if he hung around with Muggles for long.
657** Also, being considered a bumbler by wizarding folk is probably still a better option than being considered an out-and-out genetic freak by Muggles. Hagrid ''is'' quite abnormally huge, after all.
658** Some people prefer a simple life. For many folks living in a shack near a forest sounds like a paradise, much more than be “rich and famous”.
659** And Hagrid got expelled while still a teenager. I can't remember if his dad had already passed away by this point, but it's hinted that Dumbledore knew he wasn't guilty and lobbied for him to be kept on.
660[[/folder]]
661
662[[folder:Hermione and pink]]
663
664* ''Why'' was there such a big deal made over Hermione wearing pink in the movies? Seriously, it's just a freaking color, for crying out loud. It's not the end of the world if she wears a pink sweater/dress.
665** I don't think it's so much an issue as just a 'couldn't you be more imaginative than that?' thing. The whole 'girls love pink' thing is pretty overdone, especially when we see more of her than any other female character.
666** RealWomenNeverWearDresses meets TheyChangedItNowItSucks. As Hermione is not a stereotypical GirlyGirl and is more of a bookworm, some rather aggressive fans assumed she would hate all girly things. The film's IMDB page was even in an edit war with people listing "Hermione is a person who hates pink and would not wear a pink dress" as a goof. Real life is of course not that cut and dry. Even if a girl isn't [[Film/LegallyBlonde Elle Woods]], there's no law that says she can't ever wear pink. Hermione doesn't seem to follow a distinct colour scheme in the films - wearing many different-coloured outfits - so she has one pink hoodie and wears a pink dress once. And in the books, Hermione wears a pink dressing gown at one point - so she clearly isn't the girliness-hater the fans thought. For what it's worth, the costume designer tried blue first and found that it simply didn't suit Emma Watson - as brown haired girls tend not to wear blue very well - and pink looked better. And there's no uproar about the fact that Harry wore black instead of green, Parvati wore orange instead of pink and Padma wore pink instead of turquoise. Hermione's dress is changed from purple to red in the seventh film too and there's no uproar about that.
667** Paraphrasing a rather brilliant quote from ''{{Series/Supergirl2015}}'''s Cat Grant, if you're less worried about the actions of the powerful woman and your main problem is with the colour of her dress, "isn't the problem you?"
668[[/folder]]
669
670[[folder:Sacrifice]]
671
672* Why was it only Lily's sacrifice that magically protected Harry? James died for love too. Is it because motherly love is apparently stronger than a father's love? Is it because James tried in vain to fight back and violence is wrong? Is it because Voldemort offered to spare Lily (in which case it would be quite poetic as Voldemort's one act of mercy bit him back hard)?
673** The latter. Voldemort offered to spare her life and she rejected it in favor of offering her life instead of Harry's. James' sacrifice was noble, but it didn't fulfill the condition of "being allowed to walk away and not doing so."
674** V never offered to spare ''Harry's'' life, yet in "Hallows" Scarhead's sacrifice somehow provides the similair effect. How is that?
675** Because, while there was no scenario in which Voldemort was going to let Harry live, Harry had to make a choice to walk out unarmed and allow Voldemort to shoot him without resisting. He just as easily could have spent the time setting up barricades for the second wave of attacks, but Harry decided to sacrifice himself, thus fulfilling the condition. James Potter's death didn't qualify because Voldemort planned to shoot him regardless, but he honestly would not have killed Lily if she'd run.
676** James attacked Voldy. That is why he didn't give a protection. Lily sacrificed herself without fighting. That is why she did give a protection. It was the same reason why Harry, by not fighting, gave protection to everyone at the end.
677*** Not fighting back was the reason the Elder Wand remained loyal to Harry after he "died," but it had nothing to do with his, Lily's, or James's sacrifices. The protection magic can only be invoked by allowing yourself to die for another person after you've been given the option to stand aside and survive. What's important is the offer, the chance to come out of it alive: Voldemort was asked to spare Lily by Snape, but he received no such request for James, so he was going to be killed either way.
678
679[[/folder]]
680
681[[folder:Weasely finances]]
682
683* Perhaps I'm missing something from the books, but I was wondering why the Weasleys don't become clearly financially better off as the series progresses. It's quite understandable that they're in poverty at the start of the books - only one wage eaner at home (earning what sounds like a mediocre wage), supporting a housewife, a son who's just left school, four who are still there, and one daughter who hasn't even started yet. However, towards the end of the series, only two of their children are in school (and living at home), meanwhile one is in (what sounds like) a well-paid job as a cursebreaker, one works with dragons (presumably there's good hazard pay in that) and another two are running a lucrative business. Surely they can afford to help their parents out, and surely Molly and Arthur are much better off with fewer dependants at home?
684** Was their poverty even emphasised that much or at all by the end of the series?
685** Mostly Malfoy making fun of it. But that could easily just him still being a jerk even after they've become more financially stable.
686** If you'll notice in book six, Arthur gets promoted. So presumably they do become better off financially. Fred and George also send Molly a few rather expensive gifts for Christmas.
687** We also get introduced to them at a point where they've got the majority of children away at school for most of the year - and the older two are away in other countries working (which takes the pressure off having to provide for them. Things probably were very tough when Bill and Charlie were children, but they've slowly improved over the course of the years.
688[[/folder]]
689
690[[folder:Unicorn blood]]
691
692* Okay, explain this one: Even if you haven't killed the unicorn (heck, even if you haven't ''harmed'' the unicorn, it could be that the unicorn cut itself to give you its blood... assuming it can do that), would drinking its blood still curse you?
693** Firenze's dialogue in "Philosopher's Stone" indicates that the unicorn blood itself has few (if any) magical properties, but the "half-life, a cursed life, from the moment the blood touches your lips" that someone who drinks it will be subjected to is derived metaphorically, from the drinker having slain something pure and innocent to save themselves. As with a lot of other magic, intent matters.
694** Are unicorn's intelligent enough to cut themselves to allow people to drink?
695[[/folder]]
696
697[[folder:Durmstrang and Beubaxtons in the Second War]]
698
699* Why didn't Durmstrang and Beubaxtons get involved in the Second War? We know there were a bunch of contacts between the three schools (FleurxBill, Hermione pen pals with Krum, etc), so where were they during the war?
700** Uhm, probably at home, teaching their students magic. They're not a SWAT team, it's not their business to fight foreign terrorists. Besides, it's a subclause of the general "Why didn't other countries help England" question, which is discussed elsewhere.
701** Also...no. Fleur being married to Bill and Hermione being pen pals with Viktor Krum does not equate to Hogwarts having the support of foreign countries or their schools during the war, especially in the last book where the Ministry ''and'' school were both being run by Death Eaters and Dumbledore was already dead. It's possible some of the foreign relations were trying to help, but if they were, it couldn't have been a very organized fighting force since there was no one high enough in the British magical community there to organize it. A great deal of what happened in the second war was accomplished largely due to mass vigilantism.
702
703[[/folder]]
704
705[[folder:Snape and Draco]]
706
707* Why does Snape like Draco? At ''all''? It's generally shown in the books that they get along famously until Draco becomes a Death Eater in the sixth one, but previously to that, why didn't Snape just flat-out hate Malfoy's guts? Given that Draco's a lazy, cowardly, privileged, bullying gang boss, he seems like the embodiment of everything Snape should hate from his own experiences. In comparing Snape and James' rivalry to Harry and Draco's, Draco is ''clearly'' the closer equivalent to James. Now, Snape has deluded himself into thinking that Harry is exactly like [[JerkJock James]], but there's quite simply no way he can see himself in Draco, or believe Draco is the victim of Harry's bullying.
708** Perhaps Snape doesn't like Draco. Perhaps his years of favoritism were designed to get him in the good graces of Lucius Malfoy and by extension a hypothetical reformed Death Eaters. Nothing like Draco coming home and saying "Dad! Professor Snape's great! He really hates Harry Potter and mudbloods!" to get Snape the street cred he needs to be accepted despite working for Dumbledore for ten years. And by the time Half-Blood Prince comes around, Snape is concerned for Draco because he's about to ruin his life by joining the Death Eaters.
709** Also, remember that there's a part of Snape that'd been attracted to the nascent Death Eaters of Slytherin as a youth, and struggled to fit into their cliche. Early on, the well-off, socially-privileged, pure-blooded Draco may well have seemed like the kind of boy Severus had wished ''he'' could be, back in his tempted-by-Darkness school days, and that side of him couldn't help but be drawn to young Malfoy, even though he knew the path that Draco was on only led to disaster.
