Harry Potter: Magic, not Witchcraft (Also, a Few Pictures From the Croatia Trip)

Pictures first! Jar of Wonders suggested that I post some pictures from the trip, so here you go! None of these were taken by me, (I didn't have my camera with me) but by my photographically talented friends.

Part of our team in the Amsterdam airport

The other part of our team in the airport

The Campers!

Flag Tag!

My team! GO YELLOW DETECTIVES!

Now for the second part of this post: Harry Potter. I realize some people don't want to read these because of the use of witches and wizards. But sometimes, I get frustrated when people assume it's bad, just because it has those words in it, without knowing what it's really about. Saying that Harry Potter is evil because it has witches and wizards to me is like saying that Hunger Games is evil because it's about children killing children. They're the same basic assumptions, and the same lack of knowledge. Now, if you feel that it goes against your conscience to read them, then fine. I'm not telling you that you have to read them or anything else. I just want to explain a little about them. You don't have to read them!

First, the terms witches and wizards. Most people, which seems strange to me, don't seem to have a problem with the word "wizard". Also people seem to forget that many of our favorite characters in other stories are wizards. Merlin from King Arthur and Gandalf from Lord of the Rings are two examples. But as to the term witch. In Harry Potter it absolutely does not refer to the people we think of when we think of witches. We tend to think of witches as creepy old ladies who ride around on broomsticks making witches brew, cackling cursing people, and generally being evil. In Harry Potter, however witch simply denotes female. Like actor and actress. Wizards are male magical people, and witches are female magical people. It's nothing more than a way of differentiating between genders.

This brings me to a second thing. The school is called Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Alot of people also seem to have a problem with the word witchcraft. When I think of the word "witchcraft" outside of Harry Potter it brings to mind something evil. When people pray to demons and stuff like that. But when I think of the word magic, (I know this seems a bit off topic, but bear me with me) I think of all the cool things in the fantasy books I love to read. The prophecies, magical creatures. Take Eragon for example. They cast magic spells all the time. Spells, by the way, seem to be another thing that bother people in Harry Potter. But the fact that those spell require a wand, (nothing more than a magical object, which are found in all kinds of fantasy books) does not make them any different from the spells cast in, say, Eragon, which are don't require anything but speech. But back to magic and witchcraft.  In Harry Potter, the word "witchcraft" is just like a term for what a person does. Like a forester learns woodcraft. A witch, (female magical person) learns witchcraft. A wizard, (male magical person) learns wizardry. In Harry Potter witchcraft is nothing more than magic. I realize that this is not the way it works in the real world, but I also realize that Harry Potter is a work of fiction, fantasy fiction at that. So it's not the same as in the real world. In the world of Harry Potter, witchcraft is a fancy term for magic. And come to think of it, I don't remember the term witchcraft being used at all in the series. They used the word magic the whole time.

The main point of this post is that before you say a book is bad to read, find out a little more about it. And then, if you still feel like it's something you shouldn't be reading, then don't. Anyways, thanks for listening to my semi-orderly ramble. Only one rabbit trail! Yay!

Adios, love you!