Mugglebaiting, bullbaiting and bloodsports (was Re: Hate Crimes)

[Marion Ros]

No: HPFGUIDX 155981

> Renee:
> Which to me raises the question: is it Muggle baiting when the 
> Muggles both 1) know they're dealing with wizards and magic;
> and 2) have the chance to avoid the object and remain unaffected?

a_svirn:
> You know how it is with the fish? It can also avoid the baited hook 
> and remain unaffected.


Marion:
The discussion so far has been whether 'Muggle-baiting' simply meant 'being nasty to a muggle because we hate muggles' or 'intimidating muggles with wizard powers to show their inferiority' or even 'any action to or with muggles which uses magic'. The one thing that is overlooked in this - mostly semantic - discussion is the actual meaning of the word 'baiting'.
'Baiting' is not so much luring a victim (as in putting bait on a hook) but subduing and hurting another living being for entertainment & gambling. It is known as a 'bloodsport'. This is not my personal opinion, this is what the dictionary tells me.

>From Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baiting_%28animals%29 :

>>>"Bait or Baiting is the act to worry or torment a chained or confined animal by setting game dogs upon it for sport. The dogs attack with endeavour, bite and tear, with an objective to subdue the opposing animal by incapacitating or killing it. Baiting is a blood sport utilized for entertainment and gambling. It is illegal in most countries with laws being enforced with varying degrees of effort and enthusiasm.<<<

>>>Bull-baiting is a blood sport involving the baiting of bulls.In Queen Anne's time it was performed in London at Hockley Hole, regularly twice a week, and there was scarce a provincial town to which it did not extend. At Stamford and at Tutbury, from a very early period, a maddened bull was annually hunted through the streets.Before the event started, the bull's nose was usually blown full of pepper to enrage the animal before the baiting. A variant of bull-baiting was "pinning the bull"; specially-trained dogs would be set upon the bull one at a time, a successful attack resulting in the dog fastening his teeth strongly in the bull's snout.Together with other animal blood sports such as bear-baiting, cockfighting, and dogfighting, this amusement was prohibited in Britain by an act of Parliament in 1835."<<<

As an aside to this, the 'act to worry' might confuse readers, so I also include the definition and synomyms (Miriam-Webster dictionary) of 'worry':

transitive verb
1 dialect British : CHOKE, STRANGLE
2 a : to harass by tearing, biting, or snapping especially at the throat b : to shake or pull at with the teeth <a terrier worrying a rat> c : to touch or disturb something repeatedly d : to change the position of or adjust by repeated pushing or hauling
3 a : to assail with rough or aggressive attack or treatment : TORMENT b : to subject to persistent or nagging attention or effort
4 : to afflict with mental distress or agitation : make anxious
intransitive verb
synonyms WORRY, ANNOY, HARASS, HARRY, PLAGUE, PESTER, TEASE mean to disturb or irritate by persistent acts. WORRY implies an incessant goading or attacking that drives one to desperation. ANNOY implies disturbing one's composure or peace of mind by intrusion, interference, or petty attacks HARASS implies petty persecutions or burdensome demands that exhaust one's nervous or mental power. HARRY may imply heavy oppression or maltreatment PLAGUE implies a painful and persistent affliction . PESTER stresses the repetition of petty attacks TEASE suggests an attempt to break down one's resistance or rouse to wrath.
And from the online Miriam-Webster dictionary:

'to bait':
1 a : to persecute or exasperate with unjust, malicious, or persistent attacks b : TEASE
2 a : to harass (as a chained animal) with dogs usually for sport b : to attack by biting and tearing
3 a : to furnish with bait b : ENTICE, LURE
4 : to give food and drink to (an animal) especially on the road


Marion again:

The term 'Muggle-baiting' therefore has rather sinister connotations to me. If 'rat-baiting' means setting a terrier dog on a pen full of terrified, scurrying rats to bet how much your dog can kill in a minute (not in order to exterminate the vermin or in vengeance because rats would or might spread disease but simply because it was seen as exciting and *fun* to watch the scurrying rats try to escape their fate and be torn to pieces) and if bull-baiting means penning a bull, tormenting it until it's maddened and then hunting it down and setting dogs on it (not to 'punish' the bull for any misdeed or because bulls are heinous creatures but because it's *fun* to hear a dumb creature mooeing in distress and fear) then 'muggle-baiting' must surely have similar reasons and attractions.


