Marietta/On Children and the "Other" (was:Re: On the perfection of moral vir

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 169597

> lizzyben04:
> I'm wondering if JKR included this whole DA/hex thing as a possible
> parallel to the Death Eaters? The "hex" Hermione gives is very
> similar to the "Dark Mark" that Death Eaters are given. Both
> organizations have a sign that "calls" the members to meet. And both
> organizations require the members to pledge eternal secrecy - once
> you're in, there's no getting out. Now, one is "good" & one
> is "evil", but there are definite similarities in how both are
> organized. Hermione even mentioned getting some of the ideas from
> the Death Eaters. These parallels have to be there for a reason.

Magpie:
I remember thinking it was significant that when Hermione said she 
got the idea for the coins from the DEs and Harry or Ron looked 
shocked, she quickly said, "Well, these don't mark peoples' skin!" 
Like that was the big difference.

And then later it turned out yes, Hermione did mark everybody's skin. 
It just only showed up as punishment.

The coins aren't Dark Magic just because they're based on the Dark 
Mark, of course. And in HBP I thought JKR was making the point of the 
whole "the other side can use magic too," showing that whatever goes 
around comes around--we were seeing a sort of "Gryffindor's Greatest 
Hits" in HBP being turned back on them.

Lizzyben:
Fleur & Molly learn to respect
each other, even if they'll never really like each other. The
prejudices & dislike that they've built up totally dissolve in the
end as they realize that they both truly love Bill. It was a ray of
hope & light in a very dark ending. Meanwhile, Harry still remains
lost in anger, hate & despair. Maybe the Fleur encounter was a hint
at what it will take for him to heal.

Magpie:
Though I feel compelled to point out that Fleur was never actually 
the Other as far as Harry was concerned. He liked her just fine. She 
was pretty much exclusively hated by the females. ("You know what 
we're like." --gag!)

BetsyHP:
I know the answer is "no" of course. But it seems to me that Harry
and his friends are allowed to make some mistakes, and yet still
remain on the "right" side. Others (or should I say "others" <g>)
are not given as much leniency. Probably, IMO, *because* Harry and
co. doesn't recognize them as human or real and therefore susceptible
to various pressures and misunderstandings as well.

Magpie:
That was something that came up at a paper I went to last weekend, 
because there was praise over the fact that JKR made the good side 
interesting, where some people always made evil more fun. Though part 
of what was funny was that by "interesting" people seemed to 
mean "bad." Meaning that usually only the villainous side got to do 
nasty stuff, but it was great that with JKR the good guys "made 
mistakes."

And that's something that comes up a lot but the question always is: 
so when does it stop being "making mistakes" and start being "bad?" 
Not because I think Harry and his friends are evil now or anything, 
but it just seems like such an easy thing. I know I'm not the only 
one who sometimes finds the things they do hard to make fit with 
the "what a good kid--we all make mistakes!" 

In fact there was an incident that sort of centered on this type of 
attitude at my old high school and I very much agreed with a woman 
who wrote to the paper challenging the whole idea of it, because it 
rather did come down to "bad kids'" bad actions showing something 
inherently bad in them which needed punishment, while "good kids" 
(that's what they're parents always said: "They're good kids, they 
just...") just made mistakes and so people were more lenient with 
them. Even when objectively, the good kids seemed to be doing worse 
things.

Now, Harry and his friends actively do try to do good things--they're 
not like spoiled rich kids whose only claim to "good" is parent on 
the school board. But still, if small bad acts are connected to 
larger ones (and I think they are, even if you're Snape!) there is, 
imo, something not so great about the reflexive attitude the kids 
often have about others. It's not that they *completely* dehumanize 
them--I agree they're not characterized as Orcs. But...hmmm.

It's possible JKR doesn't get the same bad feelings from some of the 
books that I do. Though there's enough in there where I think she 
might. Sometimes it is hard to tell, as Lizzyben said, if she's 
speaking out against having a disregard for certain others, or if 
she's just having it. But I really like when Pippin said about how 
she sees that attacking others often creates people who want to 
attack back. I don't think Harry wants the people he hates dead: he 
automatically saves Dudley and when he almost kills Draco himself his 
response is: No. Same for Draco, who also found actual murder 
different than saying "I hope you die." But I think both have at 
times given the impression very clearly that they would be happy if 
another person died, that they considered them that contemptible, and 
I think the other person knew that. I think there's a hint of that in 
Snape's refrain of Sirius trying to kill him (answered by the 
probably infuriating answer that it was just a joke), that 
Montague "could have died" (he was an annoyance).

-m (who was furious that after wishing for posts all night she 
discovered her e-mail was apparently bouncing!)