Choosing Niceness Instead of Evil
Jan. 30th, 2012 10:38 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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deathtocapslockWhen I was a kid, one of my favorite TV shows was the silly spy satire, Get Smart. Junior moralist and social reformer that I was, my favorite part of the show was always at the end, when Maxwell Smart (Don Adams) would muse, after defeating the bad guy, “If only he’d used his abilities for niceness instead of evil.” (Italics in original)
I recently read the excellent book, God’s Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn’t Get It, by Jim Wallis. An evangelical minister(1), Wallis is one of the founders of Sojourners Magazine (available on the Internet at sojo.net) and a promoter of “prophetic politics.” He points out that all the great American social movements, such as the abolition of slavery, women’s suffrage, and the civil rights movement, were born out of Christian beliefs and led by believers. He adds that biblical prophets such as Isaiah and Amos were the social critics of their day who weren’t afraid to stand up to the rich and powerful and demand justice for the poor and oppressed. Wallis writes:
Prophecy is not future telling, but articulating moral truth. The prophets diagnose the present and point the way to a just solution. The “prophetic tradition,” in all of the world’s great religions, is just what we need to open up our contemporary political options, which are, honestly, grossly failing to solve our most pressing social problems....
What would it mean to evaluate the leading current political options by the values of the prophets? What would happen if we asserted that values are the most important subject for the future of politics? (72, emphasis in original)
We must find a new moral and political language that transcends old divisions and seeks the common good. Prophetic politics finds its center in fundamental moral issues like children, diversity, family, community, citizenship, and ethics (others could be added, like nonviolence, tolerance, and fairness) and tries to construct national directions that many people across the political spectrum could agree to.... (75)
As I read about this definition of prophesying, I couldn’t help comparing the exciting, dynamic, and eminently useful kind of prophecy Wallis is describing with the Harry and Voldemort prophecy and all the silliness related to it. (Now it’s important! Now it’s not! Which will it be today?) And I began to wonder...
What if there had never been a Lord Voldemort?
I don’t mean, what if there had never been a Tom Riddle? I mean, what if, instead of having been born a potential psychopath (since considerable research shows a strong hereditary component to psychopathy), Tom had been born a potential prophet in the biblical sense? What if he had been born a gentle, deeply spiritual boy who saw the injustice and pain in the world and, instead of trying to exploit it to gain power for himself, tried to heal it? What if, instead of using his magic to kill animals and torture other children in the orphanage, he used it to heal and help others, like little Severus tries to do with the sick “Muggle baby” in terri_testing’s story, “Father of the Man”?
Imagine Tom using his formidable intelligence and charisma to inspire his followers to create a society based on equality and compassion. Imagine Rev. Tom Riddle leading a social reform movement similar to the ones led by Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi.
Because the truth is, Tom Riddle was right: Magical society was severely messed up. It was profoundly unjust, exploitative, prejudiced, and corrupt. His solution was what was wrong. He wanted to remake it in his own image, but his image was one of complete selfishness, tyranny, and exploitation. If his own image had been one of goodness, charity, and love, the resulting society would have been vastly better rather than worse.
Assuming young Tom had been a future social reformer, here are some questions I had about him and his life:
* How would Dumbledore have reacted to Tom when he went to the orphanage? Would a predatory psychopath like him view Tom as a threat or a potential patsy?
* Which House would Tom have been in at Hogwarts? Surely he would have chosen to be put in the most despised House because that’s where he was most needed, but which House would that have been?
* Would Tom have led his fellow students in demanding much-needed reforms? If he pushed for reforms, what would those reforms have been?
* From what we know of Head Boys, they tend to be people who appear to support the status quo and don’t overtly threaten the power of the school’s administrators, such as Albus, Canon Tom, James, and Percy. Would Prophet Tom also have become Head Boy, or would he have been seen as too dangerous to put in a position of such power?
* How would he have gotten along with the Malfoys, Blacks, and other pureblooded families? Would any of them have supported him?
* Would the future of wizarding society come down to a confrontation between Dumbledore and Prophet Tom? If so, what would this look like? Would Albus try to ruin Tom’s good name so he could stay in control? Would he still found the Order of the Phoenix to counteract Tom’s reforms, only now it would be more like the Tea Party rather than a paramilitary group?
