OotP Chapter Fifteen

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

* Quite be accident, surely, Umbridge has given herself a name that Muggles associate with cruelty, persecution and censorship. I think I get it. Harry=Heretic. Even though he's actually totally in line with middle class values. Stick it to the man, Harry!

* Percy says the Minister is acting here on the concerns of anxious parents, who feel the school is going in a direction of which they don't approve. Is this supposed to be a) a lie, b) a reference to evil parents like Lucius who want the school to be anti-Muggleborn (so far the only parents who have shown much concern for what goes on at school at all are Slytherins) or c) actual innocent parents who object to letters about their kids’ lame classes and multiple dangers? Iow, I know if these parents exist they must obviously be wrong because they don't love what Dumbledore's done with the place, but are they baddies or pussies?

* I suspect I'm supposed to react angrily to the idea of "falling standards" at Hogwarts rather than thinking, "Well, there's definitely room for improvement. Here’s what I’d do..."

* Lucius is 41!

* The Prophet helpfully lists Dumbledore's "eccentric appointments" as being all about his giving jobs to people of different races. You'd almost think the guy gave the job to the person most qualified no matter what his/her background. Luckily we know that's not true.

*The Prophet also links the Dumbledore supporter with subversive groups of non-wizards to discredit her. V. George Bush.

* The paper unfairly leaves out the obvious justification for every strange appointment: Dumbledore's trying to train up Harry here, guys. He's got this awesome, byzantine plan he's working on. Once he's finished maybe he'll consider offering a good education for everyone....Nah, once Harry defeats Voldemort, Dumbledore's got an awesome plan to take over France!

* People are disgusted at the idea of Hogwarts being an extension of Fudge's office, but the main reason it's drawn Fudge's interest is that it's now nothing more than an extension of Dumbledore, who is a political force more than a headmaster, which is why Fudge wants to discredit him. Dumbledore isn't the kind of fictional headmaster who's simply earned the love of all the students by running a school they love and being really fair, here. The school really is his political base.

* Hermione's angry at having Umbridge forced upon them, as I suspect other students have been similarly angry for some other teachers forced upon them. If Dumbledore is all-knowing and twinkly, which he is, I have a hard time believing he tried and failed to come up with an alternate DADA teacher of his own. The guy who hired the fraud Lockhart could easily allow Umbridge to be hired as well, for his own purposes. He got an army out of it and presumably taught Harry whatever he was trying to teach him.

* The kids seem very offended at the idea that their teachers will be "inspected," though I'm not sure why. In my high school there was this group of people who came more than once and basically did just what Umbridge is doing. They sat in on classes, presumably interviewed teachers, grabbed random students in the hall and asked them to sessions where they'd ask us questions. I can't remember what they were called, but it wasn't Inquisitors.

* Of course, if Umbridge was the usual headmistress and Dumbledore was running the inspectors, that would be fine. Wouldn't want to suggest something so subversive as one law for both good guys and bad guys being a good thing!

* Then again, perhaps Hermione just needed something else to get angry and huffy about that morning. She had a pleasant dream and is trying to get back into the proper irritable mood before class.

* Snape's a bastard in handing out papers, though not as bad as my 8th grade algebra teacher who used to hand the tests out from best to worst and announce when he'd gotten to the next grade level. "I'm in the D's now. Sister Magpie, here's yours."

* Since I refuse to believe Snape is physically capable of giving dunces high marks just because they are Slytherin (as per HBP he's making Crabbe and Goyle do classes again to pass DADA), I assume Draco passed when he whispers about some people getting Ds. I notice it doesn't say to whom he's whispering. Hard to believe it's Crabbe or Goyle, who always have to be the most stupid.

* Of course Hermione's trying to look at Harry's paper.:-)

* I'm surprised Snape didn't give Ron and Hermione both F's--err, that is, T's—because he could easily tell she wrote his for him. Hermione doesn't seem like she'd be able to dumb down her work to make it sound like the person she's doing it for.

*Not to mention, um, these kids write all their stuff with quills so it would be in Hermione's handwriting. It's hard to believe Ron or Harry puts in the effort of copying over what she's written for him. Maybe there's a spell that changes the person's handwriting.

*I do appreciate the kids having a helpful expositional conversation where they explain to me what these grade letters mean at Hogwarts, though apparently D sucks all over.

