Amycus

[lapin-agile.livejournal.com]

Okay. alt_amycus needs his own discussion: two posts in an evening. And, omg, I'm terrified for alt_terry!

What do you suppose Amycus's "new regimen" lists mean?

I.
4L x 3D
Tx30
CCx4
results marginal

pigeons

II.
4L x 2D
2 pair trousers
5 CC but scattered.

I thought the first one was some sort of list of punishments in code, but "2 pair trousers" doesn't seem to fit. Perhaps he's trying experimental pigeon extermination strategies? But again, "2 pair trousers"? Am I making this harder than it needs to be?

Comments

[lapin-agile.livejournal.com]

although "731" explicitly suggests vivisection, biological and chemical poisoning, weapons testing, etc. some of which would be extremely irresponsible to undertake in a school (full of pureblood children who shouldn't be put at risk of infection).

Reading the wiki entry became horribly relevant when I got to the part about plague fleas... fortunately Terry's flea problem does not seem to have infected anybody with the plague (or anything else flea borne)... yet.

I suspect that the infectious disease experiments would be grounds for throwing the Carrows out of Hogwarts (for risking the LP's son's life and others'). The DEs would surely take decisive action against that sort of madness. But if they are "just" going to chop Terry up or freeze his limbs or poison him, it would be very difficult for McG to stop it. Perhaps Poppy can patch him up/restore him, but doesn't that just send him back to the lab for a fresh round of tests?

[black-dog.livejournal.com]

irresponsible to undertake in a school full of pureblood children

I can just imagine Lucius' fury! Or the LP's. Interesting hint of significant possible divisions in the DE movement -- the Carrows and their sort really are over the top, even from a "mainstream" DE perspective.

I thought about the fleas, too, when I read about the vats in the wiki article. Also the hypothermia.

[longstrider.livejournal.com]

The Carrows and Bella seem to be very much from the 'cleanse the world' end of things whereas Lucius seems to be from the 'white man's burden' end of things. A very dark & twisted version of an already fairly dark concept, but he seems very much of the "Sigh, I have take care of everything by myself. Again!" sort of frame of mind. (Ignoring his muggle camp rampage.)

[brimtoast.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I like that distinction.

Do you think the Muggles are being kept alive because they are, after all, animals at least and it would be inhumane to slaughter a ton of animals? Or because Voldemort (who I refuse to refer to by the Lord Protector title) anticipates having some use for them in the future? Like the human experimentation stuff we're seeing here. Or possibly just as a PR thing, because it would be too difficult to justify mass killings to the wizarding public?

Or do you think the camps they are in are more like WW2 death camps than we've seen, but we haven't seen it on the journals because it's not public knowledge?

(You don't have to actually answer that. Just thinking aloud, inspired by your comments)

[longstrider.livejournal.com]

I was actually thinking about the camps and the different classes of people in Voldie's England. (Has it been established what portion of the Isles are behind the wards? Is it just Britian, B & Scotland, B & S & Wales or does it include Ireland as well?)

We have 4 to 7 classes of people, (1)Pure bloods, blood traitors, those of 'mixed' heritage but several generations back, (2)half-bloods, (3)muggle-born, (4)muggles and squibs.

A couple assumptions/questions here. In canon the muggle to wizard ratio is HUGE (UK pop minus N Ireland in 1981 was ~55,000,000 & even the most generous estimates of wizarding pop are in the 10,000 range unless JKR ignored hundreds of students at Hogwarts or failed to mention multiple other schools in the UK) multiple 1000s to 1 at best for wizards. If those numbers hold and there hasn't already been a massive slaughter/exodus of muggles this is a logistical problem of control so those in power need to be looking for an intermediary population to control the muggles or even more draconian population controls. However I see no intermediary population for them to coopt. Squibs haven't been touched on (but the absence of Flich speaks volumes,) Half-bloods are being integrated into the wizard population (see numerous examples in the journals,) and the most obvious choice muggle-borns is verboten by the PTB. Along with this we've seen no indication of a class of muggle 'foremen' or collaborators given special privileges. This means (barring the aforementioned draconian population reductions) that Voldie's regime is headed for problems, see real world British Imperial India & Apartheid South Africa.

Now we may just be hand waving the population problems (as JKR did, it's hard to reconcile Hogwarts student numbers and the Quidditch Cup audience numbers and well we're all familiar with her 'maths'... issues) or working with different world assumptions or it's just not plot relevant so it's being ignored but my analytical brain and world building experience makes me want to poke at this sort of thing.

[lapin-agile.livejournal.com]

You might want to pop this question up as a fresh post: it might be more likely to attract an answer from the player or mod.

I want to know what they've decided about this population stuff.

We have had theoretical discussion of squibs in the kids conversations on how magic works: they are being taught that squibs are caused when a Muggle family steals the squib's magic in order to endow their own Muggleborn child with magical ability. Lucius had to admit to Pansy that the Ministry is studying how that works and can't yet explain it.

I've wondered about Filch's absence. Where are the Wizards warehousing their squib children?

As for Muggle "foremen"; I think you are right that the Ministry doesn't have a program of elevating some to manage the rest, but Arthur does this in an ad hoc way when he goes to the camps just before Bonfire Night and talks to the chap who had been elected Mayor of ... (somewhere - Bristol, maybe? - can't remember), according him respect and seeking his help in keeping the disturbances down to a minimum. (Arthur makes a pragmatic appeal, saying that the camps can't afford to lose numbers to another round of Muggle bashing by the DEs, and the man, though he distrusts Arthur, seems to see the logic of this.)

As for population purges. We do have some signs that there were mass killings early on in the LP's seizure of Britain from Muggle control: someone (Sirius or Lupin, I think) told Harry in comments somewhere (sorry to be providing no links!) that Muggle doctors were among the first to be killed, but then struck through that comment, apparently thinking that the LP would not much like his son to learn that lesson in realpolitik.

[wintercreek]

Muggle doctors were among the first to be killed

Lupin says so, here.

[lapin-agile.livejournal.com]

Your memory wins! (Thanks for the link.)

[wintercreek]

Does Seamus's presence indicate that Ireland is within the wards? Also, since Hogwarts is canonically in Scotland it's probably safe to assume that the wards encompass Scotland in addition to Britain and Ireland ... and at that point, why not include Wales?