Cute and relevant bit of Harry Potter media

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

While I was perusing Facebook, I found a link to a video which I thought was really cute and totally appropriate to this comm.

It's right here, if you want to watch:

I would say it's fairly on-target. The scene of the little kid with the fire extinguisher in particular.

Comments

[jana-ch.livejournal.com]

We don't know why Umbridge targeted Trelawney and Hagrid. We're never inside her head. We know only why Harry *thinks* she targeted them. Harry's motives are always in terms of who he likes and dislikes, and who likes and dislikes him, so he naturally assumes everyone else, including Umbridge, thinks the same way. Umbridge is a political appointee, so it seems more likely to me that she thinks in terms of politics rather than "disliking." She's targeting Dumbledore's political appointees:

1) Hagrid, whose place in the wizarding world, after he had his wand snapped in the Forties, is due to Dumbledore, and whose loyalty to his employer is absolute.

2) Trelawney, who was hired for a job Dumbledore had been considering leaving vacant until she delivered a politically important prophesy.

3) Snape, who might be unemployable or even in Azkaban due to his rumored Death Eater connections, if not for Dumbledore's patronage.

Of those three, the only one she doesn't try to fire is Snape, who is clearly an effective teacher. Not warm and supportive, but he sees to it that the kids jolly well learn, whether they like it or not. Being a political hire is enough to draw Umbridge's attention, but for her to try to fire you, you have to be incompetent as well.

[hwyla.livejournal.com]

Snape also had a powerful 'friend' in Lucius. Umbridge specifically mentioned how well Lucius spoke of Snape. And Lucius (at the time) had Fudge's 'ear'.

I'd say it wasn't just Dumbledore's appointees, but his presumed supporters. It isn't as if she was particularly nice to Minerva. However, Minerva would have been considerably more difficult to fire, so just make her working life more difficult ans attempt to marginalize her.

It isn't just that Snape was effective - Umbridge disliked that he was. She felt he was teaching more than the kids needed to know (and presumably more than the Ministry wanted them to learn) - at least that was my impression of her comments during his review

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

Something I've always wanted to ask native speakers:

“You are on probation!” shrieked Professor Umbridge, and Snape
looked back at her, his eyebrows slightly raised. “You are being deliberately unhelpful! I expected better, Lucius Malfoy always speaks most
highly of you! Now get out of my office!”

Does this mean that Snape had just been put on probation by Umbridge after everything he did regarding not giving Veritaserum to use on Harry, or was it "You're already on orobation, Snape, how dare you continue to passive-aggressively defy me?"

[jana-ch.livejournal.com]

It's ambiguous. It could mean either one. Since I don't recall anything being said earlier in the book about Snape being on probation, I have always taken it to mean, "I am placing you on probation this very moment."

[oryx_leucoryx]

If Severus had been on probation previously Harry would have mentioned Dolores supervising his classes.

[attilathepbnun.livejournal.com]

Hmn. You are correct in that we only have Harry's opinion as to Umbridge's motives. And I would be *very* surprised to discover that politics *didn't* play a large part in her targeting scheme.
However, her described actions and expressions certainly give me the impression that she *likes* doing such things in the cruelest way possible. She *likes* having the power to be as cruel as her whim directs

[jana-ch.livejournal.com]

Yes, Umbridge obviously likes exercising power, but when she chooses someone as a target, does she do it for political considerations (“Who is supporting Dumbledore and defying Fudge?”), racial considerations (“Who has non-human blood?”), educational considerations (“Who is an ineffective teacher and/or is teaching the wrong things?”), or personal considerations (“Whom do I personally dislike?”)

It seems to me that the first three questions enter into it, but not so much the fourth. She opposes people for specific political and racial reasons and because they interfere with her power, but she dislikes them because she opposes them, rather than opposing them because she dislikes them.

This is an important distinction in the Potterverse because Harry, who is our guide to proper values, so often bases his support or opposition on whether or not he likes someone or someone likes him. A big part of Harry’s political opposition to Scrimgeour is over Stan Shunpike, about whom Harry knows nothing except that he once met him and liked him.

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

You bring up a really good point, actually--is Rowling possibly trying to present standing by those you personally like as the morally righteous thing regardless of how good those people are? I guess that feeds into the schoolyard morality of the series.

[jana-ch.livejournal.com]

And yet Severus is morally deficient because he cares first about the girl he loves and only secondarily about the boy who bullied him and a baby he's never met.

Inconsistency, thy name is Rowling!

half-breed

[hwyla.livejournal.com]

One thing I find rather surprising is that we never hear of Umbridge attempting to fire Firenze. At least not that I remember. True, he isn't a half- centaur, but I would have expected her to dislike him anyways.

It's obvious during her run in with the centaurs in the forest, that she doesn't see them as human (but then, they also insist that they are not), so why do we not hear her complaining about an animal teaching in regards to Hagrid? Is it possible that she doesn't automatically disapprove of non-humans, but on;y the offspring of a mixed-mating? And why Hagrid, but not Flitwick? Isn't he supposed to be part goblin? Or is that not known by Dolores?

Of course, according to JKR on the Flitwick's Lexicon entry, she had not expected movieFlitwick to look so goblin/elf like - she saw him as more just a tiny old man - so presumably, his goblin heritage is pretty far back on the family tree.