Could your affection for the whimsical Arthur Weasley be tinted with shades of complexity you've never considered? Join me, Professor Julian Wamble, for a stimulating journey through the nuanced character of the Weasley family patriarch. Together with insights from your survey responses, we unpack the layers beneath Arthur's seemingly carefree fascination with the non-magical world and his relaxed approach to parenting and ambition. We're not just revisiting a favorite character; we're reevaluating him through the mature lens of cultural norms and the evolving role of a father figure.
Tune in, as your engagement is the wand that enlivens this magical discourse.
Link to Survey for Percy Weasley
Could your affection for the whimsical Arthur Weasley be tinted with shades of complexity you've never considered? Join me, Professor Julian Wamble, for a stimulating journey through the nuanced character of the Weasley family patriarch. Together with insights from your survey responses, we unpack the layers beneath Arthur's seemingly carefree fascination with the non-magical world and his relaxed approach to parenting and ambition. We're not just revisiting a favorite character; we're reevaluating him through the mature lens of cultural norms and the evolving role of a father figure.
Tune in, as your engagement is the wand that enlivens this magical discourse.
Link to Survey for Percy Weasley
Welcome to Critical Magic Theory, where we deconstruct the wizarding world of Harry Potter, because loving something doesn't mean you can't be critical of it. I'm Professor Julian Wamble, and today we are talking about the Phil Dunphy of the magical world, the one, the only, the illustrious Arthur Weasley. Have you ever wondered why Arthur seemingly lacks ambition when Molly is pushing all of her children to really ascend as high as they possibly can? And why is it that Arthur also seemingly doesn't care about the fact that their family doesn't have a lot of money? And how do we reconcile the love that we have for Arthur as a character with the problematic way that he engages with non-magical people? We are getting into it today, but first, you know, we have to dance it out, so let's take the next 25 seconds to just enjoy the music and bop along. Welcome back. I hope you danced. Okay, I hope you did. Anyways, you get it. You get what I'm talking about.
Julian Wamble:I realize that I never explained that these episodes are going to drop every other week, mostly because I have another job that I have to do and teaching and doing research and this podcast all at the same time is a lot and I can't do it all and I also want to leave you all enough time to fill out the surveys. One of the things that I really enjoyed this week was that we got a lot of people who missed out on the survey about Molly because I only had it up for three days, and so I figured if I gave us a little bit more time to fill out the survey, this would make sure that it reached more of you, especially since it was also brought to my attention that, given the nature of TikTok, for those of you who follow me there, if it doesn't show up on your FYP, you're not going to see it, and so I'm figuring out ways to kind of make this a little bit easier so that you don't have to rely on the algorithm to get you the survey and if you're not following me on TikTok one, if you're a TikTok person, do. And secondly, if you don't have TikTok, I have to figure out a way to get you this survey, and so someone suggested a mailing list, which I like as a concept. I just have to figure out how to make one, and so I need a little bit more time to, even after the survey is closed, spend time going through your comments. So it takes a little bit more time to organize things and I want to be able to have something to say to you all and to be in conversation with you all, and so every other week is going to be when the episodes drop, at least for now. We'll see what happens in the future, but for right now, every other week.
Julian Wamble:Today we are talking about the patriarch of the Weasley clan, and one thing that came up for me as I was thinking through my relationship with Arthur in the books and I'm reading through some of your comments, is how interesting it is to revisit these books as adults for some of us, as parents, for some of us as adults who don't necessarily have great relationships with our parents and thinking about the way that that informs how we view these characters. I think some of that came up in the last episode about Molly. What is so interesting to me is really thinking about what it means to engage with a children's book when you are no longer a child, and one thing that has stood out to me, particularly now as an older person who teaches this class and thinks more deeply about it, is the way that us older millennials have evolved with time, as everyone does, but there's been such a colossal shift in a number of dimensions in our own lives, within society that make us look at these characters in such a different way, and in many of the comments that you all brought out in this week's survey, it really stood out to me as something that was particularly true for Arthur. I think that Arthur is a character that, because we're looking at him through the lens of Harry, who hasn't really had much of a father figure because Uncle Vernon treated him really poorly that we are inherently meant to love this man and to find all of his eccentricities to be very cute and quaint and funny. But now, as adults, when we think about who he is as a husband, as a father, as a friend, as a member of the Order of the Phoenix we find ourselves much more unimpressed.
