Sex, Drugs, and Heartache (was We're British)

[grannybat84112]

No: HPFGUIDX 83891

Caipora is feeling punchy:

> Grannybat84112 wrote:
> 
> > (No, I don't think the prefect's bath 
> > counts. That room struck me as a unisex facility.)
> 
> "Harry, sorry, but it's prefects only." 
<snip vignette of Ron & Hermoine skinnydipping without Harry.>
> 
> Well, if you say it's unisex, Grannybat, who am I to disagree with 
> you? 

No, no, that's not what I meant. But you knew that. 

Cedric refers to the room as "the prefects' bath," not "the boy 
prefects' bath" or "the male prefects' bath." (My placement of the 
apostrophe may be off.) And (I think; I don't have GoF at my 
fingertips) Harry doesn't even notice the toilet, so he doesn't tell 
us if it's a regular commode or a standing urinal. The availability 
of so many kinds of bubble bath and water effects makes me think this 
room is the only one of its kind, meant to please a wide variety of 
male and female tastes. (Oh, get your mind out of the gutter.)

Maybe in Britain perfumed baths are more common for young men. In my 
part of the Western U.S., Real Men(tm) don't use bubble bath.
	 
> Jeff suggested on contraception:
> > > Ye old English methods, the lunar cycle, or even a spell. 
> 
> <snip theory of  werewolf rhythm method>
> 
> Of course, if the full moon were to fall just prior to her  
> menstrual cycle, the lycanthropic transformation might simply pass 
> for mild PMS. 

Mental note: It's not ovulation, it's my lycanthropy. 

Back to Grannybat:
> > Regarding the larger question–what's to keep them from 
> > employing the Magical form of The Pill?
> 
> Real witches would long ago have worked out some simple spell to 
> subtly interfere with the process: strengthen the egg wall,  
> befuddle the sperm, or something. What after all is more typical of 
> a hedge wizard than a "love potion"? If a contraceptive potion is  
> not sister to a love potion, it's a least a cousin.

Now that you bring it up, JKR hasn't addressed the issue of "hedge 
witches." I'm wondering if this will later prove to be a typical 
occupation for Squibs who choose to operate in the Muggle world. 
Arabella Figg, maybe, before she took up guarding Harry?
 
> We had best avoid imagining Fred and George testing a new 
> contraceptive spell 

Yes, let's avoid that.

> > The Pill is a product of  organic chemistry.  
> > Potion making is essentially organic chemistry. 
> 
> Muggle technology has advanced so much over the last hundred years 
> that it's hard to imagine wizards keeping up. ...
<snip comparison of brooms vs. Frequent Flyer airlines> 

I can imagine the Magical world keeping up just fine–IF they had 
chosen to interact more with Muggles. The choice they made all those 
centuries ago to separate from the wider human society is, I believe, 
coming back to haunt them. It's not just their own technology that's 
lagging behind; a walk thru the HP4GU archives demonstrates just how 
often readers have noticed that Magical society is struggling because 
it functions on outmoded, ultimately unworkable attitudes and 
institutions. The lack of social evolution is one of the underlying 
reasons for the coming war.

> In medicine and psychiatry it's easier to believe that wizards can 
> get results Muggles cannot. 

I'm not so sure about that. Certain purely physical injuries–broken 
bones, deep cuts, burns–can be healed faster and more conveniently by 
magic, but wounds caused by magic seem to affect the body far more 
seriously and take much more time to cure, even with access to 
Magical medicine.  (How many WEEKS did Hermione need to lose her 
polyjuiced cat form?) 

As for better psychiatry–the Department of Mysteries may be studying 
the human brain, but we've seen almost nothing of mental health 
resources in the Magical world. Mind-altering potions and spells 
exist, but so far they've been employed only for personal, ultimately 
destructive purposes (Lockhart's memory charms, the Imperius Curse, 
love potions). If the Healer who looks after the Long-Term Residents 
Ward (Miriam Strout?) is typical of Magical mental health workers, 
then the Longbottoms have no hope for recovery. Semi-functional minds 
need more than indulgent mothering.

(Yes, I am willing to admit that SILK GOWNS or some other form of 
chicanery might be operating at St. Mungo's. That still doesn't 
excuse the absence of better care.)

JKR hasn't explicitly said so, but Magicals seem to rely on 
the "stiff upper lip" approach to feelings. Personal pain is either 
acted out on others (Voldemort, Pettigrew) or shunted aside  under 
the rationale of serving the greater good-–until that pain becomes so 
great that it forces itself out (Harry, Molly). Denial is so 
widespread that parents don't even tell their own children just how 
badly their families were affected during the First Vold War. 

This is a dangerously ill society. Sickened in heart, sickened in 
soul. Just like so many of the main characters.

Would Tom Riddle have turned into Voldemort if he'd had access to 
weekly therapy sessions? Can you really picture Snape spilling his 
guts to a shrink? "But Severus, don't you see that all this rage 
against Potter is simply your repressed desire to kill the father?" 

The Magical World has no organized way to deal with heartache.
 
Caipora posed elsewhere, but it's more relevant here:
>
>I don't suppose you see additional evidence for the "potency" of
>Gryffindor's sword in Potters use of it - to give Slytherin's
>Basilisk a prick in the mouth?

My, my. Is it the close proximity to Halloween that's affecting 
everyone, or are we all just feeling raunchy and giggly today?

Grannybat