The way they can just dismiss someone being seriously injured like that because he is a Slytherin, and tried to take points is very, very creepy, but not nearly as much as the fact that they get away with this, that the book doesn't seem to see this as particularly serious.
The post OotP reactions stunned me. A lot of people saying 'OMG the Inquisitorial Squad were so evil! They deserved everything they got (including brain damaged, presumably!) They actively aligned themselves with Umbridge!' Well, yeah. Why wouldn't they? How is that any different from Dumbledore's Army? (Except that the Inquisitorial Squad didn't beat up the other students, of course!) Dumbledore helps his favoured students, and ignores/actively disadvantages the others, just like Umbridge. One corrupt regime or another. (I find it fascinating that Fake!Moody, for instance, or Hagrid, is never reprimanded for endangering students. Or that James became Head Boy after assaulting another student. Or that the text asks us to pity Harry and the Twins for being punished after they outnumber and assualt someone (frankly, if you'd done that at my old school, you'd thank your lucky stars if you got banned from the sport you were participating, because most British schools, boarding or not, tend towards expulsion/suspension, nowadays.) Or that the train, for example, is exempt from the rules regarding underage magic, but also exempt (presumably) from the rules about hexing fellow students unconscious.
I was very disturbed by this, partly of course because of the Harry's and Ron's mindset, but even more so because of JKR's. If I'm not misreading this, JKR doesn't see anything fundamentally wrong with the way the Trio is acting here. Certainly they're never called on their behaviour/attitude.
I don't know which freaks me out more. Ron's 'Standing in the way of Gryffindor is totally punishable by permanent injury! Feel sorry for me, I'm having awful trouble balancing this teacup!' or Harry's 'I'm so glad Montague is in hospital, thanks to those wacky jokers, the Twins; it makes Umbridge look bad!' (How is this different from Draco's glee at Hagrid's looking bad in POA; which apparently makes him 'foul', 'loathsome' and deserving of physical violence?)
Again, I wouldn't mind all this...if this were Hermione's Descent into Darkness. But the books seem to see all of this as perfectly acceptable, right down to the Montague issue, the treatment of Marietta (the hexing, and the memory charms), the hexing of Draco & Co. on the train, and leading Umbridge to the centaurs.
It seems OotP didn't make anyone look particularly moral, which is why I resent the 'OMG don't you hate Marietta/Draco/Umbridge?' message being banged over the audience's head. Frankly I have more sympathy for characters which are punished by and in the text, and loathed by the majority of characters and readers than the one's who commit precisely the same actions (and worse) but are rewarded and adored. And I loathe the idea that we're not only supposed to see the above actions as completely acceptable, but actually funny. For instance, it's supposed to be hilarious that the Twins feed a sweet to a Muggle that makes him choke. Ho ho, good one! He probably thought he was going to die, what a laugh!
She...doesn't seem to see a difference between not helping Montague, turning someone into a ferret, and being out after curfew.
Word. The emphasis in the books seems to be on a 'higher' law - that authority figures/rules are made to be questioned, as long as you feel you're doing right, in your heart. But then it's shown that the Trio/the Order/the DA feel they're right pretty much all the time, even when: trying to cast Crucio using a memory charm on a fifteen year old girl outnumbering and hexing opponents beyond the point of unconsciousness and until they a) are physically incapable of unassisted movement b) physically unrecognizable as human beings or c) brain damaged.
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Date: 2004-09-03 06:29 am (UTC)The post OotP reactions stunned me. A lot of people saying 'OMG the Inquisitorial Squad were so evil! They deserved everything they got (including brain damaged, presumably!) They actively aligned themselves with Umbridge!'
Well, yeah. Why wouldn't they?
How is that any different from Dumbledore's Army?
(Except that the Inquisitorial Squad didn't beat up the other students, of course!)
Dumbledore helps his favoured students, and ignores/actively disadvantages the others, just like Umbridge. One corrupt regime or another.
(I find it fascinating that Fake!Moody, for instance, or Hagrid, is never reprimanded for endangering students.
Or that James became Head Boy after assaulting another student.
Or that the text asks us to pity Harry and the Twins for being punished after they outnumber and assualt someone (frankly, if you'd done that at my old school, you'd thank your lucky stars if you got banned from the sport you were participating, because most British schools, boarding or not, tend towards expulsion/suspension, nowadays.)
Or that the train, for example, is exempt from the rules regarding underage magic, but also exempt (presumably) from the rules about hexing fellow students unconscious.
I was very disturbed by this, partly of course because of the Harry's and Ron's mindset, but even more so because of JKR's. If I'm not misreading this, JKR doesn't see anything fundamentally wrong with the way the Trio is acting here. Certainly they're never called on their behaviour/attitude.
I don't know which freaks me out more.
Ron's 'Standing in the way of Gryffindor is totally punishable by permanent injury! Feel sorry for me, I'm having awful trouble balancing this teacup!' or Harry's 'I'm so glad Montague is in hospital, thanks to those wacky jokers, the Twins; it makes Umbridge look bad!' (How is this different from Draco's glee at Hagrid's looking bad in POA; which apparently makes him 'foul', 'loathsome' and deserving of physical violence?)
Again, I wouldn't mind all this...if this were Hermione's Descent into Darkness. But the books seem to see all of this as perfectly acceptable, right down to the Montague issue, the treatment of Marietta (the hexing, and the memory charms), the hexing of Draco & Co. on the train, and leading Umbridge to the centaurs.
It seems OotP didn't make anyone look particularly moral, which is why I resent the 'OMG don't you hate Marietta/Draco/Umbridge?' message being banged over the audience's head.
Frankly I have more sympathy for characters which are punished by and in the text, and loathed by the majority of characters and readers than the one's who commit precisely the same actions (and worse) but are rewarded and adored.
And I loathe the idea that we're not only supposed to see the above actions as completely acceptable, but actually funny.
For instance, it's supposed to be hilarious that the Twins feed a sweet to a Muggle that makes him choke. Ho ho, good one! He probably thought he was going to die, what a laugh!
She...doesn't seem to see a difference between not helping Montague, turning someone into a ferret, and being out after curfew.
Word. The emphasis in the books seems to be on a 'higher' law - that authority figures/rules are made to be questioned, as long as you feel you're doing right, in your heart.
But then it's shown that the Trio/the Order/the DA feel they're right pretty much all the time, even when:
trying to cast Crucio
using a memory charm on a fifteen year old girl outnumbering and hexing opponents beyond the point of unconsciousness and until they
a) are physically incapable of unassisted movement
b) physically unrecognizable as human beings or
c) brain damaged.