When Harry is revolted by his father and Sirius' treatment of Snape he says he had thought they were like Fred and George, indicated *he* sees a big difference between them, but that line could just as easily be signaling to us that they are alike in a negative way (perhaps Fred and George won't get the wake-up call James did, for instance).
Let me quote this.
OotP, page 575:
... but she had described them as forerunners of the Weasley twins, and Harry could not imagine Fred and George dangling someone upside-down for the fun of it ... not unless they really loathed them ... perhaps Malfoy, or somebody who really deserved it ...
'Unless they really loathed them' and 'somebody who really deserved it' are the key lines here. Let's look at them - have you noticed that the twins do loathe more people than they should? The Slytherins because of their house, Zacharias Smith because he dares not to trust Harry, Dudley because he bullied Harry, Umbridge because she managed to remove Dumbledore from Hogwarts (well, with the DA's help, but let's not go into this). Whether or not everyone else hates Umbridge as well is not relevant, because the twins are the only ones who dare to openly laugh at her authority over them.
According to the twins, Percy certainly belongs to the second category of the people who deserve to be tortured, because... um, because Percy dares to be proud of being made a Prefect and Head Boy, and because he dares to dream of an academic career, I suppose. There was a horrifying line in Book 3 (I hope this is the right one), when Fred and George told Harry they tried to close Percy in a pyramid while the family was in Egypt, but failed because their mother caught them. A harmless joke? Just having a little fun with the pompous annoying elder brother? I'm sorry if I lack enough humor sense, but I don't see anything funny in that.
Ron and Ginny (pre-OotP Ginny, of course *rolls eyes*) belong to that second category as well. Ron 'deserves' to be laughed at because he's an insecure, highly underestimating himself boy who'd never dream to object to his brothers. Did you notice how he didn't want to do anything against them even as a Prefect? I thought that he was afraid of what they would do to him to pay him back - maybe put a tarantula in his bed or something. From what I've seen until now, I totally can see them doing it.
Ginny's case in CoS was similar - Percy had to threaten them he was going to write their mother about her having nightmares to make Fred and George stop teasing her.
I don't know why JKR likes them - I fail to see what's so funny about them. Maybe it's just my humor sense - I've never been a humorous person, and take such things more seriously than some people seem to do. However, I will never be able to see the Dudley and Montague incidents as harmless jokes, and the way the Twins and everyone else reacted to them will always make me think that not me, but JKR has a warped sense of humor.
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Date: 2005-03-18 10:43 am (UTC)Let me quote this.
OotP, page 575:
... but she had described them as forerunners of the Weasley twins, and Harry could not imagine Fred and George dangling someone upside-down for the fun of it ... not unless they really loathed them ... perhaps Malfoy, or somebody who really deserved it ...
'Unless they really loathed them' and 'somebody who really deserved it' are the key lines here. Let's look at them - have you noticed that the twins do loathe more people than they should? The Slytherins because of their house, Zacharias Smith because he dares not to trust Harry, Dudley because he bullied Harry, Umbridge because she managed to remove Dumbledore from Hogwarts (well, with the DA's help, but let's not go into this). Whether or not everyone else hates Umbridge as well is not relevant, because the twins are the only ones who dare to openly laugh at her authority over them.
According to the twins, Percy certainly belongs to the second category of the people who deserve to be tortured, because... um, because Percy dares to be proud of being made a Prefect and Head Boy, and because he dares to dream of an academic career, I suppose. There was a horrifying line in Book 3 (I hope this is the right one), when Fred and George told Harry they tried to close Percy in a pyramid while the family was in Egypt, but failed because their mother caught them. A harmless joke? Just having a little fun with the pompous annoying elder brother? I'm sorry if I lack enough humor sense, but I don't see anything funny in that.
Ron and Ginny (pre-OotP Ginny, of course *rolls eyes*) belong to that second category as well. Ron 'deserves' to be laughed at because he's an insecure, highly underestimating himself boy who'd never dream to object to his brothers. Did you notice how he didn't want to do anything against them even as a Prefect? I thought that he was afraid of what they would do to him to pay him back - maybe put a tarantula in his bed or something. From what I've seen until now, I totally can see them doing it.
Ginny's case in CoS was similar - Percy had to threaten them he was going to write their mother about her having nightmares to make Fred and George stop teasing her.
I don't know why JKR likes them - I fail to see what's so funny about them. Maybe it's just my humor sense - I've never been a humorous person, and take such things more seriously than some people seem to do. However, I will never be able to see the Dudley and Montague incidents as harmless jokes, and the way the Twins and everyone else reacted to them will always make me think that not me, but JKR has a warped sense of humor.