Religion in HP, misc.

[A. Vulgarweed]

No: HPFGUIDX 40574

>Belinda wrote:
>"Hooch becomes Bibine, which is intersting because
>Bibine in French is a bad quality alcoholic drink! (Unless of course
>Hooch means the same in English and, being Australian, I don't know
>the slang, forgive me if this is well-known as I haven't researched
>it)."

Yes, it is definitely a literal translation. Hooch is the kind of booze you
drink out of a paper bag. I'd never heard of the alky-pop thing, but it
sounds like an ironic name.


>Jenny wrote:
>
>"I don't think JKR sat down and thought "Okay, my Wizarding World is
>all Christian", but I'm willing to bet that she is, and most of the
>people she knows are, too.  If JKR was Jewish, she would have most
>likely changed the wording of these holidays to something more
>generic, like Winter Holidays or Spring Break.  I just don't think she
>thought about it one way or the other."
>
>Um.. to me living in the UK it is no sign of religion at all - I think
>this one's a cultural thing. The winter holidays in Britain *are* the
>Christmas holidays. Even if you don't celebrate Christmas, they are still
>the Christmas holidays. The spring ones *are* the Easter holidays...
>Winter and Spring break sounds really really weird in a British context.
>Nearly as weird as "math".

I think this is a common cross-cultural difference of understanding,
because the US is just a far more actively religious society. Religion is
very contentious, and it's almost always universally assumed that everybody
*has* one, even if it's not the majority religion. But I was raised in a
militantly, politically-activist-atheist family (we got continual death
threats from the local Bible-bangers everytime my dad called to complain
about some Christian thing showing up at my public school, which was pretty
much every week. We got used to it, learned not to take it seriously, etc),
and even *we* had a Christmas tree and gave presents. It's very secular, to
me at least, and to lots of other people too. I mean, what does a decorated
tree have to do with Jesus? Nada. I'm neither atheist nor Christian now,
and I still do it, because it's fun and pretty, out of habit, and because
it marks the Winter Solstice or thereabouts.

I think (please correct me if I'm wrong) it's far less contentious in the
UK. People just have that time off work and school because it's been done
that way for so long.

>------
>Nuri said:
>"I love each and every inspired Molly Weasley moments. Adding to the
>religion-in-HP debate, she looks a total "idishe mame" to me."
>
>I feel bad for asking, but hey. Idishe mame?

"Yiddishe Mama"?

And now, Perversion in the Graveyard:

I agree with Ethanol on that, in my first reading of that scene, I couldn't
believe JKR was being so gutsy! I think every child who has ever tied up
and ritually tortured a naked Barbie doll (which is an awful lot of them)
was amazed that an adult could write something that so openly acknowledged
this....thing. I felt the sadomasochistic subtext to be....well, not even a
proper subtext at all, but utterly textual. Aboveground. Dug up like old
bones (and we all *have* bones just like that, now don't we?)

To argue about whether or not it is properly sexual is to split hairs of
intense somatic sensation. How exactly is the arousal of sadism
distinguished precisely from sexual arousal? For someone of that bent, I
don't think it can be completely distinguished (and come on, speak up --
those who have been hunting, those who have become a little bit flushed
with pleasure at verbally dismantling an opponent, those who have been
physically pleased at getting the better of a fight, those who were *ever*
bullies or bug-torturers or doll-rapists in childhood....C'mon now, reach
back there: "Nothing human is alien to me - I am large, I contain
multitudes"...."let he who is without sin cast the first stone"...You get
the idea.) JKR is flat-out making no (ahem) bones about the fact that this
is what is going on here. The flush of power that Death Eaters are rumored
to get when they fully embrace the shadow I think is very real, and we're
seeing it in its "highest" form here. Yes, it does evoke the Black Mass,
human sacrifice, and ritualized rape, and yes it does suggest the rush of
power and "glory" that is to be attained from such horrors.

Bit of a turn-on, isn't it? It's a Big Bang, alright. And you want to
scream, and close your eyes, and take a bath.

