The Twins / Weasleys / Percy

[va32h]

No: HPFGUIDX 145169

A few things I think are crucial in considering the Weasley twins 
are: 

1) First and foremost - JKR has consistently expressed affection for 
the Weasley family of characters. I find this telling. In 
interviews, she expressed concern that readers were overly fond of 
Draco and Snape, but I've never read an interview in which she 
cautioned us not to like the Weasleys too much, or expressed 
surprise that the twins are as beloved by her readership as they 
are. 

Which is not to say that a certain cruel aspect of their 
personalities is not present, but I very strongly feel that we are 
supposed to like the Weasleys. 

2) The twins are teenage boys. When we meet the twins, they are 13, 
and I'm sorry, but 13 year old boys tend to be obnoxious, juvenile, 
and to do stupid things. Youth is not an excuse for bad behavior, 
but it is a mitigating factor. 

Since the adults in HP are usually absent or hands-off during much 
of the action, it's easy to forget that the characters are indeed 
children. But they are, and they act like it. 

3)Personal experiences can affect how the reader perceives sibling 
relationships in the Weasley family. I grew up with siblings who 
teased me (and each other quite mercilessly). Looking back, I can 
see that many of their actions could be classified as cruel. One of 
my brothers actually broke the other brother's leg during a mock 
karate fight. I also have a rather Molly-esque mother. Now that we 
are all grown up, those petty hurts (and yes, even the broken leg) 
are laughed about. 

If a reader is inclined to not like the Weasleys, every action is 
going to be seen in its worst light. So I won't waste my breath 
arguing - because I do think the "anti-Weasley" interpretations are 
valid (i.e. the evidence in canon is there) but I don't think they 
are what the author intended. 

However I do want to address this:

Betsy Hp wrote:
> And their level of violence started to pick up.  They seemed 
> perfectly fine with attacking much younger wizards from behind and 
> in greater numbers.  There was the bit about the dead puffskien I 
> was rather horrified to read about in Fantastic Creatures.  Their 
> pranks started drawing blood, and again, the twins seemed less 
than 
> phased by it.  When they note a team-mate apparently bleeding out 
> because they gave her the wrong side of a product, they decide to 
> play it off.  Only taking her to the hospital wing when the team 
> captain notices something is off.
> 
> Then there is the very near murder of Montague (by starvation, 
> horrifically enough) for which they've shown no remorse.  The fact 
> that they vicariously give Hermione a black eye with such a deep 
> bruise normal healing methods don't work.  The sadistic treatment 
of 
> a garden gnome foolish enough to behave like, well, a garden gnome 
> around them.  

As I said in the Hagrid/Draco/Buckbeak thread, violence and physical 
injuries simply do not have the same weight in the magical world, 
where such injuries are instantly fixable, as they do in the "real" 
world. So many very violent and seemingly grave injuries befall so 
many characters in the books, including the young heroes, that they 
just can't be taken seriously. Harry has nearly died every year he's 
attended Hogwart's. I might think JKR was the sadist, the way she 
relentless inflicts injuries on Harry, if I didn't believe that her 
fantasy world just does not see violence the way the real world 
does.  

Hermione, the "victim" of the deep bruise, is not horrified or 
deeply pained, or even very upset. She wants the bruise to go away 
because she doesn't want to look like that forever, but she didn't 
say a word to the twins about hurting her, or even mention feeling 
any pain. She just wanted the appearance of the bruise to go away. 

The Quidditch teammate with the bloody nose (was that Katie or 
Alicia?) also expressed no pain, only irritation at having her 
practice spoiled. No one on the team expressed horror at a teammate 
bleeding, merely annoyance that the practice was being ruined. 

If the victims of these alleged attacks can't even bother being 
outraged, I have a hard time doing so on their behalf. 

Montague is not described as being "nearly murdered" or "starved" as 
I recall. Disoriented, yes. Practically dead, no. Shoving Montague 
into the cabinet was not an exemplary act, but since none of the 
teachers made much of an effort to find and punish the would-
be "murderers", it does not appear than anyone at Hogwarts 
considered the situation that serious. 

The gnome & puffskein incidents: The puffskein squashing was 
mentioned in a single offhand sentence in a book that is not even a 
true part of the series. I can't believe that JKR intended this as 
anything more than a throwaway line. Which means I don't give it 
much weight - I mean, I saw it as equivalent to squashing a pet 
cricket. Not nice, but not a harbinger of future sadistic antisocial 
violence.  

Gnomes - two ways I can read that. Either gnomes are a household 
pest like cockroaches or mice, that homeowners deal with 
remorselessly. Or it's another example of wizards treating other 
magical creatures as objects with no feeling. If the latter, that's 
fine, but then Harry is just as guilty, since he joins right in the 
gnome-tossing. 

va32h