Hermione must be stopped, ...-Hermione's Crimes

[catherine higgins]

No: HPFGUIDX 149443


a_svirn <a_svirn at yahoo.com> wrote:    
You see, first Harry, then Hagrid, and now ME! How dares she! Since 
then Hermione had raked her brains and mulled over Rita's miraculous 
omniscience until she hit upon the truth. This done she set about 
capturing Rita in her animal guise and confining her. It was before 
any idea of using her professional skills could ever occur to 
Hermione. No, she caught Rita, imprisoned her, whereupon by using 
blackmail extracted from her a promise to stay unemployed for a 
year. If this is not revenge, I don't know what is. 

Catherine responds:
   
  You know, Rita wasn't just being a little mean. She was publically slandering the people that Hermione cared about most. She was also trespassing onto Hogwarts grounds after being told she wasn't allowed. Eavesdropping in to private conversations....In fact, I think that that's what drove Hermione to go as far as she did. The mystery of HOW Rita was getting all of her
  information, things that she couldn't possibly have known. 
   
  Trespassing, eavesdropping, slander, liable AND being an unregistered animagus. Rita is not a nice person. Had she NOT been on Hogwarts grounds, transformed into a beetle, trying to dig up more dirt, Hermione could never have caught her. Can we lay SOME of the blame on Rita herself? 
   
  Also it seems to me, that an animagus may retain *some* of the human's ability and thought pattern, the way Sirius spoke of it in PoA, it seems that the transformee isn't completely themselves either. So for a beetle trapped in a jar, it's a beetle trapped in a jar. Not quite the same as emprisoning a human in a jar.  
   
  I think people are reading WAY too much into her behaviors as needing to be punished. Whereas I agree that she has some faults that lead her into unwise actions, she is also far from needing to be punished. This isn't real-life. And the rules seem a little more blurry in the WW. All Rita would have to do is to go an register herself as an animagus, and she could go on writing, despite what Hermione says, since Hermione would have nothing on her anymore. Rita has remained unemployed for over a year by her own CHOICE not to register herself as an animagus.

As for Marietta, I think JKR wanted us to see just how good Hermione is at jinxing people. It may come up again in book 7. And maybe Cho could be the Ravenclaw heir? 
   
  Catherine