[HPforGrownups] Harry's remark about Kreacher WAS: Re: JKR messed up........ no.

[random832 at fastmail.us]

No: HPFGUIDX 178625

(I hit reply on Magpie's post because that's when I thought of this, but
this is a reply to the general debate)

I think one major source of the disconnect between the two 'sides' here
is a single passage, quite far removed from the infamous sandwich scene:

'You see, Kreacher was not able to betray us totally. He is not Secret
Keeper for the Order, he could not give the Malfoy's our whereabouts, or
tell them any of the Order's confidential plans that he had been
forbidden to reveal. He was bound by the enchantments of his kind, which
is to say that he could not disobey a direct order from his master,
Sirius. But he gave Narcissa information of the sort that is very
valuable to Voldemort, yet must have seemed much too trivial for Sirius
to think of banning him from repeating it.'

Some people have read "bound by the enchantments of his kind" as meaning
that wizards, at some point in the distant past, placed some sort of
magic spell on elves, enslaving them, and so this isn't a biological
thing, it's artificial. I think that the key word is "of" - they're the
enchantments "of" house elves, not of wizards on house elves. There is
no reason, particularly giving that wording these "enchantments" cannot
be naturally occuring in a magical species.
-- 
Random832