I got the opposite impression, and that it was a not-very-thinly veiled parody of Germany in the 30s, with the talk about blood purity and how the wizarding race was superior and destined to rule over the muggles.
YMMV.
Regards,
Shodan
Plus his army was made up of those who either felt their power and rights diminished, pure bloods, or by those who felt oppressed by the current regime; giants, dementors, werewolves, goblins, etc
I think some of you guys are buying into the pro-magic propaganda a little bit too much. Wizards (even powerful ones!) aren’t immune to bullets, nor are they unkillable, no matter what the Ministry of Magic wants you to think. Consider this: if wizards are so strong and muggles so weak, why are the wizards so utterly terrified of muggles?
The Ministry of Magic devotes nearly all of its time to ensuring that the muggles don’t find out about magic. Sure, they do other stuff, too, but almost all of it is done TO hide from the muggles. They have seven departments: Magical law enforcement (much of their tasks involve hunting down people who reveal themselves to muggles. They hunt, say, wizard serial killers, too, but that’s far less common!), magic emergency response team (whose main job is to mind-wipe muggles and come up with a cover story), magic animal control (why control magic animals? So that muggles don’t see a dragon fly overhead! Why put restrictions on ownership of dragons? So that muggles don’t see a dragon in their neighbor’s backyard!), and then a couple of smaller departments that most likely STILL have to worry about secrecy (the whole point of the transportation department is to make sure no one teleports – I mean, apperates – into a crowded train station, or that no one flies a broomstick on the highway.)
Why spend so much effort hiding? Because for all their bluster, the wizards KNOW that if they went to war with the muggles, it would be horrible, tons of people would die, AND THEN THE WIZARDS WOULD LOSE.
We catch some glimpses into history when Harry is in his history class. We learn about how the witch hunts were “utterly ineffective” and the wizards of the time thought it was all a big joke. Of course, that’s because the only stories the children would learn are ones that showcase how silly and useless muggles are. If the witch hunts weren’t effective, why are there so few wizards? Why are they forced to hide out in places no one else wants to go? When Ron’s family goes to Egypt, we learn that the ancient tombs were built by pharaohs with real magic. If this is the case, how did it come to be that instead of ruling the muggles as god-kings, wizards ended up hiding in swamps and forests? Where did all the dragons and giants – both nearly extinct – go? They were killed by muggles!
Even Voldemort, at the height of his power, didn’t dare reveal himself to the muggles. In my opinion, this is because for all his propaganda that he used to control his minions, he didn’t actually think he could beat the muggles – not without uniting the wizards under his iron fist, at least. He killed muggles, sure, and even did so in ways that would be difficult to hide. But at the height of his power, he could have easily prevented the Ministry from covering those attacks up. Attacking the cleanup crews is a classic move in war – see timed bombs designed to go off after the rescue efforts start in WWII. Why did Voldemort never do this? Why did he never reveal himself to the muggles on his own, ruining the wizard world? Because he didn’t want to destroy, he wanted to rule. And he knew that if the muggles found out about the wizards, there would be nothing left to rule. For all his bluster about the wizard’s rightful place atop the muggles, he never acted in a way to actually carry out his vision – because he knew he would lose.
That’s why the muggles never did anything about Voldemort. Could a British PM, upon being told of the threat, have sent out an SAS team to deal with Voldemort? Absolutely. With Voldemort’s sneering superiority, he probably wouldn’t even BOTHER to protect himself from muggle weapons. But the second a Prime Minister got that idea in his head, a Ministry of Magic team would swoop down and wipe his mind. Letting the muggles take care of your problems would set a bad precedent, in their mind – one that would eventually lead to the wizarding world being wiped out entirely.
Really there is proof that guns work on wizards
Cite
Shodan:
That was true of racist individuals, and there were certainly some of those in the Ministry, but (aside from when Voldemort took over the Ministry in book 7) it certainly wasn’t official policy or the views of wizard society at large. We can see (from book 6) that before Voldemort was even conceived, the Ministry protected Muggles from rogue wizards, and have rules regarding magical affairs that might impact the surrounding Muggle society (like informing the British (Muggle) Prime Minister of import of foreign dragons and sphinxes).
While Voldemort and the Death Eaters are clearly analagous to Hitler and the SS/Nazis, the (normal) Ministry of Magic is more like the government of France, which is not racist in the main, but still has some smattering of Le Pen’s crowd.
I plan to reread this (well, and finish it) in the near future, but as I recall the author’s observation is that Voldemort and his 50 or so followers could get very far because they were determinedly loyal to each other (and obedient to Voldy himself), which in itself allowed them considerable power over the heavily-fractured and disorganized wizarding community.
Heck, a squad of well-trained soldiers could face and destroy a far larger force of individual warriors who do not coordinate their actions or interests. Ref: every ancient Roman battle until the decline.
Antisemitism wasn’t official German government policy in 1932, and then it was. All the Nazis needed was for the majority to be too afraid or too apathetic to object.
Alessan:
Agreed, but the difference between “afraid” and “apathetic” is the difference between Voldemort being a symptom of the overall problems of Wizard society (apathetic) or being an aberration from it (afraid).
It’s all part of the same thing. They were afraid because wizard society had no real rule of law and no strong democratic institutions that could oppose someone like Voldemort. After all, your talking about a society that subcontracted its security to soul-sucking specters. They were used to being afraid.
I don’t necessarily disagree with you, and Harry Potter is certainly not intended as a political work.
We see wizarding society primarily from the point of view of Harry and the Order of the Phoenix and the anti-Voldemort groups. Thus the only real contact we have with Voldemort sympathizers is thru Draco Malfoy and his family, and thus it would be difficult to judge how prevalent anti-muggle sentiment was prior to the return of the Dark Lord.