710** This might also be a case of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" situation. His hate for Harry is ''extremeley'' personal, not just because he reminds him of James, but because he is literally the reason Lily is dead. He might think Draco is a spoiled jerkass, but that is nothing compared to the hate, resentment and bitterness - which he bottled up for years - that he feels whenever he faces Harry, and seeing how much Harry and Draco hate each other, he probably gives Draco special treatment just to make Harry's life more miserable, even if he doesn't particularly like Draco.
711
712[[/folder]]
713
714[[folder:Quidditch and quaffle]]
715
716* Why would quidditch teams care about the quaffle at all? Getting the snitch is such a huge swing in points that it seems like the best strategy is just to have the keeper and 2 chasers guard the goalposts while the rest of the team attacks the other team's seeker.
717** For one thing, in later games, they rack up such high scores that the snitch doesn't end it for the win (i.e. the World Cup game from TGOF), or they need to win by so many points in order to take the cup (this happens more than once in the books, I believe.) Alternatively, this troper hypothesizes that if a team attempted such a strategy, the opposing team would put one of its beaters and their three chasers on pure protect-the-seeker duty, and then have another beater eliminate the two enemy Chasers guarding the goals, (because anyone's fair game for a bludger hit except for the keeper when the Quaffle isn't in the goal area, if I remember correctly), and then when they're down, the beater could go guard the seeker, and then you'd have three chasers attacking the goalposts, allowing for you to score twenty, thirty goals before the other team's seeker finds the Snitch.
718
719[[/folder]]
720
721[[folder:Wizard food]]
722
723* Where do wizards get food? I mean the half-bloods and the muggleborns can always go to a muggle grocery stores, but it's shown in-series that there are a few wizards who don't know how to even use muggle money so where do they get food? Are there wizard grocery stores where ignorant and muggle hating wizards can buy their food?
724** The Weasleys run a small farm (more of a garden and some chickens but I digress); I'm sure the Malfoys are rich enough to own a plantation of sorts; once they have food, they replicate it like crazy, bada bing, bada boom, feasting for life.
725** Er, wizard grocery stores maybe? Where they pay with wizard money? But if you like, you could imagine that most of the pure blood families are well off enough to have a house elf or someone who takes care of all that. Everyone else is half blood or Muggle born, meaning they'd have some knowledge of where to go or what to do.
726** Actually, this is a really good question. I can buy that some wizards farm and grow food. But farming isn't as simple as pouring water on some seeds; you need to hoe weeds, fertilize, harvest, keep the bugs off. For livestock, you need feed, lots of feed. Not to mention, the climate of Great Britain can't suit every single fruit and vegetable we've seen throughout the series. Cocoa beans, for instance. That, combined with the small wizarding population in Britain, means that at some point, the wizards have to import SOMETHING from either the muggle world or other wizarding countries- groups we see very little contact between- in order to explain the variety.
727** For the argument that gardening is tough, that's why they teach Herbology at Hogwarts. Watering the planets? Use that water-summoning spell. Fertilizing, harvesting, there are probably charms for those, bugs could be repelled with magic, animal feed, you just need a little bit to be duplicated and you can make more...Not as difficult as it is to Muggles. (Or No-Majs, I guess, as we call them in America...)
728** LawOfCoservationOfDetail. Wizards probably have front companies that buy food from No-Majes, we just never get to see them because why would we? Also, contact may be limited, but at the very least No-Maj currence is excahngeable for Wizard one, so there must be at least some trade.
729** In Britain, most wizards do seem to live near Muggles. Hogsmeade is a little village and it's the only all-wizard settlement in the country. So there at least we can assume that they get their things from Muggle grocery stores or else they farm it themselves.
730[[/folder]]
731
732[[folder:Harry as Seeker]]
733
734* How could Harry possibly make such a good Seeker? A Seeker's job is to spot a walnut-sized ball flying around the arena, a task which logically requires good eyesight. And as we all know, Harry wears glasses. He should be struggling to spot the Snitch, yet for some reason he seems to be unusually good at the task. Glasses aren't perfect, and even if his somehow are, they shouldn't give him superhuman eyesight.
735** The point of eyeglasses is to improve the wearer's vision to the point that it is as good as that of someone who doesn't need them, so as long as he's wearing his glasses, the fact that he needs them isn't a problem. It's frequently mentioned that to be am effective seeker, one has to be able to notice things that most people won't, like a snitch, which Harry is frequently shown and said to be capable of.
736** If you'd like proof, this troper has both terrible eyesight and a real knack for noticing small details and other things most people wouldn't. (Especially when those things are moving, like a Snitch does.) So it's definitely possible that someone with poor eyesight could make a good Seeker.
737[[/folder]]
738
739[[folder:Unnecessary enchantments]]
740
741* Why does the Wizardry world seem to have an obsession with adding unnecessary and superfluous enchants to products they manufacture that should make them more inconvenient and undesirable? For instance, why do they animate chocolate frogs to move and behave like actual, live frogs (Eeewww!) and even try to run away when they're about to be eaten? Or produce [[http://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Licorice_Snap disgusting-looking black candies that bite people]]? Or animate books, turning them into [[http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110720154511/harrypotter/images/a/af/NevilleMBoM.gif monsters that attack their owners]], many of whom are children? It's like they believe that they should enchant everything just because they can!
742** It is likely they ''do'' enchant them because they can. ''Especially'' with candy for kids, for a substantial majority of kids [[RuleOfCool gross is cool]].
743*** Many kids may find gross things cool, but how many of them are willing to put gross things ''in their mouths and eat them''?
744*** Then those who are not willing do not buy the product, is not like is mandatory.
745*** You think a food maker is going to say that? "Ok, so our "extra features" have rendered our product too gross and undesirable for most people. But they don't have to buy it, so it's alright. Keep turning these chocolate frogs into live beings!"
746*** Merchants do what customer want, if there is a market for this food is because people buy it in the first place. We actually have examples of that in real life, why would someone buy poison for personal consume (nicotine)? why would someone buy cards with children puking, shitting and doing gross and horrible stuffs (Garbage Pail Kids cards)? why would someone would buy movies about torture and horrible bloody deaths (gore movies)?
747** The most likely answer to "It's like they believe that they should enchant everything just because they can!" is, well wouldn't you? Judging by how people in real life reacts to apps (turning everything in one and downloading unnecessary and superfluous apps, if magic chants were real people would do something similar. In the case of the monster book this was made by Hagrid who is not the best judge on this kind of things, he's a monster enthusiast and he said he just thought it was just funny. The monster book wasn't a real danger anyway and could be controlled with a single touch of the hand [[note]]which could be considered a very good pedagogic exercise, as it would encourage the student to solve a riddle and to think outside the box in regard to handle animals, exactly the kind of thinking that is necessary for Hagrid's subject[[/note]]. It is true that there's a modern conception that children are pussies and should be protected from anything that could be "too scary" or "too dangerous", but this books are in the 80s-90s and people did not treated kids like wimps back them.
748*** No, I most certainly wouldn't put enchants that rendered food gross, or made tools impractical and even dangerous. In real life, apps exist to either make things more convenient (the opposite of what the aforementioned enchants do), or provide publicity. They aren't created just because. We don't put gross things like mucus or earwax in our food, even though we could. Also, the book wasn't made by Hagrid, and there was no disclaimer or instructions on how to tame it; the students only found out about that trick because Hagrid (who is an expert on monsters and magical creatures) told them. Before that, they had to restrain the books to prevent them from biting them, and were unable to read them until Hagrid told them how to handle them.
749*** "No, I most certainly wouldn't put enchants that rendered food gross, or made tools impractical and even dangerous." Well I most certainly would.[[note]]For the record, they don't put mucus or earwax in their food either, they just enchant something to taste like that as a joke, actually similar stuffs do exist in real life[[/note]]. And yes, it is said in the books that Hagrid himself enchanted the bitting books.
750*** Good luck trying to sell such products to the masses.
751** To the OP: If you don't find a biting book funny, then maybe this are not the books for you. Rowling is doing fanservice, we the readers want to see magic everywhere and want to see wizards using magic for everything, even if is sometimes silly. That's why we bought a fantasy book about wizards. If the reaction about some of this world's gimmicks is "OMG kids shouldn't be eating this kind of stuffs, OMG this book is endangering these kids' lives, OMG someone please think in the safety of these children, this is outrageous!" then, again, maybe you are not the intended audience. That said, I don't think this is a headscratcher as headscratchers are define, is more a complaint.
