Voldemort - Evil By Nature Or Nurture?

Jamie: Yeah, exactly. I thought we all did. What about - you've put that he's extremely powerful, using his talents to commit such unimaginable atrocities that many witches and wizards fear speaking his name. Is that because, I mean do you think it's only him that could become this powerful and use these talents, or is it like - or is it just that any person can do it, but nobody is evil enough, apart from him, to do it?

Andrew: Well, Jamie, I think that he was born completely evil because his mother was a descendant of Salazar Slytherin.

Kevin: I don't think anyone's born evil.

Jamie: No, and Andrew, you can't really say that because, well, I mean, it's not like you've bought...

Andrew: What?

Jamie: Well, Hitler's, I think grandsons or great-grandsons, you know, are completely, absolutely disgusted by him. And they've just said that they aren't having any children because - just so...

Andrew: Well, no, I...

Jamie: ...you know, the can't continue his bloodline.

Andrew: Yeah, but this is the magic world and there could be something in the bloodline that's...

Jamie: I know. It's just - it's just interesting, you know, to make the comparison.

Kevin: I'm one of those people who don't blame the kids for the sins of the father, I guess, kind of.

Jamie: No, same. I agree, I agree. That's because you are a Dave Matthews...

[Everyone laughs]

Jamie: ...Band fan.

[Andrew and Laura laugh]

Andrew: What do you think, Laura?

Laura: Well, I think that it's kind of important to mention, when we first met Merope in Half-Blood Prince, is it just me, or did it kind of describe that she had odd facial features? They were almost sort of off in a way, and that her eyes kind of veered off in different directions? And we've seen that the pureblood families tend to interbreed with one another, and you can definitely get some weird gene mutations from that.

Kevin: That's true.

Laura: So...

Ben: Sounds like Kansas.

Laura: [laughs] It sounds like Georgia, too!

[Andrew laughs]

Laura: But, I think he could have something a little wrong up in his head, but I think that... [laughs]

Jamie: Six-finger city.

[Andrew laughs]

Laura: I think that he was definitely born a little more evil than anyone else because we saw as a child that he did terrible things, like hang bunny rabbits and...

Jamie: But when you say, "evil," do you mean like...

Kevin: Cruel?

Jamie: ...antisocial personality disorder?

Kevin: Yeah, like...

Jamie: No, so, he's a sociopath. He's not, he isn't... It's quite hard to say evil, because when you compare him to - sorry, go on.

I Want To Know What Love Is

Laura: Well, at the same time, though, I think that some of his childhood events kind of had a huge bearing on what he became, because he couldn't understand why Lily would sacrifice herself for Harry because no one would have ever done that for him.

Jamie: Yeah. Yes. Yeah, yeah. I agree.

Ben: He doesn't want to - he doesn't know what love is. [sings] He wants you...

Jamie: [sings] I wanna know what love is...

Ben: [sings] I want you to show me!

Andrew: Why is there a song associated with everything today?! [laughs]

Ben: [continues singing] I wanna feel what love is...

Andrew: Oh, boy. Kevin, what do you think?

Kevin: I said exactly what I wanted to. I don't believe that someone is responsible for the sins of their father. I don't think that you're born evil. I really don't think you're born evil. I think that the environment you grow up in or perhaps...

Jamie: Exactly, yeah.

Kevin: Yeah, it defines you. And he just ended up growing in...

Ben: [imitating Dumbledore] "It's our choices, Harry, far more than our abilities."

Laura: Yeah, but how many, how many kids in orphanages hang bunny rabbits?

Andrew: Yeah, that's not normal.

Kevin: Yeah, but...

Jamie: Isn't it?

Andrew: Okay, maybe he wasn't born completely evil...

Laura: That's a little messed up!

Andrew: ...but he might have been born messed up, like whoever just said that, said. I mean like Laura, like Laura [laughs] pointed out: Little kids don't do those things to bunnies.

Jamie: I thought it was normal. [laughs]

Andrew: Using the magic of Writley...

Jamie: Don't you, Andrew?

Andrew: ...Eric's opinion is that Voldemort decided, chose, to look at his life half-empty as opposed to half-full. He wasn't abused or tortured as a kid, just parent-less. He could have had friends, and his orphan matrons could have been parents to him if he chose to see them as that, and he decided to bring torture and that kind of stuff on his terrified classmates. Therefore, he was born evil.

Jamie: No.

Andrew: That's...

Jamie: No, because when...

Andrew: What?

Jamie: When he was a baby he didn't sort of...

Kevin: He didn't make a conscious choice...

