The Elf Problem

[tigerpatronus]

No: HPFGUIDX 69124

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, B Arrowsmith 
<arrowsmithbt at b...> wrote:
<SNIP> By contrast, the Elves working at Hogwarts are happy, co-
operative and 
> contented. They refuse Hermiones gifts of clothing as an insult, as 
if > it would be an affront to their dignity. They even stop cleaning 
> Gryffindor Tower as a reprisal. What is going on?
> 
> Elves have significant natural magical powers that militate against 
the > idea of coercion. <SNIP> I'm willing to bet that there's a 
magical > contract in there somewhere, one that the Elves enter into 
voluntarily. > It's just their bad luck that some end up with a Black 
or a Malfoy. <SNIP>
> 
> Kneasy

Apologies to Kneasy for truncating your excellent, well-reasoned 
argument. 

Do you remember, lo so many years ago, in the Hitchhiker's series 
somewhere (I think it was the *Restaurant at the End  of the 
Universe*) the sentient animal that was bred to want to be eaten? It 
was rolled out on a cart amongst the diners, and the beast pointed 
out it's own well-marbled flanks and luscious rump roast, etc., ready 
for their dining pleasure. At the end of the scene, it was removed to 
the kitchen, butchered, and consumed. The point was, of course, that 
the beast was a sentient being, and both eating it and breeding it to 
want to be eaten are monstrous. (Yes, I'm a vegetarian. Why do you 
ask?) 

The same with the house elves. Both enslaving them and maintaining 
their slave-mindset are monstrous. I am uncomfortably reminded of the 
pre-Civil War mentality that existed among those who were pro-slavery 
in the US (and I deeply apologize to anyone who is black or of 
African descent here for writing this foul stuff): the happy darky 
toiling in the fields, singing N---o spirituals. (I don't know if 
that word is okay, so I'll err on the side of caution.) The "good" or 
pretty slaves were removed from the fields to work in the big house, 
establishing a system of rewards for complicity and, most likely, 
forestalling mass rebellion. 

The popular misconception from those times was also that black folks 
couldn't survive on their own without the Massah to take care of 
them, provide them with (bad) food, clothes on their backs, etc. 
Indeed, many slaveowners forced slaves to attend Christian church, 
presumably saving their souls (imposing the dominant culture and 
destroying their own.) But slavery was (I'm having problems thinking 
of strong enough words here) a soulless, pitiless, evil, horrendous, 
monstrous, detestable, illogical, indefensable system. 

It seems as if many things said about the House Elves are reminiscent 
of the ideas promulgated by the pro-slavery movement prior to the 
Civil War. I find this disturbing. 

The other rationale for House Elf Enslavement is that, like dogs, 
they have been bred by us to be subservient and fawning, and now it 
is our responsibility to care for them. (By artificial selection, we 
turned wolves into chihuahuas. Someone's burning in Hell for that.) 
The difference between the dog model and the African-American slave 
model is sentience. Dogs, while smart and wonderful and cuddly and 
useful, are not sentient in any way that we test sentience. Pre-Civil 
War slaves were human (mai oui!) and sentient. House Elves are 
sentient. 

I hope, I deeply hope, that the House Elves are under some sort of a 
congenital Imperius Curse, and while some HE's (like Dobby) are made 
of sterner stuff and can at least partially fight the IC (as this is 
possible, a la Harry, GoF), most cannot. 

This is supported by the fact that House Elves generally belong 
to "Old Wizarding families" (as referenced somewhere in this thread, 
Cos). Old Wizarding families or at least a subset of them (like the 
Malfoys and Blacks but not like the Weasleys, which correlates with 
Elf ownership) identified with the blandishments of Salazar 
Slytherin, who was racist about magical abilities and lineages within 
the human race (Mudbloods vs. Purebloods). His ideas about House 
Elves must have been similarly inhumane, divisive, and illogical.  

The Imperious Curse hypothesis also explains DD's kind reaction to 
the HE's. If you know someone has a heart attack, you don't admonish 
them to get over it. If you know someone is paralyzed, you don't mock 
them until they can walk. If someone is mentally ill, you don't 
lambast them to get sane. You help them do as much as they can, as 
much as they want to, and hope medicine finds a pill to help them. 

I hope that Hermione, with appropriate library usage, at an important 
fulcrum of the story, finds a way to break the Imperious Curse and 
frees the House Elves. 

Can you imagine Lucius Malfoy fleeing into the forest with a posse of 
angry HE's after him? ("I'll clean *your* clock, Malfoy," Binky 
squeaked.) 

TK -- TigerPatronus