[HPforGrownups] Harry Potter and the Satanic Conspiracy

[Peg Kerr]

No: HPFGUIDX 4997

Aberforths_Goat wrote:

> Listen,
>
> I don't know whether I should even talk about this just now. Some members of
> one of the churches I work in took to circulating an article from a (small,
> German) Christian magazine quoting an interview in which Jo blasphemes
> profusely and pronounces herself a card-carrying Satanist. As I found out
> later, some religious creep happened upon that piece published back in July
> by www.onion.com (for the record, I didn't really find it funny) and spammed
> his whole address book with a letter quoting the article as though it were
> real news. The blithering idiots who received his spam happily dashed off to
> publish their "news," content to have documentary proof of what they'd know
> all along.
>
> I'm so mad I could eat the carpet. As a dedicated Christian, I think we
> should harbor at least a little respect for what that guy said about
> treating other people the way we would like to be treated ourselves. But
> perhaps I'm misjudging ... after all that was 2000 years ago. And besides,
> said guy was probably just another one of those liberal-hippie-long hairs.
> Or maybe the author of the article likes being slandered and figured JKR
> would enjoy it as much as he does.
>
> It's just too much. I've got the editor's phone number and hope he'll print
> a retraction. I also hope I didn't offend anybody with my rant. If it were
> members of some other faith doing it, I don't think I'd feel so hurt.

I understand that you feel angry, but am unclear: are you angry at The Onion or
at the Christian magazine that reprinted it, thinking it news?  Is the editor
you want to publish a retraction the Onion or the Christian magazine?  (The
Onion, for our UK friends, is a print and Internet newspaper which is entirely
parody.  It is published out of Madison, Wisconsin, I believe, and it skewers
absolutely everyone under the sun.)  If you're trying to get the Onion to print
a retraction, it's probably a lost cause: parody is what they DO.

But if you're talking about the second magazine, I understand your point.  Like
you, I'm a Christian, and it's painful to see others who claim to hate JKR's
work BECAUSE they are Christians (and PARTICULARLY after all the work I've been
doing to trace Harry's moral development in the series.  I mean, c'mon!  Haven't
they ever bothered to read these books they're condemning?)  It's even more
painful to see them fall for the Onion's parody, hook, line and sinker.  Their
doing so both makes them look like knee-jerk, stupid fools, and moreover, it
causes damage to the reputation of Rowling and her work, which we love, by
spreading a stupid (parody) lie about Rowling even further.  Nobody is a winner
here, except perhaps the Onion, who can laugh at us all.

Ouch.

*Sigh*  I hope that Christian magazine prints a retraction.

And makes a little more effort to check their sources in the future.  Yeesh.
Talk about flunking Journalism 101.

Peg