Ethanol:

One of the arguements against erotic
>undertones (might they be hetero- or homosexual) is that Voldemort is so
>evil and power-greedy that can't have a sexuality of any kind.

Oh, but he *does.* Not for any particular _person_, but for the sensation
of power in itself, the ultimate aphrodisiac. It's a form of autoeroticism,
really, and any other person involved is just an object.

>But this arguement only holds if you try to connect Voldemort with ordinary
>sexuality. I agree in so far that Voldemort doesn't have an ordinary,
>healthy sexuality but an abnormal one. When I speak about abnormal
>sexuality, I mean that of perverts and/or rapist. Please note, that I do
>*not* include homosexuality in there. I know, there are people who see that
>differently but this is not what I want to discuss.

Lord no, totally different animal. Homosexuality is about *sex* and most
homosexuals are consenting adults who want consenting adults. Rape and
pedophilia and _nonconsensual_ sadomasochism (which is very different from
consensual BDSM) only use something that's sexual on the surface to get to
the real high, which is power and domination - a partner who's any kind of
equal won't provide this. The gender of the victim is often nearly
irrelevant.
>

>But  a rapist doesn't mainly seek physical or emotional satisfaction. He
>also or simply needs to satisfy a lust for power, for domination. In
>somebody with an abnormal sexuality, the sexuality and the lust for power
>become intermingled.

Yes, exactly. In someone with a high degree of sophistication and
imagination in satisfying that urge, literal sexuality is only one
instrument in the toolbox. Voldemort doesn't *literally* rape Harry,
although he might as well have--aside from the question of whether he can
or not, it might just be too unimaginative and crude and trite for him:
rape is kid stuff, stupid, something even a *Muggle* can do. Voldemort is a
_master_. His pleasures and desires are _refined_.


>The fact that Voldemort takes blood from Harry is disturbing in many ways.
>Blood is an important symbol: it stands for life for example. But blood is
>also associated with sexuality, via the menstruation and the blood that
>flows when a virgin looses her innocence. Both menstrual blood and virginal
>blood have been associated in the past with magic, with illness, with
>healing powers. The exact interpretation differs from culture to culture and
>>from time to time.

Yes. And I'd like to reiterate the eerie double meaning of the phrase
"Blood from the enemy, forcibly taken." I agree that "forcibly taken" is
evocative, and for just a second there, there's some wondering if that
phrase modifies "blood" or "enemy" himself. (Grammatically it's the former,
to fit the pattern of the rest of the incantation, but because the brain
_can_ read it as the latter, for just a second there it does.)
>
>Not only Harry's helplessness but the blood makes this scene a kind of
>metaphorical rape.

I would say also the fact that he's bound. It may be that I'm a bit of a
perv myself but sheeesh...as subtext goes this is right up there with the
villain tying the swooning ingenue to the railroad tracks, ain't it?

>
>But Voldemort is truely evil. As Elkins said, he is so here because he
>breaks so many crucial human taboos: about religion, family and the
>treatment of the dead. And I think he is so, because unlike other villains
>he has a sexuality, an abnormal one that fits his evil mind.

Yup. And I know it was asked earlier about Christian and anti-Christian
over- and undertones in the graveyard scene; I think, yup, those are there,
but the taboos violated here are far older and more primal than
Christianity. Reverence for the ancestors, the uncanniness of the dead and
their dwelling places, the sanctity in wholeness of the physical body, the
injunction not to maim oneself except perhaps ritually, the great Mysteries
of death and belief in spiritual rebirth, the use of the body of the enemy
to ritualize one's own power...our Cro-Magnon ancestors had most of these
notions already, and pretty much _all_ religions make some reference to
them (and in the absence of religion, our social customs still address
them). Up to and incorporating our relatively recent horror of sexual
predation on the underage (I say relatively recent 'cause in lots of
cultures over the long view adult sexuality was considered to begin at
puberty, which at nearly-15 I'd guess Harry's mostly past), Voldemort's
managed to nail them all in one chapter. Impressive. Guaranteed to squick
adults even more *more* than children who might not fully feel or
understand all these taboos yet.

JKR, I toast you from a human skull cup!
AV, shuddering.