I'm just thinking through this -- maybe over-thinking -- but I wonder if the program would really be just for infants? On the one hand, we have the magical book which registers magical people at birth. On the other hand, canon suggests that magic doesn't manifest itself until later in childhood. I think Hermione was nine, though I think she also said that that was a little bit late.
As you've said, it would be hard enough to persuade Muggle parents to give up their children even if they knew for sure that they were magical; how much harder would it be if they have no actual visible evidence about the child. I imagine some parents only buy in to the program when the child starts manifesting signs, say at six or seven or eight. At which point it's a race against time, to do something before the authorities notice and take action.
So I wonder if a program for older children exists, and how it might work, or even if it could work.
I realize I'm being really speculative, on a thread that, by contrast, has turned up some very interesting "hard" arguments. I think it might be worth doing that anyway, just to become more attuned and to watch out closely for a range of possible clues that might turn up in the game, as evidence for or against any of this.
How would a swap of older children work? Would the only openings involve a death in a wizarding family, or could there be a swap of Squib for Muggleborn, seeing that Squibs aren't going to be treated that well, either? That kind of swap would make things even more brutal for the wizarding family that was involved. I wonder if that might be why the death of the Swithins would be so remarkably hard on Alice Longbottom -- more than just the failure of an eight-year-old recruitment program.
And how would you hide the swap, in the case of an older child? Speculating wildly, a "replacement" older child might be, say, pulled out of school and homeschooled, like Ginny, or sent to a neighboring village, like Luna, to reduce the chance that the Ministry would notice.
Again, I'm theorizing way ouside the currently available evidence, but I'm just sort of generating hypotheses with the idea that as bits and pieces emerge, certain kinds of evidence might be worth watching out for.
no subject
As you've said, it would be hard enough to persuade Muggle parents to give up their children even if they knew for sure that they were magical; how much harder would it be if they have no actual visible evidence about the child. I imagine some parents only buy in to the program when the child starts manifesting signs, say at six or seven or eight. At which point it's a race against time, to do something before the authorities notice and take action.
So I wonder if a program for older children exists, and how it might work, or even if it could work.
I realize I'm being really speculative, on a thread that, by contrast, has turned up some very interesting "hard" arguments. I think it might be worth doing that anyway, just to become more attuned and to watch out closely for a range of possible clues that might turn up in the game, as evidence for or against any of this.
How would a swap of older children work? Would the only openings involve a death in a wizarding family, or could there be a swap of Squib for Muggleborn, seeing that Squibs aren't going to be treated that well, either? That kind of swap would make things even more brutal for the wizarding family that was involved. I wonder if that might be why the death of the Swithins would be so remarkably hard on Alice Longbottom -- more than just the failure of an eight-year-old recruitment program.
And how would you hide the swap, in the case of an older child? Speculating wildly, a "replacement" older child might be, say, pulled out of school and homeschooled, like Ginny, or sent to a neighboring village, like Luna, to reduce the chance that the Ministry would notice.
Again, I'm theorizing way ouside the currently available evidence, but I'm just sort of generating hypotheses with the idea that as bits and pieces emerge, certain kinds of evidence might be worth watching out for.