A sandwich/Sweeping Shadows/JKR's intent

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 178712

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > And the issue of House Elves being freed was dispatched in DH    
> > with the death of Dobby and with Harry's embracing the life of a 
> > slave-owner.  How does this make lizzyben's reading selective?

> >>Pippin:
> It excludes  the part where Hermione says she wants to take SPEW
> further, in OOP, and the part where she tells Scrimgeour she means
> to do some good in the world, in DH. Those plans did not revolve
> around Dobby, and there's no reason to think they died with him.

Betsy Hp:
OotP took place before DH (and before Hermione showed herself pretty 
okay with one of her best friends owning a slave).  And her "zinger" 
(and I quote because, OMG, the childish idiocy) in DH is where she 
lost all credibility as far as I'm concerned.  Which she never 
regained.  House-elves became a good excuse to kiss her boyfriend.  
And afterwords she has his kids.  Nothing about a future of crusading 
for anyone's rights.  Just a dead freedom seeking house-elf and a 
live slave.

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > But there *is* a simple heartening answer in the books.  Owning a 
> > slave is perfectly fine if the slave wants to be owned.  RL is a 
> > bit messier, but JKR has created a world where everything is     
> > neat. Kreature is happy to be owned and Harry is happy to own    
> > him.  Cue credits.

> >>Pippin:
> <snip of quote>
> Would you please explain to me what's simple and heartening
> and perfectly fine about that? Seriously?
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Oh nothing.  Harry hadn't grown into his role of slave owner.  The 
heartening bit is at the end when Harry's happily in charge as master 
of his domain.  The happy ending: heartening and simple.  Kreature is 
a happy slave and Harry is a happy owner.

> >>Pippin:
> And only a wizard fanatic would suggest that wizards are perfectly
> correct in their treatment of goblins and never wrong. "Goblins
> have good reason to dislike wizards, Ron," said Hermione. "They've
> been treated brutally in the past." That Griphook happens to be
> lying or mistaken about the sword does not mean that goblins
> have no legitimate complaints about wizards. That's right there
> in the text too. "There has been fault on both sides. I would 
> never claim that wizards have been innocent."

Betsy Hp:
But in the end, the goblin was wrong about who owned the sword and 
wizards prevailed and Harry was the happy master of his domain.


> >>Pippin:
> > In every subplot, Harry and Hermione go from apathy or ignorant 
> > hope to the knowledge that  achieving a more equitable  society   
> > will be difficult, but improvements can and should be made. 
> > <snip>

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > Where or where do you get this Pippin?  Seriously, some straight 
> > forward, non-symbolic text that clearly states that the state of 
> > the WW bothers Harry and he's going to do something about it     
> > though it may take years.  Something concrete please.

> >>Pippin:
> "I've said all along that wizards would pay for how they treat House
> Elves. Well, Voldemort did...and so did Sirius."
> 
> Harry had no retort. As he watched Kreacher sobbing on the floor,
> he remembered what Dumbledore had said to him, mere hours
> after Sirius's death: I do not think Sirius ever saw Kreacher as a
> being with feelings as acute as a human's...."
> 
> So, if you see House Elves as beings with feelings as acute as
> a human's, how can you be okay with a system that makes them
> punish themselves?

Betsy Hp:
Apparently, after living in a house with a house-elf happily being 
your slave, you become totally cool with it. <g>  Harry defines 
Kreature as his slave. He's a good boy so he's not into beating 
Kreature, but he's very cool with Kreature serving him.  So the 
system works for Harry.

> >>Pippin:
> Do I have to quote all the text where Hermione
> talks about how the WW could be improved? Did she die at the
> end of DH?  I must have missed it.<g>

Betsy Hp:
Ah.  This is where I assume all sorts of future activity based on 
stuff Hermione said or did in past books and ignore how it petered 
away as she got older, right? In the end though, the house-elf saga 
for Hermione ended with her kissing Ron.  Then she had his babies.  
And that's all the books give us.

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > <snip>
> > If the reading is subversive show me evidence *in DH* that Harry 
> > is fighting the powers that be, not becoming one of them.

> Pippin:
> Where is the evidence that he's becoming one of them? That he
> thinks about Kreacher getting him a sandwich?
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Yes.  Because this is Harry being totally cool with owning a slave.

> >>Pippin:
> If Hagrid was right, then Peter Pettigrew was a Slytherin since    
> there never was a dark wizard who wasn't in Slytherin, and Sirius   
> was a bad person because he had the same blood as Draco Malfoy.

Betsy Hp:
Hagrid was right because yeah, pretty much all of the Slytherins 
caved to the Death Eaters.  None of them fought back and all of them 
walked out.

> >>Pippin:
> The Slytherins walked out because McGonagall told them to leave.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Because they'd shown themselves as baddies.  (Or are you suggesting 
McGonagall is a baddie now?) So... Hagrid and Ron were right. 

