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Grim Truth 91/08/12
Dec. 8th, 2008 10:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alt_siriusGreetings, British Wizarding World.
And to you elite who used to (still?) call yourselves Death Eaters: sorry to disappoint. I’m not dead yet.
That’s right. Your Lord Pretender is looking everywhere for me, has many of you searching high and low. Everywhere but in the places where you should be looking, that is. Frankly I’m quite flattered. To think that he’s gone to so much trouble over only a couple of little minor addresses! Amazing over-reaction, if you ask me, but then he always has been given to dramatics. If my words are so false, then ask yourselves why they frighten your leader so?
Well, at any rate, they haven’t caught me, and I don’t intend they will anytime soon. Meanwhile, I see that Bonfire Night raised a bit of a stir and the horrid business at Cherwell has been shifted to my shoulders—by the very men responsible for it in the first place. And most lately there have been some ‘examples’ made of a few rabble-rousers in the camps. These executions are a deplorable commentary, not on the evil of your so-called council, but on the complacency of the ordinary wizard. Yes, I mean you. All of you reading. All of you who do not speak out against the reinstitution of human slavery. All of you who do not act when children are savagely punished by sadists and the Unforgivable Curses have become commonplace. All of you who willingly give up your rights to free speech and free thought, who swallow your good sense in order to cower before the pallid face of hypocrisy, who ignore hundreds of years of peace in exchange for a few brief moments of life in open control.
If you can look in your mirror and honestly tell yourself that the government is right, that Muggles and Muggle-borns are somehow less worthy than yourself, that they have any less right to a life free of subjugation and humiliation, if you can look into the eyes of your loved ones and say with no tremor in your voice that Muggles are no better than animals, that they deserve their fate, or that they should be forced into lives of servitude, if you can do that, well, then you may be beyond saving yourselves. But if there is the least ounce of empathy in your being, if you possess the faintest glimmer of shame at the treatment these ‘lesser’ castes receive, then you cannot stand silent and still while atrocities continue to grow.
Even now, at Hogwarts, certain ‘professors’ hold their positions solely as a means to terrorise their pupils, while others have made travesties of their subjects. How many of you fear for your children's education with them at the helm? How many of you look at their ilk and wonder how it is they are not called disgraces to the name of wizard?
The answer is not pleasant, but it is true: they are there because the Lord Protector cares only to raise a generation of toadies, blindly following his edicts and ignorant to the real problems faced by his untenable social order. He allows sadists and fools to teach your children because they will keep them from questioning too closely.
Keeping everyone else busy and occupied helps, too. And this time of year is perfect for it. The season of Christmas is approaching, and I see from much of your writing that you are all preparing for the pleasantries as your means permit. But amid the bustle, I ask you to pause and think about the things they would rather you not consider. I ask you to pause in your scurrying about laying in the pudding and the goose and the presents, and think about the true lessons and spirit of the festival. It’s not just a time to gather our loved ones and neighbours to us. It’s not just about our gifts to our own, but the affirmation of generosity and graciousness to all—and that includes halfbloods, Muggle-borns and Muggles alongside ‘purebloods.’ We cannot put them down just to build ourselves up.
My friends, everyone wants success and prosperity. That’s part of the human condition. But doing so at the expense of other lives brings with it a terrible price. I know you’re afraid to speak, afraid to act, while you are not sure whom you can trust. But you must make a start before it is forever too late. Start in your homes. Start with those closest to you. Let them know, privately if you can, how you really feel. Especially in this season, the time of year when tradition encourages us to remember those less fortunate, to give to loved ones and neighbours, do not allow the lies to cloud the Grim Truth. Do not allow your fear to silence your hearts.
The responsibility lies with each and every one of us. Waiting and hoping, keeping silent, is not enough.
And to you elite who used to (still?) call yourselves Death Eaters: sorry to disappoint. I’m not dead yet.
That’s right. Your Lord Pretender is looking everywhere for me, has many of you searching high and low. Everywhere but in the places where you should be looking, that is. Frankly I’m quite flattered. To think that he’s gone to so much trouble over only a couple of little minor addresses! Amazing over-reaction, if you ask me, but then he always has been given to dramatics. If my words are so false, then ask yourselves why they frighten your leader so?
Well, at any rate, they haven’t caught me, and I don’t intend they will anytime soon. Meanwhile, I see that Bonfire Night raised a bit of a stir and the horrid business at Cherwell has been shifted to my shoulders—by the very men responsible for it in the first place. And most lately there have been some ‘examples’ made of a few rabble-rousers in the camps. These executions are a deplorable commentary, not on the evil of your so-called council, but on the complacency of the ordinary wizard. Yes, I mean you. All of you reading. All of you who do not speak out against the reinstitution of human slavery. All of you who do not act when children are savagely punished by sadists and the Unforgivable Curses have become commonplace. All of you who willingly give up your rights to free speech and free thought, who swallow your good sense in order to cower before the pallid face of hypocrisy, who ignore hundreds of years of peace in exchange for a few brief moments of life in open control.
If you can look in your mirror and honestly tell yourself that the government is right, that Muggles and Muggle-borns are somehow less worthy than yourself, that they have any less right to a life free of subjugation and humiliation, if you can look into the eyes of your loved ones and say with no tremor in your voice that Muggles are no better than animals, that they deserve their fate, or that they should be forced into lives of servitude, if you can do that, well, then you may be beyond saving yourselves. But if there is the least ounce of empathy in your being, if you possess the faintest glimmer of shame at the treatment these ‘lesser’ castes receive, then you cannot stand silent and still while atrocities continue to grow.
Even now, at Hogwarts, certain ‘professors’ hold their positions solely as a means to terrorise their pupils, while others have made travesties of their subjects. How many of you fear for your children's education with them at the helm? How many of you look at their ilk and wonder how it is they are not called disgraces to the name of wizard?
The answer is not pleasant, but it is true: they are there because the Lord Protector cares only to raise a generation of toadies, blindly following his edicts and ignorant to the real problems faced by his untenable social order. He allows sadists and fools to teach your children because they will keep them from questioning too closely.
Keeping everyone else busy and occupied helps, too. And this time of year is perfect for it. The season of Christmas is approaching, and I see from much of your writing that you are all preparing for the pleasantries as your means permit. But amid the bustle, I ask you to pause and think about the things they would rather you not consider. I ask you to pause in your scurrying about laying in the pudding and the goose and the presents, and think about the true lessons and spirit of the festival. It’s not just a time to gather our loved ones and neighbours to us. It’s not just about our gifts to our own, but the affirmation of generosity and graciousness to all—and that includes halfbloods, Muggle-borns and Muggles alongside ‘purebloods.’ We cannot put them down just to build ourselves up.
My friends, everyone wants success and prosperity. That’s part of the human condition. But doing so at the expense of other lives brings with it a terrible price. I know you’re afraid to speak, afraid to act, while you are not sure whom you can trust. But you must make a start before it is forever too late. Start in your homes. Start with those closest to you. Let them know, privately if you can, how you really feel. Especially in this season, the time of year when tradition encourages us to remember those less fortunate, to give to loved ones and neighbours, do not allow the lies to cloud the Grim Truth. Do not allow your fear to silence your hearts.
The responsibility lies with each and every one of us. Waiting and hoping, keeping silent, is not enough.
