Subject: You missed that thread, didn't you?
Author:
Posted on: 2014-09-23 22:10:00 UTC
We discussed this down the Board: here
Long story short; we don't touch this sort of story, bad though it may be. Religion is a tricky subject and too easy to cross a line with.
-Phobos
So my own mother sent me a link today:
http://www.mommyish.com/2014/09/19/mom-rewrites-harry-potter-christian-story/
And I just... I'm equally amused and horrified. WHY DOES THIS EXIST.
I'm claiming this right now.
Thoughts?
Let's see what we've got... Ravenmeans explicitly 'hate the sinner, not [just] the sin', which I'm not certain is the espoused philosophy of any Christian group. It may be what they do, but most if not all claim that you should love the sinner. So they're definitely the First Church of Strawman.
We have the first instance of this story actually being an improvement over the books - they teach Maths and English! Graduates of the HSoW&W don't get either of those.
Hedwig has... oh, stars and water, I can't believe I get to type this... Hedwig has been replaced by a literal angel (with a yellow halo - surely gold is preferable?) who delivers the mail. I'm now imagining Hedwig with a halo, and it's adorable.
And, for some reason, Dean Thomas remains a main character. Is this because Ron is in Slytholic, and Slytholic are evil? Who knows! Not me.
And one more for the troll points: every single dialogue tag has an adverb attached. That's too consistent to be just a bad habit.
hS is enjoying this far too much
In my headcanon, I figure the real Hogwarts does have lessons on the more mundane topics, but Rowling didn't mention them in the books because they weren't interesting. (Who wants to open a fantasy novel about magic and read about calculus exams?)
Basic math is probably covered during arithmancy. English probably had an unmentioned class of its own, although it's questionable whether they read any Muggle literature, or only books published in the Wizarding World. Perhaps Muggle lit is covered in Muggle Studies? It's just hard to swallow the idea that British children wouldn't be raised on Shakespeare, even children who can fly and shoot fire.
Think about it. He wrote a lot about witches, ghosts, and other magical beings. He made up a bunch of words that Muggle society had never heard before. Totally a Wizard who felt like messing with Muggles.
-Phobos
And after they gained a huge following, the Ministry(?) at the time decided it was easier to just pass Shakespeare off as a Muggle fantasy writer than to try memory-charming nearly everyone in England.
Also, while I don't subscribe to the theory that Shakespeare was a front for another playwright, perhaps it's true in the Potterverse: maybe the Wizarding World needed to set up someone with a known Muggle history as the face of the plays, since the actual wizard author wouldn't have any birthplace where people could attest to his growing up there. Shakespeare was likely a squib, or perhaps related by marriage to a wizard or witch.
(An aside: I'm surprised and disappointed that I never see the theory that that the "real" author of Shakespeare's plays could have been a woman. It would have been inappropriate for a woman to write in his time, so it makes sense a female playwright would need a cover in order to publish and produce her plays!)
21 million Google hits agree with you. ;)
And here's a third theory: Shakespeare was a Muggle, and the author of his plays - which he wrote after stumbling across Hogwarts and sneaking in.
hS
As owl is the symbol of Goddess Athena. But hush hush, don't tell her yet.
We discussed this down the Board: here
Long story short; we don't touch this sort of story, bad though it may be. Religion is a tricky subject and too easy to cross a line with.
-Phobos
I was offline for a while. My bad.
And duly noted. I apologize.
I have to say, I found the description of "Mr. Snape" at the end of chapter 7 to be especially hilarious. Gotta love a man with well-groomed chest hair. {X D
~Neshomeh
Considering he had a tie and everything... How was it allowing his chest hair to show? Was he wearing the suit jacket but no shirt? Or was his hair so thick it was popping through the buttons? And in that case, how could it be called 'well-groomed'?
On the porch was standing a huge, muscular man with a big, manly beard; and he was dressed in a plaid, red shirt, blue jeans, and sturdy, leather boots. His chest was covered in a thick, unruly carpet of coarse, brown hair. - Hagrid, in CHapter 1.
In fact, hair - chest, facial, or otherwise - seems to be the first and often only description these people get. I wonder what's up with that.
Also: new chapter! Apparently, the Dark Forces of the world do not like Christians - "And when I say Christians; I mean Gryffindor Hats." They like Hufflewashies because they 'believe everything these people say and slap the label "Christian" onto that philosophy', and they like Ravenmeans because 'hey pretend that the Ravenclaw Hats' extremism applies to all Christians'. So, er... the Dark Forces are simultaneously rejoicing in Christians apparently believing anything, and in Christians being extremist haters? Man, the Dark Forces need to get their act together. They should open a Hogwarts School of Wickedness and Debauchery.
Oh, and Slytholic is working for Voldemort (who's trying to get Congress to ban freedom of religion, remember). Quite why they're doing this when they're even more religious than Gryffinbest - having statues and a whole extra book of commandments on hand - is not made clear.
Calling it now - Voldemort has a tragic backstory to explain why he hates Christians, is possibly possessed by the devil (depending on whether such a thing is possible in this verse), and he ends the story being saved. Also: it only lasts one story.
hS