Not to get in the way of your and samkar's spectacularly retarded thread derail, but I can't let this pass:

/geography fail!
//history fail!

What makes you think that Vietnam - a "police action" misadventure by the US in Southeast Asia - has any - ANY - bearing on magical families in the UK??

On a related topic, what effect did the atrocities perpetrated by Genghis Khan and the other Geats during the French and Indian War have on Beauxbatons? :-\

 

They destroyed the wall?:awesome

 

True, memories can be manipulated, though to me at first it was a bit unclear if the situation in HBP meant that Slughorn and it was hinted that Slughorn did it out of shame. He was ashamed that he gave Tom that knowledge and ashamed because that knowledge helped Tom kill people, however I think he was most afraid of how it would affect his own social standing. Slughorn was a bottom feeder who lived to suck up to those who were more famous or successful than he was. Granted the whole situation was pure garbage.

I mean if the guy modified or obliviated his own memory, he would not have known about the incident at all. But since he did, the whole "Get Harry to get the real memory" was quite pointless. I mean the guy carried it stored up in a small bottle. Dumbledore was just too damn "noble" to not do what was needed. But then again the whole "Let's teach Harry about Voldemort's past" was completely pointless except for the part about the resurrection stone, but Dumbledore had to play cryptic rather than just fess up what he knew.

Granted Snape could have manipulated Harry, but I think it would actually take some time to do something like that, so unless he already had a fake memory of it ready I just don't see him having the time to do it at the beginning of each lesson.

As for the dark arts -thing; Snape seemingly had three passions in his studies, Defense against Dark Arts (Which requires alot of studying about dark arts themselves especially for the NEWTs of that subject), Potions and spellcrafting. You had to be good at several aspects of magic to do that because by the time he was in his 5th year, he had created several unique spells including Sectusempra, which while dark is a very useful combat spell.

As for the love thing, it was hinted at least with the Patronus -spells. Remus Lupin's patronus was a werewolf and Nymphadora's patronus changed into a werewolf as well because she loved him. Lily's patronus was a doe and Snape's patronus became that as well. Patronus is an intent-based spell just like the Unforgivables. Unlike the Unforgivables, the Patronus requires true positive emotions to work and shape it. A twisted obsession isn't positive so it would not have been able to influence the spell.

And I agree that several parts of the HBP and DH were disgraces towards the characters and the overall plot. The whole god damn plan was stupid. Wait until the last possible moment to let Harry know the truth and then pray that he won't have a nervous breakdown or for him to simply decide that fuck this, I didn't sign up to be a pig that needs to be slaughtered.

After everything Dumbledore did (though he perhaps did put his hopes on the almost non-existing chance that Harry might live after the horcrux had been taken care off), I would not have named my kid after him. That probably would have been the last straw.

Common sense, hello.

It has to do with the effect on Wizards and witches that exist world wide. Muggle wars kill off potential parents for muggleborns everywhere, which of course means less muggleborn wizards and witches. Many Muggles also move abroad often, either because of a job or sometimes simply because they met someone.

Muggleborns were stated to be rare because they are born to parents who have no magic and have not had any magical parents or grandparents possibly ever or in a long long time. The only thing rarer than a muggleborn is a squib. Halfbloods actually seem to be the most common type of wizard, considering the sheer number of all witches and wizards out there.

Now lets say that an American soldier, who just happens to carry part of that something that is needed for a muggleborn dies while in Vietnam and thus doesn't meet that English lass, who might also carry that little something needed. Well that's one less muggleborn.

Now it was already stated by JKR that many witches and wizards in UK don't go to Hogwarts. Who says they only go to Beauxbattons or Durmstrang. They could very easily go to the states. After all Wizards have had far more effective means of travel long before muggles, to them it would have been very easy to travel half way across the world. So what's stopping witches and wizards from the States or from India, South-America etc coming to Europe to study? We don't see it in the books, but let's face the books concentrate very little on other students besides the majority of Gryffindors and Malfoy and his goons.

And of course the locations of the conflicts have an effect. Patils have their roots in India, Cho Chang has Chinese ancestry, Dean Thomas is African American, same with Kingley and so on. Any major wipeouts of family lines past or recent can have a devastating effect on the amount of wizards be the conflicts muggle or magical. How many potential and actual witch and wizard -lines were wiped out in Hiroshima and Nagasaki? How many were killed in the frontlines of WWI & WWII, how many more died in the camps? How many were killed in the civil wars of Africa and so on and so on...

 

Neither Dean Thomas nor Kingsley are American.



I never realized how nitpicky I was about dates/timing before this past week.

1. If Hermione gets pregnant on Halloween, she is extremely unlikely to give birth in April... even if there are multiple babies. Unless she's giving birth to sextuplets or something.

2. A child should be taking their first steps at around 12 months - and this is on average, and on the late side of things to boot. Children just learning to toddle around at about 18 months are not brilliant in the least, and are not 'ahead of the curve.'