* How would a prophetic Tom Riddle have changed magical society, and potentially non-magical society as well?
Here are a few suggestions as to what I think could reasonably be expected to happen if Tom were good rather than evil:
* There would have been no Moaning Myrtle because Tom never would have created Horcruces. If he were the heir of Slytherin, the basilisk would still be sleeping peacefully in the Chamber of Secrets.
* Hagrid would not have been expelled because Tom would have befriended him and convinced him to get rid of the Acromantula before he got caught.
* Tom would foster solidarity between human and nonhuman magical species. He would lobby for other sapient species such as goblins, centaurs, and elves to share equal rights with witches and wizards.
* Eventually, he would fight to have the Statute of Secrecy repealed and try to establish harmony between magical and non-magical people.
What other ideas does anybody have?
1) For those who may be thinking “evangelical minister” is synonymous with “right wing Bible-thumper,” that’s not the case. The major theme of God’s Politics is the immorality of (1) cutting taxes for the rich while raising them for the poor and middle class, and (2) prosecuting an unnecessary war while cutting social programs. Wallis was part of a contingent of clergy members who came up with a (divinely?) inspired six-point plan that would have gotten rid of Saddam Hussein peacefully and avoided the Iraq War entirely. That would have saved the lives of thousands of service members, over 100,000 Iraqis, and trillions of dollars.
I recently read the excellent book, God’s Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn’t Get It, by Jim Wallis. An evangelical minister(1), Wallis is one of the founders of Sojourners Magazine (available on the Internet at sojo.net) and a promoter of “prophetic politics.” He points out that all the great American social movements, such as the abolition of slavery, women’s suffrage, and the civil rights movement, were born out of Christian beliefs and led by believers. He adds that biblical prophets such as Isaiah and Amos were the social critics of their day who weren’t afraid to stand up to the rich and powerful and demand justice for the poor and oppressed. Wallis writes:
Prophecy is not future telling, but articulating moral truth. The prophets diagnose the present and point the way to a just solution. The “prophetic tradition,” in all of the world’s great religions, is just what we need to open up our contemporary political options, which are, honestly, grossly failing to solve our most pressing social problems....
What would it mean to evaluate the leading current political options by the values of the prophets? What would happen if we asserted that values are the most important subject for the future of politics? (72, emphasis in original)
We must find a new moral and political language that transcends old divisions and seeks the common good. Prophetic politics finds its center in fundamental moral issues like children, diversity, family, community, citizenship, and ethics (others could be added, like nonviolence, tolerance, and fairness) and tries to construct national directions that many people across the political spectrum could agree to.... (75)
As I read about this definition of prophesying, I couldn’t help comparing the exciting, dynamic, and eminently useful kind of prophecy Wallis is describing with the Harry and Voldemort prophecy and all the silliness related to it. (Now it’s important! Now it’s not! Which will it be today?) And I began to wonder...
What if there had never been a Lord Voldemort?
I don’t mean, what if there had never been a Tom Riddle? I mean, what if, instead of having been born a potential psychopath (since considerable research shows a strong hereditary component to psychopathy), Tom had been born a potential prophet in the biblical sense? What if he had been born a gentle, deeply spiritual boy who saw the injustice and pain in the world and, instead of trying to exploit it to gain power for himself, tried to heal it? What if, instead of using his magic to kill animals and torture other children in the orphanage, he used it to heal and help others, like little Severus tries to do with the sick “Muggle baby” in terri_testing’s story, “Father of the Man”?
Imagine Tom using his formidable intelligence and charisma to inspire his followers to create a society based on equality and compassion. Imagine Rev. Tom Riddle leading a social reform movement similar to the ones led by Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi.
Because the truth is, Tom Riddle was right: Magical society was severely messed up. It was profoundly unjust, exploitative, prejudiced, and corrupt. His solution was what was wrong. He wanted to remake it in his own image, but his image was one of complete selfishness, tyranny, and exploitation. If his own image had been one of goodness, charity, and love, the resulting society would have been vastly better rather than worse.
Assuming young Tom had been a future social reformer, here are some questions I had about him and his life:
* How would Dumbledore have reacted to Tom when he went to the orphanage? Would a predatory psychopath like him view Tom as a threat or a potential patsy?
