imprisoned quell!smacking preproduction:…

scantiest indecision additivity …

Excellent, and reading it now, after Deathly Hallows and right before Easter, it’s even more appropriate and timely.

Pat

Yes, I do believe that there is a real evil that exists outside ourselves, and I certainly didn’t intend to psychologize evil. I fact, I thought about arguing against part of the Nacify essay – the conclusion was something about embracing our animal/werewolf instincts as a good thing! There’s where taking an completely psychological view of evil will send you in the wrong direction.

It’s interesting to note that the idea of scapegoating doesn’t come from our own twisted psyches, but is a distortion of something that is actually true: the God of our Fathers in the Old Testament instituted the idea of placing specific human sins upon an innocent victim (in most cases, a male sheep) and then killing the victim, to symbolicly “kill” the sin. While as Christians we believe animal sacrifices are no longer effective, they certainly were at one point in human history. And it was God who fulfilled these sacrifices by taking on all sins and sacrificing Himself as the innocent victim, in a totally unexpected twist.

Does the psychology of the scapegoat still dog some who don’t have the ritual presentation of Christ’s One True Sacrifice before them? Without God, human beings search for a savior, but apparently they also search for scapegoats. “Who will save me from this body of death?”

Matthew, Mia and Reyhan seem to be in agreement that Harry won’t directly save the WW. I agree with Reyhan that Hermione percieves the injustices of the WW more clearly than Harry, and seems much more motivated to address them. But realistically it will be years before Hermione would be in a position of influence in wizarding society, so it doesn’t seem like that’s going to be covered in DH.

Are there any elements in the story poised to resolve these injustices within the timeframe of DH? Maybe the coalition of outcasts that Matthew suggests. Or maybe a collapse of Wizarding Secrecy that takes down most existing WW institutions along with it?

But it’s very hard to see why JKR would make such a point about it if she didn’t plan to address it before the end of the series. “Injustice is everywhere in society and you can’t do anything about it” seems like a very improbable moral to JKR’s story.

I’ll address what I think will happen with the broader injustice issues in the next pubcast.

If he does lead in this area, it would be through example: freeing and befriending Dobby, befriending a half-Giant and a werewolf, not making any distinctions between the Muggleborn and the so-called Purebloods.

I suspect that the Hogwarts houses will unite, not through any action of Harry’s but because they face a common foe. Not all Slytherins are Death Eaters, and I strongly suspect that Salazar Slytherin himself does not have much use for his “Heir”.

I fully expect that Harry will save the wizarding world from Voldemort. I don’t think it’s his role or destiny to save them from their own prejudices and resulting injustices.

The idea is, I think, that loving sacrifice is the answer to scapegoating and sacrificing others and that evil ultimately can be overcome by goodness. It’s the Christian answer, I’d say, but some sort of evil will always exist.

I think it will be the outcasts brought together by Harry that will defeat Voldemort and the DE’s. The wizarding world would then find it reasonably hard to ignor these outcast groups… maybe.

This, of course, assumes that Voldemort has the wizarding world by the scruff of the neck during the next novel.

Matthew