Julian Wamble:And I think that some of that comes from a reality that I thought about before I recorded this episode, which is when you are a child and you are looking for yourself in books. You're looking for characters that look like you, who may behave like you, who may respond to things the same way that you would respond to them, but when you're reading something as an adult, you're looking for that experiential representation, someone who is experiencing and seeing the world in a very similar way to you. And so when we look at these books, it's really difficult for us to kind of suspend the disbelief that we had as children, because now we're looking at these things through the lens of our own lives, our own experiences, and looking for characters who kind of mirror that in some ways. And I think that, particularly when it comes to the Weasleys because we were so conditioned to love them and there are a lot of things to love about them we look at them now as adults and we are so much harder on them.
Julian Wamble:I had someone ask me a few days ago on TikTok why it is that I hate the Weasleys, and I said to them I don't hate the Weasleys, I love the Weasleys. I think that there are a lot of things about them that are incredible. But I think that, because of the perspective that we're given, when you read them as a kid they seem almost infallible, because they love Harry so much and it's through his eyes that we get to know them and understand who they are as people. But now as adults, it just feels like, oh, there are some really problematic things that we have to grapple with. That is what I am so enjoying about this process of having the survey and thinking through these characters that we do love and, I think, understand that nuance can bring some negativity sometimes, and that doesn't necessarily mean that we have to sacrifice the things that we love about them to kind of be critical of them.
Julian Wamble:This episode really embodies what I say at the beginning of every episode, which is loving something doesn't mean you can't be critical of it, and so, as we dive into the character of Arthur Weasley, I want us to remember that there are so many things about this man that are incredible. To that end, I thought it might be nice to for the rest of the episodes to come think about moments in the books that I love about this character. I think one of the things that I learned when I was in graduate school and now working with graduate students is that graduate students are so good at criticism, so good at literally tearing everything apart for the sake of trying to get down to the nitty gritty of the problem. But when you ask them, what did you like about this book, what did you like about this article, they really struggle, and I think that that can be. The pitfall of critical thinking is that sometimes we go so deep into the weeds, and particularly ripping things apart, that we really do struggle sometimes to find the positive. And so I thought, well, maybe it'll be fun for me, for you, to think about the things that you like about these characters.
Julian Wamble:And so I thought about one particular moment that I love about Arthur, and it's the moment in Prisoner of Azkaban when Harry overhears Arthur and Molly having a conversation about whether or not to tell him about Sirius Black and their belief that Sirius Black is coming after him. And what I love about this moment is it's one of the few moments where we really see Arthur show us how aware he is of the fact that Fudge is really all about public perception and not necessarily about truth telling. It's where we really get to see him put his foot down with Molly and saying, no, harry may be a child, but he needs to know this. And the reason why he needs to know this is because him and Ron are always running amok throughout that castle and they cannot do that. And so we get to see this level of protection of Harry, and at the cost of some of his innocence, but it seems so imperative to Arthur that the truth be told. And I think that there is something so beautiful about that particular moment because it's one where we really get to see Arthur claim his role as a kind of protector of Harry in a way that we get to see in other moments but not so explicitly and certainly not to Molly. This moment where they disagree on kind of what to do with Harry is a really important one Because, as many of you noted in your comments that we're going to get to, when it comes to Molly and the kids, arthur tends to kind of take a back seat, but in this moment he does not and he does not necessarily buy into the protection of Harry's innocence If it could cost Harry his life. And I think that that is such an amazing moment because it's one that we really don't get to see in other moments in the books and it's one where we really get to understand who Arthur is as a kind of paternal, protective figure. And so now let's get into the Erythmancy lesson for this episode.
