You seem to have rather conveniently overlooked the abuse the house elves undergo at the hands of their masters. They even seem to believe they deserve it.
Would you say that a victim of abuse defending his tormentors is rational? Begs the question doesn't it?

 

My only counterpoint to mention is about 45. Custom wands- this is a bit of canon at this point.

When Ollivander was captured, he was made to make a new wand for Peter Pettigrew and later made one for Luna. It took time and an appreciation for the intended owner, but it is do-able.

 

Odd but not without precedent. Although boring and mostly used as something to fight or convenient shipping

Le Tiny Economy right? Some people don't understand proportions at all.

Assuming they are just general time capsules, why not? Should only be used for random trivia though.

What about just not with Dursleys?

What's the issue here?

I garner great amusement by reading those scenes, then watching the first two movies.

Brofist.

I dunno, there was one fic where Arthur had a captured gun that had a Conjuring Charm on it, so that it made more bullets as needed. Bottomless Magazine basically. Oh right, Nightmares of Futures Past. Stopped reading it myself for some reason.

....Well, Romilda Vane wasn't ugly.

Well...there was one fic where Cormac McLaggen, at that party, was all "Fuck yeah man, just tap that Romilda Vane pussy" and got Harry to do it. It was actually an amusing story. Lost it though.

:banana:

is a thing that exists, and with the movie abandoning Robes for some reason, would be more embarrassing than anything. Would make for interesting curses

....what's the problem with this? Serious question

MAXIMUM BROFIST.

Can be interesting

Seems like an obvious thing for Purebloods at least.

Agreed. It's not like, in social aspects, most non western nations are going to be too far ahead.

agreed

How about some flames? Have some flames for hating fun.

they did both.

If it's possible...

Asskissing Goblins is what you really mean.

He basically volunteered for the job anyways. this isn't too far fetched.

*doesn't even register the problem*

And that closes down so many fanfictions, fanfiction ideas and venues that it isn't funny. At all. What the hell Taure!?

If I didn't quote it, I either agreed or don't disagree that much.

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When the equivalent of "My foot, your ass" remains a viable counterargument to "You are under arrest", and Samuel Colt was born thousands of years ago, you can have both. There is nothing saying that women couldn't also endorse, support and propagate a feudal society.

Minus the caveat of women not having a say.

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Sex on a platter is its own argument.

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House Elves may actually have strong neurological differences, like the reward part and happiness part of their brain is directly tied into the Gift Giving part and the same part which makes you love a person more when you do things FOR them instead of the other way around.

subtle differences, but powerful and unavoidable effects. House Elves aren't servants to be nice, but for self-gratification that their brains spark off happy chemicals for super hard.

If you accept this as true, then slaves or not, House Elves simply find lots of joy and pleasure is being servants. Paid or not. Properly treated House Elves are therefore getting everything they want, to be allowed to serve is their return payment. Severely abused House Elves will of course want out of the arrangement any way they can. Kreacher may have died had he been told that, in essence, everything he had ever done and could ever do for the House of Black was not just worthless, but on the other side of worth itself.

This might explain why literally anyone who was of the Wizarding world just didn't bother about House Elf rights, even aside from human supremacy issues. Because most House Elves are in fact perfectly fine, and need no chains to keep them working.

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Aka, the Slippery Slope is completely real, and any Wizard or Witch who doesn't like that and makes the comparisons with the Muggle world, would be damned determined it doesn't start sliding. Ever.

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They are 3ft tall and non interbreedable by humans, are their own distinct species.

They aren't human, Taure.

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Food Security and Self Worth. The first one is the kicker.

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...we gonna talk about Hagrid's penis now?

 

We don't exactly know that house elves cannot interbreed with humans. Goblins and giants can, after all, with similar or greater size differences.

 

Your theory presumes a lot of things. But even if we assume that it's correct you've failed to address the fact that house elves for the most part are exploited and abused by their masters. They can treat their house elves however they want without fear of any consequences whatsoever. The treatment of Dobby at the hands of Malfoys being the case in point. Lucius wasn't punished by the law for it, because there is none in place.
In short House elves are seen as possessions rather than as sentient beings and possessions have no rights.

 

I have always thought this is the best way to get rid of Quidditch if the author just can't be arsed to write about it. Harry notices that he prefers the feeling of flying over the competitive aspect of the game and done, no more need to write about it ever again.

Never really thought that the competitive aspect was a major part of Harry's character in the books, so nothing has really been lost.

 

It's sort of like the old thought experiment of the pig that wants to be eaten.

Actually, there's a whole book full of thought experiments that has that title.

I don't see anything inherently awful about the idea that maybe house elves like serving, but dislike abuse. I'll admit, though, that most authors just give Harry house elves either because having servants is awesome or to facilitate plot points they're too lazy to figure other ways around.

