Being Good and Evil (was:Re: Harry's arrogance (was Evil ...

[houyhnhnm102]

No: HPFGUIDX 154785

Nikkalmati:

>  Maybe she should have made  the consequences explicit, 
> but IMO in the WW even teenagers should know  there are 
> consequences for breaking a magical oath. Marietta did not 
> happen upon rule breaking like Draco finding out about 
> Norbert by spying on the Trio.  She took a magical oath.

houyhnhnm:

First of all, I want to say that responsibility is not the 
same thing as blame, IMO.  Blaming is a game.  If I can 
pin the blame on someone else, then I'm off the hook.  
Responsibility doesn't work that way.  

Certainly Marietta was responsible for her actions.  She 
knew before she signed the parchment that she was getting 
involved in something questionable; she knew it as soon 
as she found out they were meeting in a dodgy place like 
the Hog's Head.  She should have known when Hermione gave 
Fudge's fear of Dumbledore as the reason for students' 
not being trained in DADA, that they were already setting 
themselves up against the Ministry, whatever the talk of 
a "study group".  She should have walked out then and 
there if she thought what they were doing was wrong.  You 
don't join an insurgency group because your best friend 
wants company.  It's not a shopping trip.  

I'm not sure she knew she was taking a magical oath, 
however.  Are we to assume that every time people sign a 
parchment in the WW they are binding themselves with a 
magical oath?  When parents of third years sign permission 
to visit Hogsmeade forms, for instance, are they entering 
into a magical contract?  Still, I agree that for someone 
from the "smart" House, Marietta was very stupid. 

However I don't have nearly as much invested in Marietta 
as a character as I do in Hermione.  Therefore Marietta's 
irresponsibility doesn't concern me as much as Hermione's 
does.  It was badly done.  Hermione's skills as an orgainzer 
of underground resistance movements is about on a par with 
her talent as a gumshoe in "Draco' Detour".  Her decision 
to meet in a honky tonk like the Hog's Head where they would 
stick out like sore thumbs instead of the Three Broomsticks 
where no one would notice them was a poor one, as Sirius 
pointed out to her.  Not recruiting carefully, not sounding 
people out before letting them in on secrets poor tactics also.

The hex on the parchment was not well thought out either.  
As many others here have pointed out, it did not serve as a 
deterrent because no one outside of the inner circle knew 
about it.  It did not give them any advance warning of 
betrayal.  Its only pupose was revenge and its action, 
apparently irreversible facial disfigurement, was overkill.  
It parallels Harry's use of sectumsempra and I think we 
are meant to see it that way.  I, too, think there is 
unfinished business between Hermione and Marietta in book 7.

I think it also parallels Hermione's S.P.E.W. involvement.  
In the case of Hermione's house elf crusade, the author's 
judgement is unambiguous.  She accomplishes nothing for 
the house elves, who don't want her help, except to force 
Dobby to do all the cleaning in the Gryffindor common room 
and bury himself under a mound of hats.  Her well-intentioned 
benevolence toward Kreacher, who casts it back in her face 
and reviles her for being Mudblood filth, is pitiable.  But 
in no way are we supposed to conclude that it is wrong to 
care about the welfare of enslaved and mistreated peoples.  
What is wrong is the rash, egocentric, condescending way 
she goes about it.  Hermione knows what's best for everybody.  

I don't think cruelty was her motive in putting a curse 
on the parchment that would scar someone for life.  I don't 
think she thought it out at all.  And that's the problem.