Wizarding World under Voldemort?

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

Sunnyskywalker's last post inspired me to do a bit of thinking about our dear Voldie and to play with what-ifs. So let me put the question out there: what do you think would have happened had Voldie been a competent Dark Lord? How would the war(s) have been different - what would Voldemort and the DEs done differently? And, let's say he won or at least managed to hang onto power for a substantial length of time (perhaps Harry vanished mysteriously? Or died somehow?), so what would the WW have been like under a competent Dark Lord?

Some ideas:

- perhaps Voldemort would have made much greater use of the Dementors during the war. (Given Jodel's theory that his fear of death and psychopathy were caused by Dementor-haunting during his infancy, it could be very interesting to posit a connection between him and the Dementors, or their using each other - the Dementors maybe wanting a better bargain that what they've currently got....) This might have had particular consequences for Harry and his role in things.

- Voldemort might have softpedaled the Muggleborn angle where necessary, and/or brought up other issues that were of concern to a greater segment of the populace - perhaps the savage ridiculousness of condemning people to insanity-inducing torment for small crimes? (There is apparently only the one prison, after all.) Economic issues? - They have to pay for Hogwarts and the Ministry somehow, so that means taxes. Also possible restrictions on what can be done with cheaper mundane goods. Annoyances over restrictions on kinds of magic/objects allowed (ex. dark in the 'non-crude' sense Xenophilius mentions)? Concerns with other magical populations, human and not? And so on.

- Together with the above, more public rallies/demonstrations/leaflets/articles in the Prophet designed to gain sympathy from the public?

- After victory, how would he gain the loyalty of the public? One thing I suggested in comments to the earlier article was some sort of bread-and-circuses deal like the Nazi Strength Through Joy program. Trips, sporting events, medals to earn, useful goods?

- How would daily life have changed, including been curtailed? Censorship of the Prophet and other publications is an easy one - though perhaps putting out a rival and *better* publication might be another thing the DE government could do. (And Voldie would employ a competent and non-terrifying staff for the 'front desk' jobs.)

- How would the staff of Hogwarts, St Mungo's, etc. change?

- Did Voldie really want to break Secrecy? If not, how would that impact the WW? If so, how does he manage the other international governments bound by it, and how does the actual announcement go? What does the world look like then?

Anyway, some questions to play with!

Comments

[kitty_fic]

This is a really interesting article/essay/questions - do you mind if I link it to my flist. I think some of them would be interested in reading it.

It's also something you might want to link to the daily_snitch for the essay or discussion section of their newsletter?

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

Linking is fine! Thanks - I hope it's interesting to people. I'll see about the daily_snitch too.

[terri-testing.livejournal.com]

Recruitment rhetoric aside, I think what Voldie really wanted long-term was a world in which the Dark Lord reigned supreme, immortal and unchallengeable, with everyone on earth as his abject slaves. (Not that he needed slaves to DO anything, but he was still human enough to crave social interaction--but being a psychopath, there's only one kind of interaction he could actually appreciate.)

I doubt he saw us mundane folk as being able to act effectively to thwart him, so his first objective would have been the conquest of the WW, and then, yes, he would have ended Secrecy so all on earth could know and tremble at their dreadful Master.

Hence his promotion of Pureblood Supremacism, and his playing on the fears of the old families that their status and power is slipping away. Divide and conquer, of course, but also...

Well, long-term his genetic program would have been two-fold: encourage inbreeding among the existing Purebloods to weaken them (and encourage existing mixed bloods to start inbreeding--it'll take generations, but any genetecist will tell you it'll eventually have its result, if the base population is small enough--particularly if you have an outside pressure consistently weeding out the smartest and strongest).. As to Muggle-born witches as wizards, first discredit them as potential mates, then accuse them of stealing magic from the (increasingly prevalent) Squibs born to the Purebloods, and eventually start a program to identify and eliminate them at birth or shortly after.

Start in Britain, of course, but consolidate his hold on all the WW (possibly before moving on the his "final solution" for the Muggleborns) before addressing taking over the Muggle world too.

His regime, before he manages world domination, would probably have been a model of restoring those with Pure Blood (or pretensions there to), to what they felt to be their rightful positions of influence, while promoting a few token, extremely talented half-bloods.

In short, sort of what we did see in DH, but carried off without letting his loyal followers realize that they were really his slaves, and would be discarded as such once their misplaced loyalty was no longer useful to him. (In short, making his dupes think the window-dressing positions were real. Umbridge may possibly have thought she wielded real power, but Snape and the Malfoys surely harbored no delusions. They knew who was, not the glorious Leader of a movement of his peers, but the Master.)

Really, Tom's biggest mistake was not realizing that terrorized obedience was less useful than fanatical loyalty, and mis-managing his followers so as to turn the latter into (he expectedt) the former. He abandoned the carrot for a bigger stick. Consider: if Severus, like Peter, had expected the Dark Lord to win--which he once must have, to have joined--and if Severus trusted the Dark Lord to reward his most loyal followers, Sev's best option for saving Lily's life was to be the best possible little DE to earn her as a reward. Only Tom's own untrustworthiness made him desperate enough to turn to Albus.

Tom's second biggest error was Albus's, getting so lost in admiration of the cleverness of his own over-elaborate plans that he doesn't stay focussed, simply and brutally, on what would best and fastest achieve his goals.