752*** This is the headscratchers page. The point is asking about stuff that puzzles you, such as things that don't seem to make much sense in-universe as presented by the story. If you have a problem with people asking these kind of questions in this page, why are you even reading it? And saying "it doesn't make sense, it's just intended to be funny" doesn't answer the original question about the characters' motivations.
753*** There is also a rule that says "Headscratchers is not for complaining", which in the particular case of the HP franchise is often ignored. This is obviously a violation of such rule as is not a question, is a complaint. Is not the same to ask: how did [insert plothole here] happened? Than to ask “Why is the color of Hogwarts’ walls so ugly?”
754*** OP here. I wasn't complaining, I was asking why wizards would put enchantments on their products that exist ''for the sole sake of making them less appealing and more inconvenient for customers''. If you don't see how that's a genuine question, I can't help you. And perhaps you should learn to read, I never stated or implied that I was outraged by children being endangered in the books. I only mentioned the customers being children because it puzzled me that adults would endanger children for seemingly no reason, seems like the kind of thing that would kill a business.
755[[/folder]]
756
757[[folder:Magical community war exposure]]
758
759* How come that the magical community wasn't exposed to the Muggle world during the First Wizarding War? You have a huge wizard war going on and the muggles didn't even notice? Yes, wizards tend to hide their identities as mages from muggles, but this troper doesn't see Voldemort's side bothering with that, seeing how they were planning to enslave muggles, so clearly they intended to reveal themselves to them anyway.
760** Probably because most people is skeptic and would not easily be convince that wizards exist. Most probably they’ll rationalize the actions of the Death Eaters giving them a non-supernatural explanation… you know, like normal people do.
761** Voldemort didn't infiltrate the Ministry during the first war. So the Ministry still had some measure of control. Fudge mentions that there were witnesses to Sirius and Pettigrew's duel - whose memories they then wiped. So there may have been a lot of memory charms needed but it's just about plausible.
762[[/folder]]
763
764[[folder:Muggles and magical creatures]]
765
766* Also, how come that Muggles don't know about magical creatures? Most magical creatures are unintelligent and wouldn't bother hiding themselves from muggles.
767** The fact that most magical creatures, like dragons, exist in the mythology of most cultures means Muggles knew about their existence in the past, probably when they were much more numerous. I’m under the impression that magical creatures are kind of like endangered species, not many and living in specific areas like reservations made by wizards. It is possible that once in a while one is spotted by Muggles and then became a cryptid like the Loch Ness Monster.
768** Anything particularly big, like dragons, seem to be kept monitored by wizards to make sure they don't come close to Muggle settlements. There's mention of colonies, so there's probably reserves for them
769* The Acromantulas are an even more puzzling case that cannot be easily hand-waved. They're large(growing to the size of a small elephant), extremely aggressive spiders with human-level intelligence that live in colonies, hunt in packs, and actively target humans because they like the taste of human flesh. They are basically apex predators wherever they choose to live, and it's hard to explain why such dangerous creatures aren't known to muggles. They don't make any distinctions between muggles and wizards, and are so dangerous that Voldermort apparently didn't even consider trying to make them allies during the Second Wizarding War, since he probably knew that Acromantulas wouldn't understand or even care about an arrangement where it was okay for them to attack some people but not others.
770*** There's actually no evidence that colonies of Acromantulas exist, as the textbook notes that the one suspected of being set up in Scotland is unusual. So we can assume that the Acromantulas keep to themselves normally or don't have as big a family group as Aragog's.
771** But there must be something magical about Acromantulas, as spider's biology is not design to be that big, an arachnid would not be able to walk or maybe even breed at that size, thus making public the existence of the Acromantula may break the cover and show that magic do exists.
772** Yeah WordOfGod says that they were created before the Ban on Experimental Breeding. The ban was 1965 and the spiders were first spotted in the late 1700s.
773[[/folder]]
774
775[[folder:Giants]]
776
777* Similarly, how about wizards who look differently from normal humans, such as giants? Are they forbidden from coming into contact with muggles or letting them see them? Do they have to stay away from places where there might be muggles? Or are they forced to use Polyjuice Potions to adopt human forms (if that's even possible; humans and giants are different species after all)?
778** Hagrid takes Harry through muggle London on the way to Diagon Alley in the first book, so there probably isn't any restriction forbidding the likes of him from being seen by muggles. The muggles most likely assume he's just a really, really big guy. I imagine if I saw someone of that size walking down the street, I'd guess "some kind of hormonal disorder or heavy steroid abuse" before "descended from magical creatures that I have no reason to believe are real".
779*** Hagrid is only a half-giant. Real giants are much, much larger. Just look at Grawp, who is just a baby.
780** Do they have to stay away from places where there might be muggles? Apparently so. They live in the mountains, hardly the most prosperous of habitats. Wizards would have to force them to remain there.
781[[/folder]]
782
783[[folder:Turning in Skeeter]]
784
785* Why didn't Harry, Ron or Hermione turn Rita Skeeter in to the Ministry once Voldemort was defeated and proper authorities were in charge again? I mean, they clearly are pissed at her for what she does, so why not put a stop to it?
786** They may have turned her in over being an unregistered animagus, but perhaps politics and having just been through a major civil war meant she got off relatively unscathed. Skeeter can't be universally unpopular after all, enough people must like her columns to make them worth publishing. They probably just put her on the animagus list, and told the teenagers that being a PITA isn't a criminal matter.
787** They weren't just random teenagers at that point. Harry Potter was literally the wizard Jesus, fresh off his victory against Voldy-thing. Not to mention that the Minister for Magic after the war was Kingsley Shacklebolt, member of of the Order.
788** Being an unregistered animagus is enough to get one sent to prison, as Hermione threatens her with in book five.
789** Maybe with the Ministry being less corrupt now, Rita was reported as an unregistered Animagus and had to do some kind of community service or some other punishment that was less severe than Azkaban.
790** And defamation laws are tricky things in real life. It's the perogative of the person being defamed to sue for libel or slander, and even then there's all sorts of counters - for example it might not count as slander if the person believed the information to be true and Rita admittedly did do her research. And as you can't defame a dead person, her biographies of Snape and Dumbledore are perfectly legal (depending on how the wizard legal system works).
791[[/folder]]
792
793[[folder:Harry's son and Hagrid]]
794
795* Why is Harry okay with his son visiting Hagrid for tea, especially after what he did in Deathly Hallows? Hagrid, in this troper's humble opinion, crossed the Moral Event Horizon by trying to stop the defenders of Hogwarts from '''defending themselves''' from the Acromantulas. He is watching everyone he supposedly cares about getting potentially devoured by giant spiders and his first instinct is to defend the monsters. I'd imagine that in the many years between the Battle of Hogwarts and the Epilogue, Harry should have realized the following: 1. Hagrid's alcoholism nearly compromised Hogwarts' security. 2. He lets three children commit a crime by concealing the existence of his illegal dragon. 4. He doesn't realize the danger the creatures he loves so much pose to those around him. 5. His attempts at using magic to solve a problem will either be erratic or almost get Harry killed. 6. Doesn't have any objection when students are required to serve detention in a forest which hosts a race of violent centaurs.
796** All right, first off, you skipped 3. Second, Harry likes Hagrid, and him sticking up for the Acromantulas can be chalked up to his naivete. Third, Hagrid isn't really an alcoholic. Sure, he let something slip to someone who was intentionally trying to get him drunk while at a bar. Just because he got drunk one time doesn't make him an alcoholic. As for the rule-breaking, sure, Hagrid has made some mistakes, but he's generally well-meaning, and that's what counts in Harry's books.
797** Fourth, the centaurs aren’t innately predisposed to violence, and they have laws against harming children. All things considered, Hagrid is one of the best people to have around for a trip into the forest.
798** Hargid is the first person to be kind to Harry and give him a birthday present, he introduced him to the magical world, he compiled that photo album with pictures of his parents for Harry, and he is the one adult person in Harry's life who was actually around, going to his quidditch matches and inviting him around for tea every other week. Harry forgave Snape, a man who routinely abused him and his friends, and had a creepy obsession with his mother, so of course he isn't going to resent somebody he ''loves'' for making some mistakes - especially if they are not done out of any malice.
