[HPforGrownups] Re: Fred and George: The Bullies You Do Know

[yr awen]

No: HPFGUIDX 43070

Good.... dang! Afternoon already?!

(snipping large amounts of postage here)

Cindy:
Anyway, I do see some parallels between Draco's conduct in 
belittling the Weasleys for their poverty and Fred and George's 
pranks.  Take the Canary Cream business, where the twins 
deliberately steered a younger, less powerful student toward their 
joke.<<<<<<<<<

Yes, let's take the Canary Creams passage (GF21, US hardback), which has been oft cited but never quoted in the discussion:

"Want a jam tart, Hermione?" said Fred.

Hermione looked doubtfully at the plate he was offering her. Fred grinned.

"It's all right," he said. "I haven't done anything to them. It's the custard creams you've got to watch -- "

Neville, who had just bitten into a custard cream, choked and spat it out. Fred laughed.

"Just my little joke, Neville..."

<snip>

At this point, there's absolutely *nothing* to suggest that the twins have "deliberately steered" Neville into their joke; the impression is that the custard creams could be picked up by anyone in the room and Neville was the one who happened on them. 'Younger and less powerful' doesn't enter into it the way the scene is set up -- there's no coercion, threat, or subtle entrapment hinted at. Neville simply eats the cream. To continue:

Just then, Neville caused a slight diversion by turning into a large canary.

"Oh -- sorry, Neville!" Fred shouted over all the laughter. "I forgot -- it *was* the custard creams we hexed --  "

Within a minute, however, Neville had molted, and once his feathers had fallen off, he reappeared looking entirely normal. He even joined in the laughing.

Okay, Neville doesn't exactly come off as victimized here, or tortured, harassed, or bullied in any way. Rather, he sees the joke and shares in it. And besides, if you can't laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at? And, as Darrin pointed out (we bad people have to stick together), F&G do have a sense of humor strong enough to make them laugh at themselves whenever they get shown up, cf. their failed attempt to enter the Triwizard Tournament.

Cindy:
  Take the Ton-Tongue Toffee, where the twins deliberately 
victimized Dudley for being hungry, overweight, and not magical.  I 
certainly think reasonable minds can differ on this point as well, 
but I have to wonder whether the conduct of the twins is every bit 
as hurtful to those on the receiving end as Draco's taunts about the 
Weasleys' poverty.<<<<<<<<<<<<

No, they don't victimize Dudley for being hungry, overweight, and not magical -- they take advantage of it, yes, but the purpose behind the Ton-Tongue Toffee wasn't to Muggle-bait, it was to extract revenge (I am in no way saying that's a laudable motivation, merely pointing out that your attribution is not wholly on-target.) From GF5:

"It *isn't funny!" Mr. Weasley shouted. "That sort of behavior seriously undermines wizard-Muggle relations! I spend half my life campaigning against the mistreatment of Muggles, and my own sons --"

"We didn't give it to him because he's a Muggle!" said Fred indignantly.

"No, we gave it to him because he's a great bullying git," said George. "Isn't he, Harry?"

"Yeah, he is, Mr. Weasley," said Harry earnestly.

We have another example of Fred-n-George going to bat for Harry against the Dursleys, and that's their rescue of him from his bedroom/cell in CoS. Mrs. Weasley is simultaneously venting her rage and making them breakfast when George, in his defense, bursts out with, "They were starving him, Mum!" This assertion is 1.) very true and 2.) effective -- Molly relents a little. She agrees that Harry was in an absolutely untenable situation, and one he needed to be removed from. F&G simply beat her to the punch when it comes to said removal.

Cindy:
Hmmm.  Draco is a racist, but he is many other things as well.  For 
instance, he is an elitist.  So it seems quite logical to reach the 
question of whether Draco's elitism is similar to the elitism Fred 
and George display in victimizing someone like Dudley.
<snip>
But again, we certainly should be able to disagree on this point and 
even be willing to hear the ideas of others without our tone 
becoming overly strident, I would hope.<<<<<<<<<<

Well, being racist also implies being elitist; one would argue that they are, in some ways, cocomitant with each other, or that racism requires elitism in order for it to grow into the raging, nearsighted cancer that it is. Additionally, I'm beginning to wonder, as you said, if we're not beginning to see a polarization in our language due to the intensity of debate. "Them's fightin' words! And all that." Hopefully we can avoid vitriol :-)

The thing is that I can't think of any pattern of F&G's behavior, outside of the TTT incident (I'm just going to write that from now on...) that fits that of an established, confirmed elitist, such as Draco or even Fudge, whose elitism is going to send the WW down a very dangerous track sooner or later. There seems to be a general sort of segregation, and even hints of superiority, the wizard world has for the Muggle world, but that F&G carry that to an extreme -- even if it's not to Draco's extreme -- doesn't seem to be indicated.

Further, you have the wizarding world's opposite numbers to charge with racism and elitism, and here I'm talking about the Dursleys, who have systematically victimized Harry for being what he is, in a manner far more bullying and abusive than someone who drops a TTT on the floor. These people are in positions of absolute power and authority over Harry, but they see fit to further establish their dominance by bullying him and oppressing him at every turn -- and when Harry is given the power to fight back, like true bullies (as Darrin has said), they back down. To my mind, that oppression for the sake of it is far more unconscionable an act than anything F&G have carried out. Vernon says he and Petunia vowed to stamp out Harry's wizarding proclivities. Petunia's vituperation toward wizards in PS/SS is matched only by Draco's invective against Muggles; she dismisses the death of her sister as a massive inconvenience, calls her sister and her son freaks of nature, people who are abnormal, people who aren't deserving of human rights or basic consideration.

Yeah, that's a class act right there. That's elitism, racism... stick any classist -ism you want to on there, and I believe it applies to a far more damning extent than it does to teenage pranks.

Cindy:
See, I think the twins have a superiority complex when it comes to 
Muggle relations.  Maybe there are good reasons for this, but I 
sense it nonetheless.  So is there some reason why the twins 
superiority complex vis a vis muggles is different from some of the 
elitism Draco has displayed?<<<<<<<<<

Could you elaborate more on that, or are you drawing solely from the TTT incident? See my argument above -- I honestly don't think there's that much canon to prove F&G are any more elitist than your average wizard. And with a dad who works in the Department for Misuse of Muggle Artifacts, how could they be?

HF.


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