Harry Potter Blood wards

[GiantMonkeyMan]

The only time Dumbledore has ever said anything at all similar to 'the greater good' was when he was still shacked up with Grindelwald, before his sister died and turned him around towards the path of redemption and repentance. The 'Greater Good' was Dumbledore and Grindelwald's excuse for taking over the muggle world.

In regards to the Horcrux hunt; Dumbledore provided Harry with all the necessary information needed to search for the fragments through the use of penseive. And Snape remained a double agent for the Order and eventually opposed Voldemort openly (though probably not by choice ).

 

[zerohour]

In regards to the Horcrux hunt; Dumbledore provided Harry with all the necessary information needed to search for the fragments through the use of penseive. And Snape remained a double agent for the Order and eventually opposed Voldemort openly (though probably not by choice ).

I don't see how either of those needed Dumbledore to die. Harry was basically set for the Horcrux Hunt, and I don't think Snae's inside information contained anything that required Voldemort's utmost trust to acquire.

 

[Prince Charon]

Yeah, Draco didn't succumb to the deep end of the darkside, but he's more than happy to play around in the shallow end. Not being willing to kill a helpless, old, dying man doesn't make you a good person, and there is still plenty of evil that doesn't require killing face to face in cold blood. Partially redeeming one person at the cost of god knows how many is just bad practice.

There's also that fact that Draco is a racist, and racists view certain groups of people as not-quite-people, or even as animals or abominations. Thus, to Draco, it might be perfectly OK to kill and/or torture a muggle or muggleborn, but not to kill a respected pureblood wizard. That's how he was raised. Of course, canon doesn't say that Draco ever killed a muggle, but his failure to kill Dumbledore should not be taken as conclusive evidence that he wouldn't or hadn't.

 

[Garahs]

In regards to the Horcrux hunt; Dumbledore provided Harry with all the necessary information needed to search for the fragments through the use of penseive. And Snape remained a double agent for the Order and eventually opposed Voldemort openly (though probably not by choice ).

I don't see how either of those needed Dumbledore to die. Harry was basically set for the Horcrux Hunt, and I don't think Snae's inside information contained anything that required Voldemort's utmost trust to acquire.

You forget that Draco's family was very effectively held hostage pending Dumbledore's death. Snape and Dumbledore both knew this. Dumbledore was also already dying from the curse on the resurrection stone.

 

[Chuckg]

True, once Dumbledore hit the curse on the Resurrection Stone he was a dead man walking anyway, might as well arrange for the circumstances of his death to accomplish something.

But I really doubt he'd planned all along to get hit by the Resurrection Stone (which was, note, due to his own overconfidence and lust to use it), so, any of his long-range plans thought up before that date must be evaluated from the standpoint that Dumbledore expected to be alive afterwards to enjoy the benefits of them.

 

[Tentrees]

Heres the link to the fic I mentioned in my last post.

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5540580/1/


What ever planning Dumbledore had forhorcrux huntings was flushed the instant he died. I suspect the few clues he had left to Harry in canon were a fall back plan. Something he could get past the Ministry to Harry even if the Purebloods did take over.

I totally agree that Dumbledores Ivory tower mentality was the most annoying and destructive of his tendancies and for all his talk of equality he never really thought of anyone as his equal. That and s string of spectacular bad calls resulted in a sea of blood being spilt and enough pain an misery to make the long term survival of the Wizarding World problamatic at best.

 

[MWkillkenny84]

I totally agree that Dumbledores Ivory tower mentality was the most annoying and destructive of his tendancies and for all his talk of equality he never really thought of anyone as his equal. That and s string of spectacular bad calls resulted in a sea of blood being spilt and enough pain an misery to make the long term survival of the Wizarding World problamatic at best.

