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

[juli17 at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 154595


<snip>

Alla: (speaking of Marietta)

She may have been scared, yes, just as Peter may have been when 
Voldemort approached him ( if we believe Peter).

But no matter what her motivations were, the end result for DA army, 
whom I see as fighters against Ubridge oppressive regime would have 
been all the same, they all would have been expelled but for 
Kingsley quick thinking.

I am sure Marietta had her reasons, does it make her action better?
 
Julie:
It doesn't make her actions better, but more understandable. And
her actions are certainly *not* comparable to Peter's. She might
have gotten kids expelled from a school, which is something far
less than betraying a family to be brutally murdered. 

Houyhnhm:
  I 
> don't see Marietta as a despicable person at all.

Alla:

Neither do I, I see her ACTION as despicable.
 
Julie:
Her action is wrong, but in the context of her conflicting
loyalties, not completely despicable, IMO. Certainly not
deserving of the punishment she got.

Houyhhmmm:
  She 
> may have lacked the maturity to make her own decisions 
> about right and wrong.  She may have lacked the moral 
> imagination to comprehend that there was a higher cause 
> to be served than obeying the Ministry and her mother. 
> She may, in fact, have been a moral simpleton, incapable 
> of seeing beyond her own selfish fear of getting in trouble. 
> But she didn't *deserve* to be scarred for life.

Alla:

For life - no, but for some time - to me she absolutely did.

Julie:
But it wasn't for "some time" in a reasonable definition of
that term. If it had been for a week or two, maybe. But it's
gone into the next school year and so far hasn't been removed.
Can Hermione remove it, in fact, and if she can then why hasn't
someone made her do so? Can the teachers at Hogwarts, can the
*headmaster* all believe that Marietta deserves to have the 
curse continue indefinitely? I don't think so. Surely if it 
could be removed it would have been. And if Hermione invented
a curse that has no countercurse, that's problematic to me also.
 
Maybe this was partly an oversight on JKR's part that one of the
"good" children (and they ARE children, while we're calling 
Marietta despicable in action and deserving of this so far 
neverending disfiguration) is capable of delivering this curse
without qualm or desire to undo it. Or maybe she will address 
it later. I hope she does, because as it IS now (not the short
lived curse that could have been acceptable to some) the whole 
situation makes me uneasy about how the WW defines what is good
and what is bad, what is right and what is wrong. 

Julie
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