Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

[Victoria]

How could you like the books so much? They don't even make sense. Rowling's writings leave far too many loopholes.

Here's an example: When Harry, Hermione, and Ron are wandering around lost.

Like, why do they only stay in Britain the whole time? Why did they teleport around in forests eating mushrooms, when they could've just disapparated near a McDonald's and grabbed a cheeseburger? Why not go hide in Russia in a hotel or something?

I guess that would make too much sense.

Really, the amount of stupidity in the wizard community in these books has me rooting for the muggles. Why the **** do they still use owls, which take days to send messages, when the muggles have invented cell phones? Apparently muggle technologies kick the shit out of their magic bullshit, because muggles can talk to each other instantly, at any time, anywhere in the world, while wizards have to send owls and notes around hunting each other down.

Which brings up another example: How does a bunch of wizards in Britain seem to think they can take over the entire world, including muggles? Have they forgotten that muggles have nukes and guns?

This book is set in 1997, and Rowling has it set up where the world is much like it is today, only there is a hidden magical community.

The World War II theme was also annoying and blatantly obvious. Mudbloods = Jews. Eliminating anyone but "purebloods" = Holocaust.

This brings up another thing: The books say that the number of purebloods has drastically thinned, and mudbloods / half-bloods far outnumber them. How, then, does a group of purebloods manage to take control of the entire wizarding world and get the mudbloods / half-bloods, which significantly outnumber their own numbers, to happily go along with them? The Jews weren't exactly a majority in Nazi Germany.

Where are the wizarding communities of the United States, China, Russia, the Middle East, et cetera in all of this?

[ChemKneazle]

LAME BULLSHIT

I know! I think they're the best books ever in the world, too!

[Victoria]

Chemmy if you came up for a good response to my argument that would've been nice. The fact that you responded with a two sentence post shows that I have a good argument if you can't even attempt to pick it apart.

[Victoria]

Chemmy if you came up for a good response to my argument that would've been nice. The fact that you responded with a two sentence post shows that I have a good argument if you can't even attempt to pick it apart.

One is really a sentence fragment, but eh. :?

Which one is a sentence fragment? If you're referring to "I know!," that is a perfectly valid sentence.

"I" is the subject, and "know" is the verb. That is all that is necessary for a complete sentence.

[Victoria]

Chemmy if you came up for a good response to my argument that would've been nice. The fact that you responded with a two sentence post shows that I have a good argument if you can't even attempt to pick it apart.

One is really a sentence fragment, but eh. :?

Which one is a sentence fragment? If you're referring to "I know!," that is a perfectly valid sentence.

"I" is the subject, and "know" is the verb. That is all that is necessary for a complete sentence.

It's a pretty shitty sentence.

It is, however, a perfectly valid sentence grammatically.

[ChemKneazle]

*Cracks knuckles*

I really didn't want to argue with you because I felt you were completely against the book just for the sake of being against it, in which case arguing with you would be pointless, but I'll bite.

How could you like the books so much? They don't even make sense. Rowling's writings leave far too many loopholes.

Here's an example: When Harry, Hermione, and Ron are wandering around lost.

Like, why do they only stay in Britain the whole time? Why did they teleport around in forests eating mushrooms, when they could've just disapparated near a McDonald's and grabbed a cheeseburger? Why not go hide in Russia in a hotel or something?

I guess that would make too much sense.

Did you not sense the absolute necessity for them to be cut off from all society? Even when they were in the forest and heard Griphook, Dean, Dirk, and the others come by, they didn't reveal themselves - even though those people seemed completely on their side! They only revealed themselves to those that could absolutely help them in their quest for the horcruxes. They didn't even reveal themselves to the Weasleys when they passed by their house on the way to Lovegood's and they were so close!

The more people who saw them, the more dangerous it was because even if Voldemort and them couldn't capture them in the act of buying a cheeseburger, if they somehow knew that Harry, Ron, and Hermione had been there, they could have tortured information out of the servers about which direction they went afterwards or what they were talking about...etc.