WHAT survival?
In my opinion, the canon!Wizarding World is a society condamned to die of stagnation, because they can't adapt to the changes of the rest of the world.
Their view on not-pureblood wizards, non-human creatures, and so on, have created a situation in wich their society will die: OR because of a Dark Lord (or a muggleborn/halfblood who will have decided to say STOP to the bigotry and other social quirks of the WW) or because the Muggles will be decided to stop (at armed points) said problematic society.
The WW is composed of sheeps: they are only able to follow the one who speak louder of others.

 

[Tentrees]

I said their survival was problematic. The Wizarding Worlds survival as it is is not a posibility. Change must happen or a society dies. JKR's world is condemed to repeated cycles of oppression and bigotry until they have all died out and magic flee's the world.

Read Wish Carefully by Ten Toes and The Mudblood Act by Ayla Pascale both at at FFnet.


They present a distopic view of the Pureblood victory but an all to probable on.

 

[GiantMonkeyMan]

I totally agree that Dumbledores Ivory tower mentality was the most annoying and destructive of his tendancies and for all his talk of equality he never really thought of anyone as his equal. That and s string of spectacular bad calls resulted in a sea of blood being spilt and enough pain an misery to make the long term survival of the Wizarding World problamatic at best.

WHAT survival?
In my opinion, the canon!Wizarding World is a society condamned to die of stagnation, because they can't adapt to the changes of the rest of the world.
Their view on not-pureblood wizards, non-human creatures, and so on, have created a situation in wich their society will die: OR because of a Dark Lord (or a muggleborn/halfblood who will have decided to say STOP to the bigotry and other social quirks of the WW) or because the Muggles will be decided to stop (at armed points) said problematic society.
The WW is composed of sheeps: they are only able to follow the one who speak louder of others.

God, where do I even begin with this?

First of all, I would like to point out that we only see the wizarding world from the point of view of the protagonist, Harry. As the protagonist, he virtually has the world set against him in his quest (whether forced upon him by destiny or not) to, ironically, free them from oppression. Harry's perspective is skewed as he doesn't get to see the stalwart Aurors fighting for freedom or the quiet office working content in plugging away behind a desk. He sees the shitheads who oppose him as a, perhaps legitimate, threat to their reign due to the public fixation surrounding his life. It's the equivalent of Bono having the opportunity to become a Lenin; no government wants revolution (let alone one lead by an idiot kid celebrity).

And then there's the government itself. I could easily use the 'Hitler got into power' argument but I'll settle for something more recent. Obama, when he was running for election, was seen as the freaking dog's bollucks, the bee's knees and the badger's nadgers all in one by a shit load of people (even here in Britain) but, when he came into power, he found that the way the government is set up didn't allow him to make the changes he had promised to enact come about and then received some harsh criticism and disappointment. Basically, what I'm trying to say is 'every government has supporters and critics'. We only hear the side of the critics thanks to the small world of Hogwarts and we'll never know their true intentions beyond 'keep the public uninformed and stop panic' - which is a perfectly valid idea, even if their methods were somewhat lacking.

Thirdly, consider the context of the setting. In Britain, we have the House of Lords consisting of individuals appointed by the Queen (though in actuality it's Parliament's choice) to review the laws proposed by the elected House of Commons and decide whether or not they get passed using their 'unbiased' opinions on the matter, though they rarely resort to the full extent of their powers. We have a history of monarchy and aristocracy that only in the last few centuries has been changing from the rich elite being appointed to the rich middle-class. Now consider the wizarding world. They never had to industrialise because they were already producing on levels the muggle worlds couldn't comprehend due to magic. There's no middle-class 'money' being put into the government beyond the clerks and officials who work there which basically leads to the aristocracy, the Malfoy-esque pure-bloods, retaining all the power. And everyone knows that the powerful cling to power in any way they can.

I read a really interesting fic on the DLP forums that had a post-Voldemort wizarding world being run by Shacklebolt. The government was forcing through anti-pureblood legislation (destroying historic opera houses and ancient libraries to rid the world of the opulent elite's foul mark) and enacting creature-rights laws (forcing witches and wizards into unemployment due to the 'need' to have workers from all magical races). Be careful what you wish for or you could end up with a Soviet magical Britain (the very idea makes me 'lol' at the awesomeness).