It follows logically that 'muggle-baiting' must be similar to bull-baiting or rat-baiting, if only in spirit if not in actual action, otherwise JKR would not have used the term 'baiting' at all. The 'baiting' of muggles must therefore, in my opinion and that of the dictionary, include the harming, tormenting and frightening of muggles for sheer entertainment.


But what of the hiding of keys and the hexing of toasters that muggle-baiting seems to include? Is that in concordance of a 'bloodsport'? Muggles are not physically harmed by that, surely? 

Well, it looks to me that the object of 'baiting' is not necessarily the killing or physically harming of the animals in question at all. It's, again according to the dictionary, the 'act to worry or torment a chained or confined animal for sport'. Muggles might not be physically confined by chains, but they are 'confined' by the limitations of their power. The 'fun' element must largely be in the anomynous pestering, driving the victim wild with frustration or pain, the idea that you, the baiter, have power over the victim. It is, in other words, a form of bullying, but the term 'baiting' is expressely used in the 'bullying' of animals. Which tells you something about the WW's attitude towards Muggles.This is not really so very strange since we know that Arminta Meliflua (a cousin to the Sirius' mother) was 'was lobbying the Wizengamot to legalize Muggle hunting' and hunting is a bloodsport (although hunting is not about the tormenting of animals for sport - which is why it was not prohibited and bear-baiting, cockfighting and dogfighting *was*)We might find it strange now that people could derive pleasure from seeing an animal suffer, in pain and in panic, but according to the responses to the Twins 'toffee-prank' it is still hilarious when a stupid, defenseless and annoying muggle boy is being made to suffer panic and near-suffocation.

In my opinion Muggle-baiting is also a 'bloodsport', in the same way rat-baiting and bull-baiting was. It might not always be 'bloody', but it is about harrassing, tormenting and frightening for entertainment.

I do think that there is an element of powerplay in the whole muggle-baiting busisness, and Betsy, SisterMagpie and houyhnhnm certainly have a point here (and a very good point it is indeed)
Whether or not Dudley could have avoided being baited is not the point. Notice that with bull-baiting, the bull is stronger than any man. The bull can 'defend itself' and it does against the dogs that are set against it, but you cannot blame the bull for being a bull, you cannot blame it for playing the game and not ignoring the dogs and just running away. The whole idea of bull-baiting is putting the bull in a position where it can be tormented (a pen or an arena) and then tormenting it so it will amusingly struggle and moo. 

The discussion so far asked wether the term 'Muggle-baiting' was appropriate for the Twins' 'prank' since they said they did not do it *because* Dudley is a muggle or if it is because Dudley *is* a muggle and the twins, by being wizards, abuse their power which would *make* it baiting.The following question, if the last was true, was wether Dumbledore's intimidation of the Dursleys and Harry's blowing up of Aunt Marge could be seen as Muggle-baiting because in both cases the wizards are, by definition, more powerful than the muggles.

Well, my two cents on the matter is this: the Twins toffee 'prank' is *definitely* muggle-baiting, imo. They tormented, harrassed him and literally choked a muggle so they could have a good laugh. Usually Muggle-baiting is done anomynously because it adds to the fun to see a muggle run around frustratedly because he doesn't know what hit him, but since Dudley and his parents don't know what the heck just happened when Dudley's tongue just grew to ten times it's size, I think this element can be ignored. As for the fact that the twins also regularly do the same kind of things to wizard children, well, that is called 'bullying'. It's just as nasty, but it misses the element of total panic that a muggle can so amusingly produce. The wizard children understand about magic after all. This does not mean however that I find their bullying of the firsties of their brothers in any way excusable.

Oblivating the Muggles at the World Championship is not muggle-baiting, imo. It's detestable that the WW finds it okay to mindwipe other humans, but the obliviating is not done for amusement but out of convenience. Detestable, but not baiting. 

Dumbledore's intimidation of the Dursleys imo is just that: intimidation. That in itself is not particularly nice or even ethical, but isn't muggle-baiting. And as for Harry's blowing up of Aunt Marge, this was a surge of 'wild magic', neither planned or conciously cast. That, imo, was an accident.

Marion (who's melting in The Hague - the heatwave is international!)