Silly ideas?

[Carol]

"finwitch" wrote:
> >
> > A little speculation (if you know a fanfic, please tell) on how
the  characters would react if (say) Harry...
> > 
> > a) was blind/deaf/mute
> > b) had Tourette's
> > c) had some mental disease for real
> > 
> > As it is, I find it odd Harry made it trough Dursleys and did NOT
develop a mental disorder of any kind.
> > 
> > Finwitch
> 
> Geoff:
> What again??
> :-))
> 
> Perhaps third time lucky......
>
Carol responds:
While I'm with Geoff in not understanding your fascinatiion with this
noncanonical approach to Harry, at least I now understand that you
think Harry's (relative) normalcy was unnatural under the
circumstances. Possibly, you think that he should have become a
psychopath like Tom Riddle (who actually received better treatment, in
some ways, but had other problems, such as bad genes and no mother
love, countering the decent care at the orphanage). Or you think that,
like Snape, he should have turned out bitter, sarcastic, and verbally
abusive.

However, I'd like to point out that Harry's upbringing resembles that
of many children in earlier eras, who would not necessarily have a
spoiled, bullying stepbrother or -sister (a Dudley counterpart), but
would have had sleeping conditions similar to Harry's and have been
subjected not only to verbal but to physical abuse (by today's
standards). Even when I was a child, parents routinely spanked their
children or sent them to bed without supper, and some used hairbrushes
   or belts in place of hands for spanking. (In my mother's day, the
parents used switches from a pepper tree, which must have really
stung.) And yet, despite corporal punishment and what today would be
considered abuse and neglect, most kids turned out just fine.

The Dursleys apply a double standard, an old-fashioned spare-the-rod,
spoil-the-child approach for Harry, and an indulgent "loving" approach
to Dudley (giving in to his tantrums and spoiling him from the time he
was a toddler, mistaking fear of saying no to their child and hurting
his ickle feelings for love). It's much more of a miracle, I'd say,
that *Dudley* seems to have overcome his upbringing. Harry's (no
credit to the Dursleys, who were trying to stamp out his magic) seems
to have strengthened him. He can endure hardship and deprivation (and
spiders) much better than Ron, who was brought up in a loving home
(though his mother yells a lot) in what he considers poverty (it's
more like penury) but never had to go hungry till DH.

Carol, who probably hasn't helped at all but just wanted to have her say