And you can't say they could have used polyjuice potion because they were almost out when it came time for Hermione to turn into Bellatrix! It was MANDATORY that they made as little human contact as possible until absolutely necessary to protect their whereabouts and state.

Really, the amount of stupidity in the wizard community in these books has me rooting for the muggles. Why the **** do they still use owls, which take days to send messages, when the muggles have invented cell phones? Apparently muggle technologies kick the shit out of their magic bullshit, because muggles can talk to each other instantly, at any time, anywhere in the world, while wizards have to send owls and notes around hunting each other down.

Did you forget fireplaces and floo powder? Remember Sirius contacting the kids from the fireplace at Hogwarts? They have other means of communication besides just owl post. Also, patronuses - remember their patronuses being sent to carry messages? That was rather instant.

Which brings up another example: How does a bunch of wizards in Britain seem to think they can take over the entire world, including muggles? Have they forgotten that muggles have nukes and guns?

Um...I'm under the impression that wizards and witches have the power to thwart muggle attacks, even nuclear bombs and whatnot. Not that there wouldn't be some casualties, but the way Rowling describes their magic and shield charms and defenses, I'm confident they could take on the muggles. But that is a matter of opinion.

This book is set in 1997, and Rowling has it set up where the world is much like it is today, only there is a hidden magical community.

The World War II theme was also annoying and blatantly obvious. Mudbloods = Jews. Eliminating anyone but "purebloods" = Holocaust.

This brings up another thing: The books say that the number of purebloods has drastically thinned, and mudbloods / half-bloods far outnumber them. How, then, does a group of purebloods manage to take control of the entire wizarding world and get the mudbloods / half-bloods, which significantly outnumber their own numbers, to happily go along with them? The Jews weren't exactly a majority in Nazi Germany.

I loved the parallelisms. But that's just what they were - parallelisms, not absolutely the same idea. There were a lot of times in the book that the rift seemed very much like racism and perhaps if Voldemort had won, we were reading about what could have been pre-slavery times. I think Rowling was aware that her story sounded a lot like a Holocaust-type scenario, but at the same time, she put her own spin on it and I do not think that for one second she expects us to see the two as the very same.

As to the question of how such a large group of mudbloods can be overcome by such a small group of purebloods, well, the purebloods have Voldemort on their side! A wizard who had done incredibly evil and powerful things that a lot of witches and wizards had never even dreamed of! He was successful in scaring a lot of muggle-lovers into submission simply because of his track record. Those that were half-blood or "blood traitors," I think, truly believed that Voldemort was the most evil thing on the planet and that they had no hope of escape from his wrath if they did not bend to his will, probably because of what he did to their families the last time he was around.

Where are the wizarding communities of the United States, China, Russia, the Middle East, et cetera in all of this?

I will admit that I was a little disappointed that the final battle did not include other countries. It would have been quite cool to see British witches and wizards fighting alongside American, Chinese, African...etc type magical folk.

I thought about this for a long time, before this post, and I still haven't come to a concrete conclusion but here's what I figured:

First of all, maybe those other countries have their own "Voldemorts" to deal with. But more plausibly, remember that it was extremely late into Voldy's game when the Ministry FINALLY admitted that he was, in fact, back. Even then, with all the rumors surfacing about Dumbledore and Harry and everything else, it semed a lot of people were still in denial about the whole thing. Or not necessarily in denial but just...that denial air about it all. Anyway, if that was the case and nobody who was high up enough in the ministry was strongly concerned enough about it, they may not have made the effort to try and gain support from other countries to come to their aid. Maybe the other countries were completely oblivious to this horrible guy who planned to take them over, simply because the Ministry wanted to keep things neat and tidy the whole time.

[ChemKneazle]

Chemmy if you came up for a good response to my argument that would've been nice. The fact that you responded with a two sentence post shows that I have a good argument if you can't even attempt to pick it apart.

