The new pre-epilogue

[sunnyskywalker]

Excerpt here.

Maybe Pottermore members can fill us on on what's in the rest of "Rita's" article?

I have to wonder what they have added to the wizarding world's water supply. Remember how wizards used to be fickle creatures, capable of going from hero-worship to deep suspicion and hatred based on a few gossip columns or rumors in the halls? No longer!

As the crowd stampeded, tents were flattened and small children mown down. Fans from all corners of the globe stormed towards the area where members of Dumbledore’s Army were rumoured to have been sighted, desperate above all else for a glimpse of the man they still call the Chosen One.

Since Harry is about to turn 34, this is roughly 16 years after the DA did its thing. That they're still famous for being the DA, and Auroring and whatever else is clearly a distant, secondary consideration, suggests that they haven't really done anything all that newsworthy lately. (I would bet on the cut being from a game of pickup Quidditch with Ron & co. or something equally boring.) Yet they're excited enough to see Harry that Rita can spin it into a stampede?

There must have been nothing happening at all in the WW for the last 16 years. I guess they really do disappear when Rowling isn't looking.

Comments

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

Now we find out that the whole Wizarding World (every wizard in every country very much included!) cheers for and adores Scottish rugby team.

Yeah, never mind the fact that, in the entire series there is no mention whatever that anybody in the WW is even aware rugby exists, let alone cares about it. That's just a stupid muggle game, right?

English is not my native language so maybe I have this wrong, but would it be less sexist to say "married to the undeniably beautiful"?
Just married sounds like he was the one deciding on it and she had no choice in it.

No, it wouldn't matter. If you changed it to "is married to" it would mean the same thing. The only difference is between a direct object (married the...) and the object of a preposition (is married to the...). So Fleur's an object either way (grammatically, and arguably in the eyes of the sexist and misogynistic WW).

I can see why you might think that, though. "Married" sounds more forceful than "Is married to." Skeeter's sleazy insinuations--particularly the thinly-veiled accusations of rape and forced marriage--add to that impression.

Why doesn't this woman get sued for libel? In Britain, she'd have a hard time defending herself since these allegations are clearly both malicious and false.

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

Anyone here watched NBC's "Hannibal"? In S02E03 "Hassum", Freddie Lounds (blogger of the tabloid site Tattle-Crime) was called up as a witness to prove that Will Graham is a murdering psycopath, but Will's attorney swiftly discredited her with the following:

"Ms. Lounds, please tell us how many times you've been sued for libel?"

"six..."

"I'm sorry I can't hear you."

"SIX."

"Six... And how many times have you settled outside of court?"

"Six."

"Six times...thank you. Oh, no further questions, Your Honor."

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

But "Hannibal" is an American TV show, and American and British libel/slander laws are polar opposites. In Britain, it's assumed that if you make a statement like Skeeter's you're being both dishonest and malicious. The defendant has to prove his/her innocence. In America, if you write something like Skeeter did, it's assumed you're stating your honest belief or sincere opinion. The plaintiff has to prove you were being both dishonest and malicious. So it's easy for the plaintiff to win a case in Britain and very hard in America. In addition, it's virtually impossible for celebrities, which Bill and Fleur are, to win a case in America because it's assumed people are going to say bad things about celebrities, and that's just part of being famous, so suck it up, rich and famous person. In most ways, American and British laws are very similar, but this is a glaring difference. America's extremely liberal First Amendment allows for a lot more verbal leeway, so that figures in, too.

[dracasadiablo.livejournal.com]

Why would WW need libel/slander laws?
"Daily Prophet" had a joint Ginny and Rita article on the Cup finale. Ginny was covering the game and Rita was lookign at the VIP box and, well, commenting on former DA (and families) in classic Rita way.
Somehow Ginny was able to watch the game, write her part of the article and read what Rita was writing all at the same time. So, in the end Ginny hexed her (we aren't told what hex it was) so much that Rita was unable to write more or recover in time the article come out.

In WW there's no reason to bother with law case when you can just put people in hospital and not be punished for it.

