Unfortunately, incorrect:

It'd be like saying because Muggles have a post 17th century understanding of map-making wizarding homes are only Unplottable on ancient maps.

EDIT: and bear in mind, there are muggleborns with medical parents, like Hermione. Imagine, since the time of Pasteur, no-one bothering to mention germ theory post their entering the magical world. It's absurd.

 

They still have dragonpox (whether it is a magical zoonose or not), and only treat it, not cure it, nor have plans to eradicate it.

Given that the muggleborns leave the magical world at 11, that their parents are not at all welcome in their world and that their schooling is designed to cut them off from the muggle world?

And frankly do you see any wizard ready to admit that muggle could ever do something better than them?

Hermione thinks so little of her parents that she erased them (in a way, killed them since we are the sum of our memories) rather that actually talking to them, allowing them to have an opinion and giving them ANY agency. They were muggle so of course they had no valuable imput to give, why bother? I'll just put them safely away where they won't bother me.

So no, it doesn't seem absurd to me at all that muggleborns don't give a shit about the medical expertise of their parents after having been taught that magic makes wizards superior to muggle in every way during all their formative years.

 

You dislike the idea that civil wars would have an impact on population? In a small population society, even a single death is statistic of note. If you have 10,000 wizards around the country and 1 dies, thats 0.01%. If 0.01% of the UK muggle population died today, it would 6700 people. Then imagine you have a major skirmish between Death Eaters, and the Order/Ministry. Say...5 deaths? That half hour of combat has killed the same proportion of the population as 33500 muggles dying would.

And it only makes sense that it would impact the number of elderly in Harry's day. It may not have been the elderly doing the dying during the war, but it was the folk who would actually be old in the 1990s. People of around Augusta Longbottom's age will have been the experienced wizards, the senior aurors and the first people Dumbledore recruited to the Order. So they'll have been heavily targeted during the war, because its only sensible to try and take away your opponents best fighters.

I think the relevant quote about the first war, that says a lot, is:

A war that went on for just over a decade and every week there was news of more deaths.

In contrast the second war lasted about 2 years? And for half of that, Voldemort had really won so there were limited fights. Instead the majority of the deaths I'd think were probably via the Muggle Born Registration Commission and its work.

 

We know that wizards can cure the common cold - that is what the Pepper-Up potion does, as seen in CoS.

Wizards are far ahead of Muggles when it comes to curing diseases as well as physical injuries. They can't cure dragon pox with the same ease because it is a magical disease.

And to be clear, we don't even really know if germ theory is the correct description of disease in the HP universe. This is a universe where alchemy (which describes the universe in terms which fundamentally contradict modern chemistry) is real. It could well be that the Muggles are simply wrong about what causes disease, and that wizards have a magical theory of disease which is its true description.

 

Cool your jets. Your words.

This is the question and answer thread, supported by canon/WoG where possible.

Whatever anti-Hermione thing you're bringing, and whatever rage you're carrying about a boarding school and normal boarding school practices, with normal term holidays, leave it in the Let's shit on Hermione thread, and toss yourself a handy while you're there to calm down, mate.

 

I don't think that this makes Hermione horrible...

Let's face it, all teenagers, even the ones that don't rebel for the sake of it, go through a phase when they find their parents annoying, restraining, sometimes a bit stupid...

So when you have magic and your parents do not? Of course you are going to believe yourself superior to them. Of course you are going to see them as helpless. Because, frankly it's true. How are you going to truly believe them equals?

Adding to that, that Hermione was fighting a war with a bunch of teenagers and was under a tremendous amount of pressure. Never in her life had adults risen to the task and she was on her own. I don't think that what she did was right. But it is understandable, and probably the less worse thing she could do at the time given that she basically was on her own.

I do think that she's a pretty horrible person. But not because of this. For this I blame more the circumstances and the shitty society she was in than her.

 

This has probably been asked before, but was it ever 100% confirmed that Harry's Parseltongue was only because of the Scarcrux or is that just implied?

 

How do Sirius, Snape, James and Lily stack up with Ron, Harry and Hermione? Are the former simply the superior group, magically speaking?