I think artistically the point is to show how an apparently civilized society can be corrupted. Germany was civilized and urbane before the Great Depression, and then a few years later suddenly it became the scene and author of the Holocaust. It is sort of like some the movies and literature of the Red Scare of the 50s in the USA - “it could happen here” and such.
Rowling could have presented more about why Voldemort was able (almost) to take over, but that was not her primary aim. And the Harry Potter series is not an allegory, it is children’s literature. Presenting the danger is enough, and doesn’t need a complex explanation of how it happened.
ISTM that in the case of the takeover of He Who Must Not Be Named, it is more fear than apathy. Because they were so afraid they couldn’t even mention him. So they were spring-loaded to keep their heads down when he returned and took power, and he was able to take over in part because they were so afraid they were in denial that he was back.
Another part of the rise of the Nazis was that they were suffering economically and in their pride, from the Great Depression and reparations and being forbidden to have much of an army and so forth. If the Harry Potter series were a straight political parody, there would have to be a crisis in the wizarding world that Voldemort would blame on the muggles, and that would represent some of the basis for Voldemort’s support.
I liked your analogy to the French government of Le Pen, but I would take it a bit farther. The governments of the 30s were so afraid of war that they ignored warlike actions, like the Anschluss and the annexation of Czechoslovakia, and that made the war almost inevitable. Likewise, the Ministry of Magic was so afraid of the return of the Dark Lord that they ignored his return and made his return to power impossible to thwart until it was too late.
That’s really interesting. Even after Voldemort is defeated, ISTM that the Ministry of Magic runs everything in the wizarding world. They don’t have much of a separate court system, , and no mention is made of any elections except for the Minister of Magic, who does not seem to have any other institution besides the Wizangamot to serve as a check on his power.
Fast forward forty years after the fall of Voldemort - is Harry Potter setting himself up to become absolute ruler?
Regards,
Shodan
I don’t remember any mention of elections for Minister of Magic - Fudge said he was “sacked”, and the Muggle PM thought he understood why the wizarding community would prefer Scrimgeour, but that doesn’t necessarily imply actual elections.
Ah, OK. That makes sense from a storage mechanism standpoint.
I’m not sure that follows.
The book does frequently describe wizards as not understanding or being ignorant of muggle technology, but with so many muggle-born attending Hogwart’s, you can’t pretend that a sizable contingent of wizards don’t know all about guns. Not on a world-wide scale especially. The UK doesn’t have the gun culture that America has, where you could be sure that some muggle-born wizards spend their summers deer hunting.
If there were no spells that could protect against bullets, then someone, somewhere in the wizarding world would be using them, even if his peers teased him for being degenerate or something. And I’m sure they’d have to shut up after he took out a squad of Death Eaters with an M16. Someone like Mad Eye would certainly snatch up a gun if it worked. Bullets might not kill Voldemort with all of his horcruxes, but he’s a special case even among evil wizards.
If there are spells that can defend against bullets, the level of fear you describe might exist, but it wouldn’t be entirely rational.
It also seems like 90% of the wizarding world works for the ministry.
There’s no reason to think that there’s not some “long lasting protection shield against fast moving metal” that Wizard’s routinely get cast on them when they’re 10 which lasts for years at a time and which is never even mentioned any more than trips to the Wizard orthodontist is mentioned.
There was a witch in the Deathly Hallows book that could charm herself against fire - that makes it plausible there were, or could be developed, spells against bullets too. Some combination of the Shield charm and levitation that would deflect bullets.
Regards,
Shodan
Remember too, that wizards and witches are always doing some low level magic to allow themselves to pass unnoticed in the Muggle world. It’s more explicit in the books than the movies, but the first few chapters of Philosopher’s Stone have Harry occasionally seeing various oddly dressed people, who the Dursleys and everyone else don’t even notice. Maybe they depend on that more than anti-firearms spells.
The way Hogwarts works pretty much ensures that those muggleborn students will completely lose touch with the muggleborn world at the age of 11. They are at the school for almost the entire time from 11 to 18, hearing about how superior magic is the whole time. When are they supposed to be exposed to guns or any other aspects of muggle culture? Look at Harry and Hermione. They both lose touch with the mundane world! I think one of Harry’s friends has a soccer poster, but that’s about it for muggle influence.
I’m sure there ARE spells that protect against bullets, but spells in the HP universe are generally not “fire and forget”. They don’t work like video game buffs, providing a 20% miss chance for 1 minute/level. A wizard can probably disarm a gunman, or block a bullet or burst, but a blanket immunity isn’t really how it works. There is no water breathing spell (though there is a potion!), they can’t cast Protection from Fire and run up to a dragon. They can deflect flames, but not ignore them. I assume bullets work the same.
Except that no other spell works remotely like that. Spells are almost always instant, with very few exceptions.
A single wizard wielding an M16 wouldn’t be more effective than a single wizard with a wand. But thing is, there are a heck of a lot more muggle than wizards. Voldemort can kill or turn every auror capable of going up against him; he can’t kill every muggle good enough to get into sniping position. Besides, we have never seen a wizard cast an offensive spell beyond sight range. We have zero evidence of an effective counter to a sniper.
I don’t think we really know enough to say that.
Spells that last a long time:
-horcruxes
-the unbreakable vow
-lots of potions (usually hours, not years, granted)
-whatever allows voldemort to ride around in the back of Quirrel’s head
-animagus stuff
-whatever makes the marauder’s map work
-whatever makes hogwarts hogwarts