TBAY: Minerva McGonagall Is Ever So Evil!

[violetbaudelaire2002]

No: HPFGUIDX 39872

Excuse if I seem out of the fray, but I felt that I simply had to 
defend McGonagall, not because I have any particular liking for 
her, but because I do not see her as evil.
I'll begin with McGonagall's apparent predeliction for dressing in 
Slytherin colors, and the assumption that this links her to that 
house. While this is plausible, I find it difficult to believe a woman 
would be in tight with Voldemort (yes, I know about the 
Lestranges, but hang on). Maybe this is phrased badly, and I 
certainly don't want to sound ultra-feminist, but Slytherins don't 
place a lot of value on women. Yes, there is Pansy and Mullicent, 
and  presumably others, but the Slytherin Quidditch team has no 
women players (and I'm sure there is a statement, probably in 
PoA which says this is  slightly odd). 

 The Dark Arts (Slytherin, Death Eaters) seem to me to be a big 
boys club, very mysogonistic and definitely very patriarchal. I 
simply cannot buy McGonagall as high up in the club, simply 
because she's a woman. The Lestranges needn't have been 
very high ranking (indeed, Crouch Jr wasn't important until 
Voldemort found out that he was still alive and out of Azkaban), 
and the female Lestrange was probably following her  hubby, as 
I'm sure Narcissica Malfoy would do (by the way- Slytherin 
women do tend to be quite vain and narcisstic, and definitely 
followers, not leaders, and Minerva in mythology was not 
narcisstic.) 

As to her appearance on Privet Dr: 
> First off, McGonagall's very appearance on Privet Drive that 
morning 
> is *highly* suspicious.  Just what precisely is she doing there, 
> anyway?  She implies that she has been waiting there for 
Dumbledore --
>  and yet she keeps herself hidden from him, only revealing 
herself 
> once he makes it clear that he knows perfectly well that she is 
> there.  
McGonagall has been compared to Hermione more than once- 
she doesn't like to break the rules, and she waits for 
Dumbledore to put all the lights out and approach her. She is 
worried about the Muggles finding out about the WW, hence her 
annoyance about the celebrations. McGonagall is simply a very 
strict, uptight witch (read however you want)

> When cats twitch their tails and narrow their eyes, that is an 
> expression of aggression, anxiety, or predatory intent.  It is not 
> friendly cat behavior.
> 
> In fact, given that this particular cat is actually a witch in cat 
> form, I would go so far as to say that she reacts to 
Dumbledore's 
> appearance with outright *hatred.*
 
I also have cats- and with mine, I see this behavior as a 
tenseness, anticipation- not necessarily hatred.


I could elaborate more on this, as I am certain of McGonagall's 
innocence. That is not to say that she is not hiding anything, or 
that there will not be some sort of major plot twist involving her. 
To sum up- women don't seem to have too powerful a role in the 
Dark Arts, they have a very subjugated role, and Voldemort even 
expresses a kind of intolerance with them (as he probably has 
some sort of abandonment or possibly Oedipal issues). I simply 
cannot see him as placing a female in a powerful role, or 
allowing a female to gain power. 

"violetbaudelaire2002"