Jamie: ...wriggle and crawl and kill bunnies, yeah.

Andrew: That's a good point.

Jamie: He was nurtured.

Andrew: Hold on, that's a good point though. If you're not brought up in a regular family and you don't have parents to look up to, you're messed up.

Kevin: Which would be environmental. I mean it's...

Jamie: Exactly, exactly. So, it's nurture, not nature.

Andrew: Okay. I like that. I change my mind. [laughs]

It Is Our Choices...

Ben: That's not true! The environment may play a factor, but I completely disagree, man.

Andrew: What? With what? That parents don't play a role?

Ben: The parents do play a role, but what I'm saying is that he had the choice to - he had two paths to choose, you know? He could have chose to battle against adversity and work his way through it and become a better person out of it, or he could choose to become this dark wizard guy.

Kevin: Yeah, but the question is, what would make him make that choice to become the dark wizard? Why would he chose that?

Ben: Personality disorder?

Kevin: But where would he get his personality?

Laura: Because he has a hunger for power.

Andrew: Because he has a hunger for power and he's got this magic that could be used to harness the power.

Kevin: I think it was exactly what Jamie said - nurture. He wasn't properly brought up.

Andrew: Well, that's what we're saying, but it's also he was power-hungry. I mean you could be born to want to be power-hungry.

Laura: I don't know. I think there was some sort of point in stating that the pureblood families all tend to interbreed, because while we know that your personality isn't necessarily passed on to you by your parents if you've never known them, like Voldemort did, but there can be certain diseases or sicknesses or disorders...

Kevin: That's true, yeah.

Laura: ...that you can get genetically that can cause other issues.

Magical Limitations

Ben: I don't know how prevalent genetic disorders are in the magical world, so...

Laura: I don't know. Merope sounded pretty messed up [laughs] to me.

Ben: Yeah, but I don't know. Don't you think with something like magic, they would have cures and stuff for things like manic depression?

Laura: Well, why would they? They can't even stop a Killing Curse.

Ben: Because, it's the magical world. They have magic.

Laura: Which they can't use to stop a Killing Curse. [laughs]

Ben: Right, but they can cure a common cold.

Jamie: No, but, I think that magic's a kind of an inexact science. Magic, just like medicine or veterinary science, because...

Kevin: It has to be learned, yeah.

Jamie: It has to be learned.

Laura: Mhm.

Jamie: And they can discover spells in fifty years that do different things. I'm sure 10,000 ago, they couldn't cure colds or stuff like that. Still, people still learn stuff. They can't just click their fingers and they know everything. It's like that. They can't be always all-powerful at everything.

Lily and Voldemort

Andrew: Well, let's move onto the next question.

Jamie: Oooh, I like this one.

[Andrew laughs]

Jamie: Can I say it?

Andrew: Yeah, I think you can.

Jamie: All right. Three: Why was Voldemort offering Lily so many chances to live?

[Andrew laughs]

Jamie: What's wrong with that?

Andrew:[laughs] You don't have to say the number!

Jamie: Oh yeah, yeah. Sorry, okay.

[Andrew and Laura laugh]

Jamie: Section six, question three: Why was Voldemort...

[Everyone laughs]

Jamie: ...offering Lily so many chances to live? Jo says he actually would have let her live.

Andrew: Would have let her live if what? Was there a second part to that sentence?

Kevin: He gave her the opportunity to live so many times.

Ben: [imitating Voldemort] Stand aside, silly girl!

Andrew: Oh.

Laura: Yeah.

Andrew: I see.

Kevin: I think we've discussed this before.

Laura: And he said it more than once, too.

Andrew: I think we might have.

Kevin: Because I think I remember us saying...

Laura: Probably.

Kevin: ...something about him being manipulative and looking for people who could further his cause, and it just so happened that Lily may have been in the position where, you know, she could have contributed to bringing down the Ministry of Magic.

Snape and Lily

Jamie: Or, or, no...

Kevin: Or, at the same time, Snape liked...

Ben: Or...

Jamie: I think it was more than...

Ben: What if Snape put in the good word and said, "Don't kill her,"

Kevin: Exactly. Yeah.

Jamie: No, no...

Kevin: I think that's a possibility.

Jamie: But...

Laura: Yeah, I think that's what makes it a little more interesting, because we discussed the possibility that Snape might have been there.