And finally, in regards to the lack of adaption in comparison to the rest of the world, I have just two words to say: flying motorcycles. The magical world is further advanced than the muggle one. Of course, that's a joke but the point stands. They have differnent levels of advancement due to the little thing of magic being a part of their lives. You know, the thing that lets you regrow bones and teleport rather than being irradiated to stop cancer or drive around in air-polluting cars. A final, final point would be to remember how easy it is to say 'in the real world this and this would happen' when in the real world we don't have hidden magical societies... or do we? h43r:


Edit: Note, I'm not defending the British wizarding government; to do so would be like saying Polpot had some good ideas about nerds with glasses, I just want people to keep things in perspective and not be so angry about a fictional government. Be angry at the real life ones instead.

 

[Tentrees]

I can agree with your point of view Giant Monkey Man.

But you can also realize that from canon we don't have a lot of anything else to go with. So in making up the the back drop to our stories we take liberties with our stories and the backgrounds to tell our fic's.

I see the wizarding world ruled by those aristocratic elites you pointed out, trying to maintain power and relevance in the face of the changes in thought, and the way people viewed the world, in the generations of the '50s-60's. Many of these ideas and the potential changes pushing them frieghtened many into Voldemorts camp.

IMHO the rank and file Death Eater joined not to protect their way of life but to prevent the changes that the muggleborn and half-bloods were begining to agitate for.

They wanted to remain relevant without have to do the hard work required to do so. They felt 'entitled' to their positions and to having their every want and need taken care of.

 

[Chuckg]

I disagree that the magical world is more advanced than the muggle one. Or, more precisely, that it is a more advanced society than the muggle one. It quite obviously ain't. Sure, magic means they can have flying cars, while we don't. But culture-wise, they have barely hit the 19th century.

Indeed, Giant's post specifically points out that they've never really grasped the concept of industrialization; the nature of magic and their own needs still have them at the cultural level where pretty much everything is handcrafted by skilled individuals.

 

[Tentrees]

I also agree with Chuckq and make the observation that the muggleborn would be the ones who could bring about an 'industrial/magical' society. As they would, if helped by either the Crown or an power block within the muggle world be able to act as interface agents. Or simple go back to their non-magical schools and then on to Uni for advanced degrees in the sciences and medicine.

It is the fusion of magic with the sciences/medicine that I think would be a world worth writing about. Something like Shadow run or the world outlined in GURPS Magic...or horror of Horros the Rifts World.

Even without the extreme of the Rifts it would not be utopia but would require a lot of hard work and dedication from those involved in such projects.

Just a plot point or two...

 

[Garahs]

I disagree that the magical world is more advanced than the muggle one. Or, more precisely, that it is a more advanced society than the muggle one. It quite obviously ain't. Sure, magic means they can have flying cars, while we don't. But culture-wise, they have barely hit the 19th century.

Indeed, Giant's post specifically points out that they've never really grasped the concept of industrialization; the nature of magic and their own needs still have them at the cultural level where pretty much everything is handcrafted by skilled individuals.

Considering that most of the things that we could mass-produce (outside electronics) could be done by any halfway competent wizard and in a fraction of the time, what's so important about industrialization? There are still groups that manufacture furniture and other goods like quilts and those sell for a premium, so that's worthless as a judge. Their medicine is extremely more advanced than our own. They have models of our solar system, so their astronomy blows ours out as well. They have longer lifespans than we do, which is one of the things used to determine how advanced a society is. Extremely advanced waste removal, portkeys capable of international travel in seconds, reverse engineering our inventions and reworking them to power off magic.

The only thing they're lacking is numbers, but then muggleborn are still coming in and they haven't had a baby boom like we have.

 

[Chuckg]

Considering that most of the things that we could mass-produce (outside electronics) could be done by any halfway competent wizard and in a fraction of the time, what's so important about industrialization?