799[[/folder]]
800
801[[folder:Voldemort and the Stone]]
802
803* Dumbledore said he believed that Voldemort preferred creating Horcruxes to drinking the Elixir of Life (from the Philosopher's Stone), because the Horcruxes would make him independent of anything but himself, while the Elixir of Life would make him dependent on the Stone. Basically, Voldemort liked to work independently and to not be dependent on other things or other persons, but when it came to Horcruxes the case was anything but. First, you would be dependent on the survival of the object or living thing that was made into a Horcrux. Not only that, but if you suffer a fatal wound (like Voldemort did when he tried to kill Harry as an infant), you remain alive, but become meaner than the meanest ghost, as Slughorn put it, and that is exactly what happened to Voldemort. In order to get even a rudimentary body back, Voldemort was dependent on one of his followers finding him and then making the potion that would generate the rudimentary body. And even more so for the regeneration spell in Goblet, which made Voldemort dependent on being able to access his father's grave, a follower who would willingly amputate a limb for him, and blood from an enemy. In fact, Voldemort spoke of how he despaired when none of his followers would find him for years, showing his dependence on them. So it looks like the Horcruxes actually made him extremely dependent on both the external objects and the living things in question and on his followers going through the process of making the correct potions to regenerate his body after suffering a fatal injury. So Horcruxes didn't really confer independence at all. Getting the Elixir of Life from the Philosopher's Stone would have caused less dependence, only on the Stone. Why did Voldemort make such an error of judgment? I guess it's, as Dumbledore said, if Lord Voldemort understood all that, then he wouldn't be Lord Voldemort.
804** The Horcruxes have multiple advantages over the Stone, and really if Voldemort could be truly independent, he wouldn't need followers at all. Correct me if I'm wrong but I think the Elixir of Life only extends your lifespan, it doesn't actually make you unkillable, whereas the Horcruxes would make you unkillable (he survived attacking Harry, yes he did need help to regain a body but he was alive). True he was dependent on the Horcruxes but he got around that by 1) making several of them, 2) hiding them and adding numerous enchantments to protect them. The Stone on the other hand; as far as I recall, there was only one Stone which complicates matters if it's stolen or the Elixir is contaminated, and he's mortal again. And as I mentioned; if the Elixir doesn't make you unkillable, then he'd truly be dead when he tried to kill Harry and the curse backfired on him. In short, if Voldemort had the Stone, he'd have to drink the Elixir often, whereas with the Horcruxes, all he needs to do is make them, add protection charms and hide them.
805
806[[/folder]]
807
808[[folder:Child abuse]]
809
810* At certain points, the Dursleys cross the line and go from cartoonish dickery to actual child abuse. I'm thinking mainly about making Harry sleep in the cupboard under the stairs and when Petunia tries to hit him with a frying pan. Let's just put aside the issue of making Harry stay with these assholes. Let's just grant that Lily's protection is necessary for Harry, and that no one bothered to look in at the standard of care the Dursley's were providing their nephew. Let's just talk about what would have happened if an 8 year old Harry had gone to someone at school and told them that he was being abused? What would Dumbledore have done if a well meaning Child Services worker had come out to Privet Drive and actually seen the under-the-stairs cupboard or the ill-fitting clothes Harry wore, or any of the bruises he had on him from when Vernon had manhandled him? Would Dumbledore actually have interfered if the Child Services worker had tried to remove Harry from the home? He would have had to use the Obliviate spell on the Child Services worker, the teacher that Harry had confided in, and possibly some police officers as well. This can be downright NightmareFuel if we assume that this exact scenario took place prior to Book 1, with Harry having confessed to a teacher the conditions he was living in, told his story multiple times to Social Workers and police, only to have none of them remember it later.
811** I don't have any answers guaranteed to be the right ones, but here's an idea: charmed paperwork. We all know that wizards somehow don't get caught in spite of probably coming into contact with "Muggle aurors" on occasions, and that's while some of them lived in the wizarding world for all their lives and most likely don't even have Muggle paperwork. So let's say that their paperwork is in the Ministry of Magic, and the Muggle government has a version of it that can't be changed (only the version in the MoM can), and is as close as possible to the MoM version while still showing that "all is fine". When a wizard is caught by "Muggle aurors" for something, it means that the papers show that everything is in order and there are no prior infractions and the wizard in question was born somewhere, lives somewhere, works somewhere, and all that; exactly what they see depends on what they ''expect'' to see but always "all is fine". And then we get to Harry, and the assumption that he had tried to tell someone: In this case it would be a teacher, who would report it higher and try to investigate and note what they found in the paperwork. Then someone else would be supposed to pick up the paperwork and work on it, but all they find is that "all is fine", which clearly shows that the kid is not abused (because "otherwise it would be in the files"), so the teacher gets a report that the kid was lying which reinforces the local image of Harry (which can change like that because it's not dependent on paperwork but rather on people's perception) and he never tries to tell anyone again. And that's if he actually ever tries to tell anyone, which he might not have ever tried because of Vernon and Petunia's threats about orphanages and all that stuff (when you keep on telling a scared and poorly-treated kid that "they'll have it worse if they blab", it generally does keep them silent).
812
813[[/folder]]
814
815[[folder:Boggart topped cake]]
816
817* According to Pottermore, at Lupin's parents' wedding, they had a "Boggart-topped cake". Does this mean somehow the cake was literally covered in Boggart, or did they just have a cake-topper shaped like a Boggart? And if so, what would that look like, considering the fact it's specifically unknown what a Boggart itself looks like? Or maybe they had an actual Boggart or something which behaved like one on top of the cake, and it turned into a cake-topper-sized version of whatever their guests found the most scary... that would be pretty cool.
818** I'd go with the least absurd-sounding version and say that it was probably something like shape-shifting topping that looked like a cake version of whatever the person feared or something ... like chocolate Snape or strawberry dementors. Or alternatively, it could simply be slang and the cake simply changes taste depending on the person, presumably to what one likes rather than what one fears as dementor-flavoured anything would be pretty yucky.
819
820[[/folder]]
821
822[[folder:Seven Horcruxes]]
823
824* Why exactly did Voldemort feel the need to create 7 Horcruxes? He states that 7 is the powerful magic number, but it's not as if having 7 Horcruxes granted him any sort of additional power or protection (beyond the obvious fact that having to find and destroy 7 Horcruxes makes him much harder to kill). I mean, he could have created 100 Horcruxes and the end result would have been the same. So why did he stop at 7?
825** At 6 actually (plus one non-Horcrux Voldemort that gives seven parts of him), and he stopped because he sort of died. Later after he resurrected he might simply not have had time to do it; for all we know, making a Horcrux requires murdering someone ''and'' something else than that, something that is supposed to be really terrible. While I have to admit to not particularly caring about the alleged terribleness of the required act, the fact remains that we don't know how long that takes nor what the requirements were, and for all we know he might simply not have had time. Of course, the fact remains that he was ''planning'' on only splitting his soul into seven fragments, but that was the initial plan that he had ''"because seven is a magically-significant number"'' and he might or might not have changed it had he survived as a fully-fledged human rather than just a ghost-thingy that particular night.
826** Keep in mind that by the time he's made those 7 horcruxes, he a pale, bald ghoul with no nose, questionable sanity, and bits of soul flying off and sticking to random babies. Call me crazy, but I think tearing out a piece of your soul might physically affect you somehow.
827
828[[/folder]]
829
830[[folder:Ravenclaw and Luna]]
831
832* I get that [[KidsAreCruel kids can be cruel]], but why was a good portion of Ravenclaw house mean to Luna, teasing her about being odd and hiding her belongings? If you're sorted into Ravenclaw on Pottermore, the prefect gives a welcome message, where he specifically says that Ravenclaws value those that 'march to a different tune', pointing out that geniuses are often out of step with ordinary people. He even brings up the fact that Uric the Oddball was a Ravenclaw, when mentioning all the famous witches and wizards that were once Ravenclaws. So, if Ravenclaws supposedly 'think that you've got the right to wear what you like, believe what you want, and say what you feel', why then did this not apply to Luna? Yes, people from other houses also thought Luna was weird and made fun of her, but they weren't the ones taking her belongings, since it's unlikely that anyone but a Ravenclaw would be able to get to her dorm room.
833** Who says that Luna wasn't imagining people were taking her things, same as she imagined so much else? Or, if lots of members of her House are as strange as Luna, that one of the other Ravenclaw girls didn't have some bizarre reason to take her stuff that had nothing to do with being "mean", and made perfect sense to the culprit (but only to her)? Maybe she thought that if Luna's painting of a Crumple-Horned Snorkack was left lying around the dormitory, the Bobble-Bellied Hygraxies would come and carry Luna off to their nests in the night...
