help with JKR quote was Re: Lily and Tuney and Sev, Oh My

[julie]

No: HPFGUIDX 176470


> > Sharon:
> > I never thought hexes were Dark Magic. 
> snip
>    Hexes, while they cause pain and discomfort, are like 
> > pranks. The Weasley twins use a lot of hexes in their products in 
the 
> last couple 
> > of books don't they?
> 
> 
> Potioncat:
> I'll need help with this. JKR said that hexes, jinxes, curses were 
Dark 
> Magic. I'm not sure if that was just before or just after HBP. At 
the 
> time we were all trying to work out just what defined Dark Magic 
and 
> what it was that made Dark Magic bad. Or at what point magic became 
> gray and when it turned dark. Boy, were we coming at it from the 
wrong 
> angle!
>

Julie:
I have never heard this quote from JKR, but if she did say it,
then I'm really confused! After all, when Severus complained
to Lily that James and his friends weren't as wonderful as 
everyone thought they were, Lily says "They don't use Dark
Magic though." Yet James and Sirius hexed other students in
the hallways just for fun. Fred and George certainly hexed
plenty of people. Hermione jinxed the DA parchwment which
eventually gave Marietta long-lasting pustule eruptions and
permanent scarring. And Ginny is a master at jinxes...

So which is it? If all hexes, jinxes and curses are Dark
Magic, then why did Lily differentiate between the magic
performed by Severus's Slytherin friends and the magic 
performed by James and Co, when both were at least on the
level of hexes meant *specifically* to cause pain and/or
humiliation, however minor. And if all of it is Dark Magic,
why does the Hogwarts staff allow this continual practice
of Dark Magic by students against students to go on year
after year? (Though it does explain why the students all 
need to take DADA, since they need that knowledge simply
to survive their daily lives!)

I think there must be some dividing line between the usual
hexes and jinxes students perform on each other at school
on a regular basis (such as the twins hexes, Ginny's jinxes,
etc), and that which Lily referred to as something of a 
more sinister variety, "Dark Magic." I just don't have the
least idea where that dividing line lies--and perhaps neither
does JKR!

Julie