Yeah, well, I went to a ghetto public school of 3000.

 

Bill, didn't your school have 'that guy', the one who was more than a bit socially awkward? Mine had a few, and they got more than a bit of mockery during their schooling. One fella had something stick with him for years, and there were a few who didn't mind reminding him of it given half a chance.

 

Slut-shaming is a bad example, and is pretty case by case. I'd say it's quite likely that Harry was "forgiven" for most offenses and he got over it. Look at the DA, at one point or another most of them were "against" Harry but they all got over it after a while.

 

Definitely varies based on school size. I attended both a small high school and a large high school for two years each. In a small school, you don't really see much public hate going on because most people in the class have known each other for years and years. But in a large school it's different; there's less interaction and thus more hating on kids you don't know.

 

There were a few who were a bit socially awkward, but no one who ever really suffered for it.

 

Man... I wish I'd gone to your school. I wasn't involved with much bullying / public shaming as I was captain of Varsity soccer... but I still saw it taking place. It was pretty fucking awful actually.

 

Same at my school. Even the ones I admit shunning occasionally had their own peer-groups.

Besides, I really can't think of Harry being 'that guy'. Neville, perhaps, or Luna, but not Harry. As said before, Harry was the rich, famous athlete. You know, like the guy who had a huge following of friends or minions at your school? And in no social setting does the popular guy become an outcast overnight. It just doesn't work like that (except maybe in a revolution, but that's a different story).

Sure, Harry could be a bit awkward with people, but his other qualities would have far outweighed that. Hell, even the adults tried to suck up on him in PoA and GoF (Fudge and Bagman).

 

I think we can also attribute Harry's slide from popularity to the fact that he was a celebrity. When a celebrity supposedly does something awful, the resulting backlash and negative gossip is far more extreme than for a normal person. The bigger they are, the harder they fall and whatnot.

 

In Philosopher's Stone when the entirety of Gryffindor, bar Ron and Hermione, shunned him for losing shitloads of points.

 

I was thinking mostly of GoF, and the difference between passive resentment and open animosity. It's one thing to resent or hate someone, and completely different animal to openly declare that hate by carrying badges that say "Potter stinks". Harry probably wouldn't have even noticed anything if the Hufflepuffs would have done what normal people do in that kind of situation: grumble between friends in privacy.

The kind of open hostility shown in GoF is exactly what happens to "that guy" (and from the more cruel end of bullying at that), and we already established that Harry isn't or shouldn't be one.

 

I had the exact opposite experience as him in a large high school (~3500 people). There wasn't really anyone well known by their entire grade, much less the entire school. Even in senior year I was getting to know classmates who I'd never met before that year and had friends I'd never met, who had never met any of my friends. I could name under half the people that graduated with me, and neither of the people sitting next to me at graduation had even heard of the valedictorian. There were plenty of horribly socially awkward people, but they just hung out with the other socially awkward people with similar interests, and it was not uncommon for people people who were rejected by one social circle to transition between a few social groups until they found another one they fit in to.

You can't really generalize and say "small schools are like X, large schools are like Y."

 

At 7th book Stunning Spell collides with Killing Curse and apparently looks like fireworks.

 

Not exactly a fanon question, but it fits the title so;

How many of the members of DLP have original published works out there? I was talking to a fellow HP fan and Fifty Shades of Grey came up and spawned this little thought. I know that Joe has (at least) some short stories and that jbern has some works out there.

 

Joe just recently published his first novel, so go pick it up.

Every DLP author that's been published in jbern's anthologies counts, I guess.

 

I think the difference between the example of Harry being shunned in PS and his following problems in CoS, GoF and OotP is that in PS he deserved it. The rest of the house were perfectly justified in being angry at him, and it was only natural.

 

Could you please elaborate on that point?


Ah, nevermind that, sorry.

 

Magic screws up electronics, that's not disputed. My question is, does it mess up other technology, say something that's chemical based?

 

I took the book explanation of technology not working at Hogwarts to mean that magic interferes with circuitry, not electric charge per se. If it interfered with electric charge, matter itself would deteriorate.

No circuitry and you're probably in the clear. Steam engines should work.