Julian Wamble:For those of you who don't know, I ask questions on a survey every week about the character and for the episode we just go through the questions and we discuss, kind of what people think about the character, and this week, oh my goodness, you all really had a lot of things to say, and this week we had about 816 people respond, which is amazing. We're still shooting for a thousand, but 816 is really doing the do and I so appreciate you all taking the time. If you know that there are people who don't follow me on TikTok but would love to take the survey, in the survey link that I post in my bio there's a way to share that link. Please feel free to do so, the more the merrier. I told you all I was going to be singing and I'm just in a mood I don't even know what it is, but the vocals are just coming out of me right now, and so if you don't like it, I'm so sorry. See, like I can't even. Anyways, anyway, I added a new question this week that I was really excited about because I really wanted to understand and synthesize what you all think about Arthur, and that question was if you could describe Arthur in one word, what would it be?
Julian Wamble:The first and most popular word that came up, with about 72 responses, was curious, which I think tracks because Arthur is someone who has this kind of inherent curiosity about things. We see this when he is in St Mungo's after he's attacked by Nagini and he and one of the healers are willing to experiment on stitches and Molly loses it, and in some ways I can understand why, but I love that he was like, hey, let's just see if it works. And as a person who is very much into kind of figuring things out and having to get to the bottom of things, no matter what happens, I love that this was a risk that he was willing to take. The second most popular word was bumbling and at first I was like, well, that's not very nice. But then I thought about every time he's in the presence of non-magical people and I thought, well, actually that kind of tracks because he is just gets so excited about being in the presence of Mungo's and we're going to talk about, like, his outlook on non-magical people and the problematic nature of it. We'll get into it, I promise. But I do understand people's usage of this word to describe him, because I do think it just encapsulates how excited he gets when he's meeting people who are part of a population that he knows very little about, for better or for worse, and who he is genuinely curious about.
Julian Wamble:The third and fourth words are kind and loyal. And these words really stood out to me because as a child the Weasleys were the embodiment of kindness and loyalty in the way that they took in Harry, in the way that they just brought everyone in, and growing up I had a lot of extended family and a lot of people who weren't blood relation but played a really big part in my development as a person, and my house just kind of became a place where everyone would come and hang out, and so to see the Weasleys kind of embody that really resonated with me, and I think Arthur is definitely the architect of a lot of those things, as is Molly, and so these two words really resonate because I think that they truly do embody just the way that the Weasleys operate as people. It just strikes me that you know, arthur is one of these people who just loves family and loves being surrounded by love, and so the idea of him being kind and loyal really stands out to me because it's really something that I think is so true for him. And then the fifth word is oblivious, which honestly I get as well. I think that this is what makes him such an interesting character to dive into because there are these aspects of him that are so warm and then there are other aspects that are so cringe, and trying to figure out a way to navigate those things and come up with a way to feel about him that acknowledges all of this reality of who he is as a person is really, really, really fascinating.
Julian Wamble:Now it's on to these six questions that I ask about every character and diving into where everyone is. The first question is Is Arthur Weasley a good person? Of the 816 responses, about 88% said yes, 2.7% said no and about 10% said don't know. This is so fascinating to me because, when we think about the way that we come to the conclusion about whether someone is good or bad, what Arthur introduces to us is the question of does not being a good person mean that you are a bad person? Part of this is my fault, because I asked a yes no question and I asked a super normative question that invokes this idea of good versus bad. But I think, in ways that I'm actually surprised by, arthur invites us to really grapple with questions about what is good and what is bad and what is that in between.
Julian Wamble:In a children's book, everyone is put into one of these two categories. Right, you're either good or you're bad, or you're bad, but maybe you're going to be good. And all the characters that we tend to love, particularly in fan fiction, are the ones where the person is kind of bad but seemingly fixable Draco. But the characters that we would characterize as good are also in this weird gray space. One of the things that people wrote when asked the question about is Arthur Weasley a good person?
Julian Wamble:Someone wrote overall, he's just a guy who loves his family and tries to do the right thing, but doesn't seek the chaos of change. Not an intersectional activist, certainly, and needs to evaluate his misogynist view of gender roles in his marriage. Somebody else wrote Arthur Weasley isn't vindictive, hateful, like some of the other purebloods in this series, but he's not perfect. Someone wrote I actually had selected yes to the is Arthur Weasley a good person, but after writing my commentary, I just couldn't justify keeping it that way. It should be noted, however, that not good does not equal bad. And there we have it. There's the answer to our question. There are some objectively bad people in this series and I don't think Arthur is one of them. He's humid, excuse me, he's human. Well, we're really slaying the reading. Today.