834*** Just because someone believes in strange things, doesn't mean they are unable to perceive reality. Luna is actually very perceptive (remember, she recognized a polyjuiced Harry in ''The Deathly Hallows'', so it doesn't make sense that she would imagine something like that.
835** But if some of Luna's housemates were also weird, then why didn't any of them befriend her? Luna flat out says that being in the DA was like having friends, and only Ginny, and later the Trio and Neville, ever became her friends. And even if a fellow Ravenclaw thought that one of Luna's items lying around could attract something, he/she could at least give it to Luna and tell her to put it away, not just take it and only giving it back at the end of the school year when she puts up notices about it. Also, if her roommates were taking her shoes like what was shown in the fifth movie, that comes across as mean, even if they did have weird reason behind it.
836** Or maybe it's simply because Luna's an oddball even by Ravenclaw standards. Just because they're known to "march to their own tune" doesn't mean they still don't follow any sense of logic, whereas Luna still does, but doesn't follow it much. It's something like comparing Albert Einstein with a devoted researcher of Bigfoot - they're both oddballs as well as brilliant minds, just in their own ways.
837** They're also teenagers. Teens will always bully and isolate people who are different, no matter their intelligence level. Brainiacs can be just as ruthless bullies as anyone else.
838** Adding to this, in the books Luna has an outspoken and defensive streak about just how weird she is. She's very blunt about how she feels and extremely stubborn when it comes to what she believes in, no matter how out there it sounds in concept. Her being bullied doesn't need to tie back just to her being weird; it could be her other personality traits, or that she makes herself a particularly easy target.
839[[/folder]]
840
841[[folder: Mundane Horcrux]]
842* Yes, I get it, so Tom couldn't make all of his Horcruxes out of simple, mundane, impossible-to-track-down things, because he was so egotistical and big-headed. But, seriously? He couldn't have done this with at least ''one?'' Because he was also incredibly cunning and smart, was he not?
843** He had an obsession with grandeur and prestige. Having grown up a penniless orphan, this is understandable. And since creating the Horcruxes is his life's ambition, he wants to do it as spectacularly as possible. The diary was actually pretty mundane when you think about it.
844** Take in consideration that he is looking for things were to put '''his soul''', even a normal person would be reluctant to choose any mundane object.
845** Dumbledore has spent his time studying exactly what Tom Riddle was like, presumably to confirm that yes in fact he did not use a mundane object as a Horcrux. In the course of his findings, he sees that Tom went to great efforts to get artefacts like the ring, the locket and the cup - which would be an odd thing to do if he'd planned to just use mundane objects.
846** And here's the thing - Voldemort doesn't know what it's going to feel like when he's split his soul into seven. He doesn't know if he'll be able to sense his Horcruxes or know which is which. So it makes sense that they'd be a distinctive item so he could have no trouble finding it.
847*** Good point, he also doesn't know if everything that happens to the object is going to be feel by him. If he turns a mundane object like a coin and someone makes the cent in the railroad test he might feel it, the savest bet is to use objects that would be treated with respect.
848[[/folder]]
849
850[[folder: American wizard culture]]
851* I don't know the nationalities of other users here, so I don't mean to start aa fight or anything, but is anyone else bothered (or a bit offended) about how the series seems to have portrayed the culture of America's magical community? With the information I've gleaned about the new ''Fantastic Beasts'' film that's coming out, it seems our (America's) history is a lot rockier than Britain's, with things like Scourers (who I guess are something like blood traitors to the evillest extreme), and it being completely unlawful for a witch or wizard to marry a No-Maj, or the Magical and No-Maj governments apparently remaining isolated and not intereacting with each other, and a ''severe'' lapse in TheMasquerade that was so consistently upheld in the ''Harry Potter'' books...I've heard that the new film is just supposed to be a lot darker than the original books, but they both take place in the same universe, and the fact that this series of events is taking place in America... (It's not really just ''Fantastic Beasts'', either - I heard some time back that American wizards and witches were supposedly bored by the prospect of traditional Quidditch, and so we spice the game up by playing it using an exploding Quaffle.) Mind you, I'm really looking forward to seeing the film - I've wanted some dirt on my country's magical community for a while now - I just was wondering if anyone else has noticed how dark and complicated it seems to be...
852** I'm Latin American and well, there is an stereotype that Americans are much more conservative than Europeans and that laws are endorse in a more drastic way, as for example, things like trigger-happy sheriffs, almost no gun control, the three strikes or sentencing someone for pedophile if he has sex with a 17 year old, all of it probably more Hollywood than reality, but is still the perception that a lot of the world have. European countries are generally seen as more liberal places were a lot of things tha are still taboo here in the Americas are to some degree more accepted there, which can probably also not be entirely true, but stereotypes do have a certain base in reality. So, the combination of both visions and the fact that the franchise always had social commentary using satiric representation, cause the effect. The division between magical and muggle government can also respond to two possible stereotypes; that the American society is very dividied between Left-wing Democrats and Right-wing Republicans to a point there is almost no co-operation between the two (this is uncommon in other countries as generally are more political diversity, take Germany or Spain for example) or the other idea that is very present in popular thought is that the US government is kind of authoritarian especially regarding internal treats and paranormal situations (y'know, Area 51, Roswell, etc.) so if the US government have information about a magical race of people their relationships will be hardly as cordial as in Europe.
853** Original poster here...Sorry, but despite being American myself, I have no ideas as to the meaning behind a lot of things people say are wrong with my country, like Democrats vs. Republicans - I don't really know what the two groups do - or converatism and liberalism...I'm just not one for stereotypes...Though then again, I've also never had any hard feelings towards Britain or anything, so maybe there was some sort of social commentary being made that flew right over my head in the original books - it just kind of bothers me that I'm finally learning about magic in my home country, only for it to be so much darker and much more controlled (and in some ways, uncontrolled), and it just makes it a lot less...''magical'' than how the original books had portrayed this stuff. I'm just hoping the movie won't focus too much on it.
854** Stereotypes are normally not a true representation of anything. Yet, they're base generally in the image that certain countries project due to their media. I'm pretty sure there are many missconceptions about Latin America, Canada or Europe too.
855** That may be true. But if the original books ''were'' written based off of stereotypes of British people, they must've flown right over my head, likely because I know very little about Britain. But even if the author/writer is British, I still would've like to have been able to read/watch something about my own country without having to work my way through some sort of social commentary first.
856** I've heard several British people, including some tropers, saying that yes, it seems the books were a satiric representation/social commentary on several issues in British society, like class division, justice and educational systems, media corruption, etc. Similarly it skip my mind as Latino, and most Latinos I know too.
857*** And now we know things were not so bad. Yes the movie does show the US government to be very authoritarian, have death penalty and racial segregation (and those are sadly things that many Europeans do think the US has/had) but for the rest the American characters were as lovely as any other.
858** Some of it does have a RealLife basis. Rappaport's Law is a wizarding parallel to anti-miscegenation (interracial marriage) laws that were not only on the books in most of the South, they were actually written into the constitutions of a number of states. Rappaport's Law was repealed by MACUSA in 1965. In 1967, a landmark No-Maj Supreme Court decision, Loving v. Virginia, rendered the anti-miscegenation laws on the books in 16 states unconstitutional and unenforceable, though many of these laws remained on the books for some time afterward. Alabama was the last state to repeal anti-miscegenation legislation in 2000. And really, Rowling seems to be an equal opportunity satirist. She is often downright merciless in the main series, with regards to the British bureaucracy (Fudge is a caricature of Neville Chamberlain, Umbridge of Margaret Thatcher) and the British education system.
859[[/folder]]
860[[folder: Fairy Tale or Epic Fantasy?]]