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

/I doubt he saw us mundane folk as being able to act effectively to thwart him/

Why, though? He grew up in the Muggle world. He was living in a Muggle orphanage during World War II. Surely, even if he still viewed Muggles as weak and stupid, he’d know enough about them to know that their weapons were not weak or stupid. Unfortunately, JKR had him pretty much act like a pureblood wizard the moment that he went to Hogwarts, so he never really utilized any knowledge about Muggles from his days at the orphanage when trying to take over the wizarding world.

[maidofkent.livejournal.com]

There have been a number of fanfics (I remember an interesting Snape/Karkaroff) in which Tom used Muggles' lethal effectiveness as a recruiting tool - so there were lectures on topic such as the Holocaust (ironically), Hiroshima, environmental damage, encouraging wizards to take steps to gain power to save themselves. After all, magic wouldn't be of much use if you were in the vicinity of a nuclear explosion. It made sense as a way in which Tom could recruit the more intelligent of his followers (until JKR decided in DH that he didn't have any intelligent followers).

[sunnyskywalker]

Well, for one thing, since he is close to immortal, I think he'd have a plan that unfolded over at least a couple of centuries. What's the rush? Make sure everything is lined up properly before executing each phase of the plan.

I think extending the Hogwarts program to include primary school might be a good start. Keep all the magical kids under watch from a very young age, indoctrinated into the Cult of the Dark Lord, so that the next generation grows up taking his rule for granted. The pureblood parents would be sold on this by emphasizing that the kids will get to learn more about their glorious heritage while surrounded by their peers and taught by members of the best old families, and the Muggleborn kids would be separated from their families early so they'd be adjusted to the magical world - and their subordinate status - early, for minimum cultural "contamination." Voldemort would probably want the Muggleborn kids to make sure none of them grew up like he did and came into the wizarding world with big ideas and powers they developed while unsupervised, but he'd probably pitch it as a way to make sure the ww had enough useful worker bees doing the less desirable jobs, like receptionist at St. Mungo's. Plus he could emphasize the security risk of leaving those kids out in the Muggle world even for eleven years, doing who knows what accidental magic.

Probably he would encourage inbreeding as Terri suggests (those Muggleborns are for working, not marrying!), knowing it will help him within a few generations. I like your ideas of the rival newspaper and youth groups (wizarding summer camp has lots of possibilities). He could slowly introduce more and more innovations - maybe increasing restrictions on Muggleborns, then switching to rounding up and eliminating them after they're isolated enough, as Terri says. Alas, our servants have betrayed us... Maybe introducing the Dementors as guards in more places, like the Ministry, as a "precaution" to make extra sure no Muggles want to linger nearby. Creating more isolated wizarding enclaves like Hogsmeade and encouraging everyone who doesn't have a manor to move there, to keep further away from Muggles supposedly but of course also to control them. More information on how those terrible Muggles are making it harder to hide because they're breeding and spreading all over (this doesn't have to be a true reflection of the birthrate; he just has to make them believe it), plus they're leaving their trash everywhere. Biology class with captured Muggle specimens? He could expand his power into more countries, introducing similar measures in as many places as possible. Possibly he could start small with ideas of "greater international cooperation," and keep expanding - maybe some sort of twisted Magical European Union, which he could eventually rule.

The kids from the youth groups would grow up wanting to join the elite Death Eaters, where they could learn advanced magics and be close to the Dark Lord; there would also be lesser auxiliary groups. These would grow increasingly militarized, not just rounding up Muggleborns and "subversives," but also starting to surreptitiously target Muggles. He would emphasize not breaking Secrecy - at first. Just terrorizing anyone too close to wizarding areas, maybe "cleaning out" crowded neighborhoods to keep the numbers of Muggles down - and get his followers used to extreme violence against Muggles.

[sunnyskywalker]

Cont.

By this point, the purebloods are probably really in trouble with all their inbreeding, and they're now terrified enough of the teeming Muggle hordes and their pollution and WMDs for Voldemort to unveil the next phase: killing enough Muggles that they'll be easy to rule once wizards come out of hiding and make themselves lords of the earth. (Voldemort probably wouldn't want to have to hide from anyone forever.) They'll start cautiously, because they don't want anyone thinking there's a war and setting off any inconvenient nukes. But surely wizards could devise a Muggle-specific plague? And assassinate a lot of key political figures in ways that look like accidents or heart attacks to weaken the Muggles' response to the crisis? This might be a good time to loose the Dementors on the Muggle world, too.

What happens next depends on what he really wants, I guess. Does he enjoy the challenge of ruling magical people who might occasionally produce a rival? Does he have some sort of vision for the idea society he'd like to live in and rule? Then probably he'd try for some sort of status quo after conquering the Muggles. Maybe once there were actual Muggles in play, he could switch rhetoric and make halfbloods and Muggleborns acceptable again, to stabilize the magical population. Though shifting magicals around across international borders might also provide enough genetic diversity to keep them going for a while. Or does he just want absolute control and the chance to terrify and kill a lot of people for kicks? Then, once his wizarding followers have done the heavy lifting, maybe he'd do what Jodel suggested once and turn them over to the Dementors, leaving him the unchallenged only wizard ruling a much-reduced population of terrified Muggles. He'd give the Dementors free reign and have fun.