[T-Bird45]

Love the closing paragraph.

[BenLurkin]

I've never read any Harry Potter. Is all this true?

[50sDad]

The scariest implications come in the sixth book; the creeping control that the Ministry of Magic exerts over Hogwarts. It is positivly Clintonesque! Gradually, what were formerly classes taught by qualified (well, mostly) professionals for the purpose of producing well-educated wizards who can watch out for themselves are hammered, pushed, shoved and molded into fools who have no "real" knowledge of Magic. As I watched Harry's class "disarmed", I cringed. Bit by bit, defensive magic, which under previous professors WAS useful and practical, was chewed up and cranked out into the "Lowest Common Denominator" book-only learning where they weren't even allowed to say the spells. (This is akin to Hitler confiscating all the guns...what better for Voldemort than a generation of Wizards who are bad at magic? Hello?) It is the NEA all over again...setting educational policy based on what they want the students to become, not on making the students educated. Shudder!

[50sDad]

I have to also note that Johnathan Swift wrote satire attacking the excesses of the govenment of his time, and today these satires are mostly remembered as children's stories.

[Grig]

In other words, it's a like England (except the no taxes part)

[SuziQ]

The best part about the Harry Potter books is that Harry and his friends continually work AGAINST all that bureaucracy and WIN!

[AppyPappy]

Harry Potter is an interesting read on society

The media in HP is irresponsible and vindictive, constantly pushing opinions as news. When confronted with truth, they ignore it in favor of stories that fit their view. They live by the Clintonian phrase "How can we fool them today".

The Ministry of Magic is chiefly concerned with perpetuating itself. It also takes a dim view of the truth if the truth is different from its views. If truth is different from their beliefs, truth is BAD and evil. They don't hesitate to use their police powers to guard themselves from the truth.

The House elves are bound by rules that lack reason. They love slavery and hate freedom. Anyone who enjoys freedom is considered a freak and is sometimes punished. Being kept down is a full time job with them. Slavery is freedom.

[retrokitten]

Potter Ping!! No spoilers in the thread so far...

[Sentis]

Long Live Luna Lovegood and her Family!!!! Long live the Revolution

[discostu]

Doesn't really seem that different that normal England, I mean this is the place that has people driving around with special antenaes looking for people watching TV who haven't paid the TV tax.

[Charlespg]

There is a lot anti authoritarian /anti government satire in Harry Potter. A part of the Order of the Phoenix was supprising very anti government control of education and had a Strong anti gun control/pro selfdefence message

[Wuli]

I admit to being an admirer of her writing. I put her in the same league as JRR Tolkien and others that use a mythical environment through which to chart a large morality tale and a mulititude of little moral lessons along the way.

With a thoroughly good writer, those elements are discovered in the reading of the story, not in a philosophical discussion in the text. Like color and taste, they are experienced and you know them to be true without having that truth explained.

In the Middle Ages, some Christian religious orders developed practices for learning from the Bible in the same way, as a religious experience - letting the text speak to the spirit, as opposed to seeking an intellectual understanding by textual analysis.

[r9etb]

Nah, this article is full of crap.

To take but one example: children aren't "taken away from their natural parents at age 11 and remanded to a government-run school, where they are required to wear uniforms and tuition is free." For example, Stan Shunpike didn't go to Hogwarts, and the expense of attending Hogwarts (just including clothing, books, and supplies) is borne by the students, not by the government.

Perhaps Our Author is merely ignorant of the details of English boarding schools?

[kevkrom]

There are some mis-statements in the article, but on the whole it's pretty funny. What the author seems to miss, however, is how much Rowling seems to be ridiculing such large government most of the time. The Ministry is very inefficient, highly politicized, and especially in the 5th installment, worse than counter-productive, it's actually an enemy to Harry.

The two major factual errors in the article:

• rounding up citizens to appear before the Wizengot, where the accused are tried in a dungeon while bound to a chair - Only violent prisoner appear in chains; Harry was not chained during his trial in Book 5 (which was, however, an abuse of the system in and of itself) nor were certain defendents in the flashback scene in Book 4, like Ludo Bagman

• Children are taken away from their natural parents at age 11 and remanded to a government-run school, where they are required to wear uniforms and tuition is free - school uniforms are standard practice in the UK, and nowhere in the books does it say that tuition to Hogwarts is free or that attendance is a government requirement; I've always seen Hogwarts as being an invitiation-only school, and assumed tuition is required (heavily implied in Book 1 when Harry worries about not having the money to go before Hagrid tells him of his parents' fortune) and Book 5, it is implied that Tom Riddle was admitted for free as a hardship/scholarship case.