by Amreen Bi

Created on: July 30, 2009

There are many people who love the Harry Potter series and will be shocked to find some people have objections to it. Many religious organisations are calling for a ban or a boycott of the book, so what is it about the book that some religions have an objection?

The main religious based objection to the Harry Potter series mainly comes from Christian groups.

Their first reason of objecting to the series is because of the books including magic and witchcraft. People may think of this as nothing more then fantasy but some Christian groups think that the series are promoting witchcraft and paganism to young children.

Non-Christian parents too have some complaints similar to those coming from Christian groups as well. Harry Potter books do have a darker side to them and as the series continued the darker side of Harry Potter became more noticeable to many.

Harry, an orphaned young child, is left in the care of his horrible aunt and uncle. He is bullied by their son. For some Christians this is seen as a ploy to encourage young readers to see a 'special' child with magical powers vs. adults.

As some stories do have a message or a moral to go with the storyline people are also looking at what sort of message the Harry Potter books give to readers, in particular the younger generation who may not be able to question or fully understand what they are being told.

The good vs. evil storyline has been repeated in various stories for many years with the end result of good winning. The goodies are often easy to tell: they do the right thing, are honest, don't break the rules etc. The baddies are of course the complete opposite.

Some Christian groups have opposition to the fact that the good characters in the Harry Potter do sometimes do things that are perhaps morally questionable. For example the main characters may lie, steal and generally break the rules.

Another thing is that is a bit of mixed personality trait amongst some of the characters. They may not be entirely good or they may not be entirely bad.

In defence of such accusations one may say that in real life it is not always easy to tell what or who is good or evil. The Harry Potter books series may show that there is no simple black and white type of way telling the good/bad things in society.

Recently there has been much speculation by newspapers and other media about the sexuality of Dumbledore. Many assume or think that he may be gay. This is another reason why some groups may object on grounds of religion. They think that the book is promoting homosexuality.

If you read the book you will not find anything that is remotely to do with homosexuality and in fact there are zero references to it. Whether or not Dumbledore is a homosexual it is not mentioned in the actual book or has anything to do with the storyline.

While some Christian groups have been highly opposed to the Harry Potter book series there are many others who hold a very different view. Many just see it as harmless entertainment and even if the books contain things which are anti-Christian parents can use them to show their children about the message of the bible.

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