Yes, I do see a connection between the sort of vanity-based ethics involved in believing it's immoral to destroy a dangerous animal and highly moral to introduce it to children and this incident. Sadly, the women with the pit bull in the article looks like a sworn defender of children next to Hagrid. While she, too, was dealing with a situation that was always a potential danger when she brought a pit bull into that neighborhood, she didn't orchestrate the situation half as carefully as Hagrid did! And at least she possibly had to face the truth that her desire to keep a pet she considered herself the savior of did not trump the safety of the most irresponsible child in her neighborhood--and nobody blamed the victims.
Yet I know any dog can be unpredictable. Should mine ever harm another person or dog, I would consider myself responsible, except in the rarest of circumstances (if someone attacked me, for example).
This seems like such common sense to me, and it's why PoA bothers me so much. I have so little patience for the ethical contortions people have to get into to absolve the friggin' teacher and owner of the animal for any blame whatsover. Sometimes the scene's just re-written. Malfoy "abused" the animal! He got attacked on purpose!
The guy brings a herd of dangerous animals and orders a herd of 13-year-olds interact closely with them, unsupervised. They all get the basics about making them bow. After making a big show of how sweet the animal is, he tosses off a throwaway, vague threat of, "Just don' insult them or it might be the last thing you'll do," which is missed by at least three kids but probably more, since at any given time some kid is zoning out, which is why any responsible teacher with animals repeats instructions like that repeatedly, makes sure kids understand exactly what he means and then supervises each individual encounter. If you went through the books and found every time Harry or Ron wasn't paying attention in class and assumed they deserved something equally violent as payback, neither of them would have any limbs left. Voldemort wouldn't need to kill Harry. He would have died horribly after he threw a firecracker into Goyle's cauldron in potion or something.
In Hagrid's class, Neville's running back and forth nervously, obviously in need of help but not getting any from his teacher. That kind of skittishness might have guaranteed he was the one attacked if these were real animals. Instead it's the kid who, while petting the thing as instructed, says something "insulting," quite possibly unaware that a) insults cause it to attack you or b) that calling it a "big ugly brute" while petting it would be considered an insult.
Well, the kid is definitely the one that the animal was reacting to, just as the peke was the dog that did the running up to the pit bull in the article and the grandmother and little boy were the ones who ran up and tried to stop it (in fact, they were far more provoking). But acting like it's just the kid's fault and the teacher has no responsibility? What planet does that make sense on? As if anybody would feel that way if it were them or their child who just got mauled: "Well, I told you not to insult him!" "I didn't think it was an insult." "Well, it was. He doesn't like that." "I didn't hear you say it was an insult." "Then it's your own fault for not listening to me." "Oh, gee. Sorry ever so. Maybe you should have the dog's teeth checked to make sure he didn't chip anything on my bone when he ripped my flesh off. Send me the bill."
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Date: 2004-11-19 09:46 pm (UTC)And at least she possibly had to face the truth that her desire to keep a pet she considered herself the savior of did not trump the safety of the most irresponsible child in her neighborhood--and nobody blamed the victims.
Yet I know any dog can be unpredictable. Should mine ever harm another person or dog, I would consider myself responsible, except in the rarest of circumstances (if someone attacked me, for example).
This seems like such common sense to me, and it's why PoA bothers me so much. I have so little patience for the ethical contortions people have to get into to absolve the friggin' teacher and owner of the animal for any blame whatsover. Sometimes the scene's just re-written. Malfoy "abused" the animal! He got attacked on purpose!
The guy brings a herd of dangerous animals and orders a herd of 13-year-olds interact closely with them, unsupervised. They all get the basics about making them bow. After making a big show of how sweet the animal is, he tosses off a throwaway, vague threat of, "Just don' insult them or it might be the last thing you'll do," which is missed by at least three kids but probably more, since at any given time some kid is zoning out, which is why any responsible teacher with animals repeats instructions like that repeatedly, makes sure kids understand exactly what he means and then supervises each individual encounter. If you went through the books and found every time Harry or Ron wasn't paying attention in class and assumed they deserved something equally violent as payback, neither of them would have any limbs left. Voldemort wouldn't need to kill Harry. He would have died horribly after he threw a firecracker into Goyle's cauldron in potion or something.
In Hagrid's class, Neville's running back and forth nervously, obviously in need of help but not getting any from his teacher. That kind of skittishness might have guaranteed he was the one attacked if these were real animals. Instead it's the kid who, while petting the thing as instructed, says something "insulting," quite possibly unaware that a) insults cause it to attack you or b) that calling it a "big ugly brute" while petting it would be considered an insult.
Well, the kid is definitely the one that the animal was reacting to, just as the peke was the dog that did the running up to the pit bull in the article and the grandmother and little boy were the ones who ran up and tried to stop it (in fact, they were far more provoking). But acting like it's just the kid's fault and the teacher has no responsibility? What planet does that make sense on? As if anybody would feel that way if it were them or their child who just got mauled: "Well, I told you not to insult him!" "I didn't think it was an insult." "Well, it was. He doesn't like that." "I didn't hear you say it was an insult." "Then it's your own fault for not listening to me." "Oh, gee. Sorry ever so. Maybe you should have the dog's teeth checked to make sure he didn't chip anything on my bone when he ripped my flesh off. Send me the bill."