861* I'm not entirely sure if this has been confirmed by Word of God, but it seems that J.K. Rowling wrote the Harry Potter series to progress in maturity with its original audience; starting at an elementary school level with "Sorcerer's/Philosopher's Stone," and ending with Young Adult level "Deathly Hallows". There are two parts to my issue with this: First, we're now stuck with a series where the first book is read to kids as a bedtime story, and the last book is... hopefully not. Is this really a good marketing strategy? You'd hope that you would be able to pick up more readers over the years, and it seemeth to me that it would be difficult to do that if you don't have a consistent target audience. Granted, it's still a good series, but it's like the first movie in a trilogy being PG and the last being rated R. Values dissonance on my part, maybe? Probably. Second: J.K. treats the Harry Potter world as either "Children's fairy tale" or "Dark, Fantasy drama". For example, the Dursley's treatment of Harry is generally treated in a light-hearted, Cinderella style, Quidditch is a fun wizarding game, and Ron and Harry steal a flying car and get into shenanigans. Fun for the whole family, wheee! But on the other hand, there are some deep and disturbing implications about government, racism, and the media, and some seriously disturbing death and battle scenes in the last few books. MAKE UP YOUR MIND! We can't take some parts lightly and others seriously- like the use of the Cruciatus curse versus the cartoonish Dursleys. In the same book, we're supposed to be outraged at the lack of quality teaching in DADA, yet chuckle fondly at the students' boredom in History of Magic- taught by a GHOST?! Point is, the switch in seriousness implies some blatant double standards. It's either a fairy tale, or an epic fantasy. I'm fine with either, but I don't enjoy the flip-flopping.
862** First, relax. Second, well children’s books and movies use to be pretty dark. There are many examples of many dark subjects in many children’s stories, especially those written in the 1800s and early 20th century. Children’s movies use to be very dark and scary too, especially during the 70s and 80s, many movies from Creator/DonBluth or Creator/JoeDante for example. ''Gremlins'' was considered a family film in the 80s. But then, in the 90s something change and suddenly people start to think that children are coward and impressionable and that everything made for children should be “sugar-free”, therefore all children’s media like movies, books and cartoons became basically like the “light soda” of media as something that has no drama, tension, conflict or scariness. Everything have to be “child friendly” to an extreme. The situation has been changing.\
863Now, I’m not saying that Rowling have that in mind when she wrote the books, but I do think we as adults don’t give children enough credit. They’re not dumb, they can handle those topics. \
864And yes, there’s a certain irony in mentioning the “fairy tale” as the original fairy tales were pretty dark, full of murder, rapes, cannibalism and the sort. Basically the other extreme. \
865Creator/DonBluth use to say that children can handle any topic as far as there is a happy ending.
866** OP here- I actually did refer to it as a "fairy tale" on purpose; while the original fairy tales did, I'll admit, contain some dark events such as those you listed above, they were not really depicted as such. I'll refer to Harry Potter Book 1, which involved a poor guy who had a dark sorcerer's soul leeching off of him and hanging off of the back of his head. That's some pretty messed up stuff, but the way it was depicted in the book, it did not seem so dark; a surprising plot point to the ten-ish year olds who were reading at the time, little more. Heck, in the second book, the basilik, a monstrous creature that can kill you WITH A LOOK, fails to kill all but one of its victims, who later came back as a ghost, which doesn't really count as a 'death' in the mind of a child. This, to me, could have been a very dark event, but was played off as a slightly more whimsical adventure. Later in the books, things get incredibly dark, and plot points that previously had an abstract, faraway quality to them, such as the murder of Harry's parents, suddenly seemed to be depicted as incredibly dark and horrific. It's like taking 'Cinderella', complete with the "birds pecking out the eyes" ending, reading it to a child for a bedtime story, then the next day reading it to them again, with less emphasis on the 'Happily Ever After' and more on the 'OH MY FREAKING HECK THE STEP SISTERS GOT THEIR EYES PECKED OUT BY CROWS, AND IT WAS ALL BLOODY AND GROSS AND AN ABOMINATION TO HUMANITY!'
867** I'm pretty sure she wrote it sort of with the intent to have the stories and concepts within them age as the reader did. Describing the first book as a "bedtime story" seems like a bit much, even if only because it's a chapter book. I'd assume any child who's old enough to read the first few books (as well as have the diligence to actually finish them, considering their rather impressive length) would be old enough to handle what happens in later installments.
868[[/folder]]
869
870[[folder: Death Eaters]]
871* I've heard in a few places that Death Eaters can't cast a Patronus...Why would that be? A Patronus is said to be formed by you calling upon an extraordinarily happy memory - not only is Bellatrix Lestrange such a sociopath that she probably feels her own version of happy just by doing Voldemort's bidding, but wasn't one of the points of all of this that everyone has light ''and'' darkness inside them? The Malfoys' story arc had them valuing family even over their loyalty to Voldemort - do you mean to tell me Narcissa didn't feel happy or joyous when her only son was born? [[spoiler: Also, Severus Snape himself was a Death Eater who, like the Malfoys, had love as his redeeming factor - he could produce a Patronus easily, so where does the difference lie between him, them, and all the rest?]]
872** Maybe because they've never been in danger from the Dementors? Lupin says in the third book that it's not a common skill for the average adult wizard. Umbridge knows how to cast one at the very least, and she's in league with the Death Eaters.
873** I believe the official word on this was that they ''couldn't'' cast a Patronus charm, not that they've never had the need to.
874*** Death Eaters couldn't do it ''because'' they never had the need to, not because they have some inherent deficiency. The Patronus Charm aren't just "find a happy memory and wave the wand," it's consistently referred to as incredibly difficult magic, happy memory or no, and if the only things you'd want to use it on are the things that you've allied yourself with, then you have no impetus to put in the time to learn.
875[[/folder]]
876
877[[folder: Ilvermorny]]
878* In ''Goblet of Fire'', it's mentioned that there are witches at the Quidditch World Cup hailing from someplace called the "Salem Institute of Witches" or something of the sort, but from what I'm reading up on now, Ilvermorny seems to be referred to as ''the'' American school of magic, which would imply that there's only one. Are Ilvermorny and the SIoW referring to the same school and Rowling hadn't come up with a name yet, or is there more than one magic school in America? (And in the latter case, why would two of them be built so close to each other?)
879** Maybe the institute is not a educative one, maybe is an institute of some other kind, like the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Institutes_of_Health National Institutes of Health]]
880** America is significantly larger than Britain, so maybe there are more schools there. They can afford to have just one school in Britain, but America is the fourth largest country in the world. And since America is a nation of different cultures and ethnicities coming together, it's not unreasonable to think that different schools may have been set up by different settlers. For example one school set up by the French, another by the English etc.
881[[/folder]]
882
883[[folder: Snape's love for Lily]]
884* The only reason Voldemort was defeated when he tried to kill baby Harry was because Lily's sacrifice protected him. The only reason Lily's sacrifice protected him was because Severus asked Voldemort to spare her, if he could, and she refused. Even if Voldemort just assumed that Snape had gotten over his fondness for Lily when he came back into his service (which seems weird for even Voldemort to do), why wouldn't he give him some sort of punishment for causing his downfall in the first place?
885** Voldemort is not Skelethor or Megatron or some villain like that, he doesn’t seem to be interested in wasting time punishing underlings because they did something or not, he seem to focus more in his main goals than wasting time punishing. Also, his downfall wasn't really caused by Snape, it was Voldermort's own mistake by killing Lily that caused it and he seem to be the kind of character that will assume that and won't blame others. On the other hand, to judge for his treatment of the Malfoys, when he want to make someone feel bad he prefers emotional torment, and considering that Snape was already feeling crushed by the lost of Lily he probably thought it was more than enough. Besides, how is he gonna punish Snape? Is not like he is living a very happy life to begin with.
886** ^ What would give you that idea? He left Lucius Malfoy to sit in Azkaban for a year as punishment for failing to collect the prophecy and forced his teenage son into his plan to kill his most powerful adversary, among countless other things - he seems like ''exactly'' the type of person who would punish his underlings for their failures and mistakes, even if they were due to extraneous or unforeseen circumstances.
887** But the punishment of Malfoy was useful to his plans or at least didn't interfere with them. In any case that doesn't take away the other part... how is gonna punish Snape? is not the happiest man around anyway.
888** Voldemort's never been terribly creative in doling out punishments. If he can't punish someone in a way that benefits him in the process, his next course of action isn't to just forgive them for it and move on - it's to use the Killing Curse and get them out of the way. He's done it plenty of times over lesser things than this. Also, another thing I was questioning was how Voldemort would've been led to believe Snape had gotten over his fondness for Lily.
889** But still, Voldy is a utilitarian, and Snape is one of the world's best potions' expert, a very competent wizard, probably one of the best duel masters, and knows Hogwarts better than any of his other mooks. It's not the same thing to use the curse to kill, say, Goyle Sr., as it is to kill one of his most useful allies (even if he suspects he could be a mole).
