Tom Riddle's Origins

[erinellii]

No: HPFGUIDX 84148

> The Sergeant Majorette says:
> > He wasn't the most evil dark wizard in a hundred years when he 
killed his father and grandparents. 

Erin:  
Yes he was.  He might not have actually earned public recognition of 
it at that point, but make no mistake- Tom Riddle has always been, 
personality-wise, the person he is today.  He knew exactly what he 
meant to become, he had it all planned out.


Sergeant Majorette:
He was a teenager with a screw loose, or  he could have simply taken 
the Riddles for every penny they had and left them destitute and 
suffering.

Erin: 
I fail to see exactly how Tom Jr. could have left them destitute.  
You also mentioned a lawyer in your other post.  So are you saying 
Tom should have sued his father?  On what grounds?  It isn't actually 
illegal to abandon your spouse, you know.  He could maybe have gotten 
18 years of child support and some mental distress, but that's it.  
And that wouldn't have touched the older generation of Riddles at 
all.  
 
Or maybe you're thinking blackmail.  Well, remember, Tom Jr. can't 
expose Tom Sr. to the muggle world because of the wizarding angle.  
And, since Tom Sr. is a muggle living in a muggle world, he would be 
unlikely to care what the WW thinks of him.


Sergeant Majorette: 
> And did his mother die as a direct result of abandonment? "My 
mother died just after I was born, sir. They told me at the orphanage 
she lived just long enough to name me..." Okay, septic shock, but a 
> broken heart? We don't buy it in the ballet Giselle and we don't 
buy it in a witch with the blood of the great Salazar Slytherin.
> 
> And was abandonment *less* or *more* common back then? I'd be 
willing to bet that orphanage placement was standard procedure for 
the children of abandoned wives, wayward girls and other fallen women.

Erin:
Less, definitely less, because the stigma was greater.  Ok, it might 
have been more common for abandoned mothers to place their babies in 
orphanages, but overall abandonment was much less. 

And as for why exactly she died... it almost doesn't matter.  What 
matters to Tom is that it is his father's fault he was placed in the 
orphanage he hates so much.  If his mother had lived and still placed 
him there, then probably his anger would have encompassed the both of 
them, and he would have taken revenge on both. 


> Tom Riddle is *insane*. And the Quibbler is a tabloid...

Erin:  
Insane, huh?  So you think that when Harry catches him, they should 
spare him the Dementor's kiss or AK, and instead give him a nice cozy 
bed in St. Mungo's?  I disagree.  The level of planning and 
organization in Tom's evil empire is evidence of sanity, as is the 
large number of followers he gained.  Just because he doesn't have 
the same moral standards as you is no reason to label him as "of 
unsound mind".

As for the Quibbler... first, we don't know for sure that it was even 
around back then.  If Luna's dad founded it, it probably wasn't.  But 
a wizarding paper wouldn't have worked regardless.  As I pointed out 
earlier, Tom Sr. was a muggle.  He wouldn't have cared what the WW 
thought of him.  And also, have you forgotten Voldemort didn't want 
his followers to know he was of mixed birth?  He was hardly going to 
broadcast it all over Britain.  His father could have been killed to 
dispose of the evidence as much as for revenge.



 Erin