Julian Wamble:Someone else wrote he thinks he is a good person and tries to be and this is something that we also saw in conversations about Molly which is their intention versus their reality, and how we as readers and critical thinkers, grapple with what they want to be versus who they are. What does the benefit of the doubt look like, and who are we more likely to give the benefit of the doubt to, and why? What is clear is that Harry plays a really large part in whether or not someone gets the benefit of the doubt from us as readers. Someone wrote mostly, I think Harry as our narrator, is unreliable when it comes to all of the adults. He projects good feelings onto the Weasleys because they took him in unconditionally and since they first helped him learn about magical normalcy, he doesn't know any better. And I think that this is such an interesting perspective because Harry is biased, and he's, particularly throughout these books, biased in favor of the men in his life, and so we as readers are also biased in favor of a lot of the men in ways that we do not necessarily grant to the women, and so, as we continue this deep dive, I want us to engage with this idea of Harry's biases become our own, and some of it is implicit and some of it is explicit and the fact that it kind of mirrors the way that we view people in our own society based on their gender identity.
Julian Wamble:The next question was a doozy Is Arthur Weasley a good husband? About 52% said yes, about 29% said no and about 20% said don't know. Now this is one of these moments where us engaging with these books as older people really comes into play this question and the next about whether Arthur is a good father, because the 90s were the Wild Wild West for those of us who weren't around, or who were around but not old enough to really appreciate the era. There was a lot going on, particularly socially, surrounding the way that we understood the roles of gender in society. And on top of that, we have to remember that obviously, jk Rowling is British and that each culture is going to also add a different dynamic to gendered norms, so that when we look at the relationship that Arthur has with Molly as a husband, a lot of the critique that I saw leveraged came from people basically saying this might have worked in 97, but in the year of our Lord, 2024, it's a no.
Julian Wamble:And while, yes, there are some people in this contemporary moment who are okay with very stringent gendered roles in relationship, there are a growing number of people who really do buy into the idea that a relationship is partnership and that there is a level of equity and equality that doesn't have to be constrained based on someone's gender, and that those roles then have to be reevaluated and restructured to reflect the way that the people in the couple see themselves as partners. Thus, the idea of Arthur as a husband really came under a lot of scrutiny, as we look at this through the lens of the 21st century, in fact. Someone wrote is Arthur a good father and husband? On one hand, yes, he loves his family unconditionally. On the other hand, his choice of profession is selfish and puts his family in a tough spot. Someone else wrote as a provider and husband, if we are going to lean into JK Rowling's heteronormative framing, I think he's a bit questionable.
Julian Wamble:Some of the critiques leveraged against Arthur as a husband are ones that come out of our own kind of newly revisited understandings of what we would want, and so the lens through which we view him in these books is as someone who is present and who is a provider but who also doesn't play a very strong role in kind of co-parenting with Molly. We see, a lot of the time he is just kind of letting her make the decisions about how to raise the children and he in some ways is kind of like oh, you know, yeah, what she said. I think that for a lot of us that rubs us the wrong way because it seems like he's putting the brunt of parenting on Molly and when you have seven kids, that's really really, really a lot to put on another person. This strikes me as another moment where those of us who are older millennials, who were socialized in this kind of shift in gender and shift in understanding of what relationship looks like, have to really recognize the lens through which we view the world and the way that that makes us look at Arthur. I also found it very interesting that a lot of the critiques leveraged against Arthur as a husband had to do with how he and Molly negotiate their child rearing and not to do with their actual relationship with one another, kind of absent their kids, which I recognize as very difficult because they have so many children and they're constantly taking care of them and we only really get to see them in moments where they are surrounded by their kids. But I also do think that there are moments where we get to see them kind of interact with one another, not as mom and dad, but just as Molly and Arthur, and those are worthy of us thinking about.
