harry potter

[Guest Ella]

Worry about drugs in school, gang violence, peer pressure to have sex or drink

Exactly, there are so many real issues we ought to worry about for our children - without devoting our time to issues that even our children know are make-believe. I like Kahlan have never met a child who believes Harry Potter to be anything else than fiction and fantasy - and before coming here I've never met an adult who thought that Harry Potter is anything else but a good moral fable for children about growing up, power and responsibility.

The author doesn't believe in the magic in there, the kids don't, and the parents don't - so lets focus on real problems, like drug and alcohol abuse, poverty, ill-health etc.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

What a shame the parents who allow their children to read this genre don't direct their children's reading to the good moral truth of the bible and use the word of Jesus to teach them instead.

"Bad company corrupts good minds." Fill your children's head with teachings of witchcraft and magic and you will have children more corrupted by peer preasure, drugs and violence - because the world will just not be 'exciting' enough for them.

Oh and of course the author wouldn't believe in the words of magic she wrote would she - that wouldn't exactly sell books now if she did, would it!

Oh and of course the children who read these books, like the adults, all understand that it's just make believe - yup, and children don't believe in santa clause either do they?

So let's not focus on addressing the underlying issues which feeds our teenage society's problems, lets just agree that we are all over worrying adults, lets sweep this hysteria under the carpet and just ignore the silly talk that we are wasting our 'energy' on - Let's do that while the devil will tells us 9 truths just to get one lie across!

[Speechless]

Isn't Harry Potter a white magician - like Moses? The books are the usual story of good v evil - or am I talking rot again?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Harry Potter isnt a book about good vs. evil. It is a book about evil vs. more evil. I dont know what breaks my heart more, to see kids reading this book, because they just dont know, or parents who let them, or encourage them to read them.

[Guest charlie]

I've read the Harry Potter series and 11 of the 12 Left Behind books. In all honesty I think "Left Behind" is a lot more dangerous in the long run. Both books are fiction but you know HP is fiction; people have a tendency to think LB is based on truth when in reality it's based on a false doctrine that affects people's real lives, worldview, and interpretation of scripture. It's like a "wolf in sheep's clothing" imo.

Harry Potter is just a big fairy tale; has no effect on my life when I lay down the book.

[Bread_of_Life]

Ella,

The moment you produce a shred of evidence that Harry Potter, or Lord of the Rings, or any other fantasy book turns children to drugs and violence, you come right back to me.

In fact, children who read frequently do better at school, and better educational attainment is linked to a lower probability of criminal activity, higher income, and better health. I'd rather have kids in my neighbourhood at home reading Harry Potter than on the streets in a gang, frankly.

As for children believing in Santa Claus, yes, they do, until the age of, oh, say, seven or eight, when they realise it's all part of a childhood makebelieve world. Furthermore, Harry Potter is not presented as fact in the media, by parents or by teachers - but rather as fiction, which is it. The only people who present it as fact are extremist Christians who would have us believe that the spells in there are real, and that it's a product of satan. I would just like to welcome them to the real world.

[Guest Blind_Guardian]

Although I'm no fan of Harry Potter I am a huge fan of the Lord of the Rings and the fantasy genre in general and I've never taken any drugs or been involved in crime and nor have the vast majority of people I know that also read fantasy novels. Most of the people i do know that have taken drugs are those who never read anything (whether it be fantasy or a different genre) so i think it's hardly fair to say fans of the fantasy genre are gonna become drug addicts because the world isnt exciting enough for them. One of the reasons we read the books is for the excitement, if we used drugs for this we wouldnt need excitement from the books now would we. Oh and surely all of you realise that the spells in these books aren't real. Even the people who practise religions that believe in magic (like Wicca) don't believe these spells are real. After all don't you think it might be on the news if there was some id running around the place shooting fireballs at people or whatever.

[Bread_of_Life]

Blind_guardian,

Quite. To the people who think the spells are real, a simple message: try them. The minute your broomstick starts flying, I'll believe you.

To people who think reading fantasy books lead to drug addiction: give me your evidence. When you show me a causal link, I'll believe you.

[Lekcit]

Charlie,

I'd like you to point to some definitive proof that will back up your claim that the Left Behind Series is based on false doctrine. While I understand that you may not *agree* with the eschatological viewpoint that Jerry Jenkins and Tim LaHaye put forth, it is a valid viewpoint and based in years research and study done by not only the authors but others as well.

Take great care in what you label as "false doctrine" because the fact that you disagree doesn't discount those that believe that it is a correct assessment of Eschatology.

In Him.

[Guest charlie]

I don't think Nic said anything untrue by using the words extremist Christians. There are extremists Christians just as there are extremists in Islam. Extremism is dangerous regardless of which religion an extremist belongs to. They're particularly dangerous imo to others who are Christian but don't fall into lock-step with their extreme beliefs which are usually dictated by their self appointed "leaders" whom they follow without question. You pretty much pointed out the same with this statement:

When you say that it is only

[Guest charlie]

I'd like you to point to some definitive proof that will back up your claim that the Left Behind Series is based on false doctrine.

difinitive proof - The series starts out with a pre-tribulation rapture occuring. There's no such thing in the Bible; proponents try hard to link it to one sentence in the Bible but have to sacrafice many other scriptures to come up with this wacky unbiblical senario.

After reading the first two or three books I started trying to find out where the idea originated and it only took a couple of minutes using a search engine to find out. Christianity is 2000 years old; the "pre-trib" rapture only goes back to the 1800s.

Take great care in what you label as "false doctrine" because the fact that you disagree doesn't discount those that believe that it is a correct assessment of Eschatology.

I am very careful; when I first read "Left Behind" I thought I must have slept thru that story in church or something, I'd never heard of it and I wanted to know if it was true because it is intriguing I must admit; however, it didn't hold up when I started checking it out. I'm not a bit worried about calling it false; I think Lehaye and Jenkins should be worried. When I heard they decided to write 12 books instead of the original 7 I thought "ah-ha" guess greed is in there somewhere. Evidently those two don't expect the "rapture" to occur anytime soon so they milked the series for as much as they could.

Edited June 13, 2005 by charlie

[Bread_of_Life]

Charlie,

Thanks for your support. Of course, I would include extremists from ALL sects and groups, including muslims. What I meant was the only people I'd personally seen saying these things had been extremist Christians, I'm afraid Horizoneast is given to deliberately nit-picking on my posts to see the bad, so as to paint me as some sort of radical Christian-hater. Of course, I'm not, I don't hate Christians, Muslims, or any other religious group - I'm just pointing out that extremism is dangerous - especially when it ignores real threats and discourages children from reading good books.

I'm afraid that some people always like to see the bad in things Charlie, including in me, and in the Harry Potter books. That includes extremists from all denominations who see plots and satanic ritual in everything - without looking at how evil is *really* affecting the world. We have millions dying of AIDS and malnutrition in Africa - and yet we burn tonnes of excess crops to keep the market-distorting subsidy system going, and refuse to export cheap AIDS drugs from over here to make ourselves a little richer. Yet we focus on Harry Potter, to avoid facing up to our own evils, and things going on in our own country with the governments we support. It's twisted.

Similarly, some people will focus on me in their replies, rather than focussing on the actual argument at hand - one that they don't want to answer. I don't want this to put you off what you are saying, which is quite right - because this topic is bigger than me, or any member of the bulletin boards, and we shouldn't get distracted by personal vendettas, and ad hominem attacks.

All the best,

Nikolai

Edited June 13, 2005 by ScientificAtheist