Faeries that like doing for humans but leave if given a reward (like clothes) are not unheard of in folklore, in case anyone wants to look at that angle.

Indeed, he'd have made a fine police dog.

Oh... Oh no. I may have jumped in too quickly on that one.


In light of that faux pas, I guess a comparison of the idea that the only reason effectively all house elves desire servitude is because wizards don't give them freedom, with the notion that the only reason a cat licks its ass is because we humans are hoarding all the toilet paper would seem almost trollish, now.

It's all fun and games until someone breaks the page formatting.

 

Fire Crab + Manticore + magic pink umbrella = Blast-ended Skrewt

Wizards can interbreed with anything. All it takes is the right (wrong) fetish.

While I don't mind the trope, in canon Harry is very much proud of his position as a Quidditch player, as it is something he earned on his own talent and not by losing his parents in a near-mythological moment of history. He looks at Hermione just as contemptuously as the rest when she says Quidditch is meaningless and too divisive. The only reason he doesn't sound off like Ron or Oliver about it is that he lacks a 'home team' and never gets to see a pro game aside from the one World Cup match.

 

We're making progress.

1) We do not know if the majority of House elves are treated like dirt. You are assuming they are because you've seen how Lucius Malfoy (a notorious dickhead) treats Dobby.

2) It is obvious that treating them better would make them happier (even Kreacher warms up to Harry when he starts being nice to him iirc). That and it would be the decent thing to do.

3)Let's give them the right of self determination. Apart from a few (like Dobby), we can safely assume they wouldn't want freedom. Whether it is because of brainwashing/learned behavior or merely a characteristic of their physiology, we do not know (after all, we're talking about fictional magic creatures. We have no idea how they function)

4)Is it our job to educate them? Would they even be happier if they were free? We have no idea. Maybe they would like it. Maybe not.

However we can safely say that treated decently, House elves are content.
Why change that? If you're against mistreatment, make laws against that, I agree. After all, it has been proven that House elves react badly to physical and verbal abuse.
I am a lot less sure that freedom would make them happier as a whole, which is why I'd favor the status quo.

Hold your horses, we've never said they were beneath us, we're saying they're not human therefore we can't know for sure whether they truly want to serve or if it merely is, as you say, the result of centuries of exploitation/House elf social expectations.




Edit : an interesting experiment would be to forcefully free a sample group of extremely young House elves, educate them like average young children and see what they do with their freedom. That way, we could make more reasonable guesses on the matter of House elf freedom. Until then, we'll have to agree to disagree, as Taure said.

 

We also saw how Barty Crouch Senior treated Winky.

 

I wasn't talking about hypothetical situations. I was talking about status of house-elves in general in Rowling's world and what I am saying is they are no better off than slaves, that's it!
My argument was never about if they should be treated as humans or not. I just wanted people here to acknowledge that house-elves have gotten a raw deal. Even if most house elves are treated well it doesn't change the fact that if they are abused they have nowhere to go and seek sympathy let alone justice.

 

Barty Crouch is also a notorious dickhead.

 

Sirius and Molly weren't dickheads and look at how they treated Kreacher.

 

Does nobody here see the contradiction in wanting to free a house elf - who is a being serving their master's will - and the fact that many of you want to enforce your will onto them by freeing them, which as we have seen in canon they do not take kindly to.

Going further, say you do free all house elves, what then? We have two examples of freed house elves in canon, one (Dobby) goes back to work after a period of inaction due to boredom and the other (Winky) goes back to work after a period of inaction due to being absolutely miserable with her situation, even then she drinks all the time due to missing her master.

So there you have it, based on the two canon examples even if you were to free the house elves they would more than likely all go back to work. Or end up drinking themselves toi death due to their despair.

 

Much of this has already been anticipated:

 

After an extreme fuck up. A fuck up that, by the way, directly led to Lord Voldemort's resurrection.

Other than that, people often force their children to confront fears and be in uncomfortable situations. So putting Winky in a high spot when she has a fear of heights isn't that bad. Especially since Winky got to do exactly what she loved.

Take care of someone.

 

My point was more to do with the fact that you seem to be missing the fact that in trying to free the house elves, you are enforcing your will onto them. You don't think that they should do it, so they shouldn't do it. That in effect takes away their free will.

 

Um. Rule 34? :fire

What he is proud of is the acceptance and friends that he gets from it. Give him a not shitty childhood, he might not love it so much.

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/5329223/1/A-Different-Dursley-Family

Basically, this. Damn, that woman needs to update it. It's awesome.

 

No, you're empowering them to make the decision for themselves as to whether they want to be free or not. At the moment they have no such choice, they are, as stated above, under a "social imperius".

If, after a process of effective education (taking generations, most likely), they decide they want to serve a master for free, then that's their choice.

 

And you're taking the decision away from them, Hermione asked the house elves of Hogwarts if they wanted be free and they basically told her to fuck off.