One is really a sentence fragment, but eh. :?

Which one is a sentence fragment? If you're referring to "I know!," that is a perfectly valid sentence.

"I" is the subject, and "know" is the verb. That is all that is necessary for a complete sentence.

It's a pretty shitty sentence.

It's quick and to the point. Also, that post was more of a joke than a real post. See previous post for serious posting. I'm capable of forming completely valid and elaborate sentences. =)

[Victoria]

Why would I be completely against this book when I have read all seven and seen the five films?

I even went to the midnight releases of the 4th, 5th, 6th, and this one.

Did you not sense the absolute necessity for them to be cut off from all society? Even when they were in the forest and heard Griphook, Dean, Dirk, and the others come by, they didn't reveal themselves - even though those people seemed completely on their side! They only revealed themselves to those that could absolutely help them in their quest for the horcruxes. They didn't even reveal themselves to the Weasleys when they passed by their house on the way to Lovegood's and they were so close!

The more people who saw them, the more dangerous it was because even if Voldemort and them couldn't capture them in the act of buying a cheeseburger, if they somehow knew that Harry, Ron, and Hermione had been there, they could have tortured information out of the servers about which direction they went afterwards or what they were talking about...etc.

And you can't say they could have used polyjuice potion because they were almost out when it came time for Hermione to turn into Bellatrix! It was MANDATORY that they made as little human contact as possible until absolutely necessary to protect their whereabouts and state.

Fine. They could've gone to the local Tesco under the invisibility cloak, grabbed some food, and left. Why was dicking around in a forest for a few weeks scavenging for mushrooms necessary when they knew they had a perfect invisibility cloak?

Did you forget fireplaces and floo powder? Remember Sirius contacting the kids from the fireplace at Hogwarts? They have other means of communication besides just owl post. Also, patronuses - remember their patronuses being sent to carry messages? That was rather instant.

Fireplaces? Carrying around bags of powder? How is this even close to being as convenient and practical as a cell phone?

If wizards are truly intelligent, why haven't they embraced the wonders of the Internet? AFAIK, it was fairly popular by 1997. Nope, they rely on some shitty magical radio transmission for the latest "updates."

Um...I'm under the impression that wizards and witches have the power to thwart muggle attacks, even nuclear bombs and whatnot. Not that there wouldn't be some casualties, but the way Rowling describes their magic and shield charms and defenses, I'm confident they could take on the muggles. But that is a matter of opinion.

I find it highly unlikely that a single wizard community in Britain could take over an entire world of muggles. Especially if said community is incompetent enough to let one guy take over and start killing off their own kind easily.

Voldemort was by no means invincible, and with the world's muggle armies against him, I would place my bet on the muggles.

You agree yourself that the fact that Britain is apparently the whole "Earth" is nonsensical and hard to explain, despite the facts that the books reference France, Romania, Albania, Germany, and so on indicating that this is set in the world we are all kickin' it in right now, circa 1997.

[ChemKneazle]

Why would I be completely against this book when I have read all seven and seen the five films?

I even went to the midnight releases of the 4th, 5th, 6th, and this one.

I'm sorry. I was wrong. I thought that with the fervor and gusto that you made those YTMND spoilers that you couldn't care less about HP. I didn't know you did all that.

Fine. They could've gone to the local Tesco under the invisibility cloak, grabbed some food, and left. Why was dicking around in a forest for a few weeks scavenging for mushrooms necessary when they knew they had a perfect invisibility cloak?

But they did! Remember Hermione went into all those peoples' houses and stores and bought food and left money when they weren't looking? She got all guilty about it.

EDIT: When I say she "bought" food, I meant she took it and left some money in its place. She didn't actually go up to the counter and be all, "O hay ken I buy dis plzkthx?"

Fireplaces? Carrying around bags of powder? How is this even close to being as convenient and practical as a cell phone?