890** Voldemort understood that Lily's sacrifice protected Harry, but he might not have realized that it only 'counted' because he tried to spare her for Snape. If that's so, then there really isn't anything to punish Snape ''for'' - Voldemort was always planning to kill Harry and, even if he doesn't understand love, obviously that would most likely have to involve killing the parents. To Voldemort, it doesn't matter that Snape asked him to spare Lily because he probably believes that her protection would've worked either way.
891** I guess that makes sense, especially since he didn't seem to make the connection when Harry sacrificed himself during the Battle of Hogwarts.
892** Presumably when Snape went back to grovel, he could have insinuated that he just wanted Lily as a trophy or something. Voldemort in his final speech before his death says that Snape just "desired her" and then came to realise there were better women of pure blood.
893** And at the point when Voldemort resurrects, he doesn't have that many followers. Just the Death Eaters still alive and not in prison. So until he's got an army built up, he can't afford to waste what little resources he has. Snape does a good show of being sorry for what happened - and Voldemort decides it's better to have a man on the inside at Hogwarts.
894[[/folder]]
895
896[[folder: Trusting Mundungus]]
897* Why does the Order put so much faith in Mundungus Fletcher that they see fit to involve him in so many of their plans? The guy has a lot in common with Peter Pettigrew, whom they were similarly mistaken to have trusted, and he stole artifacts from Sirius's house, went AWOL and nearly got Harry expelled because of a good deal, and his cowardice in the final book was what got Mad-Eye killed...I'm fine with them keeping him around for intel, but why let in him in on so many of their operations when he's known to be extremely untrustworthy?
898** As they say, he's useful because he knows all the crooks. It's only twice that he's failed the Order, and the second time was the last time he worked with them wasn't it?
899[[/folder]]
900
901[[folder: Living Horcrux Limitations]]
902* Both Nagini and Harry became horcruxes, and horcruxes need to be destroyed by something powerful like basilisk venom or fiendfyre. But what about natural causes for living horcruxes? And if Nagini was still aging, why would Voldemort place a piece of his soul in a vessel that would die in only a few years?
903** Nagini and Harry became Horcruxes in different ways, so let's suppose the soul-anchorage works a bit differently too. I would imagine that Nagini's bit of soul was primarily tied to her physical body. It extends her lifespan by a great deal and gives her a good deal of protection, and even if we assume that it doesn't make her natural lifespan ''indefinite'', we can suppose that the Horcrux would remain in the corpse once her own soul fled. Even though the Horcrux is the body, though, I would assume that the two souls can still ''interact'', in the same way that any other Horcrux can interact with other beings in its immediate range. Harry's case is different because his piece of Voldemort specifically attached itself to Harry's ''soul only'' and ''not'' to the rest of him, which is why he doesn't insta-regenerate his injuries throughout the series. I would guess that if he had lived out the rest of his life as a Horcrux and died of natural causes, Voldemort's soul would simply die with him - not ''destroyed'' like the other pieces were, but it would move on to the afterlife and therefore not be useful for keeping Voldemort alive.
904
905[[/folder]]
906
907[[folder: Seriously Though — ''The Fidelius Charm'']]
908* The Fidelius Charm makes a given informaiton into a secret that people ''literally cannot comprehend'' unless the spell is broken by the Secret Keeper revealing it. It can clearly remove people's access to knowledge they once had, too, because it was by no means unknown that James and Lily lived in Godric's Hollow before they went into hiding, and yet Rowling states Voldemort could have gone up to their house and looked through the window and his brain just wouldn't have processed that the two people he was seeing were James and Lily. '''''Do I even need to explain how overpowered this is.''''' There are dozens of time a Fidelius Charm could have saved the day in the books:
909## First off, you don't need all the Obliviators and Co. if there's no further restrictions of the spell. Just put a Fidelius on "magic exists", with the various Ministers for Magic serving as Secret Keepers, then let the wizards back in on the secret. At this point wizards could waltz down the streets of New-York casting left and right and no one would bat an eyelid. …But okay, I hear you, let's assume there are such limitations on the spell that the secret has to be known to a somewhat limited amount of people to begin with for the Charm to work. Fine. I can work with that. You see…
910## …how about, as soon as Harry comes back from Little Hangleton Graveyard and tells him about Voldemort's resurrection, having Dumbledore place a Fidelius on the secret: "Voldemort is not actually dead and is seeking followers"? Bam. Voldemort in all his corporal snakey magnificence could walk right up to Lucius Malfoy and yell "I'M BACK FOR MERLIN'S SAKE!", and Lucius would just wonder who this strange man is. Would put a hinder on his plans, is all I'm saying. It can work the other way around, too, for that matter. Why the hell didn't Voldemort put a Fidelius on "I have created six Horcruxes and destroying them is necessary to killing me"?
911** Perhaps I simply missed the information that would indicate otherwise, but the Fidelius Charm is only ever shown being used in reference to a ''location'' in the books, never in regards to any generic bit of information. The Charm is used to hide a particular place so that no one will be able to locate it or anyone currently in that space. It is possible that its initial description implied that it could be used for any sort of secret, but in practice it is only ever used to hide a location, and from that it is fair to assume that it is restricted to a physical location.
912** It would also be illogical for the Fidelius Charm to retroactively erase memories of whatever secret it's supposed to protect, even if it can prevent minds from processing that secret - if Voldemort knew that the Potters were in Godric's Hollow but didn't know exactly which house they lived in, then he would've just burned down the entire village and killed them all that way.
913** Professor Flitwick says the charm is complicated but from what we've seen in the series, it's used to hide someone or a place itself. The charm only seems to work on the location. So the Potters have to stay in their house all the time to be protected. You can't use the charm to protect information itself, but you can to protect those who know about the information.
914[[/folder]]
915
916[[folder: Those damn Funetik Aksents]]
917* I mean, I'm glad Rowling was able to restrain her love for those bloody accents on everyone who doesn't speak BBC English, but Hogwarts and Hogsmeade are in Scotland, and if her name is any indication, Professor [=McGonagall=] is Scottish. If Hagrid and every foreign character had to be written in FunetikAksent, why aren't the Scottish characters written the same way?
918** The books are written from Harry's point of view. Maybe [=McGonagall's=] accent isn't thick enough to be written that way, whereas Hagrid's (and everyone else's who aren't from Britain) are.
919** [=McGonagall=] is also a teacher, so she needs to make sure her students can understand her - so she could have got vocal training or just not have that thick an accent. Scotland has a variety of dialects just like England so her and Hagrid probably aren't from the same area.
920** And in the movies, although Hagrid is played by Robbie Coltrane, he uses a West Country accent. Not a Scottish one.
921[[/folder]]
922
923[[folder: Quodpot]]
924* If Quodpot is "immsensely more popular than Quidditch" in America, then why does Ilvermorny appear to have a Quidditch team but no signs of a Quodpot team? That'd be like a No-Maj school having a soccer team instead of one that plays football.
925** TheLawOfConservationOfDetail: Only Quidditch is mentioned because only Quidditch is relevant to the plot. Ilvermorny most likely has a Quodpot team but is not mentioned as is not relevant. Many American schools have soccer teams in real life alongside national sports but if a documentary about international school soccer matches is on it's unlikely they'll take time to show the football team.
926** RealityIsUnrealistic: Plenty of RealLife American colleges do in fact have soccer teams but no football teams. Why? Because it's a lot cheaper. The tendency of the Quod to keep exploding many times a game would likely make the sport a lot more expensive than Quidditch. Plus Quodpot has 50% more players per team, and the larger roster sizes are another reason many schools don't sponsor football in real life.
927[[/folder]]
928
929[[folder: Quodpot as a spectator sport]]
930* Is it just this troper, or does Quodpot sound very uninteresting as a spectator sport? Quidditch matches have essentially three different games going on during one match, whereas Quodpot just seems like a larger-scale game of hot-potato. I guess it was Rowling's way of poking fun at how Americans are drawn to more "action-y" sports like football as opposed to soccer in the UK, but then how come the American sport is the one with less stuff going on?
931** I don't know if is Rowling's case but for most soccer-fan countries like the European ones certain American sports like baseball and American football are considering boring to watch, ironically quite the exact feeling many Americans have over soccer.
932** Because Quodpot isn't satire of Americans' sports preferences, it's a satire of Americans' equating entertainment with StuffBlowingUp.