Jamie: What about, though, that he just didn't see her as enough of a threat in power? Magical power? He had to kill James, since he could have hurt him, disabled him, whatever. But Lily, she was clutching Harry. She couldn't do complicated wand work. And he was so set in his mind that he had to kill Harry that he didn't really have time for secondary objectives like that. And the only reason he killed James was because he had to, whereas he thought, perhaps, he didn't have time to kill Lily or people would already on their way, you know?

Laura: Mmmm, I don't know, because...

Jamie: Maybe.

Laura: ...I think it was Hagrid that said in the first book, that Voldemort got to the point where he just liked killing.

Jamie: Yeah, that's true.

Laura: And I don't think that he would just walk into a house and kill everybody in it and let one person survive. I think there's definitely a big underlying reason as to why he did that because in the interview last summer where Emerson and Melissa went and talked to Jo, she said, "I can't tell you."

Jamie: Oh, right, yeah.

Laura: So, I think it's something very important.

Kevin: It probably is, yeah.

The Only One He Ever Feared

Andrew: So, we know that Dumbledore was, quote/unquote, "the only man he ever feared."

Ben: The "only one," you sexist pig! [laughs]

Andrew: The only one. [laughs] The only one!

[Andrew and Laura laugh]

Andrew: The only...what?! It says, "The only one he ever feared."

Ben: You said, "the only man."

Andrew: Oh.

Jamie: The only human being.

Andrew: Sorry! Sorry!

Laura: You jerk.

Jamie: The only homo sapien.

Andrew: [laughs] We know that Dumbledore was the only one he ever feared, but why? He is powerful, yes, but isn't Harry his real opposite?

Jamie: No, no, because...

Andrew: I - hold on! I'm answering this!

Ben: [impersonating Jaime] No! No!

[Andrew laughs]

Jamie: It's because - it's because Dumbledore...

Andrew: Okay, fine.

Jamie: No, I was just going to say it's because Voldemort had to get to a table tennis game; English against Switzerland, so he had to kill Dumbledore.

[Andrew laughs]

Jamie: No, no, no, the thing is, is that he didn't see Harry as powerful magically. He just thought that he could be his obstacle.

Andrew: Yeah, that's what I was going to say.

Jamie: He had the potential to be his obstacle, but he had to get him out of the way quickly, and this relates back to the previous point about why he didn't kill Lily. Perhaps, he just thought he had to get rid of Harry before he gets too big for his boots, whereas Dumbledore, he thought, could stop him. And that he had the power to kill him because Voldemort thinks that the only bad thing is death. So, perhaps he realized that Dumbledore knew about the Horcruxes, so that he feared that he could get rid of them and then kill him.

Laura: Well, I think he might have definitely had some fear of Dumbledore from when he went to school.

Jamie: Yeah, definitely.

Andrew: Yeah.

Laura: Because Dumbledore was really the only one who suspected him of having opened the Chamber, and he always probably saw Dumbledore as the person who would expose him.

The Fate Of Lord Voldemort

Andrew: What will the outcome of Book 7 be for him? If Harry kills him, will he come back as a ghost, etc? Well, aren't we supposed to learn in Book 7 how ghosts, or who...

Jamie: Yeah, we are, yeah.

Andrew: ...what determines what makes a ghost in the first place?

Jamie: Unfinished business.

Ben: We already learned that, didn't we? Nick told... Yeah, unfinished business.

Jamie: Like an imprint of themselves on Earth, but you couldn't...

Ben: Right, but could a ghostly Voldemort be able to rally a cause?

Jamie: No, because he doesn't have...

Andrew: No.

Laura: I don't think so.

Jamie: He doesn't have unfinished business because it's finished. It's finished.

Kevin: It's true, yeah.

Jamie: You can't just not like what happened to you in real life, and come back because of that. I think it's like, if you get killed prematurely, before you've got to do something, the whole fate through destiny argument comes in here. If you're destined to do something, and you get killed prematurely, perhaps you have to come back and finish that off; whereas the Voldemort and Harry thing has gone through to conclusion when, if Voldemort dies. So, you know it's...

Ben: So, you're saying that if Voldemort got run over by a bus before he had the chance to meet Harry in the final battle, then he could come back as a ghost?

Laura: Yeah. I don't think so.

Jamie: No, I don't think he - no, because that would just be half of the, half of the... It would just conclude the whole thing, anyway. I think, say, if somebody has - I'm thinking, I'm thinking. If they have like a big part in creating, I don't know, a magical corporation around the world, or if one thing can't happen because somebody dies - something like that. I think perhaps then they come back. Or if say, or if say they have a duty to guide somebody through life, so then they come back. But, I don't think they can come back just because the odds didn't suit them during life.

