[HPforGrownups] Re: What would Bella think or do?

[Barb Roberts]

No: HPFGUIDX 126380


Tonks wrote:
>
>  I have been trying to understand Bella... 
>
>  Anyway how can a person be strong, unyielding, cruel and loving it
>  one minute, and the next be a sniveling, whimpering being groveling
>  at the feet of LV?  I just don't get it. Can someone help me
>  understand what is in Bella head? 

Not sure I have an answer exactly, for it's the same problem that many 
have in understanding real true-to-life people who have become 
fanatically devoted to a person and who then do horrible crimes.  
Remember "Squeaky Frome?"  She was one of the "Manson's women," and 
during Manson's murder trial, she camped out in front on the 
courthouse.  Too much. She later tried to shoot President Ford.  After 
20 years in prison, she still says that she is still one of Manson's 
most loyal supporters.  People are still trying to figure out why a 
popular, middle class kid turned into a dangerous fanatic just 
enthralled by Manson.  In Frome's case, emotional abuse from her father 
was part of the puzzle.  Her father stopped speaking to her when she 
came an adolescent.  (http://www.squeakyfromme.org/media/sipchen.htm.)  
  Manson knew how to pick his followers.

Bella seems to be the counterpart of McGonagall.  MM thinks for herself 
and is not a slave to Dumbledore, yet in OotP she is willing to follow 
Dumbledore when he is banished. MM has a healthy loyalty and respect 
for Dumbledore.  On the other hand, Bella's devotion is not rational 
(LV is a half-blood): and slavish.  She's an example of loyalty and 
devotion gone amuck.

What I find interesting is what it is about Manson or Hitler) that 
engendered such devotion. There were both paranoid, very delusional. 
Both Manson and Hitler dabbled I think in the occult--think "dark 
arts."  lt's funny I can see Tom Riddle as a cult leader.  Voldemort 
just doesn't seem quite human.  However, Voldemort's power to possess 
and control people does seem real.  How many parents of a sullen or 
wild adolescent's have wondered what has taken control of their 
formerly docile child?

Barbara Roberts






[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]