The Wizarding World of Harry Potter taught many of its readers the importance of standing up for what’s right, but is S.PE.W. an example of what to do or what not to do? A 14-year-old Hermione Granger founded S.P.E.W. in her fourth year of attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. As an avid student, she was all about taking what she learned and turning it into action.
Naturally, when she realized that many house-elves – the magical creatures who provide all manner of domestic services to magic wielders – were being mistreated, she investigated their situation. Hermione came to the conclusion that they were essentially being enslaved and needed to be freed from those holding them in bondage.
What Does SPEW Stand For?
Hermione initially intended for the group to be called ‘Stop the Outrageous Abuse of Our Fellow Magical Creatures and Campaign for a Change in Their Legal Status’. Since that didn’t exactly roll off of the tongue, though, she shortened it to ‘Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare’ and then again to S.P.E.W. so she could better advertise the group using merchandise items like badges and buttons. A better name might’ve been the ‘House-elf Liberation Front’, which Ron Weasley came up with after it became obvious that she was needling his brother Fred for information on how to find the school’s kitchens.
The young witch’s heart was in the right place. Just as the Harry Potter series advocated for its readers to do, she saw injustice and immediately sprang into action figuring out how to get rid of it. It’s not like she was making up a cause or exaggerating the issue. The conditions of the house-elves was in dire need of intervention from someone who noticed and cared enough to do something about it. Dobby, for example, flourished after Harry Potter gifted him a sock which then granted him his freedom from servitude. Her methods, unfortunately, left much to be desired.
Why was SPEW problematic?
Hermione quickly became notorious among her peers for badgering them to support her cause. She would even shake a donation box and demand they pay two sickles (~92 cents) to even participate. Worse, she would harangue them with pamphlets of information in a method not unlike being accosted by members of P.E.T.A for wearing fur or eating meat. S.P.E.W. supporters like Neville Longbottom joined less because they believed in its message and more because they just wanted Hermione to stop yelling at them about the rights of house-elves. She tried to get the Weasley twins and Professor Rubeus Hagrid to join with no success. It was a great way to alienate the very people that could’ve helped her elevate S.P.E.W.’s overall message.
However, it wasn’t just about school politics for the outspoken Hermione Granger. In fact, her passion for freeing house-elves from bondage was inspired by an incident she witnessed at the 1994 Quidditch World Cup. Barty Crouch forced Winky, his house elf, to defy her own fear of heights to save him a seat in the Top Box only to never even show up. Hermione was scandalized at the callous treatment and it got her thinking about the plight of house-elves throughout the Magical World. This led to her concluding that they were basically being enslaved, and she took this spark of passion for freeing them into the school year.
Many Harry Potter fans felt Hermione had the right idea with the wrong methods. Considering the disruptive ways she attempted to secure freedom for the house-elves, it’s probably safe to assume that other students and even the house-elves themselves felt the same way. Hermione would often go around the Gryffindor common room shaking her S.P.E.W. badge at other students in a misguided attempt to pressure them into joining. More troubling, though, was Hermione’s unwillingness to take into consideration what house-elves might want for themselves. While Dobby flourished with his new sense of freedom, Winky’s struggles with it led to her falling into emotional despair.
It doesn’t help that Dobby was given freedom as a gift whereas Winky received it as a punishment for circumstances not of her own doing. Most house-elves Hermione encountered made it very clear that they didn’t want freedom, or at least not the version of it she was trying to sell them. In response, Hermione resorted to trying to trick them into freedom by leaving spare clothes around the Gryffindor common room for them to pick up accidentally and thus be considered free. When the house-elves realized that this was her cunning plan, all but Dobby left the Gryffindor students to clean up for themselves.
The general narrative around S.P.E.W. in the Harry Potter book series was that it wasn’t taken seriously and Hermione, despite her intelligence, never figured out how to properly get it off the ground. The only members of S.P.E.W. were pressured into joining and even then didn’t really seem supportive of its cause. As far as students were concerned, the house-elves seemed happy in their position of servitude – whether that was in individual homes or in public institutions like Hogwarts. It was what they had done for a long time and there seemed to be no reason for it to change. If Hermione really cared about establishing freedom for house-elves, she should’ve asked them about what better care looked like since most wanted to continue working. She could’ve also sought to amend the Elf Legislation, a regulation process established by the British Ministry of Magic to ensure the proper care of house-elves. Instead, she basically made S.P.E.W. more about herself than those she claimed to fight for and students in response treated it all like a joke.
Despite S.P.E.W.’s faults, its impact can be seen throughout Harry Potter. It’s the catalyst that helps Ron and Hermione finally change their relationship from best friends to romantic partners. During the brutal Battle of Hogwarts, Ron was the only member of the Golden Trio to stop and consider evacuating the house-elves to prevent them meeting the same fate as Dobby. It was enough to make Hermione literally swoon into his arms. S.P.E.W. also inspired Harry to be a lot kinder to Kreacher, which caused the grumpy house-elf to reveal the details of his master Regulus Black’s visit to Lord Voldemort’s Horcrux cave.
Hermione’s efforts might not have led to the complete freeing of house-elves. Yet, it might’ve inspired them to pick up arms in the Battle of Hogwarts and definitely lead to her working in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures at the Ministry of Magic. While the legacy of S.P.E.W. lives on infamy, the work Hermione attempted to do carries with it a reminder of why it’s important to do the right thing – even if that means working alone.