Industrialization, by necessity, requires a society capable of relatively efficient large-scale organizational efforts. You have a lot of moving parts, and they all have to jam together efficiently.

From the dude what mines the ore and coal to the people who ship it to the guys who turn it into steel to the guys who ship that to the factories what machine that steel into thousands of complex, precisely-shaped little parts, to the guys what ship those to another factory where people turn those parts into, oh, let's say clocks, to the guys who ship, warehouse, wholesale, and retail those, until, shazam, you have something sitting on your table that wakes you up at the same time every morning.

Repeat all of the above for every single other thing you own.

Now add in the complex, multi-level recordkeeping that was invented to not only keep track of all this, but keep track of all the $$$ that everybody in the chain owed everybody else. And the international financial system that evolved so they could all pay each other. And the legal codes and framework of civlizaiton that provided a relatively stable enough environment that people actually could do business this way, because even with all the lying, cheating, and stealing that human beings do to each other you can still be relatively sure that most people will pay on time, and most competitors won't be coming around to try and blow your factory up, and most people who try to screw you can be sued in court and forced to fork over, because, hey, we have procedures and systems and law and order for all of that.

Wizards don't have any of this, as they've never needed to learn it.

Or to put it another way; even if there were one million wizards, you couldn't possibly imagine them being as organized in large-scale efforts as one million muggles. Which is why muggles are on the moon and wizards are still partying like its 1699.

In short: I wasn't simply referring to modern technology when I said "industrialization", I was referring to an industrialized economy, with everything that implied both on the economic and social levels.

 

[zerohour]

1.Considering that most of the things that we could mass-produce (outside electronics) could be done by any halfway competent wizard and in a fraction of the time, what's so important about industrialization?

2.There are still groups that manufacture furniture and other goods like quilts and those sell for a premium, so that's worthless as a judge.

3.Their medicine is extremely more advanced than our own.

4.They have models of our solar system, so their astronomy blows ours out as well.

5.They have longer lifespans than we do, which is one of the things used to determine how advanced a society is.

6.Extremely advanced waste removal

7.portkeys capable of international travel in seconds,

8.reverse engineering our inventions and reworking them to power off magic.

1. I don't recall anything complex being created by magic, so this could be a moot point. Also, food has to be grown, so we blow them out of the water with that at least.

2. Not quite sure what you're getting at here, so I'll lump it in with #1

3.We don't know how advanced their medicine is, only that they excel in certain parts of it. They don't know how to treat mental illnesses (Longbottoms, Lockhart) and we never really see them deal with diseases, only injuries. They could be extremely vulnerable to disease, or only treat the symptoms of the disease. Broken bones don't change much, but bacteria and viruses evolve and become tougher and more resistant to treatment over time.

Hm... that could be an interesting point. I'd be interested in seeing the side effects of Modern medicine on the wizarding world.


4. Oh, solar system models, because that's the pinnacle of Modern Astronomy. <_<

5. The longer lifespan may be related to having magic rather than overall quality of life. If we're basing this purely off of lifespan, then trees are by far the most advanced species on the planet.

6. I'll grant that they can removed visible, obvious waste, but I don't recall wizards ever washing their hands before eating. They seem to just take a shower once a day unless something nasty and obvious gets on them.

7. Portkeys are powerful, but we don't know how difficult they are to make, and they seem to be limited to small numbers, as opposed to 747s and Luxury cruisers, which can transport hundreds or thousands of people.

8. I don't remember anything like this. The closest was the Weasley's car, but that was more of an accident than by design.

 

[Minami]

3.We don't know how advanced their medicine is, only that they excel in certain parts of it. They don't know how to treat mental illnesses (Longbottoms, Lockhart) and we never really see them deal with diseases, only injuries. They could be extremely vulnerable to disease, or only treat the symptoms of the disease. Broken bones don't change much, but bacteria and viruses evolve and become tougher and more resistant to treatment over time.

