Vicarious Retribution (long)

[dumbledore11214]

No: HPFGUIDX 128806

Magda Grantwich :
<SNIP>
I realize that everyone wants to see unpopular characters punished
but the big lesson I take from JKR is that being good or bad isn't
like Quidditch teams: you don't pick one side and you're that side as
long as you wear the team colours.  Your goodness or badness depends
on your actions and you're constantly affirming or repudiating your
goodness or badness with the actions you take every day.  There's no
one so bad (except Voldemort) who can't be redeemed someday - if they
take the right actions for good.  Similiarly being a good guy doesn't
give you a free ticket to hurt or attack others, even people you
don't like or who go after you.  


Alla:

Right. I agree. I just don't see how what you wrote excludes the idea 
of "vicarious retribution'. Bad guys CAN be redeemed, if they make 
the right choices down the road, but it does not mean that they 
necessarily WILL be redeemed, if they fail to make the right choices 
over and over again AND even if they make the right choice eventually 
at the end, the reader still wants to see them punished for the 
wrongs they committed ( I am talking about myself only of course), 
which is not always possible in a normal way.

How large is the possibility for example that Draco will be expelled 
for making racial slurs against Hermione over and over again? There 
will be nobody to fight with Trio on Hogwarts. He is a weak adversay, 
but he is getting stronger, I hope at least.

How large is the possibility that Draco will be somehow punished for 
example for campaigning for execution of Buckbeak? I remeber reading  
post by Amy Z ( I think) in the archives that trying to get Buckbeack 
executed could be Draco's biggest crime yet.

So, we see amasing bouncing ferret and some other things done to him -
sort of indirect punishment.

How large is the possibility that Dudley will somehow pay for ten 
years or more of "Harry hunting" by .. I don't know  some kind of RL 
punishment ( Social Services supervision or something) That is not 
the story JKR writes , but she wants to punish Dudley somehow and we 
get the pigtail.

How large is the possibility that Snape will get fired for emotional 
abuse he subjects Harry and Neville to routinely? ( Just my opinion, 
just my opinion, just my opinion   :-))

Right, we won't have a story without Snape in Hogwarts, so we take 
what we can get as punishment.


So, what was I getting at? Oh, yes, good guys. OF COURSE those 
actions are wrong as metaphors for RL punishments,because people need 
to be punished for the offense they committed by the people who are 
allowed to do that but at the same time this reader gets immense 
satisfaction that bad guys get punished SOMEHOW.
JKT does not give good guys FREE ticket to hurt people, IMO, but  the 
fact that they punish characters who are so obviously guilty fo 
wrongdoings ( IMO only) allows them to remain good guys.

Just my opinion of course,

Alla