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

But @oneandthetruth, the character of Freddie Lounds (in the original book Red Dragon he's a male tabloid journalist and in the TV series a gender-flipped blogger) keeps getting taken down a peg in the stories, even though he/she makes big money writing exploitive and mostly untrue material. In the book he threatened to foil the FBI's plan unless he gets in the investigation and writes a piece, an inter-state transmission of a threatening message which the FBI totally recorded down in case they needed to burn him, since in such a case even the 1st Amendment won't be saving him. What I'm trying to say is that both Skeeter and Lounds had done damage to their reputations as a journalist that no one in their right mind ought to believe them anymore. But they just booody do.

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

both Skeeter and Lounds had done damage to their reputations as a journalist that no one in their right mind ought to believe them anymore. But they just booody do.

That makes sense if you're talking about an open society with a variety of news sources, but it's easily rebutted with an example from current news about the Malaysian airliner that was shot down.

I watch a lot of political talk shows. Recently I've seen several conversations like this:

Talking Head 1: In Russia, the news media are saying the plane wasn't an airliner, it was a spy plane. They're saying a lot of the people were already dead when the plane took off, which is why some of the bodies were naked when they were discovered.*

TH 2: But that's crazy! Surely the Russian people wouldn't believe anything so ridiculous.

TH 1: Yeah, they would, because the government controls all the news media in Russia. So the people only hear what the government wants them to hear, and they never hear information that conflicts with what the government is saying.

Now, I realize the British WW does not have government-run media, but it is a closed society with only a few news outlets. So it's reasonable for people to assume that if Rita Skeeter has been able to write whatever she wants for years and years, it must be reasonably close to the truth, or she would be either reined in by her bosses or fired.

*When I first heard this, I immediately thought the Russian media must have seen the first episode of that new TV show, The Strain, and were ripping it off. It involves a plane full of dead people that lands at JFK Airport. They were killed by a super vampire that was hidden in the cargo hold and was being shipped in so some dying billionaire could have eternal life. 'Cause what's a few hundred innocent dead people, and the possibility of an epidemic of super-vampire virus infecting one of the world's biggest cities, matter when an old rich guy's life is at stake? (no pun intended)

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

Well, dracasdiablo, Ginny obviously didn't do a good job of controlling Rita if she let that vile libel about her brother possibly being a kidnapper and rapist get by her. I'm sure Ginny wouldn't care about Fleur being trashed, but you'd think she wouldn't want Bill to be insulted.

BTW, I didn't know Ginny was watching Rita write her article. It doesn't say that in the OP, and the excerpt I read didn't mention that.

You have a good point about lawsuits not being necessary when you can assault people and get away with it. Yet they consider themselves more civilized than non-magical people.

[dracasadiablo.livejournal.com]

Rita's always been a bit of a meta-voice for the series.
True. Rita is nasty. And she's not above lying and trying to destroy a schoolgirl out of pettiness. But a lot of times she is saying (admittedly presented in worst light possible) the truth.

Yeah, never mind the fact that, in the entire series there is no mention whatever that anybody in the WW is even aware rugby exists, let alone cares about it. That's just a stupid muggle game, right?
The whole rugby thing is horrible.
It's stupid, makes no sense, turns everybody in WW into JKR sport fan self-insert, shows us that even before DD all Hogwarts professors were crap at their job and utterly unable to care for children.

But to me the Fridge Horror of "one of (suspected) Squib players looks suspiciously like Hagrid".
We know just how sensitive and tolerant of Squibs Hagrid is so can you imagine him having a kid that can't do magic? Not only would the poor body be in constant danger that some of daddy's "interesting" critters would eat him, he would also have to deal with Hagrid's prejudices.
And that's the better option! I don't even want to think that we are supposed to consider the possibility that Hagrid is that player's uncle.

Only bright spot is when Jo admits that wizard's love of rugby have a "element of sadism in it".

Thank you for explaining that!
It really sounds terrible. If it was just Rita being catty it wouldn't be so bad. But WW is sexist. And the way Jo writes female characters she dislikes also smacks of internalized misogyny. That or lack of empathy and narcissistic tendencies.