Muggle-borns

[jodel at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 49176

Honoria Granger asks:

<< Given that as JOdel has pointed out, there is a huge security risk in the 
WW contacting Muggle parents of magical children (what's to stop just one 
freaked-out parent from blowing the whistle completely? A Memory Charm?), 
just how do we suppose most such parents reacted?

 >>

One of the beauties of the WW's seclusion has been the benefits it has had 
upon Muggle development of technology and evolution of thought. A beauty 
which the MoM has been at considerable pains to cultivate insofar as it has 
worked to thei benefit of the WW. 

In the first place, as I've stated before, about ten minutes after the WW 
slammed the door, Muggles were making accurate scientific observations of the 
operation of the natural world. No tampering on the part of some loopy wizard 
who wanted rainbows for his daughter's wedding regardless of whether the sun 
was shining from the correct direction to produce rainbows or not. No 
contamination of experiments by some magical who doesn't bloody care whether 
this is the way the work works naturally or not, so long as it does what *he* 
wants it to do. 

After about a generation of watching the world behave as it was designed to, 
educated Muggles started rethinking rather a lot of the superstitions of 
their youth and we got the beginnings of the Age of Reason (which could 
hardly have gotten off the ground so long as wizards were out and about and 
meddling with everything in range). Yes there were still witch burnings 
throughout the 18th century, but fewer as time went on, and many of the 
victims of these latter-day pogroms were, in fact, deluded souls who really 
did think they had made a pact with the devil. As time went on, more and more 
of the educated classes began to adopt the firm stance that magic did not 
exist, that superstition was a failing of the ignorant and the credulous and 
that the world behaved as the world behaved, with no exceptions. A great deal 
of what we rthink of as "modern thought" got its inception during this period.

>From the Ministry of Magic's point of view, this development could hardly be 
improved upon. If the Muggles were firmly convinced that magic is not real, 
they will not be looking for magic. If they are convinced that "science" has 
an explanation for all mysteries, then anything that seems odd must somewhere 
have a "scientific explanation". Once they twigged to the direction that 
Muggle thought was taking (and they would have realized this fairly promptly, 
if my postulation of a wizardly "import" business is on target) they started 
doing all that they could to encourage this direction of inquery. Here and 
there an observation of Muggle science has probably even crept into wizardly 
experiment and has been incorporated into magical technology. 

If this is the course that Muggle beliefs have taken, then the discovery of 
magical ability in one of their children will be far less likely to "freak 
them out". Particularly if one is careful with one's euphamisims. I firmly 
believe that in the case of a true Muggle-born, a Ministry representitive v
isits the family around the child's 11th birthday who gives them a soothing 
and encouraging talk about their child's "rare talent" and lets them know 
that a place for him  has been reserved at an exclusive boarding school in 
Scotland where he may learn valuable training for the proper use and control 
of it. In most cases the family is flattered and intrigued, if bemused. 
Typically, the only people who freak out are the bonafide religious nuts, and 
those are delt with by a quick "obliviate'; and a notice is forwarded to the 
Magical Reversal department to monitor the site. It is possible that upon 
attaining majority, the child of such a family will be aproached again and 
informed of the a QwickSpell correspondence courses.

The Ministry rep also makes an appointment with the familey to escort them to 
Diagon Alley to buy the child a wand, and their first set of school supplies 
and teaches the child how to get into the wizarding world for future trips.

Which all, if correct, offers the possibility of a very oblique clue that 
I've not seen anyone bring up, so far. 

Petunia Dursley is a Muggle, but she didn't have a normal Muggle upbringing. 
She was brought up in a houshold that included a witch. The same can be said 
for her son, who is being raised with a wizard. And both of them loathe and 
fear magic. 

Does it occur to anyone that the elder Thomas Riddle's conduct in walking out 
on his pregnant young wife (assuming that they were, in fact, married) upon 
learning that she was a witch is not what one could call exactly *normal*?

I mean, think about it. Doesn't it seem a lot more likely that the expected 
response to such an announcement would be more on the order of;"You're 
joking." Or even, "Your're crazy." or, even, given the time period; "You mean 
Alastair Crowley and that lot? Give me a break!" But to walk out and disown 
the child? Isn't this a little , um, *extreme*? Have we met *anyone *else in 
the entire series who you could imagine being capable of that kind of 
behavior?

Does the name 'Dudley Dursley" pop immediately to mind?

Was one of the elder Tom Riddle's parents raised with a witch (or wizard)? 
What was his mother's maiden name? Did *all* of Tom Marvlo Riddle's magic 
really come from his mother?

But then, i'm not convinced that the name of "Riddle" was exactly  chosen at 
random, either...

-JOdel