[HPforGrownups] Re: Darned right It's time to defend Ginny!

[Maria Kirilenko]

No: HPFGUIDX 52367


Pippin:" I wonder if the urge to put down Ginny may be a bit like the
urge to create Evil!Cho, rooted in the readers' desire to consider
Harry romantically available rather than on her portrayal in the text
itself."

Jenny from Ravenclaw:"Okay, I think Pippin nailed it here. I could
never understand any criticism of Cho and while I agree that Ginny is
not a developed character, I can't criticize her either. Really, I
think Ginny is a nice kid. In fact, I think she has been since we
first met her."

Jim Ferer

A big "me too" to both viewpoints.  Ginny has done nothing wrong
whatsoever, but both her and Cho must be eliminated because they're
'in the way,' too dangerous to other potential Harry romances to be
allowed.

Evil!Cho is even more ridiculous, since we haven't heard the slightest
derogatory thing about her ever, period.  Some of those with kinder
intent say Cho will never overcome her grief over Cedric and her
association of Harry with it enough to get involved with Harry.  This
theory denies the fact Cho is fifteen or sixteen and ought to have the
resilience that goes with that age.

<snip>

I frankly get impatient with those who criticize characters for acting
their age.  As Jenny says, Ginny's ten years old when she forms her
first crush on Harry, and acts like it. We don't see much of her, but
she's always kind and loyal when we do. Cho is as nice as you can
imagine every time we see her; I've never been rejected that nicely.

<snip> 

Me:

<pause>

<clears throat>

I thought about this a lot during the past couple of months, and I have something to say about it.

You know, often people, and myself included, dislike certain characters (for me, it's Cho) and write about this dislike in a way that makes other people think that that particular character is disliked because of the character's *faults*. 

But very often it's not the case, even if it seems like it. Elkins in message # 51702 (Elkins, brilliant analysis, BTW, I meant to tell you, but forgot)

( http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/51702 )

outlined *seven* reasons for disliking a certain character, and they don't have anything to do with the charcter's personality at all (well, except idolized portrayal, which *is* pretty irritating ). 

I, for example, don't like Cho, while having no preferred Harry SHIP. This is due to reason #1: <quote from message 51702>

"The 'Crush on Cho' subplot did not interest them and/or actively 
annoyed them. Annoyance with authorial decisions almost invariably 
gets displaced onto the characters who serve as the textual agents of 
those decisions (a phenomenon which ties into that old question 
of "What Does It Mean To Like/Hate A Character?")."

So, what did I do the first time I wrote a post on Cho? I said: I don't like her! And immediately got several posts in reply that sounded pretty much like Jim's post here (I might have snipped some of what he wrote) - that I can't think ill of Cho because canon doesn't have anything bad on her. Right, it doesn't, which meant that I didn't dislike *Cho*, I disliked something about the Cho subplots, or something else connected to her. Some more self-analysis and another message by Elkins led to a conclusion which was what I quoted above. 

The same goes for Ginny.

Jim, you are right - there isn't anything bad about Ginny or Cho in canon. But associations people have, their expectations and wishes about the book, the way they relate to different characters doesn't let them be completely objective while reading. It's only human to be subjective - it's what we are in real life.

Maria



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