WW as Parasite (was:Snape's iPod (was: Staff's Activities...)

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 142558

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > Again, they record memories.  Recording music really wouldn't be 
> > that hard for them, I'd imagine.

> >>Nora: 
> Then we get down to the issue raised; why and how would they be 
> listening to all the *Muggle* music you want them to have been? :)

Betsy Hp:
For exactly the reason you've raised.  The WW is not a culture that 
encourages artistic creativity.  They're a tiny little population 
with one school, and that school doesn't teach music. (Or theater or 
art or literature...)  So if a wizard is into chamber music, he'll 
have to look beyond the WW to find his fix.

It goes back to the WW as parasite to the Muggle world, I think.  
They play the piano (not invented by a wizard).  They listen to 
gramophones (not invented by a wizard) or music boxes (not invented 
by a wizard) or the wireless (not invented by a wizard).  They take 
pictures using a camera (not invented by a wizard).  They drive 
around in cars and buses (not invented by wizards).  They have an 
elevator at the MoM (not invented by a wizard).  It's important to 
note, I think, that all of these cunning gadgets were invented 
*after* wizards and witches went into deep hiding.   

Also, the forms of music they listen to (a torch singer, a rock 
group, chamber music) were all formed by specific and logical 
progressions of Muggle culture.  A culture the WW purportes to have 
no part of.

Their books are printed in enough of a mass production that the 
price of books is not outrageous.  Harry's not always the most 
observent narrator, but I think if he was wiping his ass with 
something that wasn't toilet paper, we'd have heard about it.  Which 
means that the WW has a cheap and steady supply of paper products.  
Where do they get their oranges or wool or cotton or cardboard 
boxes?  There's not been a single mention of a wizard factory.  
Hogwarts teaches no sort of economic or managerial course.  All of 
the stores and resaurants we've seen have been cottage industries.  
The Weasley twins, with their second store, are the closest we've 
seen of a chain, IIRC.

Why does Gringotts allow for Muggle money exchange?  Because wizards 
*must* interact with the Muggle world.  They don't do it easily.  
The fear of discovery is too great.  But some wizards and witches 
probably do it often.  Kingsley had the knowledge and wherewithal to 
blend so successfully into the Prime Minister's office it came as a 
shock to the Minister when he was revealed as a wizard.  So I'm 
doubting he showed up to work in a nightgown.

For every wizard comfortably tucked away from the Muggle world, 
there must be another wizard out there buying up large supplies of 
paper goods, textiles, produce, etc. with which to keep the WW 
businesses and homes running.

> >>Nora:
> <snip>
> I can't think of really *any* way or reason that Lucius Malfoy    
> would be engaging with Muggle culture, and that includes classical 
> music (and opera above all, given its peculiar nature).
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
As JKR has shown us with the House of Black, not even the pure 
bloods are really pure.  It's all image.  So maybe, once upon a 
time, an enterprising young witch bought up Muggle musical 
recordings or sheet music, gave them a wizarding twist, and sold 
them as her own creation.  (Or maybe she snuck into some 
performances with magical recording gear -- the WW as bootleggers 
<g>.)

Or maybe it's like music and culture in the USA a while ago, where a 
white audience listened to black performers in a hotel the 
performers were not allowed to stay in.

But the very fact that Dumbledore is noted as being fond of chamber 
music on his Chocolate Frog card, and the fact that chamber music 
developed in the Muggle world *after* the WW went into hiding, 
suggests that there must have been some sort of respectable 
interaction between the cultures.  Even if that respect was gained 
by the wizards deliberately fooling themselves.

I think the WW has clung with desperate stubbornness to those things 
that define it as a different culture because they do recognize how 
easily their culture could be swept away by the more vibrant and 
progressive Muggle culture.  (I'm thinking of their robes here.  No 
way there hasn't been thoughts of going with pants, especially for 
quidditch games.)  I think that fear is part of what made the Death 
Eaters so easy for Voldemort to form.  But their world is too filled 
with Muggle items given a wizard twist to suggest that their culture 
is truly seperate from the Muggle one.  And I'm betting that would 
include their music.

Betsy Hp