Defending Harry Potter

WorldNetDaily ^ | 6/21/03 | Joel Miller

[rwfromkansas]

Harry Potter is fun fantasy, which is why I am not upset by it.

As for real witches (both Wiccans and those practicing more dark arts), I have no sympathy for. They are all in league with Satan.

[discostu]

As a matter of fact I know just the place:
http://www.whatarerecords.com/

[rwfromkansas]

What kind of twisted individual said you were going to hell for reading the "Lord of the Rings?"

They are mentally deranged.

I have not read the works, but you can spot so many Christian parallels in the movies it is incredible. I love the movies.

Anybody who says the LOTR is evil needs to get his head checked.

[Chancellor Palpatine]

I need to keep something around - granola bars, slimfast or something. I know there's some month old turkey in the office fridge, and several 3 year old cans of Coors, but those all scare me.

[rwfromkansas]

I am ID myself, but I can only hack so much of those threads. Basically because a lot of the ID folks come off as ignorant and it is quite embarrasing some of the things they say. And then I can't stand the arrogance of the evolutionists. Those threads never go anywhere productive unfortunately.

[rwfromkansas]

Indeed. But lighten up, unless kids start going out and actually dabbling in sorcery or divination.

[Chancellor Palpatine]

I'll be damned - somebody still prints them. I've got hundreds hogging perfectly good storage bins in the basement - I'd like to think there is some small market for 'em.

Some is good, some utterly reprehensible (like that awful ELP "Love Beach").

[rwfromkansas]

I read books about King Arthur when young and some fantasy books about witches.

I turned out okay.

[rwfromkansas]

Jonah was not swallowed by a whale necessarily, just a "big fish," some aquatic animal of some sort.

[rwfromkansas]

But yes, he really was swallowed.

[Chancellor Palpatine]

Best King Arthur movie by far - Excalibur.

Merlin rocked, Guinevere was a babe, and many of the Knights were very cool.

[ican'tbelieveit]

I have been told the same thing by members of fundamental christians. They feel because there is a wizard, and magic, and... on and on, it is evil, and by reading it you were opening yourself up to possession and a trip to hell.

[TheBigB]

Depends on your translation...

"For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth." Matthew 12:40 (NIV Bible)

Here is the same verse again in the King James version:

"For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth." Matthew 12:40 (KJV)

[discostu]

Not only that but you can get new record players:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/index=electronics&field-keywords=record%20player&search-type=ss&bq=1/102-8236127-0492904

10 dollars worth of cables and connectors from Radio Shack will plug one of these puppies into your computer. I've been converting old LPs to CD, kind of fun because my musical taste and musical media tended to "cluster" in my youth (my heavy King Crimson phase was also a heavy LP phase) so I'm rediscovering some great music in my library.

I think these guys http://www.stroud-clayshooting-club.netfirms.com/Club.htm have a better solution for Love Beach though.

[rwfromkansas]

When I was in HS, we decided to do an editorial over Harry Potter because for some reason, lots of HS students read this book. Anyway, there were some good conservatives on staff and a couple liberals, so we had a hard time deciding what to say. We did locate a quote from a coven leader who said Harry Potter helped their recruiting, but then found out the quote was fraudulent. There just was no evidence we could locate that the series inspires significant numbers to practice witchcraft.

Ultimately, we decided to come down saying the books were good for getting people to read and that parents should make judgments about the material contained therein.

[Chancellor Palpatine]

Damn - my wife just called, begging to go to some spa in Dallas - but this may be more important, depending on what I can get already printed on CD, what I can find online and what I'll need to use my old records for.

F'rinstance, have you ever tried to find CDs of Keith Emerson with the Nice, or the Quincy Jones version of "Smackwater Jack" (beats the hell out of the Carole King cut, and the albums got some other great stuff on it)?

[Chancellor Palpatine]

I looked for it before - its the first time I found it. Great album, but damn, its pricy.

[discostu]

Actually it's not too suprising they be popular in HS, they really are more young adult (YA) books than kids. The series starts when he's 11 and will end when he's 18, in America that's 6th grade through Senior year, in the latest book he'd be a Sophomore. So it's pretty much in line with HS aged kids. That's also one of the reason it's success is so remarkable, traditionally YA is a tough field, kids that read a lot tend to skip past it straight to adult books, kids that haven't caught the reading bug tend to have stopped reading by then (I work an SF convention, I've scheduled and attended a few panels on these issue). What's happened though is that Potter has good cross age appeal so it's doing well in age brackets above and below the traditional YA demographic (IMHO given the increasing darkness Potter should be read by any kid more than 4 years younger than Potter in that book, that's just IMHO).

I also think that's why those that try bashing it are taking so much guff, this isn't like previous times when they've attacked fringe hobbies and moderately popular music, during those most people didn't know what they were talking about so it was just a few people trying to defend their entertainment from wild accusations. They're now going after something wildly popular now, lots of people know they're full of it.

[rwfromkansas]

First, some children may find witchcraft as a way to have power. True. But until I see hard evidence that more than just a few Harry Potter readers are converting to white or black magic, I don't think this should mean the books are evil in themselves. They are fantasy.

Next, there is no doubt that Ouji Boards etc. open the doors to the demonic realm. I had HS classmates who had some incredible and unexplainable things happen to them after using a ouji board. But Harry Potter is not the equivalent of actually trying to initiate contact into the other realm. Reading a fantasy book does not do this. It is only if they act on what they read and start reading spell books, the Book of Shadows, etc., that the door to the evil one is truly opened.

Most kids are able to see Harry Potter is fiction, not reality.

[discostu]

Some of that stuff can be really hard to find, one of the other advantages of the conversion is that it's cheaper (once you have all the equipment and software that is, but that cost pro-rates) than buying it on CD especially if they haven't added boonus tracks for the CD (or they suck, lots of curddy bonus tracks out there), blank CDs are about a buck a piece. Also if you're an audiophile you can play with your mix levels and get the CD pressed your way (something I always loved in my recordable cassette days).