Marietta and Hermione (was JKR's Messages ) (was Re: Hermione In Trouble?)

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 120760


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "eggplant9998" 
<eggplant9998 at y...> wrote:
> 
>  "pippin_999" wrote:
> 
> > I think Hermione was as wrong to punish
> > Marietta the way she did as Umbridge 
> > was to use the quill on Harry 
> 
> So, you think a breakout in acne is too severe a punishment for 
a  piece of scum like Marietta. Let me ask you something Pippin: 
During World War 2 what do you think would have happened to a 
member of the  French Resistance who was caught betraying 
her comrades to the  Nazis? Do you think she'd get acne or a 
bullet in the brain?

> This is no longer kid stuff, this is serious business,<<snip>>

Pippin:
 Joining the Death Eaters is a serious business too, did that 
make it okay for Voldemort to have Regulus murdered? Of 
course not, because Regulus didn't know what he was getting in 
to. Defying a ministry official is a serious business, did that 
make it okay for Umbridge to use the quill? Of course not, she 
was violating the policy that corporal punishments should not be 
used against students.

If Hermione thought that traitors to the group should be punished 
with something more than ostracism, the accepted punishment 
for betraying student secrets, she should have discussed that 
with the group. Of course someone might have  refused to sign 
the parchment and gone straight to Umbridge,  but in fact, there 
was an eavesdropper who went straight to Umbridge anyway, so 
Hermione didn't gain anything by her secrecy. Hermione's hex 
didn't even keep Marietta from further betrayals -- it took 
Kingsley's memory charm to do that.

 All Hermione accomplished with her tyrannical methods was to 
make an enemy of Cho, a powerful and influential young witch 
who might have been a  useful ally. I expect Hermione might be 
sorry for that one day.

The lesson, IMO, is that tyranny does not pay, even if the tyrant 
has good intentions. It's a case of choosing the easy path over 
the right one--tyranny is a more efficient way of making rules, but 
as Umbridge demonstrated and Hermione found out, it's not a 
more efficient way of enforcing them. 
 
Eggplant:
> Pippin, you also seem to think Hermione was wrong to trick 
Umbridge  and let her be kidnapped by the unicorns;<

Pippin:
No, I think Hermione was wrong to use the centaurs'  
xenophobia as a weapon. As she found out, there's no 
controlling it.

Pippin