In defense of Ron

[faerysneezes at yahoo.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 4861

--- In HPforGrownups at egroups.com, faerysneezes at y... wrote:
> --- In HPforGrownups at egroups.com, eggplant88 at h... wrote:
> > The only time I found Ron really obnoxious was when he had a
fight 
> > with his best friend, a friend who had saved his sister's life, a 
> > friend who had demonstrated a willingness to risk his own life to 
> > save Ron too. I understand why he had the fight, he was jealous
of 
> > Harry, and I understand why he was jealous, he was insecure; 
however 
> > understanding why somebody is obnoxious does not make him one bit 
> > less obnoxious. Harry was going through a very difficult time, he 
> was 
> > scared to death he was either going to get killed in the first 
task 
> > of the tournament or even worse make a complete fool of himself, 
> > almost everybody at school hated him, he was depressed and needed 
> > moral support from Ron. He didn't get it. Harry didn't ask Ron to 
> > risk his life, he just asked him to be his friend and Ron
refused. 
> > His only friend was Hermione.
> > 
> > It's hard for me to get very weepy over Ron's early years, 
everybody 
> > has problems growing up but it seems to me Ron's childhood was 
> > wonderful, as close to being perfect as anybody ever had. Harry's 
> > childhood on the other hand was a pure undiluted nightmare, but 
that 
> > would never make him let down a friend when he needed it most. 
Harry 
> > has forgiven Ron so I guess I should too, but he should have the 
> good 
> > grace to be thoroughly ashamed of himself.


I'm sure Ron was throughly ashamed with himself. Of course we don't 
see him *say* it... considering during the tent-reconciliation-scene 
in GoF (after having dealt with the horntail) Harry sort of prevents 
Ron into going into a proper apology. And its not like we can't see 
how sorry Ron is for his absence... we have some indications after 
that of Ron trying to make up for it by trying to boost Harry's 
confidence.

And these characters aren't meant to be the perfect, they're meant to 
be like real people, and people tend to let things blind their
vision. 
I'm sure everyone on this group has had an experience of when they 
know they had been acting like a real jerk.

If not speaking to eachother is equivalent to being obnoxious then 
Harry has had his moments too. How about that whole fiasco with 
Crookshanks. Although the fight was primarily between Ron and
Hermione   
Harry totally sided with Ron. I didn't see Harry trying to get the
two 
of them to reconcile (like Hermione does in GoF by trying to get the 
two of them to talk to eachother). Hermione was so distraught that
she 
was in tears at Hagrid's house about it. And i'm sure Hermione could 
have used both their support at that time too. The poor girl didn't 
have many people to default to (at least in GoF Harry had hermione 
there for him) And Hagrid had to tell Ron and Harry that she was 
feeling this way. I don't think that their childhoods (ie. Ron's
being 
better than Harry's) should really matter at this point. People get 
obnoxious regardless of whether they're the king of the world or 
merely underappreciated.


To tell you the truth I'm pretty surprised that its taken four years 
for them to have an actual fight. Its quite a natural thing to
happen. 
Friends are allowed to have squabbles. And most times these squabbles 
are a result of one person being obnoxious or totally ignorant. It 
happens. 

Don't go and hold out a grudge against Ron because he isn't perfect

norevoli