* I love the way Harry is always secretly imagining himself as monumentally failing everything. His image of himself trying to hide T's from Hermione reminds me of his visions of himself stumping around after Hagrid once he's gotten expelled in PS/SS. I don't think this is due to Harry lacking confidence. It's more he just never ever wants to be in the humiliating position he was at the Dursleys again. Being Harry, his failures must be just as spectacular as his victories.

* I can see why Flitwick had no trouble with Umbridge while Trelawney got furious. He's actually teaching a class; she's doing a Vegas lounge act.

* Umbridge is quite awesome in this scene, without being rude. Certainly she's a lot less rude than Hermione was in Trelawney's class.

* So far Umbridge has not conducted "an investigation that violates the privacy or rights of individuals" or even a "rigorous, harsh interrogation." It seems a bit like referring to one's employee review as an Inquisition.

* Though I suppose it must seem that way after Dumbledore's reviews: "Let's see, do I still have some use for keeping you around? Yes. Awesome work!"

* I'm sorry, but the idea that Umbridge would blink in surprise at Hermione saying she's read the whole book is a little too Mary-Sue-fantasy. The kid in the class who has to proudly announce she’s already read the book is hardly anything shocking. OMG, you read the whole book? But you’re only 15! Are you some sort of reading superhero?

* Hermione objects to the idea that "counter-jinx" is a euphemism for "jinx," however sometimes it seems like that's exactly what it is. Sometimes it's something that undoes a jinx, but other times it seems like "counter-jinx" is used to describe the jinx you throw at the guy throwing jinxes at you.

* Hermione goes on to explain that when she says she "disagrees" with Slinkhard she means that jinxes can be useful, especially when used defensively. Err...that's not disagreeing. Calling something a jinx instead of a counter-jinx does not imply it is not useful or can’t be self-defense.

* Btw, "especially when used defensively" means "they started it!"

* Most of the kids in this class who are sad at having to put their wands away and itching to try these hexes will, of course, wind up not only concentrating on jinxes but using them on other students without it being self-defense. It's so inspiring the way our heroes eventually triumph over the evil Slinkhard by proving how useful jinxes are by using them on Those Who Suck.

* Btw, wouldn’t it be funny if the Inquisitor Squad actually did have a policy based on a more pacifist idea, never hexing etc.? Too bad the bad guys must be a collection of contradicting ideas at all times.

* Note that Umbridge does not actually counter Hermione's argument but says Hermione’s opinion doesn't matter, making it seem like Hermione won the argument but Umbridge is imposing Slinkhard because he supports her evil agenda. Hermione's right and being censored because nobody can win an argument with a Mary Sue, ‘specially a fat girl.

* Nobody in school knows anything about what Harry's done in the past because he doesn't ever tell anyone, but in Umbridge's class he just can't shut up with the plot summaries of previous books.

* For the second time Hermione's set alongside McGonagall as the voice of reason with Umbridge, and for the second time it was Hermione who intentionally started annoying Umbridge out of nowhere. Malfoy could take tips from Hermione on how to manipulate Harry into getting himself detention while smelling like a rose himself.

* Godwin’s Law alert. Don’t take this too far, but Fudge is described as gesticulating forcefully on the front page of the Prophet during some kind of speech, and I can't believe I'm not supposed to be picturing Mr. Forceful-Gesticulations himself, Hitler, who’s kind of the standard of all politicians who yell.

* Harry is cross at Hermione through Charms until Umbridge reappears and he transfers it to her. J'ever notice how this works throughout the whole story? We could play "following the bouncing ball of anger" or "Anger Pinball" throughout the book as it jumps from one target to another.

* Understand, of course, that this is all Voldemort doing that.

* Dean does something to a mouse that McGonagall threatens him with detention for. I'm beginning to see the groundwork for Ginny/Dean here. He wants hexing in DADA, loved Crouch as a teacher and teases small animals. He's becoming more attractive by the second. How did he ever become friends with that traitorous Irish boy?

* I think McGonagall shares Hermione's magical "dissing Umbridge" power, being the only two people who seem, almost arbitrarily, to unnerve her where others can't. Note they are both female and remember Maya's essay about that. Harry's anger at McGonagall naturally bounces back to Umbridge when he sees her do this.

* Now that Harry's in CoMC his eyes are fixed on Malfoy, whose own eyes are fixed on Umbridge. Not that Harry remembers Malfoy exists. You know, I suspect the reason people feel like Malfoy loses Harry’s interest in this book isn’t that anything between them is different but that Harry is so mad at everybody Malfoy fails to stand out. He’s just one more bumper in Anger Pinball.

