On the other hand (was Re: Disliked Uncle Vernon)

[Doriane]

No: HPFGUIDX 93103


I, Del, wrote :

> > In mine, they are Different. They are indeed awful by my moral 
> > standards, but I have no right to force those standards on them. 
> > They were landed with a baby whose very idea they hated, and 
> > they received no help. Not that they would have accepted it, 
> > mind you :- ), since they didn't think they needed it.

Alla answered :
 
> Just one comment. They live in Western society, so yeah, I would 
> expect them to abide by the predominant morality.

Del replies :

Predominant doesn't mean everyone goes by it. And the variants 
depending on where exactly you live (France or Britain, countryside 
or downtown London or suburbs full of immigrants, etc...), your 
income, your traditions, your education, and so on, are innumerable !

Alla said :
 
> Actually, no scratch that. :o) As long as they do not act on 
> their "moral standards", I would let them be, but as soon as they 
> start hurting other people (Harry in this situation), I have no 
> problem forcing the general norms of behaviour (like abuse is not 
> allowed)on them. After all, we don't allow people, who feel it is 
> OK to commit a crime a free ride.

Del answers :

Aha ! I completely agree with you, and I repeat what I said in 
another post : WHY didn't anyone do anything to stop their abusing 
Harry ? Harry was going to school with unfitting clothes and broken 
glasses, he was being chased and bullied by Dudley and his gang 
right in the school and in the street, he must have acted in social 
situations in a way that screamed "abused kid", he was left in a 
tree for *hours* with a dog barking at him, etc... And yet we are 
never told that anyone reported anything, that the social services 
came to visit, that any teacher had a chat with the Dursleys, that 
Dumbledore or anyone else came to visit them and check on Harry 
(even though we know the WW had a way of knowing anything and 
everything they needed to about Harry, through Mrs Figg), or 
*anything* !!

The Dursleys don't share our moral standards to start with, but 
noone in authority tried to enforce it on them either. Nobody 
actually even tried to enforce the LAW, let alone any moral code, on 
them...

Del