* Which House would Tom have been in at Hogwarts? Surely he would have chosen to be put in the most despised House because that’s where he was most needed, but which House would that have been?
* Would Tom have led his fellow students in demanding much-needed reforms? If he pushed for reforms, what would those reforms have been?
* From what we know of Head Boys, they tend to be people who appear to support the status quo and don’t overtly threaten the power of the school’s administrators, such as Albus, Canon Tom, James, and Percy. Would Prophet Tom also have become Head Boy, or would he have been seen as too dangerous to put in a position of such power?
* How would he have gotten along with the Malfoys, Blacks, and other pureblooded families? Would any of them have supported him?
* Would the future of wizarding society come down to a confrontation between Dumbledore and Prophet Tom? If so, what would this look like? Would Albus try to ruin Tom’s good name so he could stay in control? Would he still found the Order of the Phoenix to counteract Tom’s reforms, only now it would be more like the Tea Party rather than a paramilitary group?
* How would a prophetic Tom Riddle have changed magical society, and potentially non-magical society as well?
Here are a few suggestions as to what I think could reasonably be expected to happen if Tom were good rather than evil:
* There would have been no Moaning Myrtle because Tom never would have created Horcruces. If he were the heir of Slytherin, the basilisk would still be sleeping peacefully in the Chamber of Secrets.
* Hagrid would not have been expelled because Tom would have befriended him and convinced him to get rid of the Acromantula before he got caught.
* Tom would foster solidarity between human and nonhuman magical species. He would lobby for other sapient species such as goblins, centaurs, and elves to share equal rights with witches and wizards.
* Eventually, he would fight to have the Statute of Secrecy repealed and try to establish harmony between magical and non-magical people.
What other ideas does anybody have?
1) For those who may be thinking “evangelical minister” is synonymous with “right wing Bible-thumper,” that’s not the case. The major theme of God’s Politics is the immorality of (1) cutting taxes for the rich while raising them for the poor and middle class, and (2) prosecuting an unnecessary war while cutting social programs. Wallis was part of a contingent of clergy members who came up with a (divinely?) inspired six-point plan that would have gotten rid of Saddam Hussein peacefully and avoided the Iraq War entirely. That would have saved the lives of thousands of service members, over 100,000 Iraqis, and trillions of dollars.
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Date: 2012-02-01 05:54 am (UTC)Dumbledore is all about appearing like a fair, liberal fellow, so he probably would have taken the line that Tom had some lovely ideas which of course sensible witches and wizards would support, but his methods were dangerous and could lead to a terrible division in society and maybe bloodshed. After all, look what happened on the Continent with that Grindelwald trying to enforce The Greater Good!
Probably there would still be a pureblood fanatic faction, run by the Blacks - and probably both Dumbledore and Tom would accuse each other of really being ideologically close to that faction despite claiming otherwise. (He's essentially run the ww for decades, and see how the purebloods retain their ancient privileges and the magical races are still oppressed - no surprise given his secret youthful association with Grindlewald! He's an untrustworthy descendent of Slytherin himself and is really planning to become dictator for life, and now he knows who all the agitators are because you gave him your names!) There would be less violence than the Voldemort-led version and a lot more secret political deals and bribery. The Weasleys would still be in Dumbledore's camp - the rich purebloods still wouldn't like them, but pureblood privilege is their main advantage, so they wouldn't be keen on Tom dismantling that. Though they'd justify it some other way. (If Harry is born, but Lily went to Tom's side, he might end up rivals with Draco and Ron.)
On another note, I do want to take issue with one point: most of the opponents of all those social movements were also devout believers. Because just about everyone was a believer, and found a justification in their common text for whatever they were doing. Pro-slavery people cited the passages in the Bible supporting slavery, and anti-slavery people cited different verses, etc. (An analogy I heard is that religion is like an amplifier: if you're already a jerk, you'll find the verses about how children who laugh at prophets will be eaten by bears, the brats; if you're already inclined to kindness, you'll get inspiration to help the poor.) And were plenty of non-religious people even in the 19th century who also wanted social reform, like Robert Ingersoll. So I don't give religion itself too much credit - more what people make of it. I like to give people credit when I can :D
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Date: 2012-02-01 05:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-04 03:22 am (UTC)(And I agree with you, religion is whatever people make of it.)