* Umbridge helpfully chooses this class full of Slytherins to wander around and talk to kids. Harry is pleased the class is "not letting Hagrid down," by being able to answer questions on magical creatures. Guess it's a good thing Umbridge didn't talk to Harry or Ron, who get by by copying Hermione's notes.

* Malfoy IDs himself as the kid what got injured and Harry helpfully offers that this was only because he was too stupid to do what Hagrid told him to do--damn that Malfoy for letting Hagrid down! It's probably his fault no other class of students ever get shoved into a paddock full of seventh-year dangerous creatures their first day, unsupervised, after cursory instructions.

* Interestingly, all Malfoy actually says about the incident is, "That was me. I was slashed-heh heh—by a Hyppogriff." He just confirmed the injury that was on file, without elaborating. Probably because he knows it was all his fault and there's no way any decent person could hear about that incident and think Hagrid was anything but an innocent victim.

* Too bad Umbridge didn't ask Harry about it. He could have told her how Hagrid had Harry climb up on the Hyppogriff's back and then slapped it on the arse so it flew into the air while Harry was trying to figure out where he was supposed to hang on. I'm sure that would have counterbalanced Malfoy's own dreadful irresponsibility with the animal and shown Hagrid in a far better light.

* Harry has moved into martyr mode, where now he's not telling anyone about his hand because it's UP TO HIM TO PROTECT THEIR JOBS OMG1!1--Just go with him on this. IITS.

* Harry is pleasantly surprised when he arrives in the common room with a bloody hand to find Hermione disposed to be sympathetic instead of critical. In fact, Hermione exhibits a marked change here suddenly in becoming more motherly, waiting for Harry with Murtsap, speaking to him nervously, looking aghast when he gets angry, making a sacrifice in saying Voldemort's name. I wonder what could have brought on this sort of change? Oh, I see! She wants something from him!

* Hermione's face lights with a fervor usually reserved for SPEW when she imagines learning dueling skills to face what's waiting for them in the world. Please tell me Hermione is intentionally being portrayed as a potentially dangerous fanatic who can't wait to leave homework behind and really cause some damage. She's already done some thinking about how jinxing is necessary, and apparently it was after that class--the one where her actions started the tension that led to the detention where Harry hurt the hand she's caring for--that she just happened to start thinking about starting her own army seeing if other kids want to get together and study DADA. Harry will teach her his mad dueling skillz, the two of them will defeat Voldemort and rule the world together!!


* School in this place seems to again veer between schoolwork and natural talent, with Harry beating Hermione in PoA, the only year they sat a test and had a teacher who knew the subject (and was a personal friend of Harry's who taught him on the side). Harry just frankly *doesn't* seem any better in DADA than Hermione is. He's better at fighting, but does that really make him better at taking the tests? It's not like he seems interested in it as a subject, studying the Dark Arts in order work out how to counter them.

* Harry works himself into a frenzy and finally tells Ron and Hermione...the opposite of what he's wanted to yell at them from the beginning of the book. Go Harry!

* Harry's hand starts throbbing since he smashed the bowl of healing stuff in anger--kind of a nice metaphor for Harry's life at this point.

* Btw, Harry's hand really hurts. Why is it that people heal lickety-split in this world except when it's more dramatic for them to be Muggle cuts that sting? I don't think it's just the magic quill.

* This chapter was long and again left me feeling vaguely irritated, like all the characters in this book.





Designated Hero
'nuff said.

Exploitation Filmmakers’ Credo
Did they just like the last DADA class so much they thought they'd have the same one over again?

IITS
Harry can't tell McGonnogal, the teacher with whom he has spoken about Umbridge frankly before, because he is protecting her from losing her job, which he has just informed us is in danger. Have you not seen how she is unable to handle Umbridge?

Idiot Picture
So. I'm thinking of getting myself more detention with Umbridge this class. You in?

Informed Attributes
I know it's been hammered into everyone's head that Hermione is the best student in all classes academic and that no one could ever come close to her on an exam, but now we need Harry to be better so he is. Remember this when he gets his OWL results.

Misdirected Answering
Sorry, but we've really no time to explore the ethics of jinxing here. The kids prefer to quiz each other on what the grades they just got on their tests mean. Apparently the "D" did not stand for "delightful."

Nut o’ Fun
Hee! Bowtruckles!

Final Score: 7

Also, just for fun, this chapter’s Anger Pinball tally:

Umbridge-->Trelawney-->Umbridge-->McGonnogal-->Hermione-->Umbridge-->Malfoy-->Ron & Hermione

Comments

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

I hadn't thought of that but yeah, it's like Dumbledore's doing to everyone what he's doing to Harry. Are the teachers complaining to him about this?