Julian Wamble:It's so clear that he loves her and I love the moment in Half-Blood Prince where everyone has to have passwords and confirm who they are because the Death Eaters are doing what they're doing and impersonating people. And he comes to the door and he asks and Molly's like, oh, come in the house. And he's like, no, you have to ask me the question. And he asks what do I call you when we're alone? And she says Molly Wobbles. And I just find that moment so endearing and beautiful because it really does show that they have love for one another. And when she talks about them and their relationship, it's so clear to me how much she cares about him and feels cared for by him. If we just meet them where they are at in these books and take what they give us, it seems like she's happy that some of the responses that we have to this question and why there is a third of people almost say that he's not a good husband is because for us he wouldn't work. And the other question is OK, that's great. But what does this look like for Molly in the moment? And it seems to me, based on what we have in the text, that she thinks he's great and he's even. The next question was is Arthur Weasley a good father? Now, y'all this is one where the variation in the answers was also very surprising to me and I can't wait to get into it. About 56% said yes, around 28% said no and around 16% said don't know.
Julian Wamble:I call Arthur the Phil Duffy of the magical world because on the show Modern Family there was a character named Phil Duffy who is one of the dads of the families that are being kind of followed in this mockumentary, and he is such a goofball and very eccentric and he calls himself a P-E-R-E-N-T a parent and not a parent. And there are a lot of similarities actually the more that I think about it between the way that Phil parents and the way that Arthur parents and the expectations that they have for their wives to pick up the rest of the slack in terms of parenting, in terms of discipline and in terms of just general responsibility and Phil prides himself on kind of being the good cop, on being the fun parent, and loves the fact that his wife is the one that everyone lives in fear of and she's the one who has to kind of go lay down the hammer. This is something that stood out to many of you as you thought about whether or not he was a good father. Someone else wrote but as a father, as in moral compass for kids, I think he falls in the quote unquote better side of the characters. He doesn't give into pressure to do what he thinks is morally wrong and tries to encourage that in the people around him as well. Someone else wrote.
Julian Wamble:I don't consider him to be a good father. He may have been considered to be one in 1997 when these books came out, but there are several qualities I believe someone must possess to be considered a quote unquote good father in 2024. There is an element of selflessness, team unity and consideration for the family unit that I expect a man today to be considered a good father, and Arthur simply does not possess these things. He seems completely unbothered by pursuing his passions at the expense of his wife and family's comfort, and has even shied away from key parenting moments. Throughout the series this is presented as comedic relief, but more than once he's only half-heartedly reprimanded his children and had no intention of telling his wife of their wrongdoing. This strikes me as a very divided approach to parenting and marriage.
Julian Wamble:I have to confess that I was really surprised at the number of people who brought up the fact that he was working a job that was not yielding enough money to support his family as an indication of Arthur's selfishness for being a provider. This is something that I had never thought of, and it could be because I'm a man, it could be because I don't have a partner, it could be because I don't have kids, so this never occurred to me as an indication of who he is as a father, but I think it is such a fascinating thing to consider when we think about how heteronormative and strict the gender roles are within the relationships that we see in these novels from JK Rowling. It strikes me as so fascinating that Arthur is working this job and not making a lot of money at all, and again, it doesn't seem to be bothered by that. But I also wonder about what his kids think about this. I think that, as someone alluded to, following your passions is really important, and I think that it's something that a lot of us, particularly millennials, are realizing can be great and can also come at a price, and that price tends to be sometimes actual money. And some of us are unbothered by this, like Arthur is, and some of us realize that there are ways that we have to kind of negotiate the practicality of living in the society that we live in and the desire to do the things that we love. In some ways, I feel like we're asking Arthur to give up and make the sacrifices that we ourselves have had to make in order to make ends meet. And is that fair If we look at his relationship with his kids, particularly one that you all brought up a lot in your comments, which is his relationship with Percy?
Julian Wamble:Percy is one of the first children that we get to see kind of leave Hogwarts and go into the working world, and we see firsthand, in Goblet of Fire, the way that he kind of overcompensates for his dad's muggle fetish and muggle passion Call it what you want. And I think that the fact that Arthur in some ways it seems to me at least resents Percy's desire to move up the ranks and kind of do what he's been conditioned to do by Molly. It strikes me that so much of the way that Arthur parents is I'll provide you with the fun stuff, right, like he's the parent. I'll take you to the Quidditch World Cup. Your mom's not coming, you know, I will be the one to. You know, let you fly around in the car and chastise you a little bit, but not a lot. I'll let you come to the Dursley's house and wreak absolute havoc and then, kind of, you know, give you a little bit of heck for it, but not a lot.