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/178707
> >>Betsy Hp:
> > <snip> 
> > I think JKR was working through some various issues through
> > her writing of this series. And I think she got... maybe tired,   
> > maybe scared? Anyway, I've never seen a book sweep its shadow     
> > characters under the carpet so firmly and so quickly. I think the 
> > House Elf slavery issue was an innocent by-stander in some ways. 
> > Since JKR decided to embrace the close-minded, protectionism of   
> > the WW, all of its traditions had to be upheld. Therefore the    
> > House Elves remained slaves, the Centaurs remained in the forest, 
> > the Giants remained banned, and the Slytherins remained in the   
> > dungeons. Harry changed nothing; he just took his place amongst   
> > the elite.

> >>Carol responds:
> I certainly don't agree that Harry changed nothing. He destroyed
> Voldemort and made it impossible to become a Death Eater, paving the
> way for changes in Slytherin and the MoM.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Neither Death Eaters nor Voldemort were stopping changes occurring in 
the MoM.  Also, Harry just killed Voldemort.  Packs of fanatic bigots 
could rise again because he did nothing to change or enlighten the 
primordal soup they rose out of, IMO.  The epilouge reflects that by 
showing that neither the MoM nor Slytherin has changed.  The idea 
that they needed to change is so unimportant to JKR she doesn't even 
address it.  Instead we learn the names of the Trio's children.

> >>Carol:
> <snip>
> But setting aside JKR's interviews and DD's statements about the
> fountain in the MoM being a lie, if we look strictly at the canon,
> there was never much chance of an equal, integrated, utopian WW
> society. 
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
I absolutely agree.  The WW is defined by separation and fear.  
That's not the sort of society capable of change.  Unfortunately 
Harry did nothing to heal the deep wounds within the WW.  He didn't 
even really call attention to them.  It was me, as a reader, that 
noticed the WW was pretty brutal.  Harry was cool with it, and stayed 
that way.

> >>Carol, who thinks that the idea of magical nonhumans as "races" is
> misleading and the idea of Giants (or Trolls) becoming civilized
> (made to act like humans) is unfeasible at best

Betsy Hp:
Again, I agree.  So, in the end the fountain was right.  Sure, the 
details of the worshipping faces of the various creatures was a 
bit... optimistic.  But that wizards and witches needed to rule above 
them?  Quite the way it needs to be, apparently.


http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/178708
> >>Betsy Hp:
> > I just want to take this moment to say I for one (can't speak for
> > Lizzyben obviously) absolutely believe that DH really *does*
> > encourage bigotry and hate.

> >>Pippin:
> Gosh, shouldn't the ACLU speak out against this menace?<g>
> In fact I can't think of any serious anti-discrimination group
> that agrees with you. Are there any? It's their job to look for
> this kind of thing, but somehow it's only disappointed fans
> who seem to think that JKR's failure to portray the Slytherins
> or the goblins as wronged saints is immoral.

Betsy Hp:
That's me. <g>  A goblin fanatic; a Slytherin apologist.  Very 
strange ideas I have about not judging a child at age eleven, about 
showing a modicum of respect for foreign cultures.  Eh, it's probably 
because I'm an educated woman.  Honestly, I should return to sighing 
dreamily over Harry's gorgeous green eyes and glorious naked body 
before I sprain something.  (Don't worry.  More than likely I'm just 
horribly jealous of Lily.  You know how we women are.) <RBEG>

I know you're just being silly here, but JKR doesn't actually assign 
a specific RL group as her focus of bigotry and hate.  So why would 
RL anti-discrimination groups get involved?  It just means that I 
personally find the story distasteful because it does reflect how 
bigots viewed those they judged, IMO.


> >>Pippin:
> It might help to remember that in fairy stories, the death of a
> villain or monster may symbolize integration, not destruction.

Betsy Hp:
Only if this were a fairy story. But fairy stories don't run from the 
deep dark woods the way JKR did.  So I don't classify this as a fairy 
story.  (Though I notice you're once again reaching into the 
symbolism drawer to try and twist a message of "integration" into the 
ending. <g>)

> >>Pippin:
> Harry's visit to King's Cross could be seen as joining his ego
> to the superego (Dumbledore) and the id (Voldemort).

Betsy Hp:
If Voldemort is the tortured baby, Harry (encouraged by his superego) 
ignores him.  So I'd say King's Cross is more Harry rejecting his 
id.  Which, IIRC, doesn't lead to good things in general.  Also this 
totally fits with pushing the water house down.  (And um, yeah, I 
notice I'm embracing this sort of symbolism...  I think because for 
me it's dealing with the actual text, not encouraging me to ignore 
the text and base my interpertation on something completely outside 
it.)

Betsy Hp (off to bed)