Bothered by JKR likening Harry's trials to the caged disabled Czech kids

[davewitley]

Tim expressed concern, while supporting JKR's action:
 
> Was anyone else slightly unnerved about JKR's quote about Harry in
> relation to the disabled Czech children caged on their beds?
> 
> http://www.herald.ns.ca/stories/2004/07/11/f215.raw.html
> 
> I find something worrying in the quote:
> 
> "The very idea of being locked in a bed-sized cage around the 
clock is
> enough to give adults nightmares - far more terrifying than 
anything
> Harry Potter has had to encounter"

> (Harry) is a fictional
> character in a childrens' book and nothing that happens to him can
> compare with the real life anguish of the Czech children. 

Well, first I should say that, when I read about this, my mind 
jumped to the cupboard under the stairs before reading that specific 
quote.  So not only was I not troubled by it, but I was almost 
expecting it as an obvious comparison that might be drawn.  As 
others have already said for their own case, I read it as "I write 
books in which I imagine an abusive situation for my main character, 
one which readers would find shocking and unacceptable in real life, 
but this is worse than that."

Clearly, that is only my reading, and the middle clause in 
particular is not explicitly in what JKR said.  An alternative 
reading might be something like "People are outraged that Harry has 
such a rotten time of it, and so they should be more outraged about 
these Czech children", which would open the way IMO for arguments 
like "I think Harry is *worse* off: the graveyard scene is worse 
than a cage, so I'm going to reserve my sympathy for him."  Now 
*that* would be well squicky, I grant you.  (Or worse still "New 
canon!  The things Harry has to go through in Books 6 and 7 will 
never be as bad as being locked in a cage.")

Judging by the comments on The Leaky Cauldron's reports of this, 
fans did not confuse fiction with reality.

However, I think you are touching on something paradoxical here. 
Many fans clearly feel, and feel strongly, the emotions over Harry 
Potter that they would feel if he were a real person known to them.  
This is evident in posts here ("JKR *can't* kill off Lupin.  That 
would be too cruel after Sirius."), and I have seen elsewhere, for 
example, writing by fans on the anniversary of OOP about how they 
have come to terms with their grief at Sirius' death.  Yet it is 
clear that these fans have in no way lost their grip on reality.

In that sense I think JKR was tapping into a real vein of emotion, 
whether deliberately or inadvertently, which possibly lent force to 
the urgency the Czech authorities felt to do something in response.

David