If wizards are truly intelligent, why haven't they embraced the wonders of the Internet? AFAIK, it was fairly popular by 1997. Nope, they rely on some shitty magical radio transmission for the latest "updates."

Do you really think carrying around bags of powder is more difficult than keeping up with a cell phone? Especially if they're used to it from the time they were allowed to use magic outside of school. I can't tell you how many times I've dropped my cell phone into my purse and had to dig around for it for what seemed like hours. Even in my pocket, if I'm driving down the road, it's so hard to get it out without getting in a wreck. I love the fact that Rowling has the wizarding world use what we might consider to be slightly "oldschool" devices but in a magical way. It's romantic, not in the lovey-dovey sense but in the literary sense. You have to admit, magical folk have a few legs-up on muggles when it comes to practically everything else. Perhaps the fact that they aren't more efficient in every single area over the muggles is Rowling's way of keeping things more down-to-earth in the books. The fact that they're not all-powerful makes the idea of muggles and wizards living in the same world more believable.

I find it highly unlikely that a single wizard community in Britain could take over an entire world of muggles. Especially if said community is incompetent enough to let one guy take over and start killing off their own kind easily.

Voldemort was by no means invincible, and with the world's muggle armies against him, I would place my bet on the muggles.

We're going to have to agree to disagree on this one. If it hadn't been for Harry Potter being in the right place at the right time, Voldemort would have been invincible because of the horcruxes. The fact that there was only one person in the world that could destroy Voldemort makes him seem pretty dangerous and capable of practically anything to me.

You agree yourself that the fact that Britain is apparently the whole "Earth" is nonsensical and hard to explain, despite the facts that the books reference France, Romania, Albania, Germany, and so on indicating that this is set in the world we are all kickin' it in right now, circa 1997.

I never said it wasn't. I'm confused about this statement. My argument was that maybe these countries just didn't realize Voldemort was such a threat yet because the ministry in Britain hadn't yet made it known to all of them just how much danger they were really in.

[Victoria]

Do you really think carrying around bags of powder is more difficult than keeping up with a cell phone? Especially if they're used to it from the time they were allowed to use magic outside of school. I can't tell you how many times I've dropped my cell phone into my purse and had to dig around for it for what seemed like hours. Even in my pocket, if I'm driving down the road, it's so hard to get it out without getting in a wreck. I love the fact that Rowling has the wizarding world use what we might consider to be slightly "oldschool" devices but in a magical way. It's romantic, not in the lovey-dovey sense but in the literary sense. You have to admit, magical folk have a few legs-up on muggles when it comes to practically everything else. Perhaps the fact that they aren't more efficient in every single area over the muggles is Rowling's way of keeping things more down-to-earth in the books. The fact that they're not all-powerful makes the idea of muggles and wizards living in the same world more believable.

Lol, so you admit I was right about cell phones. Carrying a bag of powder around that lets you communicate at any fireplace is nowhere near as convenient. And yes, yes I do think that carrying a bag of powder around is more difficult than keeping up with a cell phone.

How do they call for emergency help? Where is the wizard police force? The muggles seem to be more advanced when it comes to emergency capabilities as well.

I never said it wasn't. I'm confused about this statement. My argument was that maybe these countries just didn't realize Voldemort was such a threat yet because the ministry in Britain hadn't yet made it known to all of them just how much danger they were really in.

WTF, think maybe the hoards of mudbloods fleeing to their countries might've tipped 'em off? What's the deal with having to 'flee,' through a forest anyway? Why can't they just teleport halfway around the world to safety? The books seem to indicate that it was only Britain's hidden wizard community that was taken over.

[ChemKneazle]

1. I think carrying around floo powder is equally as difficult as carrying around a cell phone. So no, I didn't agree with you there. I did, however, agree that perhaps the muggles have a leg-up on overall ease of communication, however, I believe magical folk are so used to and comfortable enough with their forms of communication that they don't feel there to be a difference between themselves and the muggles as far as communication is concerned.

