Arthur right or not? /Dudley bullies Harry at the time of GoF or not?

[dumbledore11214]

No: HPFGUIDX 155854

„«	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.

Alla:

How does it changed if Harry is still locked in the room and almost
starved? Harry is still powerless, IMO.
„«	
Edited to add that what I was trying to say is that Dudley's 
bullying IMO does not exist in vacuum, but tied to his parents' 
abuse 
of Harry. All that Dudley has to do if he feels that, I don't know 
Harry is scaring him too much is to complain to his parents and 
Harry would be dealt with. I mean, you are not arguing that Harry 
has any power over Dudleys after PS/SS?
Like in GoF for example, Harry is starved **because** Aunt 
Petunia wants to keep Dudley morale high by making sure that he eats 
more than Harry, etc.
„«	
So, as I said below I am not convinced that Dudley stopped 
bullying Harry, but even if he stopped doing it himself, he still 
has his parents to **ask** to bully and abuse Harry and as we know 
whatever Dudley wants, Dudley gets. He still gets to bully Harry 
**through** his parents IMO, so what I was replying to originally -

Dudley's bullying of Harry is never water under the bridge IMO till 
he has 
this possibility.
„«	
Moreover, even in HBP Harry ( narrator through him) comments 
that experience taught him to stay out of Vernon's hands reach, so I 
feel pretty safe assuming that even at that time some sort of 
physical abuse occurred.

> 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:

Sorry, but I don't think so. For years, Dudley's bullying is
something that Harry has to live with every day, I think that if
Dudley stopped bullying him, that would have been something so
unusual that Harry/or narrator through Harry would made some sort of
comment.



> Betsy Hp:
<SNIP>
> 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>

Alla:

I am not convinced that this is JKR's definition of muggle-baiting,
I am sorry.

If JKR ever gives us clear definition of what muggle-baiting means
and if that includes playing pranks on muggles without intent to
target muggles, then yes, I will agree with you.

And actually even Arthur **never** calls what Twins did **muggle-
baiting**, he just says that it undermines the relationship between
Wizards and Muggles, no?
Those relationships could be undermined by many ways, not only
**muggle-baiting**.

JMO,

Alla.