Identifying with Muggles in Potterverse WAS: Re: DD at the Dursleys:

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 158043

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > It's the use of magic that tilts it for me.
> > <snip>
> > That it's done so easily suggests that abusing that power is an 
> > easy thing for wizards to slip into.  And I don't like it.      
> > Which colors how I take that scene.
> > <SNIP>
 
> >>Alla:
> I think I understand sort of, but let me ask couple more questions 
> just to make sure I do...
> <snip>
> Is the main source of your empathy with Dursleys the idea that 
> wizards can do it to your as muggle? Basically that you can be in 
> the same situation as they are?
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Yes, that's exactly it.  Because I relate so much to being an easily 
abused Muggle I do (as icky as it is) empathize with the Dursleys in 
this scene (and others, actually).   Not that I'd treat a child as 
they did (though let's remember that Dudley is being treated exactly 
as his parents are), but that I'd be as powerless as they are in 
this scene.  That if I'd upset a wizard in any way I'd just have to 
take whatever "justice" he felt he should mete out.  Or drink the 
mead he'd forced on me.

> >>Sydney:
> <snip>
> The Dursleys are just plastic; I wasn't surprised when JKR
> said Vernon was the character she most disliked in the series. She
> never bothers to get into his head at all-- I mean, it's not like
> it's ridiculous for a muggle to be afraid of someone who can do   
> magic.
> I'd have an undercurrent of fear myself every time I dealt with a
> wizard, I think. But, I don't know, I just don't feel JKR really
> engages with the fear as anything other than a joke, and that     
> really holds the scenes back, I think.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Oddly enough I don't have too hard of a time imagining a three 
dimensional life onto the Dursleys.  Though I agree that I think I 
do that *in spite* of JKR, rather than because of her.  

For me it all came down to Aunt Marge.  There was a bit of 
solidarity there for a moment, when Aunt Marge came to visit.  No 
one was thrilled to see her coming, and yet they had no choice and 
had to suck it up as best they could.  I think that's when I began 
to see the Dursleys as more than cartoon baddies.  (I read a theory 
that Aunt Marge raised Vernon, and he is what she created.  Nothing 
canon for it, of course, but it's that sort of speculation I enjoy.)

> >>bboyminn:
> OH MY GOD! Dumbledore annoyed the Dusleys, he should be
> shot!
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Goodness, Steve, no one's suggesting shooting Dumbledore.  I'm 
merely expressing a bit of disappointment that he released his anger 
(as understandable as that anger was) in such a petty and childish 
fashion.  I mean, let's keep things in perspective. <eg>

> >>Tonks:
> <snip>
> I think of Muggles as those humans who don't see or don't want to
> see that there is a world outside of the world of matter as
> experienced by their 5 senses. I see the WW as similar to the world
> of the mystic or the spiritual world. It is just that the Muggles
> don't want to know about the world of the wizards. But the wizards
> know about both worlds. Some even live in Muggle areas and appear
> to be Muggles to the Muggles around them.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Hmm, see I have it as exactly opposite.  The wizards are the insular 
xenophobes, with little that is beautiful and soul enriching 
surrounding them.  They know nothing of art or music or literature.  
Their schools concentrate soley on that which is practical and 
pragmatic, thriving on and encouraging cut-throat competition with 
little love or mercy for their fellow man.

They are the elites, surrounded by what they perceive to be rabble 
who'd swamp them with desperate cries for help if they revealed 
their sanctified existence.  Not recognizing that *they*, the 
wizards, are the ones who are so hopelessly backwards.

The Weasleys, the Malfoys, the Diggorys, the Smiths know nothing of 
Shakespeare or Chaucer or Lawrence or Potter (Beatrice, that is <g>) 
or Blake or Austen or Michelangelo or Galileo or Einstein.  Nor do 
they seem to have any equivalent.

As per JKR there is no fiction in the Wizarding World.  (She'd be 
stuck writing "how to" books, IIRC.)  There are no art courses of 
any kind offered at Hogwarts that we've seen.  Their sense of humor 
seems to come straight from "Punch and Judy"; their sense of 
government from a similarly archaic time (no poli-sci major me, 
sorry <g>, though I'm betting the Minister of Magic was 
condescending to Winston Churchill back in the day, and in no way 
should have been).  

In short, the Wizarding World is brutal and dark and I wouldn't want 
to be there for any length of time.  At least, that's how I see it.

Betsy Hp (agreeing with Sydney about the Jedi-blood crap and will 
keep my kids away from the prequels like it's the worst sort of 
nasty, raunchy porn)