Dudley/Treated As Adults/Therapy

[potioncat]

No: HPFGUIDX 184589

 "wildirishrose" <wildirishrose at ...> wrote:
 
> Say the magical gene pool was stirred up.  Say the 
Dursleys "Dudders" started showing magical tendencies.  How far would 
the Dursleys go to try and force Dudley from showing those magical 
tendencies?  Explain him to the neighbors, family, etc.  Would they 
spoil, mollycoddle, indulge Dudley?  Couldn't you see the looks of 
the Dursleys faces when the letter from Hogwarts showed up.
> 

Potioncat:
I'm not sure where I stood on this question before DH, because the 
question has come up before. (What hasn't?) But after DH, I think 
Petunia would have been thrilled and would have done everything 
possible to cultivate the magic. She'd be pacing back and forth at 
the entrance of Diagon Alley, if she had ever been there, trying to 
get a wand before he was 11. As for Vernon....Petunina would have 
brought him around.

Of course, she really, really wouldn't want Harry going to Hogwarts 
too.

wildirishrose
> Second
> 
> The age of 17 is considered being a man, I'm assuming a woman also, 
in WW.  All of a sudden they are thrown out in the world, they are 
treated as equals, well sort of in the case of the Weasleys and the 
twins.  They are expected to know what profession they want to go 
into.  In the case/book of the DH, they fight side by side with other 
adults that are older and more experienced then they are in the 
battle of HW and nobody thinks anything about it.
> 
> Am I the only one that thinks this is a real abrupt way to enter 
the adult world?

Potioncat:
You answered this one youself, does that mean you withdraw the 
question?  ;-)

I think JKR showed a fairly realistic entrance into legal adulthood. 
It comes very abruptly and too soon for some kids in the RW or the 
WW. Fred and George, in spite of wanting to join the Order and be 
adults, were made to return to school and mature a little more. Ron 
and Harry didn't get that extra time. 


> wildirishrose
> Third.
> 
> After the things that happen at HW to the kids in the DH book, well 
>include OOTP, and especially the battle of HW, how can these young 
>men and women, the 17 years that have attended HW,  just blow the 
>ash off their wands, find a place to sit, and celebrate that a 
>person has been killed.  Or HRH go up to the headmaster's office, 
>talk to a portrait, fix a broken wand and discuss putting the elder 
>wand back where it belongs and everything is fine.  Voldemort is 
>dead and all is well with the world.  It seems such a quick and easy 
>fix to end things.

Potioncat:
Dealing with the Elder wand was part of the post-battle clean-up. 

Because the living have to keep living. Because the author has to 
keep the story moving. I think the emotions during and after a battle 
in the real world are also all over the place. Happy you're alive, 
sad someone else isn't, glad it's over. 

 

>wildirishrose 
> I've thought about PTSD, anger managment, etc.  I would think after 
>such a thing as the battle of HW there would be a line around the 
>block to get help at St. Mungo's Hospital, and be in years of 
>therapy afterwards.  Or would the magical world have a far different 
>way of dealing with trauma in their lives.

Potioncat:
JKR avoided all that by jumping ahead 19 years to one specific event. 
And who is to say that as soon as the Express left, the gang didn't 
go to their regular group therapy meeting? Except that the WW as JKR 
wrote it, doesn't seem to do much about emotional damage.

Interesting questions.