A follow- up question to the discussion on the Malfoys:

[mary-j-59.livejournal.com]

From 2007 onwards, we have, via DH (that disastrous book) and interviews, discovered the following things:

1. The Death Eaters were right. According to Rowling, there are no "Muggleborns". Every Witch or Wizard born to normal parents is a throwback to a magical ancestor. Yes, she really said that!

2. All Wizards seem to feel themselves superior to normal people. Even good-hearted types like Arthur Weasely show themselves extremely prejudiced toward non-magical human beings, as well as extremely ignorant. But-

3. I am no expert on magical history - like Harry, I missed any hints of a coherent backstory that might have been in the books. But I do get the impression that, in addition to being prejudiced, magical people might fear ordinary human beings. Perhaps the persecutions shown as laughable in Harry's textbook were actually quite serious?

4. Young Tom Riddle was fearful of being locked up in an asylum.

5. Young Gellert Grindelwald and Albus Dumbledore aspired to rule over Muggles and Muggleborns.

6. Young Regulus believed Voldemort's agenda was to overthrow the stature of secrecy and have wizards take their rightful place as the lords of creation.

7. And then there's the way Dumbledore chose to raise Harry.

Where I'm going with all this? It's seemed to me for awhile now that the Death Eaters might have a point. What if every Dark Lord in the Wizarding World was either a Muggleborn or a Muggle-raised half-blood? What if Dumbledore was actually trying to create a new Dark Lord?

Think about it. Given what we see of Tommy's, Sev's, and Harry's experiences, magical children have a very hard time in the normal world. In self defense, they may well come up with grandiose theories about their specialness. And, like all magical children, they will lash out with magic at times of high stress. The future Dark Lords among them will control magic early, cling hard to their specialness, and learn contempt, as well as fear, for the normal people who don't and cant' understand them and cant' do magic, either. By the time such a child is 11, he may well be quite powerful magically and morally and emotionally quite messed up.

Thoughts?

Comments

[danajsparks.livejournal.com]

----The Death Eaters were right. According to Rowling, there are no "Muggleborns". Every Witch or Wizard born to normal parents is a throwback to a magical ancestor. Yes, she really said that!

I believe the truth may be that everyone, both magical and non-magical, has a magical ancestor, in much the same way that probably anyone with European ancestry is descended from British royalty. (See www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/05/the-royal-we/302497/ )

Here's how it might work. Let's say that magical ability is dependent upon two genes, each with two alleles.

Gene 1 Alleles: U,u; where U is dominant for magical ability
Gene 2 Alleles: W,w; where W is dominant for magical ability

There are 16 possible combinations from these two genes. Both U and W are required for magical ability, so a wizard or witch can have the genotypes UUWW, UUWw, UuWW, or UuWw. And a squib or muggle can have the genotypes UUww, Uuww, uuWW, uuWw, and uuww.

Now, suppose that the child of two magical parents has the genotype Uuww, making her non-magical. If she marries a muggle/squib with the genotype uuww, then her children have a 50% chance of being uuww. In other words, they can have two magical ancestors yet still have completely non-magical DNA.


--- It's seemed to me for awhile now that the Death Eaters might have a point. What if every Dark Lord in the Wizarding World was either a Muggleborn or a Muggle-raised half-blood?

swythyv had some similar thoughts about this in Part II of her essay The Rule of Men (http://hp-essays.livejournal.com/209001.html), though she was focused on nature rather than nurture in her theory. She suggested that most Dark Lords are half-bloods because, due to genetics, half-bloods tend to be the most magically powerful.

I'm not sure if we have enough of a sample to determine whether Dark Lords tend to grow up in muggle environments. Voldemort was muggle-raised, but Grindelwald probably had at least one magical parent or guardian since his aunt was a witch. And Dumbledore, who almost became a Dark Lord, had two magical parents. On the other hand, Dean Thomas grew up in a mugge household, and he apparently turned out relatively sane.

[oryx_leucoryx]

but Grindelwald probably had at least one magical parent or guardian since his aunt was a witch

And attended Durmstrang, notorious for not taking in Muggle-borns.