Umbridge and Harry (was McG / DD / Re: Why should Harry be expected...)

[festuco]

No: HPFGUIDX 123203


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Geoff Bannister"
<gbannister10 at a...> wrote:

> All things considered, I think that you missed an important point in 
> Alla's remarks - that using the quill was /in itself/ correct. Are 
> you suggesting that the action, which was improper and sadistic, was 
> correctly started by this woman to bring home to Harry the need to 
> conform? 

No, I did not. But I refuse to spell out for people what I mean for a
third time. If they don't get it, too bad. 

> Dolores Umbridge has the right as a teacher at Hogwarts to seek to
> improve the educational achievement and social interaction skills of
> her pupils but I think the use of water torture, meat axes and even
> magic quills falls outside the parameters of what would be considered
> to be good teaching techniques.

Are you actually suggesting Umbridge is there to teach a subject? 
Please cite me some canon on which you base that. Umbridge does not
want to teach a subject. Is not there to teach a subject. She is there
to install fear and make the rules of the MoM obeyed. And she will use
anything to make sure she gets her way. She is not interested in nice
little moralities. She is the strongest, so she has the right. She has
the full cooperation of the MoM behind her, and they don't really care
about fair play, justice or angry parents. For her good teaching
technicques are those that do the job: making her students do as they
are told. And that is what her boss wants of her. From their points of
view their method works. And that is all they are interested in. 

Now we as readers can analyze all we want. Say how evil a person she
is, and how immoral her behaviour. But inside the story, the Hogwart
students had better not do the same where she or her squad members can
hear it, because she will make them pay for it. They had better learn
that in a dictatorship the rules are what the dictator says they are.
They can scream about morality and justice all they want, but
sometimes it is not available. And then people had better adapt and
choose their actions wisely, especially if they are going to resist her. 

Gerry