Julian Wamble:It just strikes me that Arthur really likes the role that he plays in the family as the good cop and as the fun parent, and I think that there's something that's really great about that, because I think it does kind of counteract what we see from Vernon Dursley. But also, how do we reconcile the idea of Arthur's kind of parenting as a costly behavior for everyone else around him who has to figure out how to navigate what his being the fun parent means for them? Is Arthur Weasley a good, pure blood? All right, this is our moment. This is the time. About 35% said yes, about 41% said no and about 24% said don't know.
Julian Wamble:We cannot talk about Arthur Weasley without investigating his muggle. I'm going to call it a fetish and I'll explain why. When we think about the relationship that Arthur has with non-magical people, it's really important for us to think about the fact that he actually knows nothing about non-magical people, but the fact that he lives close to them. It strikes me that Arthur is someone who has this fascination with the way that non-magical people have figured out how to live their lives without magic and he thinks that it is for lack of a better term nifty. And we see this in his conversations with Harry, in his conversations with Hermione, and I know that he is someone who has put laws into place, to quote unquote protect muggles. But at the same time, we watch him stand there while Mr Roberts, who owned the more where the quidditch world cup was occurring, be oblivious, within an inch of his actual sanity, and say nothing other than it's going to be okay.
Julian Wamble:We've seen on numerous occasions that Arthur has bought into the kind of wizard understanding of what non-magical people can endure and is okay with that, and ask very little questions about the ethics of it, whether or not it's actually true. And so, yes, he has signed into law that dark objects like those possessed by Lucius Malfoy shouldn't be put into the possession of non-magical people for fun. But we also see him still abiding by the rules and regulations that allow for him to show up at the Durses house and basically blow it up for the sake of trying to get Harry out, and all that is coupled with an ignorance about this world that he claims to care so much about. That is offensive, if we're being honest, and for me there's no way to really grapple with this and give him too much grace or compassion about it without calling out the supremacist lens through which he has to be viewing non-magical people in order for this to persist. Someone wrote I have mixed feelings about Arthur.
Julian Wamble:He's not a malicious person, but he does have a fetish towards the non-magical sector that I feel warrants discussion. He has a fascination with a culture that he has not lived in and treats muggles and muggle borns like zoo animals that can do cool tricks. There is this infantilization that we see him exhibit when anything comes up about non-magical people, where they seemingly are using technology to survive. He always says things like bless them, or if they can do it, so can we, and I want to be very clear about the fact that Arthur is not the only one who holds these kinds of views. I'm always struck in Deathly Hollows when Harry, ron and Hermione are listening to the radio and Kingsley has to remind people good people who are finding this radio station right and they have to be non-death eaters that they should be protecting magical people and that they shouldn't be adopting an idea of wizards first, because that's one step away from purebloods first.
Julian Wamble:So there is a pervasive understanding of where non-magical people sit, and Arthur is not exempt from that and he actively plays a role in it. Despite the fact that he's put forth legislation that it protects them in certain domains, it does not protect them from the fact that non-magical people have very little say over their lives when things that are happening in the magical world affect them too, and none of what Arthur has put into place legally changes that, and that cannot be undiscussed and that cannot be overlooked for the sake of the quirkiness and the fun and the cuteness. I just can't y'all, and I won't, but I think, because so often we assume that if you are not a death eater then you are inherently good person that we, especially as children, right. I think that this is the kind of way that JK Rowling really pushes us to see the Weasleys and look past some of their more problematic characteristics because, well, they're not the Malfoys. What so many of your comments brought to bear was this question does not being a bad pure blood make you good? And that is the question that we have to grapple with, particularly with Arthur, in a way that we may not have to grapple with with other pure blood characters, and that's what makes him so fascinating and that's what makes this question so difficult to answer.
Julian Wamble:The next question is is Arthur Weasley a hero? About 40% of us said yes, about 42% of us said no and about 19% said don't know. Again, some of this is tricky, because what does it mean to be a hero? And, as I said in the last episode, it's up to you. How we conceptualize it, particularly in these books, is really, really hard, because some people would say, well, if he's in the order of the phoenix, he's actively a hero because he's fighting against Voldemort.
