Umbridge's Rape (Was Umbridge a Half-Breed???)

[Matt]

No: HPFGUIDX 78162

--- carla wrote:
> While a theory of Umbridge being sexually tortured 
> would certainly be a horrifying possiblilty, I have 
> a different opinion about what happened late in the 
> forest that night.
> 
> .....
> 
> I don't accept a rape scenario, simply because it 
> would be too vulgar and "human" for the centaurs' 
> taste.

I agree, and have a couple of things to add on your
point.  Although I can see why one might read the 
Umbridge's re-entry scene as the aftermath of a
sexual assault (and although this thread raises
some terrific points for discussion), I submit that 
such a reading is at odds both with the centaurs' 
concept of honor and with their particular brand of 
wildness.  

Centaurs are violent and unconstrained by the 
conventions of humans, but not sexually rapacious 
(assuming here, that, as appears to be the case 
with other mythical creatures that JKR has adopted 
into the Potterverse -- such as werewolves and 
merpeople -- she intends the centaurs to correspond 
to the common myths surrounding such creatures).  
Even if they have little respect for the humans who 
enter the forest -- perhaps *because* they have so 
little respect for them -- the centaurs are *unlike*
we the readers, in that they have no reason to wish
to abuse or disempower Umbridge.  The factors that
make this thread such an interesting psycho-moral 
investigation from the reader's perspective are
simply irrelevant to the centaurs.

Conversely, an assault would contradict much of what
we have heard about the centaurs' moral principles.  
It would be an act of abuse, inconsistent with the 
Centaurs' rejection of evil (and good).  It would be 
a supreme act of interference with the affairs of 
humans.  It would treat Umbridge as a means rather
than an end, just what the centaurs blamed Hermione
for doing to them.  

I can believe that the centaurs would imprison 
Umbridge, and would use physical force if she tried 
to escape; I can even believe that they might kill 
her out of random violence; but rape strikes a
chord that is out of tune with the rest of their
behavior.

-- Matt