2. Emergency communication is carried out a few times via patronus charm in the book. EDIT: If it's a true emergency, there's Aurors as a sort of "police" force. Also, the Ministry seems to have pretty good taps on what people are doing, seeing as how Harry got a few letters from the Ministry each time he did an underage spell. They do have a type of court, as well. They're definitely not lacking in a judicial system.

3. As for the mudbloods leaving the country, if I were one of those mudbloods, I'd do everything I possibly could to keep undercover, even after arriving in another country. Their lives were at stake! I doubt they all announced their arrivals and with all the confundus charms and disillusionment charms at their disposal, I doubt they'd be picked up by the authorities as illegal immigrants, either. I'd expect them to have stayed hidden or in disguises until they heard everything was safe, perhaps expecting to stay hidden forever in case Voldemort was never defeated.

[Victoria]

1. I think carrying around floo powder is equally as difficult as carrying around a cell phone. So no, I didn't agree with you there. I did, however, agree that perhaps the muggles have a leg-up on overall ease of communication, however, I believe magical folk are so used to and comfortable enough with their forms of communication that they don't feel there to be a difference between themselves and the muggles as far as communication is concerned.

2. Emergency communication is carried out a few times via patronus charm in the book. EDIT: If it's a true emergency, there's Aurors as a sort of "police" force. Also, the Ministry seems to have pretty good taps on what people are doing, seeing as how Harry got a few letters from the Ministry each time he did an underage spell. They do have a type of court, as well. They're definitely not lacking in a judicial system.

3. As for the mudbloods leaving the country, if I were one of those mudbloods, I'd do everything I possibly could to keep undercover, even after arriving in another country. Their lives were at stake! I doubt they all announced their arrivals and with all the confundus charms and disillusionment charms at their disposal, I doubt they'd be picked up by the authorities as illegal immigrants, either. I'd expect them to have stayed hidden or in disguises until they heard everything was safe, perhaps expecting to stay hidden forever in case Voldemort was never defeated.

I think your arguments are starting to get pretty sad now.

[ChemKneazle]

I think your arguments are starting to get pretty sad now.

Well, I was thinking the same thing at your last post, too.

I was afraid this would happen. Too much is left for speculation concerning the points we're now bringing up. All we can debate with are our own imaginations about what could have happend/could be and that'll get us nowhere once I start letting on that I think dragons end up eating everybody on earth and nobody survives and unicorns become the new rulers of the planet. Oh, and Hagrid too.

= )

[moomoo]

I love the books but I agree with Xizer about wizards and muggle technology. They seem to know very little about what goes on outside their own little world. Most of them aren't even familiar with telephones - remember Ron ringing Harry at the Dursley's? It's probably the result of them thinking it impossible that anything muggles come up with could be better than magic. Most of them don't have any contact with the muggle world and as such have no experience with computers and other modern devices. It's stupid of them to not pay more attention to the rest of the world, but that seems to be the explanation for it.

[cicley_has_aids]

What I'm going to say isn't an excuse for the obvious flaws of the wizarding world Rowling has set up. Often certain details in the books like owls and all the other far fetched spells/objects that are thrown in to make the story work, make me go, "oh come on". BUT, I still realize that this is a kid's series, about magic. What do you expect? It's supposed to be full of unbelievable twists and other bullshit. Knowing this, I am fully able to take these books with a grain of salt and enjoy them just as much as when I started reading the series at age 10.

The way you're trying to point out flaws in a kids book is kind of pointless, you should stick with Tom Clancy. Although, the entire holocaust of the mudbloods was and the way the ministry turned so quick was a bit...frustrating. Plus she made Dumbledore a faggot. I still enjoyed it throughly. It was a great conclusion.

Btw, she brings up American wizards once or twice, but probably doesn't get into it do to laziness.