Julian Wamble:Someone wrote the idea that Arthur is a hero isn't one that I'd see as much of a debate. He fights on the side of good for the main protagonist of the story only, using violence when necessary and protecting those closest to him. Someone else wrote is Arthur Weasley a hero? I don't know. Is everyone who fought in the war a hero? He is brave and he definitely made sacrifices. So now we're getting into again the way that people are conceptualizing the idea of hero, sacrifices, fighting.
Julian Wamble:Someone else wrote can you be a hero when you just do what you were told, or are you canon fodder for Dumbledore? My, my, my. That is an interesting question, but again takes us back to the fundamental one of what does it mean to be a hero? To me, arthur is a hero because he is in a position in society where he actively does not have to do anything. He is not going to be a part of the affected party.
Julian Wamble:When Voldemort comes back, I know that he is seen as a blood trader, but what we know over and over and over again is that pure bloods, no matter where your stance is, are unaffected by the rounding up and removal of wands from muggle-born people. Voldemort even says to Neville Longbottom I'm not going to hurt you because, even though we disagree, you're pure blood. So if we take that as an understanding of the kinds of privileges that pure bloods have in society, even in the midst of being someone who disagrees with the villain, then we can imagine a world where the Weasleys just go along to get along and don't do anything and don't have to fight because their skin is not in the game. And so the fact that Arthur and his family all go and decide yes, even if we are not affected, even if the people being rounded up have nothing to do with us, we are going to be active participants in this war. We are going to join the organization that seeks to upend this particular tyranny and risk our lives. Arthur almost died. That, to me, is the sign of a hero when you are making not only a sacrifice of your life but that of your family, when you don't have to.
Julian Wamble:The last question is is Arthur Weasley a good friend? About 61% of us said yes, about 9% said no and about 30% said don't know. Now, some of us highlighted the reality that we don't really know a lot about Arthur as a friend, but when I think about it, I think we do get a good indication of it. We see that part of the reason why they get to go and be in the top box of the Quidditch World Cup is because of a favor that Arthur has done. We know that when Matt I Moody gets into trouble, he goes and kind of smooths things out for him after the dustbin situation. So we get this sense that he is very much someone who is a good friend to people.
Julian Wamble:And again I'm taking back to kind of the fact that one of the words that people said best described Arthur is loyalty, and even in your own comments about this someone wrote he has excessive personal loyalty, meaning anyone close to him he would go to the ends of the earth for someone else row. If he is one thing, he's a good friend. We actually get to see him have friends with other people in his job. I think we also get a sense of how much people like him at the Quidditch World Cup where everyone is coming up to him and saying hello. He is someone who people value, which is fascinating given the fact that he's kind of you know, part of a family who is looked down upon for their beliefs about, you know, the inclusion of muggle-born people in magical society. Arthur is someone who clearly cares about the people that he cares about. I think again his opening up his home as a way to bring people in and keep them safe and taking in Harry when he doesn't have to, and having Hagrid and Tonks and Lupin and all of these people as part of this kind of extended family that is already stretched in and of itself speaks volumes about who he is and the way that he engages with other people who he deems as friends.
Julian Wamble:I think Arthur is a person who loves to have the family of it all, and now we've reached the part of the episode where I reflect on my own thoughts on Arthur and what you all shared in your comments as part of the conversation about who Arthur Weasley is, and I think I'm gonna say this every episode. I welcome your disagreement. I welcome the fact that you might not like the take that I took. I think that that's part of conversation. You don't have to agree with me. You can listen to this reflection and say absolutely not. I welcome that. My goal is not to be right. I am not invested in trying to make you think the way that I am.
Julian Wamble:My goal is to ask interesting questions that get us thinking critically about these characters, and the question that has really stood out to me is why doesn't Arthur care about money or ambition in the same way as his kids, in the same way as his wife. What motivates him to just be so unbothered? One thing that we talked about in the last episode is Molly's desire to really elevate her kids above a station that she and Arthur's ideology has kind of landed them in. But we really only see Molly making these choices to push their kids in a certain way. Arthur seemingly does not care, and I wonder if Arthur is just rejecting the pureblood accoutrement that comes along with that status in Wizarding Society. We know that purebloods tend to be very wealthy. We know they tend to be very well connected and Arthur does not seem to care about any of that, and I think that this is intentional. I don't think he wants this. I don't think he wants anything that would actively attach him to being a part of a group in which people like Lucius Malfoy participate, and I think that this motivates a lot of his resentment and anger towards Percy, who wants to be a part of that world.
