A Paper for English class

Creative Forums Creative Writing
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The Overzealous, Paranoid, Delusional, Christian Perspective Continues

Dear The Undersigned, Christian Extremists, and the creator of exposingsatanism.org,
I read your petition online. Let’s take a look on what you have to say:
“Dear World,
Please take into consideration this petition. Harry Potter, the new ‘fad’ for books and movies is evil. Some people disagree saying, ‘Oh it is only a harmless book’. But what lurks behind those pages, it more evil then Harry Potter himself. Please help us band harry potter and read some of the comments made by children who have read these dreadful books. And please, read this one right below carefully, and reread it if you have to. 'And here is dear Ashley, a 9 year old, the typical average age reader of Harry Potter: ‘I used to believe in what they taught us at Sunday School,’ said Ashley, conjuring up an ancient spell to summon Cerebus, the three-headed hound of hell. ‘But the Harry Potter books showed me that magic is real, something I can learn and use right now, and that the Bible is nothing but Boring lies.’ age 9…what is this world coming to?” (Undersigned 1)

First time I read this, I was actually shocked. Did a little girl actually say this? I took your advice and I reread the quote. “…said Ashley, conjuring up an ancient spell to summon Cerebus, the three-headed hound of hell.” In English literature, the comma is used to divide, or pause (like so), certain parts of speech. The sentence, “…said Ashley (comma) conjuring up an ancient spell to summon Cerebus…” implies that this little girl was actually summoning Cerebus while she was talking. This is quite obvious.

So, wait! Little innocent nine-year old Ashley was literally summoning a hell hound! Absurd! As soon as the curiousity, bewilderment, and cautious, creeping anger came over me, I copied and pasted this quote into Google Search Engine. Guess what came up? The Onion , a well known newspaper that is entirely built upon false information for the simple purpose of obvious, “outta-whack” humor. So you really intend to persuade people to help sign your petition by using an article from The Onion? You obviously did not take your own advice, maybe you should reread the quote yourself. Next time you want to make an outlandish statement, such as Harry Potter being satanic, avoid using quotes taken from The Onion, and if you do, make sure you delete the part about Ashley summoning Cerebus while she’s talking.

For the creator of exposingsatanism.org: Although there is an obvious difference between our perspectives, lifestyle, and affiliation with religion, there are some fallacies I would like to point out about your take on Harry Potter. You wrote:

“There are many books about Witchcraft but none so cleverly packaged like the latest. Satan is up to his old tricks again and the main focus is the children of the world. The latest crazy is a series of books by author J.K. Rowling, known as Harry Potter.”
(“Exposing” 1)

It’s easy to call just about anything satanic, or in your words, “Satan’s old tricks.” Let’s take a look around. Where was the uproar during the show of Sabrina the Teenage Witch? What about Pinocchio? The North Star was once seen as a figure of the occult, and Geppeto prayed to it (which would be blasphemous) for a boy, and in return the Blue Fairy of the North Star gave life to a wooden doll. Demonic possession, perhaps?

If J.K. Rowling purposely wrote a series of books to promote witchraft into the minds of children, then who is to say what isn’t? The book is meant for imagination; it’s meant for fantasy. Do you know what that means? Fantasy? Just in case you don’t, here’s the definition: Fantasy is a genre of art that uses magic and other supernatural forms as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting (“Fantasy”). Notice how it says nothing of satanism. If Harry Potter is part of Satan’s work, then Satan must not be doing his job very well. In the literature world, it would go far back to the “Epic of Gilgamesh.” George MacDonald, William Morris, Rudyard Kipling, Nathaniel Hawthorne, J.R.R. Tolkien, and C.S. Lewis (to name a few) would be deemed satanic by your standards, but are seen as tasteful, professional writers in literature throughout Western literature (“Fantasy”). Are they trying to introduce the occult into our minds? Why don’t you ask them, see what they say? Is it ironic to you how Harry Potter hasn’t turned anyone onto satanism? If you can prove this wrong, do so, I would be very surpised. You wrote:

“(sic)Harry is a nobody, treated like dirt by the aunt and uncle who begrudingly inherited him when his parents were killed. For the first 10 years of his life Harry sleeps in a cupboard under the stairs of his only living family who loathe him never realizing he’s special. Note how the adults are depicted as hateful and perhaps strict. Then note how these wizards and other creatures are the good guys. These types of writings are nothing more than Satan’s way to undermine the family. Kid get these books and then live in a fantasy world and rebel against their parents.” (“Exposing” 1)

If you had the mental capacity to understand books, you would not be offended by fantasy books. The message behind this shows that Harry Potter was once in a world of the only tangible people he knew did not believe in him, or rather, did not care for him. He was able to escape because he was actually special. How does this remind you of Satan?

