Arthur right or not? ( was Hate crimes (was Re: muggle baiting vs. muggle tortur

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 155850

> >>a_svirn:
> > <snip>
> > He was indeed responsible for the bullying bit, but that was    
> > water under the bridge by the time of the Toffee incident.      
> > Moreover, he had already been "punished" for that by Hagrid. 
> > <SNIP>

> >>Alla:
> Where is it stated in canon that by the time of GoF Dudley was not 
> bullying Harry any more? Harry hunting or something else?
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
I think that's made clear in CoS when Dudley tries to verbally taunt 
Harry for a lack of birthday cards, but Harry easily scares him off 
by babbling some nonsense "magic" words, that the power structure 
has changed since PS/SS.

Honestly I think the pressure is on anyone trying to prove that 
Dudley *continues* to bully Harry after PS/SS to provide canon.  
It's hard to prove a negative after all.  Can you provide canon 
proving that Harry *doesn't* dress in a pink tutu on Wednesday 
nights up in the dorms, for example?

> >>Alla:
> I mean, in OOP Harry sure has no problem talking back to Dudley,   
> not that it stops Dudley from mocking Harry's nightmares, but I    
> don't remember Harry stating that Dudley stopped at all.

Betsy Hp:
Harry asked for it at that point.  He purposefully approached Dudley 
to give him some crap and Dudley pushed back.  Again, does Harry 
ever state that he doesn't like wearing pink tutus?

> >>Alla:
> <snip>
> Also when Fred says that they gave candy to Dudley because he is a 
> bully and asks Harry to confirm, Harry's answer is 
> "Yeah, he is, Mr. Weasley," said Harry earnestly.
> Not, he **was**, but he **is**, so to me it is not proven that 
> Dudley's bullying is water under the bridge at the time of GoF.

Betsy Hp:
Oh, Dudley's still a *bully*.  We see that in OotP when he and his 
friends are fresh from bullying Mark Evans (iirc).  But what we 
never see after PS/SS is Dudley bullying *Harry*.  As Hagrid and 
then later the twins make clear, wizards are more powerful than 
muggles.

But of course, none of that means that Fred and George didn't use 
their magical ability to toy with Dudley.  Which means none of this 
changes the fact that there was a bit of muggle baiting going on. <g>

Betsy Hp