Neville again

[meriaugust]

No: HPFGUIDX 102249

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, Barry Arrowsmith 
<arrowsmithbt at b...> wrote:
snip
> And to add fuel to the fire being fanned by those who consider 
that any 
> representation of 'child abuse' is not amusing and must be 
condemned 
> outright - isn't it time you had a go at Uncle Algy? Remembering 
of 
> course, that if he hadn't persisted in throwing Neville off piers, 
> dropping him out of windows and whatever, Neville would probably 
not 
> have got
> to Hogwarts. 

Meri now: According to JKR, when a child with magical potential is 
born a quill in Hogwarts detects that kid's birth and puts his or 
her name down for admission (which explains Hagrid's SS comment that 
Harry's name had been down since he was born). So even if Neville 
had never been bounced into the garden by meringue happy Uncle Algie 
he still would surely have gotten into Hogwarts because, as we saw 
in Order, Neville's got some kicking mad wizarding skillz. And as to 
what Algie did to him being child abuse, I have a pair of older male 
cousins who used to (and still do to some extent) find it amusing to 
throw me and my sibs into their swimming pool fully clothed, hang us 
by our ankles over the deep end, sit on us (v. painful) and poke our 
arms with pliers. So, maybe that's just how uncle Algie shows his 
love. 

Meri - cretainly none the worse for wear after her cousins spent her 
youth throwing her in the pool, and glad she took them with her a 
few times!