A sandwich/House Elf Storyline/JKR's Intent

[a_svirn]

No: HPFGUIDX 178755

> Pippin:

<snip> 
> Are the attractions of slavery so seductive that they have to
> be swept under the rug lest people wonder why we ever got
> rid of it? <snip> I think the description of Kreacher's suffering 
> is sufficiently memorable that Harry is never going to be okay with 
> it. I'm certainly not. I don't know of any reader who *is* okay 
with 
> it.
> 
> 
> Magpie:
> That's a nice argument against slavery from outside the books, but 
I 
> don't particularly see how it relates to the books. What's the big, 
> clever warning against slavery I'm supposed to be getting from HP--
> that the author's actually showing in the story? *I'm* not the one 
> who inherited a slave and lives in a society where I could own one 
> who doesn't want to be free. It seems like you're saying I could 
> write a story about happy slaves--perhaps a nostalgic revisionist 
> ante-bellum story like one I unfortunately had to read a while back-
-
> but it would still be an anti-slavery story because that's the part 
> I'm supposed to bring to it myself as a reader. Not that that 
> couldn't be done, but I just really don't get that from the House 
> Elf story in canon at all. I can't get it from canon, actually, 
> because the House Elves aren't human. Some of the most basic 
> arguments against slavery don't hold true for them, while some of 
> the most common arguments for slavery are true for them. And the 
> idea that JKR is expecting us to see Harry as having become bad 
> there seems hard to believe.
<snip> 

a_svirn:
Exactly. I used to argue that the house elves were NOT slaves by 
nature, because the very concept makes me sick. I took Dumbledore's 
words about Kreacher having been made what he is by wizards as a 
proof that their servility was both magically enforced and culturally 
nurtured. But I was wrong. Dumbledore either lied outright (he *did* 
say that Hermione was right after all, and the Hermione of OOP held 
passionately abolitionist views) or evaded the truth as was his 
custom. (Which comes to the same thing.)  Hermione's lecture on 
elves' nature in DH leaves no doubt of her change of heart – her 
updated stand for evlish welfare is that they should be treated 
kindly, while staying exactly where they are. Harry and Ron have 
never doubted the truth of this dictum to begin with. So we have it 
now on the best authorities that elves ARE slaves by nature.

Now WHY would Rowling invent such a revolting thing as that? She said 
in one of the older interviews something about house-elves being a 
metaphor for slavery in real life or some such (I don't have an exact 
quote at hand). She said more recently that her books are moral 
books. What kind of moral lesson Kreacher's story is supposed to 
teach us? The only one I can discern is that those who are by nature 
slaves should stay slaves. A responsible and moral person should 
treat them kindly, but firmly. Frankly I find it disturbing. In real 
life Great Minds starting from Aristotle have been saying exactly the 
same thing about various groups of people, but have (fortunately!) 
been proved wrong. Yet Rowling creates a world where it is right (and 
all right) to own a slave. If it is supposed to be a metaphor of real 
life slavery it must mean that she – metaphorically – gives her 
benediction to it. But surely it can't be that, can it? But perhaps 
Kreacher's story isn't supposed to be a moral one? Then what it is 
supposed to be? Did she invent house elves simply because she wanted 
Harry to own one (such useful creatures, and the poor boy has had it 
too rough) and be OK with it? I am not sure which one is more 
disgusting.