 

@BlitherBlip JK confirmed it later, and in books, we have only Dumbledore's word for it: "You can speak Parseltongue, Harry," said Dumbledore calmly, "because Lord Voldemort — who is the last remaining ancestor of Salazar Slytherin — can speak Parseltongue.

@kinetique Yes, they are. Lily and Hermione might be similar in the terms of nerdiness and such, but Sirius and James are surely superior to Ron and Harry. McGonagall about them: "Both very bright, of course — exceptionally bright, in fact —" From her mouth, it's a big compliment, and it is implied they had good marks without really studying while Ron and Harry often struggle with studying and have slightly better than average marks. Snape, we can see in HBP, is genius at potions, knows how to make his own spells, is very knowledgable about dark arts and so on. If you skim the books, you'll find a lot of hints and implications that James and Sirius were brilliant in everything they did. with Remus being the nerdy one and Peter the useless one.

 

I’d say the James Potter era group probably beats the HP group overall, but I’d still put my boy Harry in a league all of his own. He killed Salazar’s own millennia old basilisk at 12, produced a corporeal Patronus at 13 that caused hundreds of dementors to flee, mastered Occlumency, etc. he’s not as intellectual as Lily or Remus but he’s definitely magically talented. It’s hard to rank Sirius and James because we just have people’s word on it, and basically everything cool they did, Pettigrew also managed to do.

Harry, Lily, Snape, James + Sirius, Hermione, Remus, Ron, Pettigrew. imo

 

I mean assuming both groups are at 17, what magical feats have the older group accomplished except being Animagi? I don't think they even seriously started fighting until they were out of Hogwarts.

 

Currently doing a reread of DH at the moment, and something thats really struck me is that Harry is pretty shit at most magic except a very limited subset. He doesn't know a particularly wide variety of spells and is absolutely reliant on Hermione's abilities. That being the case, I don't think its reasonable to rank him alongside people who were described by McGonagall as "exceptionally bright".

He took down the basilisk yes, but he didn't use any magic to do it. And its true mastered the patronus charm - which perhaps goes to show what he is capable of if he bothers to apply himself properly. But part of being a skilled wizard is putting in the effort and the time to gain that skill. Its suggested that James and Sirius did so on a broader basis, its clear that Harry hasn't.

 

Harry and Ron both did well enough on their OWLS that they were able to take the sixth year courses required for Auror training, and, per McGonagall in OotP, "They only take the best." Granted, they don't take their NEWTS (as far as I know), and the whole defeating Voldemort undoubtedly bought them some credit when it came to actually joining the Aurors, but McGonagall is perfectly willing to tell Neville he's not up to the courses he's chosen for NEWT. I'm not necessarily saying that Harry or Ron are the equal of James et al, but they're still talented.

 

James, Sirius and Peter managed to become animagi and alongside Remus they made the Map. Lily, Snape and Remus were academically gifted. Lily was great at charms and potions. Snape was great at the dark arts and potions. Remus had the defence against the dark arts. James and Sirius were impressive at least at transfiguration.

Hermione was academically gifted. She knew everything that was ever needed to be known in most situations.
Harry had a very special set of skills that allowed him to perform feats well beyond his years. It took 7 books to tell how awesome Harry was.
Ron is just for laughs with a great presence of mind. He was a versatile character who has allowed fans to portray him as anything in between the worst sort of cretin to the best human shield for his best friends.

Being able to cast patronus charm (a supposedly difficult spell to learn) and teach it to other brats is far more useful than any map or the ability to turn into an animal. A coin that allows instant communication is more useful than any fish in a bowl no matter how impressive. Imperius and Cruciatus are very useful curses in a wizard's arsenal. The ability to use two of the three unforgivable curses demonstrates Harry's magical talents.

In terms magical ability from a purely utilitarian perspective Harry is the best, followed by Hermione.

Marauders were bullies and pranksters. Snape was an edgy little shite. Lily was a teacher's pet. Harry, Ron and Hermione started a militia of their own. Ron was fun to laugh with and laugh at. Hermione had the teacher's pet covered.

Lily's best friend spent years bulling her only son. James was betrayed by one of his friends. His best friend got himself thrown in jail instead of looking after Harry. His other friend was conveniently absent for about a decade from Harry's life.