933[[/folder]]
934
935[[folder: Rebounding Killing Curse]]
936* I've noticed that the books seem a bit conflicted as to which Killing Curse rebounded on Voldemort in Godric's Hollow. On the one hand, Harry himself is typically referred to as the only case of someone surviving the Killing Curse, the first film shows baby Harry being held at wandpoint in a flashback, and in ''Deathly Hallows'', Voldemort specifically recalls looking down at baby Harry after Lily has been taken out, which means it was Harry's curse that rebounded...But then there are a lot of other retellings where the spell that kills Lily is the one that rebounds and kills Voldemort, too. I'm just wondering which scenario was actually the case here.
937** Lily's curse never rebounded, it was always the one cast on Harry. Lily in fact couldn't have given Harry the protection had she not been killed saving him. As Voldemort gives Lily a choice to stand aside and let Harry die, she refuses to and so he kills her. But because she chose to shield Harry, that's what gave him the protection that made the curse rebound.
938[[/folder]]
939
940[[folder: Dumbledore's past]]
941* According to Pottermore's article on ''How to live like Albus Dumbledore'', "One of the best things about Dumbledore – and it’s a long list – was his willingness to talk candidly about matters that meant a lot to him, including a lot of his personal history. That ability to spill your guts when it’s appropriate is refreshing. It means there is little room for dishonesty and it’s the most mature way to approach a situation." Now, I love Dumbledore as a character despite his flaws, but this doesn't seem very accurate - in ''Sorcerer's Stone'', he specifically lies to Harry about what he sees in the Mirror of Erised despite desiring the same thing as him, and it's a plot point in ''Deathly Hallows'' that Harry starts to harbor misgivings after discovering so many of the things Dumbledore kept from him. How do these match up with him "being willing to speak openly about matters that were significant to him and that encompassed his own past?"
942** Perhaps Albus is a lot more willing to talk about his past to someone who isn't one of his teenage students?
943** Let's see - "I was once best friends with a dark wizard who thought Muggles should be slaves and nearly helped him conquer half of Europe, during which my sister got killed and my brother never forgave me. Oh and my father was in prison for murdering three Muggle children" - is that the kind of thing one tells an eleven-year-old?
944*** How about, "Professor, what do you see in the Mirror of Erised?" "Harry, much as you do, I see the members of my dear family with me, all of them alive and well. That is my greatest wish." That wouldn't require revealing how he father died in Azkaban, his sister killed his mother, or that he and his brother killed his sister. All it would tell Harry is that he had a family and they're dead now, and Harry probably wouldn't think to look any deeper.
945** Firstly, Harry was only eleven for one year out of the six or so that he knew Dumbledore. Second, when one is being described as willing to speak openly about one’s own past, yes, I might expect a little something like that. Not when Harry’s still an eleven-year-old, obviously, but it could happen at some point when he’s older.
946[[/folder]]
947
948[[folder: How is Harry a half-blood?]]
949* In the fifth or sixth book, it's explained that Voldemort chose Harry instead of Neville as the subject of the prophecy because Harry was a half-blood like Tom was. And while I can see why the Death Eater bigots would consider him a half-blood, since they don't see the value of Muggle-born witches and wizards, there are other points in the series where he's identified as a half-blood by perfectly normal people, even though his mother and father could both practice magic. Why is that?
950** Because Lily was Muggle born. You're considered to be a half-blood if you have Muggle or Muggle born parents and/or grandparents. In Harry's case, his mothers's family line was entirely muggle. You're only pureblood when you have no muggle or muggle born in the last few generations, as for example, James Potter, or the Weasleys. Though blood pursits would argue you're only a real pure-blood if there is no muggle/muggleborn at all in your entire ancestry.
951[[/folder]]
952
953[[folder: Whatever Happened To Robes?]]
954* In the movies at the very least, you can't go a whole book chapter without someone's robes being brought up. But that's kind of my point, there are places in the movies where characters should be wearing robes but instead are just wearing slightly odd muggle clothes or just regular muggle clothes. Obviously, the Doylist answer is that wearing robes all the time would be murder on the cast so they changed things up a bit but what about in-universe? Whole passages of the books make comments on how wizards wouldn't know how to dress in muggle clothes even with instructions but the movies show them having no problems at all. By Deathly Hallows Part 2, the only people left wearing robes are [=McGonagall=], Snape, and Voldemort. And the students but only briefly, though for some reason the students' robes had very conspicuous zippers. And by the time of the Fantastic Beasts series, absolutely no one is wearing robes (except for the students, strangely enough), not even Dumbledore.
955** The in-universe explanation goes along with the out-of-universe one -- in the films' continuity, wizards simply aren't as out-of-touch with Muggle fashion trends. You've probably noticed that ''Goblet of Fire'' emits the joke in which a male wizard insists on wearing a woman's nightgown to the Quidditch World Cup, presumably for this reason. [=McGonagall=], Snape, Voldemort, and (in his old age) Dumbledore only choose to wear robes because they all have a more formal or traditional sense of style, while the Hogwarts students do so because it's part of their dress code.
956[[/folder]]
957
958[[folder: They never learn...]]
959* How come none of the Hogwarts students never figured out the kind of teacher Snape is, over six years? Whether it's Potions or Defense Against the Dark Arts, they do things like ask stupid questions and give really in-depth answers like they're trying to impress him, even though it's obvious that he's not so easily impressed and will take away points on a whim. I would've figured out within my first week that the best way to survive his classes would be by keeping my mouth shut - why do they even bother speak up during their lessons?
960** They're Gryffindors. Showing off is kind of what they do. Hermione often answers him and it's within character for her to want to show off what she knows, regardless of who's teaching.
961** Knowing the kind of person Snape is, he'd probably take overwhelming silence as another challenge to his authority and find some new way to needle the kids he didn't like.
962** Most students ''do'' keep their heads down in Snape's lessons. Neville never does anything but keep his head down and try to do the assigments, and Snape still bullies him mercilessly. Snape is a SadistTeacher who abuses his students regardless of what they are doing.
963[[/folder]]
964
965[[folder: Privet Drive as Harry's Home]]
966
967* Dumbledore says that as long as Harry calls the Dursleys' house home, he is under the magical protection of his mother through his only blood relative. However, it's been stated multiple times that Harry does not consider the Dursleys' house his home; he considers Hogwarts his home, the only place he's ever felt was home. So how does the magical protection work then? It makes no sense.
968** The spell is more technical than that. Harry saying “Hogwarts is my true home” amounts to wishful thinking — he wishes he could stay there year-round, and it is the only place where he feels as though he belongs, but he knows that if asked, he would give his actual home as #4 Privet Drive. That’s where he goes home to every summer, and if he didn’t have Hogwarts, it’s where he would stay throughout the rest of the year too. And the people he’s living with are important to the spell, too — it’s dependent upon him residing with a willing blood relative on his mother’s side, and if there’s one thing Petunia has consistently demonstrated throughout the series, even begrudgingly, it’s that Harry Potter is always welcome to live at #4 Privet Drive, no matter what happens or how many times he tries to leave. Contrary to that, Harry would require the headmaster’s permission to live at Hogwarts year-round, and Dumbledore is just about equally insistent that that can’t be allowed to happen.
969[[/folder]]
970
971[[folder: The Muggle Orphanage]]
972
973* Why is Tom still living at the muggle orphanage when he starts attending Hogwarts? Are there no wizard orphanages he could've gone to instead?
974** Probably not. Wizard population seems to be very small compare to Muggles', most orphan wizard we see like Harry and Neville go into care of close relatives and 99% of wizard we see have large families. Tom was really a very particular case in the wizarding world, thus the need for an orphanage may be unexisting especially if you only have one orphan with no living relative every couple of generations at most, you're not going to create an orphanage to cover such small demand.
975** ''Cursed Child'' implies that the Wizarding World uses something similar to a foster care system -- it's mentioned that Delphi was entrusted to the care of a certain Euphemia Rowle after the deaths of her parents, but that Rowle didn't even like having her around and only did so because she received financial compensation for doing so. Also worth noting is that Rowling herself is an advocate for discontinuing the use of orphanages and switching to the foster system instead, as it leads to less deficiencies in the way children are raised and allows them the chance to be reunited with their birth families, should that ever become possible.
976** Neither of these explanations accounts for why some wizarding family couldn't simply ''adopt'' Tom or Delphi as soon as their powers emerged.
977[[/folder]]
978
979[[folder:Does it Have to Be Chocolate?]]
980* Does it ''have'' to be chocolate that helps with dementors? Or can it be any enjoyed food? What if someone didn't like chocolate, or was allergic to it?
981[[/folder]]
982

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