Peter and Gollum

[junediamanti]

No: HPFGUIDX 82731

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "susanbones2003" <rdas at f...> 
wrote:
> You bring up two points that I want to call to the list's 
attention:
> 
> 1) What the heck is the draw of serving Lord Voldemort? He's a 
> horrible leader, and as you say pay and benefits are lousy. One 
way 
> or the other, most of his followers end up on the wrong end of 
things 
> or dead. What's his attraction? We've compared the WW to the 
Muggle 
> World at the beginning of the Nazi regime and I just don't think 
LV 
> compares to Hitler. Wasn't Hitler compelling on some hideous and 
> unspeakable level? Didn't he couch his evil in ways that were at 
> least palatable to the German people? Lord Voldemort is obviously 
and 
> proudly out for himself. "Rewards" I have seen consist of a 
> prosthetic hand. I don't call a silver hand an appropriate and 
> equitable reward for the loss of your real one. Look at Bella, now 
> that she botched the prophecy grab. She can only look forward to 
> punishment, no reward at all for all her troubles. So, someone 
tell, 
> me, what's the Dark Lord got that I'm not seeing?

June:
You get a cute mask and cloak.  What more could you want? All Evil 
Overlords supply uniforms. Oh and you get to kill people.

I think all people like Peter, Barty, Bellatrix et al would benefit 
from being sent an immediate hyperlink to "Peter's Evil Overlord 
List - or Things I'd Never Do if I became an Evil Overlord".  

Why oh why do EO's always treat their "faithful servants" like 
chicken dirt, and more to the point, why oh why do the "faithful 
servants" invariably put up with it (the torture, the insults, the 
tantrums), until their defining moment when they either pull a gun, 
a knife or set off the device and blow EO headquarters to 
smithereens.  (Grima Wormtongue, Darth Vader, all the others, 
various Bond Villian underlings, etc)

Anyone who hasn't looked at the above web site is more than welcome 
to email me direct for the address.  

Unfortunately the RL EO's of the past century have had more 
attractive inducements to get not just one but millions of faithful 
servants to follow them.  I'm not going to go into just how the 
likes of Hitler, Stalin and Saddam have won followers or coerced 
people into adhering to their ideologies - because it's way off 
topic.  Sadly, the truth of the Evil Overlord in real life is always 
worse than any writer of fantasy fiction could ever come up with.

No fantasy writer would have the sheer audacity to come up with the 
likes of a Pol Pot.

June