3. Hogwart's term ends approximately mid-June, and not the beginning of May.

4. If Remus is a part of the story at all, please don't forget when you've scheduled your full moons.

5. While Harry is certainly the emphasized character as far as birthdays go (and Neville, to a lesser extent), Ginny, Hermione, and Ron's birthdays are all readily available online.

6. The Time Turner certainly had a definite effect on Hermione's age, but not her birthday. She will always have been born on September 19th.

7. There is no seven.

 

Do you actually read the shit you post Dantrag? It's so mind-blowingly stupid that there's no way you actually realize what you're saying. It was was funny briefly, but at this point it's just sad. Putting you on ignore now.

 

You do realize that JK Rowling put little to no thought into most of the things you're talking about, right? Any point we make is pointless because we have no idea what is canon or not unless directly supported by Rowling (or the books), and anything she says is at most, vague. Hell, I think she said Dumbledore was gay just to support gay rights. She probably came up with it on the spot.

 

That^

Made me think of Shatner on SNL berating Trekkies "You; have you even kissed a girl?"

(and just to affirm my total geekitude)

Of COURSE HE WAS GAY:

"He was tall, thin, and very old, judging by the silver of his hair and beard, which were both long enough to tuck into his belt. He was wearing long robes, a purple cloak that swept the ground, and high-heeled, buckled boots. His blue eyes were light, bright, and sparkling behind half-moon spectacles and his nose was very long and crooked, as though it had been broken at least twice."

Just visualize that and think 'South Beach'.

Freakin' Hermione was more butch than him.

 

OMG! Dumbledore dresses like a wizard?!

 

No, Arthur dresses like a wizard. Dumbledore has more outfits than Liberace in a wide variety of contrasting colors with animated moons, stars, sunbursts and whatnot, but wouldn't be caught dead outside his office without his heels on.



Only Gilderoy Lockhart has a more ostentatious wardrobe, and Dumbledore hired him.

 

Apparently, the first 'leak' that Dumbledore was gay was when she was reviewing one of the film scripts - she crossed out a line that Dumbledore would of said about a former girlfriend having 'the silkiest hair' when he and Harry were looking at a model on a billboard, and wrote a note: "Dumbledore's gay!"

It was in one of her many interviews.

 

My pet peeve... No the wording of that isn't harsh enough.
The single thing I can not stand in a fic:

A lack of internal logic

I can accept pretty much any plot device in a fic (seriously test me). But if the author is too lazy or stupid to actually extrapolate how that action or device would effect the world they have created then I have no business with the fic.

 

I call bullshit on her.

Because honestly, I don't think it's feasible to call Dumbledore gay. Maybe he was gay once, but at his age in the books, he's at most asexual.

 

I never understood the bitching about Dumbledore being gay. So he's gay, why u mad? In fact, being gay, with all the fabulous softness and interior-deco stigma the word carries, makes him all the more awesome when he strides in a room with that twinkle in his eye and you just know he's the hottest shit in sky-blue robes.

 

It's the fact that Dumbledore's sexual orientation had to come up at all. Before Rowling announced that he was gay, none of us thought about where Dumbledore got some poon from. He was just some (awesome) 150-year-old wizard that wore colourful clothing. I don't see the need of adding in 'homosexual' or 'heterosexual' as an adjective in there.

 

Yeah, about that- Does it even matter who Dumbledore finds attractive? Does the idea that old people once had sex scare you knuckz? The only time it even obliquely comes up in the books is in DH, with the dream sequence after Harry dies. I guess that maybe she dug the idea of the hero and the villain being star-crossed lovers... which sounds disturbingly similar to the reasoning behind Harry/Voldemort slash fiction.

Clearly, JK Rowling is writing fanfiction of her own work. :awesome

 

Hmm...did his post rantings get him banned?

 

Nah, on IRC Vash said he asked to be banned.

 

Ah yes, I see it now.

All I can do is... :facepalm

What an idiot.

 

No, it doesn't matter. So why even bring it up? The books only barely brought up Dumbledore's past and like you said, it was oblique.

Anyway, my posts seem to have been misinterpreted. I don't care that he's gay. I'm just slightly annoyed that people bring it up as an issue. Dumbledore's past did not really play a big role other than to introduce the Hallows. I only brought it up to point out that JK was probably bullshitting and came up with it on the spot instead of thinking it through.

Also, I'm not bothered by the idea that old people once had sex. Instead, it was old people having sex that I don't want to think about (Dumbledore hitting up a gay bar?). But hey, if you're into that sort of thing...

And I'm going to assume that you're talking someone else being banned, because I don't believe I've done anything to warrant that.

---------- Post automerged at 11:41 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:40 PM ----------

Oh, you mean like Stephanie Meyer did with that huge Mary Sue of hers.

 

The abomination that masquerades as the author known as Stephanie Meyer and its works shall not be mentioned, here!

Seriously, that woman and her works are a plague on literature.