Veela charms and strength of will (was: Gay!Bill)

[Patricia Bullington-McGuire]

No: HPFGUIDX 55267

On Sun, 13 Apr 2003, Catlady (Rita Prince Winston) wrote:

> Errol Owl wrote:
> 
> << Er....cough...does the fact that Harry reacts so much less 
> strongly to Fleur than Ron signify a significantly reduced libido 
> toward women? >>
> 
> Yes.
> 
> I prefer Gay!Harry, but PreferringCelibacy!Harry is what I see in 
> the text.

I think it simply reflects a stronger will.  Harry is also much better 
able to fight off the Imperius Curse than Ron.  Both the Imperius and a 
veela's charms are forms of mind control, so it would make sense that the 
same trait or skill might help resist both.

In fact, I think Harry's ability to shrug off Fleur's veela charms after
his first exposure to veelas at the QWC in GoF is a bit of foreshadowing
for his ability to resist Voldemort's Imperius at the end of the same
book.  Since JKR has established throughout the book that Harry's mind
cannot easily be bent by outside forces, and that he learns to resist such
attempts quickly, it doesn't seem quite so preposterous that he can shrug
off an Unforgivable Curse cast by the most feared wizard on Earth in the
big climax of the book.

It's worth noting that Ron seems to demonstrate the opposite trait.  He
seems to be extremely susceptible to Fleur's charms, no matter how many
times he is exposed, and he seemed to have more trouble than most shaking
off the Imperius Curses cast on him by Moody!Crouch in DADA class.  IIRC,
he was still hopping down the hall well after that class ended.  I fear
this weakness of his could come back to haunt him (or Harry) eventually.

----
Patricia Bullington-McGuire	<patricia at obscure.org>

The brilliant Cerebron, attacking the problem analytically, discovered
three distinct kinds of dragon: the mythical, the chimerical, and the
purely hypothetical.  They were all, one might say, nonexistent, but each
nonexisted in an entirely different way ... 
                -- Stanislaw Lem, "Cyberiad"