Laura: Well, I've always been of the opinion that regardless of what happens to Voldemort, he could never come back as a ghost because his soul isn't whole.

Andrew: Oooh...

Jamie: Yeah, that's true.

Laura: His soul is fragmented and scattered everywhere, and I've always really been of the opinion that you've got to have a complete soul to be able to come back.

Ben: I don't know about that.

Andrew: Interesting.

Laura: So there.

Andrew: Maybe that's how it is brought up in Book 7.

Kevin: Yeah, but I mean, we don't know enough about what it takes to be a ghost to really, truly judge.

Laura: No, we don't. That's just my opinion. [laughs]

Kevin: Exactly.

Jamie: Or what constitutes a ghost? Because a ghost doesn't have a brain in him. So, it must just have a mind. A sort of - an ethereal mind somewhere.

Gimme A Butterbeer: Media Craze On Harry's Fate

Andrew: So, now we're going to move on to Gimme A Butterbeer.

Jamie: [gasps] Andrew, Andrew, wait, wait!

[Ben laughs]

Andrew: What, what?

Jamie: What is this? What is this, Gimme A Butterbeer? What is it? What is it?

Andrew: [laughs] Well, Jamie - this is scripted.

Jamie: No, it's not. It's not scripted.

Andrew: Gimme A Butterbeer is Ben's segment where he whines about something in the Harry Potter world.

Jamie: Ah, thank you, Andrew! Thank you, Andrew!

[Ben laughs]

Andrew: Not whining, [laughs] but expressing his concern.

Jamie: Andrew, thank you for telling me about that segment.

Andrew: You're welcome. So, you'll be able to experience one now.

Ben: This week we're going back to the traditional format of Gimme A Butterbeer. Last week was a little out there, but we're back and better than ever.

[Andrew laughs]

Ben: There was something in the media this past week that really got on my nerves. Last night I was sitting at my computer, working on MuggleNet, when my older brother walked in the room and said, "Is it true that the Harry Potter author is going to kill the main character?" I looked at him and sighed. The media has blown things out of proportion again. During her interview with the UK talk show, Richard and Judy - Jamie, are you a big fan of that show?

Jamie: I've seen it a few times. It's okay. It's like...

Ben: Oprah?

Jamie: It's, well - oh god, no, no. It isn't at all. It's just two people interviewing, say, one person.

Andrew: [laughs] Two people.

Kevin: Two on one?

Jamie: [laughs] Yes.

Andrew: [laughs] Very descriptive.

Jamie: I know it sounds obvious, but it's two people, Richard and Judy.

[Ben and Andrew laugh]

Ben: Yeah.

Andrew: [laughs] "It's two people, Richard and Judy."

Ben: Either way, either way, either way

Andrew: Well, thanks for that.

Ben: All right.

Andrew: All right.

Jamie: Yeah, like... Whatever.

Ben: During her interview on the talk show, JK Rowling said, like she has said countless times before, that no character in the series is safe. Her exact words were, "We are dealing with pure evil, so they don't target the extras, do they? They go straight for the main characters; or I do." Just like little kids, the media has asked JKR the same question time and time again: if she plans to kill off Harry. Thinking that the next time she might just give away the entire ending to the series she's been formulating for the past sixteen years. Yeah, right.

Sure, this was her first ever live TV interview that she's participated in, and sure, she did offer quite a bit of information about Book 7, such as the fact that she is now going to kill off two additional characters than originally planned, while one who initially got the axe will be saved. The wizarding world is at war, people. Of course people are going to die.

Don't hang me for this, but I honestly think it would be pretty cool if Harry did die in Book 7. Maybe I'm just a bitter young man, but seeing the headlines about Jo planning to kill off Harry in Book 7 are starting to get a little more than annoying. I guess when you're in her shoes, you're going to be forced to answer the same question a million times. But that's what gets me. The answer never changes, but the media still reacts the same. And worst of all, they still pull an Andrew and mispronounce her name by calling her JK Rowling [pronounced like Rowling] instead of JK Rowling [pronounced correctly].

[Laura laughs]

Ben: I'm Ben Schoen, and I say, Gimme A Butterbeer.

Jamie: I like that, Ben. I like that.

Ben: Thank you.

Laura: Well, I don't think that Hermione is going to get the axe, but I'm not sure that's really...

Jamie: Relevant.

Laura: ...pertinent to the discussion at hand. I think that this is - [laughs] Shut up, Jamie.

[Jamie and Laura laugh]

Laura: Anyway. I really think this is a very large scale problem that we have with the media, and we will probably always have with the media because it's not just with Harry Potter. They like to do this with everything. So, Ben, thank you.