Harry's friends on the other hand were willing to follow him to certain death. They came through for him on multiple occasions. Harry inspired greater loyalty than either Dumbledore or Voldemort.

On the whole Harry and friends were better than the previous generation.

 

Lily and James defied Voldemort three times before the prophecy was made, and they all fought for several years with the Order, so I don't really agree with painting them as just bullies and pranksters, unless pranking Death Eaters was all they did in 78-81 when they had no other jobs than whatever they did for the Order. They also fought against an enemy they knew a lot less about than Harry & co. Having said that, they were definitely defeated by Voldemort, whereas Harry wasn't.

All except Pettigrew seems to have been ready to die for the cause of killing Voldemort, same as Harry, Ron and Hermione, at least that's how I've interpreted it. Even Snape. It would be interesting to know how the trio would have done if one of them had turned traitor in secret, but somehow I don't think they would have fared any better than the marauders.

 

Harry first performed N.E.W.T. level magic when he was 13. James did it at the end of his fifth year (in Snape's Worst Memory, where he used non-verbal magic), but he was 16

Harry also taught 7-8 N.E.W.T. students Defence. Katie, Cho and Marietta were in their sixth year. Anjelina, Alicia, Fred, George and Lee were in their seventh year. If he was able to teach them useful stuff, it says a lot about his skill in Defence.

Also, Defence is the only subject Harry puts much effort into. He spends a lot of time reading the books Sirius and Remus gave him, practises for the TWT and teaches students older than him.

Harry's skill level is ridiculously inconsistent though. He didn't really struggle much in the first three books and even mastered a charm adults couldn't always perform, but needed Hermione's help in GoF to learn the Summoning Charm.

I would say it isn't Harry's laziness as much as it is JKR having him perform magic only in life-threatening situations.

As vlad said in one of his AN's;

 

Not to pile on this (As this seems like more of a discussion than a question with a solid answer), but Harry performed one NEWT level spell at the age of 13. It's not like he was throwing around NEWT level spells every other casting.

Like, I knew basic algebra when I was around 6/7 even though we didn't learn it in School until I was 11. I didn't know Surds, I didn't know about Differentiating or SOHCAHTOA or anything else, just how to add, subtract and multiply in Algebra. Doesn't make me a genius or anything.

Canonically, James and Sirius have shown to be much better at Magic than Harry. Praise from McGonagall, seeming ease with their exams, turning into Animgi at an unheard of age, able to go toe to toe with Snape who was no slouch. In contrast, Harry had to study for his exams just to get average/passing grades and never received all that much praise.

Plus (And I might be talking out of my arse here), DADA seemed like it was more about Tactics and incorporating other subjects (Patronus Charm, Dark Creates from Care of Magical Creatures).

Question: Was it ever canonically stated if everyone in the Wizarding World was aware that Voldemort was in power during Deathly Hallows after Rufus Scrimgeour's death? Since he had Pius Thicknesse as a puppet Minister? Did some people (Both in and out of the Ministry) think that the Ministry was still against Voldemort? I know a Wanted notice was issued for Harry but the reason for that was because they implicated him in Dumbledore's death (I think) so the average person might think that the Boy-Who-Lived had gone rouge and Voldemort was on the loose?

 

My impression from DH is that its a sort of unspoken knowledge. That being the case there'll have been a solid chunk living in blissful ignorance and refusing to accept it - "What do you mean You Know Who is running the Ministry? I didn't see him there when I filed my Billy's form on Friday. That Thicknesse fellow is the Minister." The people who could live blissfully unaffected by Voldemort's regime may have kept themselves deliberately ignorant of it as well, in order to keep themselves safe.

 

It seems incredibly unlikely. If everyone were aware, the Prophet articles would have taken a completely different tone, because there would be nothing lost by admitting that Voldemort controlled the whole operation. I would think most people dismissed the idea of Death Eaters being in the Ministry as a conspiracy theory.

 

Also worth noting that Voldemort wasn't even in the country for a chunk of that year, he was off on the continent hunting for the wand. So his looking presence will have been even less in your face during that time.