The Malfoys WAS: Wizarding kids and their parents

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 183973

Carol earlier:
> > 
> > But you don't take it upon yourself to control your parents' lives
> and fates and rob them of their identity. That's utterly
presumptuous and unnecessary. There has to be a better way.

Justcorbly (Did I get that right? It's an unsigned post) responded: 
> I dunno. It seems in character for a frightened teenage girl who's
aware of her powerful skills and talents. I didn't question it when I
read that passage. 

Carol again:
In character, certainly. Hermione is always taking things into her own
hands: Hats for House-Elves, blackmailing Rita Skeeter and putting her
(in bug form) in a jar, hexing the parchment at the introductory DA
meeting, "borrowing" the dead Dumbledore's books on Dark magic, to
name a few instances). Now the beaded bag (aside from forgetting about
food) was an example of thinking ahead and planning for emergencies,
but even then, she didn't consult anybody. she just took matters into
her own hands. So, absolutely it's in character for Hermione to deal
with things herself. But "frightened teenage girl"? She has no cause
at *that* point to fear for her parents, and if she did, she should
have consulted with someone older and more experienced. Someone who
knew how to cast a Fidelius Charm, for instance. 

And why could she not tell her parents that Voldemort might endanger
them and let them decide for themselves how to deal with it? Harry,
after all, told the Dursleys, whom he didn't love at all. But Hermione
takes charge of the parents without whom she would not even exist, who
have loved her and given her everything she needed and wanted even
though it meant doing without her company for at least ten months
every year. Maybe in your view it's all right for a child to control
the lives of her capable acult parents. It's not all right in mine.
(Granted, kids don't have magical powers in our world, so it's hard to
think of a comparable real-life example. I suppose it would be
comparable to deciding that your parents needed a new home and buying
them one with their money without telling them, at the same time
selling the very house they lived in. Difficult but perhaps not
impossible for a Muggle Hermione who thinks she knows best for
everyone, including her own parents.)

Corbly: 
> Placing her parents in the hands of the Order would have entailed
telling her parents precisely what was going on and how much she was
at risk.  It also might have entailed telling her parents of the
things she had already done and might be called upon to do in the
future. (Hermione's, Harry's and Ron's extracurricular adventures were
not the things most children would be happy to write home about. 
Hermione is the only member of the trio with parents who are
essentially clueless Muggles.)*

Carol:
And why shouldn't she tell them at least as much as Harry tells the
Dursleys or Fudge tell the Muggle PM back in HBP--by no means
everything, but at least enough to let them know what's going on and
why they're in danger? They can't permit Hermione from endangering
*herself*; she's eighteen, and "of age" even from the Muggle
perspective. They're "clueless" only because Hermione has kept them in
the dark all these years. They'd never have sent her to Hogwarts if
they knew she'd been Petrified in her second year or that she'd been
nearly killed by Dolohov's spell in her fifth. But she could have
given them *some* indication of what she was learning instead of
thinking that "they wouldn't understand." And now, if she's going to
"protect" them, they have every right to know why and how and to
propose alternate measures instead of doing what their daughter wants
them to do with no choice in the matter. They are no longer
themselves; they have a fictional identity and don't even know that
it's fictional! and we're supposed to feel sorry for poor Hermione who
may die without their even knowing that they ever had a daughter. My
sympathies in this particular matter are with her parents. she has
every right to go with Harry and Ron now that she's eighteen, but she
has no right to high-handedly take control of her parents' lives.

Corbly: 
> In short, I really wouldn't expect Hermione to tell her parents that
she and her two friends were dropping out of school to go chasing
after the World's Most Evil Wizard, someone prepared to kill her on
sight. Not, I'm sure, what they had in mind when they agreed to send
her to Hogwarts.

Carol:
I quite agree that chasing after the world's most evil wizard isn't
what they expected her to do when they sent her to Hogwarts, but
that's not what's under discussion here. She could easily have told
them that she's going back to Hogwarts to finish her education but
that because she's a friend of Harry Potter, who is being targeted by
an evil wizard, her parents will be in danger. A little half truth
like those we're accustomed to hearing from Snape and Dumbledore would
be better than telling them nothing at all. Essentially, she can't
stay with them so they need magical protection before she leaves.
(they can't stop her from doing what she wants, and they wouldn't try
to stop her from attending Hogwarts, anyway, not knowing that
Dumbledore is dead, but she needs to give them an indication of *their
own* danger and let *them* decide what to do about it. (Why not an
extende trip to Australia of their own volition if they have that sort
of money? Or, failing that, an offer to take them to a magically
protected safe house where the bad wizard's followers can't find them?)

Corbly: 
> So, Hermione's approach leaves a number of questions unanswered,
like how did she manage it.  But it did work.

Carol:
We don't know that it worked. All we know is that it got them out of
England and Hermione, unlike Ron, didn't need to spend time worrying
about her family. It's a plot device, pure and simple, for disposing
of the Grangers who have never been presented as real characters and
now have lost all dignity and all believability by being sent off to
Australia by means of some complicated and unidentified spell because
they're an inconvenience for JKR. Why didn't she just wave her wand
and Vanish them, to be reconjured at her convenience? It would have
been as respectful of their dignity as human beings (but probably
contrary to whatever those laws are that limit magical powers).
> 
corbly:
> *JKR tells us nothing about how, or if, Hogwarts deals with Muggle
parents. Do they offer counseling session explaining such things as
"Here Is What Your Child Really Is" and "Here Is What The World of
Wizards and Witches Is All About." 

Carol:
You're right about that. In one of her interviews, she mentioned that
Muggle parents are normally approached in person by a representative
of the school rather than having their child sent a mysterious letter
by an owl, but it's one of those matters that she doesn't really care
much about. Muggles are either victims of Wizard pranks or abusers
like the Dursleys and Tobias Snape or objects of misguided sympathey
and admiration by Mr. Weasley, whose fascination with Muggles is
limited to mundane objects like plugs and toasters and turnstiles. I
imagine that the Muggle parents are given some sort of introduction to
the exciting new world that their children will be entering, but
that's the end of it. Maybe a grade report or a mention of
disciplinary action in a letter, but if they're told about their
children's injuries, it's not mentioned in the books. (Montague's
parents belatedly visit him, but he's probably a Pure-Blood given that
he's a Slytherin and the parents can both enter Hogwarts.)

Carol, hoping that I didn't scare off our newbie by responding just as
I would to a long-time member of the group