Smashing of Death Eaters?
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:date: 2019-04-21T20:19:39
:category: literature
:tags: review, harryPotter, blogComment, justice
(my comments on “`Canon and the Moral Dimensions of Killing in
War`_” thread on reddit)
.. _`Canon and the Moral Dimensions of Killing in War`:
https://www.reddit.com/r/HPfanfiction/comments/bf4n17/canon_and_the_moral_dimensions_of_killing_in_war/
This is no question of agreeing and disagreeing with me. What I wrote
was not exactly my opinion (which I specifically emphasized), but what I
consider the prevalent notion among Europeans. Discussion here is very
different from the one in the States (I lived there for five years
studying for law-related PhD), because the basic milieu is given by the
European Convention as “no” for the capital punishment, which is
obviously the opposite of the normal in many US states.
Considering my personal opinion, I have a legal education, so I spent
many hours discussion pro- and contra- of the capital punishment. My
conclusion of these discussion is that I understand a lot of reasons for
it, but in the end I am mildly supportive of ECHR, mainly because of
possibility of mistake. From the Harry Potter universe, if the mistake
of Sirius Black happened in the world with the capital punishment, there
would be probably no way how to rectify the mistake (or whatever it
was). However, I am not much fanatical against it, and for example I
have no problems with capital punishments for Nazi criminals given in
the Nuremberg trials.
I am a Christian (not a Catholic) and I respect a lot of the current
pope, but I think his declaration that the capital punishment is
eternally against the Gospel, is completely crazy. Not only it makes all
great Catholic theologians (including couple of Doctors of the Church)
opposing Gospel (which is mildly disturbing even to me), but I cannot
imagine myself standing in the courtroom and accusing all those who
voted for the capital punishment for Hermann Göring et al., that they
are standing against the justice. I am not sure what I would vote for
(and I am very glad I don’t have to make that decision), but certainly I
could very much understand and approve decision of those who thought
these monsters deserved to be hanged (in time when in the most countries
there was an automatic hanging for one intentional murder).
That’s for capital punishment. Concerning the morality of the killing in
war, I think it is slightly more problematic than what I understand you
suggest. I am not an expert on law of war, but if I recall correctly the
legitimate goal of the war effort is to eliminate war-making power of
the enemy with preference for preserving life and health of the other
side (for example by capturing enemy soldiers and putting them in the
POW camps, where they should be treated humanly). Thus, aerial carpet
bombing of both England and especially of Germany in the later phases of
the Second World War are highly problematic, not mentioning endless
number of war crimes committed by both sides on the Eastern Front.
I would highly disagree with your assessment of the First World War.
1. I am highly suspicious of motives of any large power in the
war (both French, Russians and to large extent British were
very much willing and happy to enter into the war; Belgians et
al. might be truly pure victims of the war), and I think the
Article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles (War Guilt Clause) was
just a piece of unjust anti-German propaganda hiding own
French partial guilt for the war.
2. Concerning the different results between the First and the
Second World War. I really don’t think the difference was
because Germany and Austria-Hungary was not sufficiently
smashed. You know certainly your German history better than
me, so you should know the state of the Germany after the
First World War, and I think it is correct to say that both
Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy were completely destroyed
(Austria-Hungary literally, the other two were mostly
non-functional for years, and especially in Italy one could
find an evidenced of the clear link between the collapse of
the government and rise of Fascism).
3. I believe a way more important than the level of smashing was
exact opposite: after the First World War destroyed countries
were mostly left to their devices (whether the similarly
ruined France and Britain were even able to help defeated
countries is another question, but certainly there was no will
to do so; if I recall correctly, the Keynes’ book had a little
impact on the treatment of defeated), but immediately after
the Second World War there was huge effort, first by UNRRA
later by the Marshall Plan, to get all countries of Europe
including the defeated ones to the functional state as soon as
possible (and the true perpetrators of the war were actually
punished, contrary to the First World War). Thus you had the
hyperinflation of 1920s in Germany, but the Wirtschaftswunder
of 1950s. That I think made the difference.
Now, back to the Harry Potter universe. I think the problem of smashing
of the Death Eater ideology is the different situation than after the
Second World War. First of all, this was civil war and more than the
true war, The Second Blood War was more law enforcement action capturing
criminals. Yes, criminals were proportionally almost as powerful as the
official government (which was captured by them), but still I think the
fit result of the conflict was just punishment of all criminals
(including collaborators and propagandist for the essentially racist
ideology), not large scale killing of all Death Eaters and their
friends. Tom Riddle fled from justice (which is quite ironic: he didn’t
flee from the death in the end, but he did so from justice) in the same
manner Adolf Hitler did, but whether the large scale criminals like
Lucius Malfoy, Yaxley, Dolores Umbridge, etc. deserved the Kiss by a
dementor (that’s probably the magical equivalent of the capital
punishment, right?) is an interesting question. Aside from the morality
of plea bargains (in case of Lucius Malfoy), which is another very
complicated question, we actually don’t know what was the result of the
Shacklebolt’s regime. There is not much (if anything) in the canon
describing the post-War resolution. Epilogue is nineteen years later,
and the situation may changed then a lot.
I would hope there was some effort of dedeatheaterization or something
like The Truth and Reconciliation Commission á la post-apartheid
Southern Africa, which are more fitting answers to the post-civil war
situation, but again the canon doesn’t say anything. There are some
lovely fanfiction stories on that theme:
- `Annals of Arithmancy by White_Squirrel`_ it is has finished
with both of these: dedeatheaterization and The Truth and
Reconciliation Commission. Yet, still the results are not quite
completely satisfactory.
- `Escape by SingularOddities`_ and especially `Mr
and Mrs Percy Weasley by SingularOddities`_ (both of which are
AU) deal with more realpolitik situation where the post-War
government has to balance its relatively weak political
position with efforts to re-establish the normalcy.
- `Grave Days by Northumbrian`_ and his universe (which
is probably the most canonical postwar fanon) don’t deal with
the situation much at all: some people are punished, most
important Death Eaters (sans Lucius Malfoy) are killed at
Hogwarts, and some went to Azkaban for life, but mostly
government is not significantly damaged and works as it
should now back under the management of good people.
- `The Weight of the After Paperyink`_ the (unfinished) story is
mainly focused on the international criminal court organized by
ICW, mostly about the psychological readjustment and PTSD from
the Carrows treatment of students.
.. _`Annals of Arithmancy by White_Squirrel`:
https://archiveofourown.org/works/15287883
.. _`Escape by SingularOddities`:
https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11916243
.. _`Mr and Mrs Percy Weasley by SingularOddities`:
https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12373273
.. _`Grave Days by Northumbrian`:
http://www.siye.co.uk/siye/viewstory.php?sid=128596
.. _`The Weight of the After Paperyink`:
https://archiveofourown.org/works/8449852
