[HPforGrownups] Quidditch World Cup - Irish vs English

[manawydan]

No: HPFGUIDX 97096

bboy_mn wrote:
>So, on to another. It's possible that the wizard world government is
>organized along different lines than the Muggle government. North
>Ireland and Ireland are an invention of modern (somewhat) muggles.

Quite so. I'm sometimes tempted, when posters on the list are judgemental
about the fact that the WW is a bureaucracy rather than a democracy, to ask
how they'd explain to an intelligent WW Minister, certain things like the
Partition of Ireland, English constitutional monarchy, or the result of the
last US presidential election...

But I suspect the list elves would get _very_ stroppy about developing
_that_ idea,

>Also, the International Quidditch League does not necessarily have to
>be divided along the same political lines as the government. The
>Government could possibly make the distinction between Ireland and
>Northern Ireland, while the Quidditch league may not.

That of course has parallels in real life. Ireland has one rugby team,
though it has two football teams.

>Another point of interest, England it hosting, the stadium appears to
>be in Scotland, but Ireland is playing. If Ireland were a completely
>unique entity of government, wouldn't they be hosting the World Cup
>themselves?

Once again from the field of rugby, that's not unusual, especially when the
World Cup is hosted in the Northern Hemisphere. Notionally, Wales hosted in
1999 but a lot of the pool matches were played in England (and in France, if
my memory serves me right) with the final (which sadly we weren't in!) being
played in Cardiff.

It's clear from other references in the books (Sardinia, Transylvania,
Flanders, Assyria) that the WW political boundaries don't match our own
(that's not to say that Muggle political boundaries in the Potterverse don't
match our own either of course) so there's no necessary reason why England
and Ireland should be separate Ministries - strongest evidence once again
comes from the fact that there is a common Quidditch league (I sometimes
wonder in a fanfictional sort of way how the kind of tensions found in a
multinational state express themselves in the WW and come to the conclusion
that, like any sort of oppositional politics, they'd have to do so
conspiratorially).

Cheers

Ffred

O Benryn wleth hyd Luch Reon
Cymru yn unfryd gerhyd Wrion
Gwret dy Cymry yghymeiri