Dark Book - Draco - Antinomianism

[muscatel1988]

No: HPFGUIDX 177364

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Carol" <justcarol67 at ...> wrote:

> You speak of "tricking goblins," but Griphook (whom Harry had 
> carried to safety and whose broken legs had been healed and fed and 
> given refuge in a safe house by wizards) was not tricked. 

Mus responds:

Oh, the last thing I wanted to suggest was that Griphook was a cuddly 
misunderstood little innocent.  I *know* he's a twisted, duplicitous 
little trouble-maker.

But it comes back, for me, to the whole question of non-Wizard 
magical peoples, which was discussed before from Sister Magpie's post 
at #176421(or so) on.  This is another of the strands of the larger 
story that I was puzzled by.  From at least the introduction of 
centaurs in PS, house elves in CoS, right through the merpeople in 
GoF and probably also in the Grawp story line, JKR seemed to be 
taking the line that non-Wizard magical peoples *shouldn't* be 
regarded as subserviant - that their separate identities and 
aspirations should be respected.  That was, for me, the point of 
Harry's later reaction to the statue in the fountain in the Ministry -
 its portrayal of goblins, house-elves and centaurs as lesser than 
witches and wizards was something we were supposed, through our 
HarryVision, to suspect.  The RW analogy is that human rights should 
be extended to them too, and wanting to do it was a worthwhile goal. 
Furthermore, doing it dishonestly, without consulting them, as 
Hermione did with her knitting, wasn't the right way to go about it.  

There was no necessity for JKR to take this line, but she did take 
it.  One of the things that made me uncomfortable while reading DH 
was the way that it switches to supporting the status quo - house-
elves like being enslaved and disregarding goblin views on property 
is not only necessary but right.  I was genuinely puzzled as to why 
JKR would put in something that so clearly mirrored native people's 
property rights, and then blow it apart.

As I said when I made the parallel between Native American views of 
land ownership, admitting the validity of a different set of views 
doesn't entail that having such views doesn't mean that the holder is 
morally better or incapable of venality.  I'm not suggesting that 
Griphook is necessarily morally superior, nor that he didn't betray 
them.  But Harry was, as Bill suspected, setting out to trick them.  
If we hadn't had the "separate but equal" message in earlier books, 
there would be much less of a problem.  But we did have it, and it 
was once one of the things that made us (or at least me) think part 
of the narrative involved wider moral change in the WW.  Instead, 
what I saw was moral reversion to the mean on behalf of our heroes, 
although something else had been trailed:

" 'I'm sure they'll never go over to You-Know-Who,' said Mr Weasley, 
shaking his head.  'They've suffered losses too; remember that goblin 
family he murdered last time, somewhere near Nottingham?'

'I think it depends on what they're offered,', said Lupin. 'And I'm 
not talking about gold.  If they're offered the freedoms we've been 
denying them for centuries, they're going to be tempted.  Have you 
had any luck with Ragnok, Bill?' " [OotP, UK hb: 81]

So yes, Carol, I'll agree with you that Griphook is an ungrateful 
little horror.  But he is a representative of a race that we've been 
told has been treated rather high-handedly by wizards for centuries - 
I raised an elegant eyebrow when we then got Harry meting out similar 
treatment in DH.  More moral muddle, for this reader.

Mus, who hopes this makes sense.