The Impact of a Post-9/11 World on the Wizarding World: Difference between revisions

 

(N.B. I do not think any of this breaks rule 2: I am speaking of things that occurred after 9/11, but I am not making kind of ethical or political evaluation concerning whether those things are good or bad, and I am only discussing in the broader context of how "how did 9/11 affect the world of Harry Potter," a question centered on an event that this sub has decided is pre-modern)

 

With 9/11 came the introduction of the PATRIOT ACT, the topic it hand is the effects of 9/11, not the goodness or badness of particular political policies that we must acknowledge if we are to have any kind of coherent discussion at all), the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, mass wiretapping, immense records of internet activity, etc etc. 9/11 came at just the time when technology began to allow governments to hyper-surveil their citizens and gave such governments just the cause to justify such surveillance to said citizens.

With the rise of the Surveillance State, muggle governments no longer ''need'' cooperation in this area.

 

 

Wizards do not care to understand modern technology. They don't bother with it. They've created a reactionary culture built on an understanding of muggle inferiority several centuries out of date. This is a great weakness here as it is unlikely that wizards would know that intelligence agencies were gathering data on them until it was too late, until muggle governments had exponentially expanded their understanding of the wizarding world.

 

 

At a certain point, intelligence agencies will have sufficient understanding of wizardry at large and will have sufficient dirt on many wizards in particular that they may begin forcibly recruiting wizards as assets.

Circle back and combine that understanding with an increasing number of turned assets, and you now have muggle governments asserting real ''influence'' over wizard governments. The CIA has the Minister of Magic's dirty laundry, and it knows how to weaponize that against him.

 

 

A coalition of nations now begins to wage war in the Middle East. Note that "war" in the aftermath of 9/11 includes things like declarations of no-fly zones, assassinations, troop movements into territories not officially at war, proxy-wars, etc etc.

Given the new relationship between Muggle and Wizard governments, how would the wizarding world be involved in the War on Terror?

 

 

Almost immediately, intelligence agencies would begin using their assets for the purposes of torture. Two of the three Unforgiveable Curses would be used to gather intelligence from muggle prisoners.

 

 

In the longterm, however, muggle governments (and their defense contractors) would likely seek ways to weaponize wizardry. We know that magic can be used to enchant muggle technology like cars and busses; why not planes? Muggle governments and contractors would likely research ways to use magic to wage war without risking the lives of soldiers (and, by removing the trigger finger from the immediacy of the battlefield, making it psychologically easier for soldiers to kill others).

The development of this magic-technology would, of course, take many years, and so we might not expect to see mass drone usage until the 2010s.

 

 

But the biggest effect overall would be the change in perception of the wizarding world.

The War on Terror would operate also as a shadow War on Magic.

 

 

Let's look at the event from the other direction.

This is a confrontation unlike any other in modern wizarding history. Muggles have never before been a threat, and so there is no useful antecedent to this conflict. That means things will likely go bad for the wizards, but also that, with this new paradigm, massive change may come about in their culture.

 

 

Wizards would likely begin attempting to infiltrate muggle governments, militaries, and intelligence agencies. Their success is likely mixed at best; on the one hand, magic allows them to gather information from prisoners easily, force people to do their will, and imitate the appearance of anyone. However, again, these are people whose muggle experts struggle with the concept of a rubber duck.

It would be become clear that the wizarding world would need to change if it was going to survive.

 

 

Wizards would likely begin to actually study the Muggle world and, as time in the War on Magic continued on, begin building a more resilient Wizarding World, a society that was prepared to engage with the wizarding world. Things like "basic math and science" might begin to be taught in schools. Computers and phones might begin to appear in wizard homes. And indeed, this confrontation with new ideas, ways of seeing reality, data about the universe, and cultural phenomenon would likely lead to new innovations in magic. If magic warps reality, a better understanding of that reality likely enhances that magic.

The wizarding world of the events in the ''Harry Potter'' books is a very stagnant place in every way; real revolutions in culture and magic may finally begin to occur. Of course, that may also lead to some problems.

 

 

As the internet becomes common in the wizarding world, so too will its algorithmic effects.

Muggle governments too would be united with Wizarding governments in their opposition to Wizard Leftists; in the long term, the creation of a post-scarcity society threatens both their ways of life, and in the short term, both would be served by protecting the secrecy of the wizarding world, which Wizard Leftists would threaten to end.

 

 

By 2017, the wizarding world should be ''devastated''. After 16 years of war, a good chunk of the populace should be wiped out. Those that remain should be far more integrated with the muggle world than we see in the play. Further, they should be radically polarized.

But let's say it is canon. Let's say that ''The Cursed Child'' really is the 2017 of the Wizarding World. That must mean one thing:

 

 

But how? Why? Why this one atrocity avoided, when so many others still occurred?