House Elves

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 180811

Carol earlier:
 
> << still wondering what this glorious "freedom" to be imposed on the
> House-Elves against their will would consist of >>
> 
Catlady responded:
> 1) Freedom from being compelled to punish themselves. In the long
term, by removing the 'enchantment'. <snip>

2) Freedom from being abused. Laws must be passed AND enforced against
> cruelty to House Elves. <snip>

Carol again:
Well, yes. But eliminating the compulsion to punish themselves, which
I agree is a problem (the chief concern of Hermione in DH), isn't
freedom from what a_svirn and Magpie are calling "slavery." IMO,
ending the self-punishment and preventing abuse would in themselves
solve the House-Elf problem, allowing House-elves to work for wizards
but not be mistreated. In a_svirn's and Magpie's view, "slavery"
itself is the problem. They want freedom from servitude to humans
altogether, apparently. Let them set up businesses or something
money-related, as a Wizard might do, apparently. I really don't know
what they think the answer is other than Slavery Is Evil And Must Be
Ended Now. With what in its place? that's what I want to know.
> 
Catlady:
> 2.5) House Elves taken away from egregiously abusive employers would
feel the same as children taken away from egregiously abusive parents
> -- that they are the ones being punished, not the masters/parents.
This is a bad thing, which WSPCHE should have a rehabilitation
(brainwashing and re-employment) program to help displaced House Elves
with.

Carol: 

I don't understand what you're saying here, or what WSPCHE is.
> 
> 3) Freedom to leave an unwanted employer and seek another. Of
course, it's only fair that the employer would have the right to sack
an unwanted House Elf and seek another. <snip> To make sure that both
House Elves and wizards know their rights and duties, a law that both
must sign an employment contract. Yes, the law intrudes between House
Elves and wizards who have lived together happily for decades, forcing
them to sign some stupid contract.

Carol responds:
Are you for or against the "stupid contract"? Are you advocating more
bureaucracy (just what the WWW needs!) or ridiculing the idea?
>
Catlady:
> 3.5) Can we rely on the free market to spontaneously generate a
House Elf employment agency? An 'Elves Seeking Houses' section of
classified ads in Witch Weekly? A particular bulletin board in
Hogsmead where wizards post House Elf Wanted notices?

Carol responds:
Not unless you want to make House-Elves as dependent on money as
humans, essentially turning them into us.
>
Catlady:
> 4) At first, most House Elves would stay where they are. As the idea
of leaving an unwanted employer became more common, some House Elves
might decide to leave and go into business for themselves, such as
running a hotel or restaurant or laundry. Or an employment agency for
other House Elves.  This might require laws to come into sync with
reality about House Elves having property rights and so on. Maybe the
House Elves would rather start their own Credit Union than do their
banking with Goblins. 
> 
> 5) Eventually, WSPCHE should gracefully retire, replaced by the
House Elf Self Help Association.
> 
> 6) Maybe some House Elves eventually will want to pursue entirely
different careers, as curse-breakers and potioneers and Healers and
joke manufacturers and book publishers. Maybe someday they'll drift so
far from domestic work that more of them hire wizards as domestic
servants than are hired by wizards as domestic servants. 

Carol responds:
So wizards should impose their own values onto House-Elves, deciding
what's right for them and ignoring their own wishes so they'll be just
like us. Sounds like cultural imperialism to me, assuming that human
culture and values (specifically, those of the WW) are superior to
House-Elves values, as if House-Elves are incapable of deciding what
they want (which is, clearly, domestic service to Wizards). How that's
different from nineteenth-century Christian missionaries saving
cannibals from their own culture by converting and educating them is
unclear to me. The Wizards are deciding what's right for the Elves
("freedom") and imposing it on them. (You *will* wear clothes and earn
wages because that's the *right* way to do things. And if Elves would
rather wear tea towels and work for praise from a master they respect,
well, the Elves must be wrong.)

Somehow, I don't think that more Wizarding laws and more bureaucracy
are what a_svirn has in mind. I think it's more like self-rule for
House-Elves, whether they want it or not. As they obviously don't, or
they'd have picked up those hats that Hermione placed in the
Gryffindor Common Room.

Carol, who is all for an end to self-punishment and an end to abuse by
Wizards, but thinks that, otherwise, the system works fine as it is,
for all concerned