If Harry Potter is some sort of tool of Satan, then what else is? Noticing how your website has it’s own tab for “false beliefs,” which is ignorantly compiled of different articles including why Buddhism, Hinduism, Islamic, Atheism (which is strange because atheism is the disbelief…) are false beliefs, it is an easy assumption to say that everything besides yourself is possessed. If everything besides Christianity (and in your case, only the extreme version of Christianity) is false, are they satanic? If Harry Potter is a tool of Satan, and everything else besides your arrogancy of your blind faith is the same, then your God is failing miserably. The world must be possessed, only except your delusions that your religion is the only truth that you hazardly spew out as if your ideas are rational. Quotes from the Bible aren’t good enough. There is no subjective, rational support behind your ideas, it is only childish naiviete that binds you to your own doom of diminishing hope of all rational thought.

Another thing I want to point out to all people who want to ban Harry Potter from public libraries and schools. I can only assume that you are striving to do something good for the community, and for the children. You hope to eliminate things that you fear, and you happen to fear a series of books intended for children. To your surprise, Harry Potter has been a very succesful book in terms of getting children to actually read. You are openly hostile towards people using their imagination, as if Harry Potter was a sort of “gateway drug” to introduce Satanism. You are driven by fear. Fear is necessary sometimes, but being afraid of a book is nonsense. Extreme Chrsitians discourage enjoyment of fiction because they want God to be their only imaginary friend. If Harry Potter promotes Satanism, then your God has failed, and failed miserably.

-This is only the rough draft, and it’s short of one page. The project given was to present an argument towards a source, but in letter form. Although this looks like a letter, it wasn’t made for actually delivering the letter, if that makes sense. If you’re curious about this guy, check out exposingsatanism.org Tell me what you think!

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Nobody? Don’t be shy/afriad of giving criticism!

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How old are you, and what class/year are we talking about…?

At a brief glance, you need to tidy up your paragraphing, be a little less zealous with the adjectives in places, and give the piece some linear structure. As it stands it’s a little too stream-of-consciousness’y: ie: “Hi - I wrote this exactly in the order that I thought about it…”

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I’m 19 and a freshman in college. The original is on a nice word processor, and when I copied and pasted it, it messed up the paragraphing. It is very stream of consciousness, but I always end up writing like that in the end; it seems hard to avoid. I appreciate your comments. =D>

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Well, I tend to think about something over a couple of days, and have a pad and a pencil laying around to jot down any good soundbytes or ideas that come to mind. When I have enough of an outline, then I sit down at the computer and write. Wether you have the luxury of time is another matter.

It’s not always possible to give everything a beginning, a middle and an end, at which point putting like with like, and ending the piece with a re-itteration of the central theme is about the best we can do.

Anyway, hope your coursework goes well - And always remember the academic writer’s mantra: “Given a choice of being boring and right, and cool but shakey… go with boring.”

Plenty of time to be hip later with a diploma tucked away in a drawer at home.

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Excellent point.

I enjoyed this paper (obviously) because it was our only project that was “open,” or being able to write freely without much research.

I’m interested in your writing! Can you show me something?

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Check the blog - the link is now in my signature.

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i think you have a good start, and you seem to be doing a nice job of keeping within a set of boundaries to avoid letting this essay turn into the book that it is begging to be.
the perspective of choosing other “respected” children’s works (that many people don’t have issue with) to side with harry potter seems like a good way to show people that opposition to harry potter is silly.
poking fun of her for taking the onion seriously is a grand idea, how much longer before people start taking “weekly world news” (or whatever the current outlandish “news” tabloid is) seriously?
how about pointing out that the mistake she is accusing/worried about the children making is the same mistake that she is making - in other words, it’s understandable that she would find harry potter to be dangerous… she takes “the onion” seriously. perhaps a better question to ask might be targeted at determining if she has a firm grasp of reality?

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Don’t use ‘you’ in a formal essay.

If it is supposed to be a letter, then it’s fine.

Interesting, funny topic. I like the sentence structures. It is stream-of-conscious style. A lot of the stream-of-consciousness will be taken care of by rephrasing without using ‘you’.

I don’t know. I really hate reading an essay with ‘you’ in it. Letters have very little structure and are only easy to read by the recepient. I think it should remain an essay and more informative; not so directed toward one person instead of the audience.

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It is a letter. At the end of the letter, I point out that was the project.

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It’s just that the teacher wanted for the class to do a Rogerian/Toulmin style of arguing, which is ambigiously targeted towards an audience, although it is meant for one person (or in this case, a small handful). The project is similar to MLK’s Letter from Birmingham Jail.