Julian Wamble:Arthur is someone who is just rejecting his status and his place in Wizarding Society by doing the exact opposite of what everyone expects, except also not right. He marries a pureblood woman, he has a bunch of pureblood kids, and so in some ways he's doing what purebloods I imagine are meant to do, which is keep the pureblood line strong. But when it comes to trying to elevate his station, as some of you pointed to, with regard to his being a good father and a good husband, he does not care about that. And what seems true to me for Arthur is that good enough is good enough. There's something about that that feels healthy to me. I think that a lot of the anxiety that we see from Molly, that we see from Percy, that we even see from Fred and George as they try to kind of build up their business, comes from the feeling of I need to do better and if I don't, all is lost. And Arthur just seems generally content with where he is at in life. I think that there is something healthy about this idea of sometimes good enough is good enough, and this may be because this is something my therapist keeps telling me but sometimes in striving, I think, you lose a lot of yourself. The other side of that is also true.
Julian Wamble:Arthur's general contentment with good enough does not provide enough for his family. Why is it that Arthur is the only one who is seemingly content with the status and the station of his family. Why is everyone working tooth and nail to get out of the position that they're in? It seems that this is the selfishness that some of us are talking about in your comments, right, that his contentment with good enough is not enough for everyone else. It seems to me that for Arthur, excess is the mark of a pure blood and that for him he's like if we are happy and we are healthy, then we have what we need. But the question is, is everyone happy? In the words of Ariel the little mermaid, they want more, right, like they want more for themselves. Molly wants more for them.
Julian Wamble:And this kind of jettisoning of pure blood mentality, of pure blood excess, of pure blood status, also makes me wonder if that's the origin story for his muggle fetish, if, as part of his rejection of pure blood supremacy, he also kind of takes on and overcompensates how much he cares about muggle things and muggle artifacts in order to really drive home the point I am not like you, I am not like Lucius Malfoy, I am not like these other people. I am my own man who has his own beliefs, and that that is what motivates him to kind of dive in. And in many ways this makes sense to me because it's also why he does not dive in as deeply into figuring out how muggles operate and what muggle money looks like and all of these other things that really drive us crazy, because he just, seemingly, is very surface level in his fascination with them. And that's because it doesn't take much to be considered a blood trader. It doesn't take much to be seen and looked down upon when all you have to do is acknowledge the humanity of non-magical people. So why go deeper? This fascination seems more of a rebellion to me than it is actually something that is substantive and meaningful to him. There are fundamental things that he does not understand about non-magical people, and two of his son's best friends come from muggle households, and the best he's asking is what's a rubber duck? He can't say electricity, which is crazy. He can't say telephone. There are so many things that strike me as easy fixes that he is not trying to fix, and I think that that is in due and large part to the fact that he does not want to, because his goal is to stand in the face of expectations that society has of him, and in doing so, all it takes is believing in their right to live, not necessarily their rights.
Julian Wamble:Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Critical Magic Theory. As always, thanks to Mark Miller and Niles Luther for the music. Next week we'll be discussing Percy Weasley. I know, I know I'm skipping over Bill and Charlie. I just don't think that there's enough for us to really kind of sink our teeth into. Maybe I'll do a bonus episode. You all let me know what you want. But next episode we are absolutely talking about Percy Weasley, because one thing that you all need to know about me is I love mass, I love drama, I love hijinks, I love antics, and Percy Weasley serves all of those things on a silver platter.
Julian Wamble:Okay, this has been another episode of Critical Magic Theory. I'm Professor Julian Womble, and if you loved this episode, first off, thank you, and secondly, please go and rate, like, comment, subscribe all the things that one does when pods are cast. And if you would like to continue this conversation on social media, please feel free to follow me on TikTok, at ProfW P-R-O-F-W, on Instagram, at ProfJ-W, on YouTube, at Critical Magic Theory, and if you want to send me an email, please feel free to do so at CriticalMagicTheory at gmailcom. Thanks so much. See you in two weeks.