Understanding Marietta (long) (Was: Evil Hermione)

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 154991

Carol earlier:
> > <big snip> 
> > Rather than telling them what they want to know, Harry confronts
Zacharias with "I fought him!" and, in essence, if you don't believe
Dumbledore (who told them only the condensed version of Cedric's
murder), you don't believe me, followed by an angry, "If you've come
here to find out exactly what it looks like when Voldemort kills
someone I can't help you. I don't want to talk about Cedric Diggory,
all right? So if that's what you're here for, you might as well clear
out" (341). Yes, very convincing, Harry. Very helpful in assuring
Zacharias, Marietta et al. that you're not an attention-seeking liar
with an unstable, possibly violent streak.
> > 
> 
> 
> Neri:
> Er... what? Are you actually saying that Zacharias, Marietta et al. 
> *shouldn't* have trusted Dumbledore's word completely? Just because 
> he didn't supply them with a few clarifying details?
> 
> Or, wait ,wait, are you saying that Zacharias, Marietta et al. 
> thought that Dumbledore was generally a good person, but that he was 
> duped to think that Voldemort was back just because he chose to 
> believe a suspicious story told him by a person appearing to be an 
> attention-seeking liar with an unstable, possibly violent streak?
> 
> So are you actually claiming that the argument "Dumbledore believes 
> person X, therefore if you don't believe person X you don't believe 
> Dumbledore" is *not* a viable argument??? 
> 
> Carol, I'm shocked. 
> 
> <veg>
> 
> Neri
>

Carol responds:
What I'm saying is that they did have a right to know the details and
Harry was behaving exactly like the person the Daily Prophet said he
was, an unbalanced liar. As Zacharias says, "Dumbledore believes
*him*" (Harry)--he isn't speaking from his own knowledge. And they've
had several months worth of Daily Prophet articles to reinforce that
impression.

Zacharias wants to know what happened. If he's given credible details,
he'll believe it. He also wants to learn what Harry can teach him once
he learns that Harry has those skills (that he killed a Basilisk and
helped thwart Quirrell would not prove to Zacharias, much less to
Marietta, that Voldemort was back). Even Seamus, who knows Harry and
isn't at the meeting, doesn't know what to think because of the way
CAPSLOCK Harry reacts to him. Marietta, IMO, doesn't think she needs
those skills because 1) she's not in her OWL year, 2) she doesn't
believe that Voldemort is coming back, and 3) she thinks it's wrong to
oppose the Ministry, which, in her view (AFAICT), is acting to protect
the students.

Neither Zacharias nor Marietta knows Dumbledore personally, and even
Harry doesn't always believe what Dumbledore says. Neither Dumbledore,
whose source of information is Harry, nor Harry himself (who is being
angry and uncooperative as he often is in OoP, wholly unsympathetic to
anyone else's point of view) has presented any supporting evidence
that Voldemort is back. Hermione herself says earlier, "The thing is,
Harry, I don't think they believed Dumbledore" (or something to that
effect), referring to the end-of-year speech, and she presents the
reasons why a large portion of the student body still believes the
Daily Prophet's version of events, including their depictions of
Dumbledore as a deluded old fool and Harry as an unstable attention
seeker prone to collapsing and having hallucinations. Harry's words
and behavior do nothing to convince them otherwise and everything to
confirm their views.

As Hermione says when Luna talks about Fudge having an army of
heliopaths, "Excuse me, but what's the evidence for that?" And yet
Zacharias et al. are supposed to believe without evidence that the
Dark wizard who vanished and has been believed dead for fourteen years
has returned, resurrected, restored to a body, and murdering people?
If Harry had calmed down and explained to them exactly what happened
in the graveyard, even Zacharias would have been impressed. Instead,
he merely confirms the impression that he's unstable.

Zacharias doesn't "snitch" because he wants to learn the spells, but
he doesn't like or trust Harry. Marietta, IMO, sees him as dangerous
and deluded, exactly as the Daily Prophet depicts him.

Carol, who is trying to see from a perspective other than Harry's and
is not at all surprised that Zacharias et al. didn't believe
Dumbledore considering both the source of DD's information and the
total absence of supporting evidence that he presents