They advanced enough to be able to have a cure for the common cold and cured magical diseases like dragon pox. What the Lockharts and Longbottoms have isn't just mental illness it's spell damage (dark and backfiring magic respectively) of course it's going to be harder to fix. We have no canon view on how they treat normal mental illness.

6. I'll grant that they can removed visible, obvious waste, but I don't recall wizards ever washing their hands before eating. They seem to just take a shower once a day unless something nasty and obvious gets on them.

I'm pretty sure Molly had told them to wash up before dinner in book 2 or 5. Either way I always put the washing hands on the same category as reading about the characters use the bathroom. No one wants to read about it.

7. Portkeys are powerful, but we don't know how difficult they are to make, and they seem to be limited to small numbers, as opposed to 747s and Luxury cruisers, which can transport hundreds or thousands of people

The only thing with portkeys is they're illegal if your not ministry approved. But they've never been treated as that hard to create. It seems like common sense to limit the use otherwise anyone could leave the country at the drop of the hat. Mass portkeys seem pointless when you could just buy one for you and your family at the ministry to take you to your location whenever it's convenient for you.

8. I don't remember anything like this. The closest was the Weasley's car, but that was more of an accident than by design.

The Ministry owned Knight Bus (that could forces other objects to jump away to avoid it) and Sirius's motorcycle.

 

[raiderthe1]

Coming back on the issue about dumbeldore. Can we honestly say we know what dumbeldore thinks about raising children. I mean he is rather old and was around when physical punishment was still allowed at schools.
Also count in that the magical society is rather backwards mabey he though that what harry whent trough was rather strick but fair and he can't have know every detail what went on at the Dursly's.
Im applogising in advance about my handwriting

 

[zerohour]

3.We don't know how advanced their medicine is, only that they excel in certain parts of it. They don't know how to treat mental illnesses (Longbottoms, Lockhart) and we never really see them deal with diseases, only injuries. They could be extremely vulnerable to disease, or only treat the symptoms of the disease. Broken bones don't change much, but bacteria and viruses evolve and become tougher and more resistant to treatment over time.

They advanced enough to be able to have a cure for the common cold and cured magical diseases like dragon pox. What the Lockharts and Longbottoms have isn't just mental illness it's spell damage (dark and backfiring magic respectively) of course it's going to be harder to fix. We have no canon view on how they treat normal mental illness.

Can you cite this? I don't remember disease really coming up in the books.

8. I don't remember anything like this. The closest was the Weasley's car, but that was more of an accident than by design.

The Ministry owned Knight Bus (that could forces other objects to jump away to avoid it) and Sirius's motorcycle.

Probably falls into the same category as washing hands, as no one wants to read about Stan stopping to refill the gas tank. It's enhanced, but we don;'t know if that includes unlimited fuel, and going by the Weasley car, probably not.

 

[Minami]

The Pepper Up potion was mentioned in second year after a string of colds forced a bunch of students to Madam Pomfrey. The One-Eyed-Witch that hid the secret passage to Hogsmeade was the curer of Dragon Pox.

 

[zerohour]

The Pepper Up potion was mentioned in second year after a string of colds forced a bunch of students to Madam Pomfrey. The One-Eyed-Witch that hid the secret passage to Hogsmeade was the curer of Dragon Pox.

Pepper up potion seems to treat the symptoms rather than the disease. It was also used after they went into a lake. Similar to how we have treatments for the symptoms of the common cold, but nothing to eliminate the virus itself.

Curing one disease doesn't mean that they're disease free. We've cured dozens of diseases, but there are still plenty of them around

 

[Chuckg]

I always thought the blood wards protected Petunia and Dudley as well... Sirius tries to kill them and is killed in turn by some very obscure magic.

Well, as witnessed by the frying pan aimed at Harry's face, the wards do not prohibit muggle-on-muggle violence, or the use of mundane weapons.

And anything from the Imperius to some gold, jewels, currency, et al at the local thug bar could get a wizard all the muggle-committed violence he cared to ask for.