House elves and some spoilers for Swordspoint WAS: realistic solutions

[a_svirn]

No: HPFGUIDX 180984

> SSSusan:
> Then WHY have they run away from the opportunity to not be slaves? I
> don't understand why that point gets pooh-poohed. Several Hogwarts
> HEs are offered freedom via Hermione's hats. They run away from
> them. Why do we need to assume they don't *actually* want to be
> slaves, if they're showing us that they don't want to take the
> freedom offered to them?
> 
> Magpie:
> Because they are looking at it in a short-sighted way? The elves at 
> Hogwarts are happy and don't want to leave their situation. 

a_svirn:
And frankly we don't even know for sure that they are slaves. That 
was Hermione assumption, but too many of her assumptions were elves 
are concerned were too hasty. We don't know if they are owned, we 
don't know how they are owned. At the very least it would seem 
Hogwarts's elves are more like serfs than slaves, because they are 
bound – IF they are bound at all – to a place, rather than to a 
person. Moreover, Hogwarts itself is not a private possession (at 
least it doesn't seem to be the case) but a public institution. So, 
they are not even like serfs since the place they are bound to – if 
they are – isn't owned by anybody. So their position is very 
different from that of Kreacher, Winky and Dobby. And, as I said, we 
can't even be sure that there is any sort of bondage in evidence. 

All things considering they have a great deal to loose, and what did 
Hermione offer to them exactly? Grand lectures about things they 
don't understand? Insecurity? She did not know what she was about, 
and on top of that she was dishonest. It is no great wonder that they 
gave her a wide breadth. 

a_svirn