Jamie: But, isn't that part of the media, especially some media? You know, it's like you expect, say, the tabloids are always going to sensationalize stuff. It's like, that's why they report it. It's like, they're there to do that.

Andrew: Right.

Laura: Yeah, but that's why they have tabloids.

Kevin: Exactly.

Laura: That's what tabloids are there for.

Jamie: Wait, exactly, so...

Laura: When you're talking about actual interviews, the fact that people ask the same question over, and over, and over, as though one day she's just going to break down and say, "Yes, I hate Harry. I'm going to kill him," is ridiculous.

Jamie: But, but you're speaking from the point of view of a big fan of Harry Potter. Every single person who listens to this show...

Kevin: Exactly.

Jamie: ...is a big fan of Harry Potter...

Kevin: What about...

Jamie: ...so they have heard it many times before.

Kevin: ...the...

Jamie: The general public, exactly. People tuning into Richard and Judy - apart from the people who had seen it advertised say, on this site, or on TV and just want to see Jo on there. The people who have tuned in just because they watch Richard and Judy wouldn't know about all the stuff that we know about...

Kevin: Yeah, they go by demographic. I mean...

Jamie: ...so they have to say it. So, they have to do it.

Kevin: Yeah, if the demographic of Richard and Judy doesn't listen to the other shows, then why would they assume? Exactly.

Jamie: Exactly, yeah.

Laura: Yeah, but isn't it kind of like when they get any other celebrity on and it seems like you're hearing the same interview ten times?

Jamie: But that's just how things are, I think. They don't interview - I think, personally, they don't always interview them just to get information; they interview them because it's publicity, and because they have to interview them.

Laura: Mhm.

Jamie: It's like, we want to hear different questions, but if they ask, say, why are Sirius's eyes gray, or were they gray, people tuning in would think, "What the hell are they talking about? We don't want to know details as complicated as that!" Whereas, we do. So, it's like they interview people to the extent that they have to be interviewed, and that they have to ask specific questions for it to be popular, and for people to tune in.

Ben: Right.

Jamie: And also, if they ask questions about Harry dying, then it's going to hit the papers, as well; whereas if they ask about Sirius's eyes being gray, it isn't going to be like, you know, "News-flash! Sirius's eyes are gray," because...

Andrew: Yeah. Yeah.

Laura: Touché, touché.

Ben: Right. But, Jamie, the reason I'm saying that is because - the reason I was sort of griping about it is because this happens once every six months, it seems like. There will be a big media explosion because JK Rowling will say something that, "Oh, Harry might be killed, too."

Jamie: It's to do with revival, though. Ben, it's to do with revival. It's like, even though for us, Harry Potter is ongoing and for a big part of the population it's ongoing. For just the general reader who has read it and that's it, Harry dying in the seventh book is a news-flash. It's something new, whereas for us it's been talked about to death. So, you know, they're just catering for the general public, not for the big Potter fans.

Laura: Yeah, but...

Jamie: I know it happens...

Laura: ...if the general public doesn't read the book, why do they care? [laughs]

Jamie: Well, no, they do read it, but it's like when they see JK Rowling on there, they think, "Oh, right. She's the author of Harry Potter," not, she's done all of these interviews, she owns a website, she talks about us; they don't think about all the things that we talk about, that we think about. They think that she wrote Harry Potter, and they associate her with that name. So, when they talk about, that Harry Potter's going to die, it's a lot more important than if they talk about Lily Evans dying. But, of course, for us it's completely different. But, you can't look at it from a subjective point of view like that.

Andrew: I think the reason why so many television news stations have been reporting on the story is because it's a good sell. It's a good teaser.

Jamie: Well, exactly, yeah.

Kevin: Yep.

Andrew: When people are - when the news hosts are saying, "Coming up! JK Rowling reveals who will die in Book 7."

Jamie: Will Potter die? Yeah.

Andrew: "Oh, I'll tell my kids this and they'll finally talk to me, and I'll be able to start a conversation with them," like all that. It's a good sell. It's...

[Laura laughs]

Jamie: People dying is a big thing as well, in any book, especially Potter, so it's like...

Andrew: Yeah, well...

Kevin: In any media, people dying is a big deal.

Andrew: ...it's not like we're seeing A Series of Unfortunate Events on the news, where Lemony Snicket reveals how many people are dying in the next book. Nobody cares, but it's the fact that it's Harry Potter.

Jamie: [laughs] Exactly.

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