Fred and George: The PREDATORS (NOT!)

[jenny_ravenclaw]

No: HPFGUIDX 43224

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "bboy_mn" <bboy_mn at y...> wrote:

>If Fred and George had really been mean and/or bullies, they would 
have found a way to beat the crap out of Dudley, not play a prank on 
him.>

I feel that Fred and George did beat the crap out of Dudley though.  
They just used magic to do so.  They planned and executed an attack on 
a person they saw as weak, using his weakness (food) to get him.  
Dudley has done nothing to Fred and George, and, in fact, has not 
touched Harry in quite a while.

If Fred and George witnessed Dudley punching Harry, then their actions 
would have been justified.  In the situation that was actually played 
out, I can't see any real justification for what they did.  

People keep saying that the twins aren't bullies but that they can be, 
as bboy said: 

>insensitive, they can be overbearing, and they can be intimidating>

I had a student who, in the context of the discussion about the twins, 
reminds me quite a bit of them.   He was often the class clown, loud, 
sometimes rude, loved to get the best of others, and so on.  Many of 
his peers thought he was funny, but others were uncomfortable around 
him.  As a teacher, he was a student I loathed having in my class, 
even though we got along quite well and he liked me.  He detracted 
from class discussion and as his Advisor, I found that I was spending 
too much time tracking him down while he was wandering in the halls 
and disrupting other classes where he didn't belong.  It was annoying.  

Maybe it's hard for me to be objective about Fred and George because I 
do look at them from a teacher's point of view, but I would not 
tolerate their prank pulling in my classroom.  That doesn't mean I 
wouldn't think they are funny and charismatic kids.  A mean streak is 
a mean streak, though, and Fred and George sure have one.  I don't 
think anyone can deny that.

>The kick was not, by any interpretation that I can see, a blunt force 
trauma kick. They push him out using their feet which is still 
technically a kick, but it is NOT an assaultive kick; a kick by 
definition only. By the way, that's is exactly what I would have done, 
and I'm about as far from a bully as it is possible to get.>

A kick is an assault no matter how you slice it, dice it, dress it and 
season it.  Once again, if I witnessed a student kick another student 
who was lying on the ground, unconscious, the kicker would be expelled 
from my school's program within the next hour, regardless of what the 
unconscious student had also done.  Would the unconscious student also 
be punished in some way?  Most likely, but we have to place 
responsibility on the ones responsible.  If you kick, hit, push, slap, 
punch, bite, or spit at someone else, no matter WHAT that person has 
said to you, you and only you are responsible for that action.  No one 
can make you do something (well, under Imperius, maybe).  I'm not 
saying I don't understand why people want to slap others from time to 
time, but if you reach out your hand - or foot - towards someone else, 
you are responsible for that.  Fred and George are responsible for 
their actions.  I cannot blame Dudley, or Draco, in the scenarios 
we've been discussing.
 
--jenny from ravenclaw, who, as usual, agrees with Cindy about her 
Hagrid comment ************