[(Anonymous)]

The paper unfairly leaves out the obvious justification for every strange appointment: Dumbledore's trying to train up Harry here, guys. He's got this awesome, byzantine plan he's working on.

And given that Harry is a rather dumb and incompetent kid, who only triumphs through pluck, luck and the author's iron fist and the "plan" consists of eventually dumping the fate of wizarding Britain in his lap whilst denying him any necessary information or support and playing silly mind-games with him until the very last moment, all the sacrifices and deprivations of _other_ students were totally worth it! Isn't it lucky that the antagonists are so terminally stupid themselves, that one wonders how they survived long enough to be exterminated by OUR HERO?

Dumbledore isn't the kind of fictional headmaster who's simply earned the love of all the students by running a school they love and being really fair, here. The school really is his political base.

Not only that, but he is directly responsible for the fix their society is in, because it is due to his mismanagement that the school was turned into a hot-bed of DE recruitment. An uncharitable person might even suspect that DD tacitly allowed the early DE movement to flourish at Hogwarts so that he could gain more political clout whilst publicly opposing them later.

Harry is pleased the class is "not letting Hagrid down," by being able to answer questions on magical creatures.

The funny thing is that they only could do so because of Grubbly-Plank's teaching. IIRC, they didn't learn anything curriculum-related or generally useful in this class in the previous 2 years.

Harry just frankly *doesn't* seem any better in DADA than Hermione is. He's better at fighting, but does that really make him better at taking the tests?

The humorous thing here is that apart from the Patronus, all the extra-curricular spells that Harry knows were taught to him by Hermione (who learned them out of books, as she is wont to so) in GoF, whilst he was preparing for the Third Task. Harry being better at fighting is due to quick reflexes, pluck and of course DESTINY - not something that he could teach. Let's remember that all those older kids also studied under Lupin and Crouch Jr. too and actually should know more than Harry.
OTOH, I think that the DA is one of the few intelligent undertakings that trio engaged in throughout the saga. Therefore of course, it had to be discontinued in HBP.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Yeah, we don't think about this so much anymore but dude, Voldemort literally created his DEs at school. Kids went on to be recruited at school--even if they weren't actual DEs at school we know all these kids who were already known to be on their way in school. Clearly Hogwarts is the breeding ground for these people, yet nobody ever thinks that any changes need to be made there. Even with a headmaster who's literally presided over this stuff for decades--2 Voldemort wars, he can't think of anything to do but more of the same.

I love the point about the spells coming from Hermione--or occasionally people like Snape or whatever in the dueling club (Expelliarimus is done there, for instance.) JKR just never really worked out how one was good at this stuff except for whatever the plot needed at that moment.

[kaskait.livejournal.com]

* Hermione goes on to explain that when she says she "disagrees" with Slinkhard she means that jinxes can be useful, especially when used defensively. Err...that's not disagreeing. Calling something a jinx instead of a counter-jinx does not imply it is not useful or can’t be self-defense.

This is where I diverged with the rest of the HP fandom and thought that the Slinkhard curriculum wasn't all that bad. But the WW is all about using the big stick first, fast and furious. I found it an interesting story choice to make the "girlish" Umbridge concerned with magical ethics. But it turns out that she was evil.

Because practicing the ethics of non-violent behavior in tense situations is sooooo evil.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

It always fascinates me that JKR starts out books obviously poking fun at the Dursleys for their attitudes, but then sometimes supports the same attitudes in the books. Like in this case, Vernon (and also Filch, who's also bad) complain about the lack of corporal punishment. Yet when it comes to kid on they have the same attitude--sometimes you have to smack somebody around until they get it.

[starzangelus.livejournal.com]

* Lucius is 41!

That totally surprised me. I guess I thought the cruel, aristocratic figures of HP had their kids at that age... not in their twenties. O_o There goes my theory of "the younger you are when you have children in HP, the more caring and sacrificial you are for them"... damn...

* The Prophet helpfully lists Dumbledore's "eccentric appointments" as being all about his giving jobs to people of different races. You'd almost think the guy gave the job to the person most qualified no matter what his/her background. Luckily we know that's not true.

God forbid that professor's get their appointment by talent and qualification and not have their daddy's pay their way onto the team. Oh wait, wrong book... O_o

* I'm sorry, but the idea that Umbridge would blink in surprise at Hermione saying she's read the whole book is a little too Mary-Sue-fantasy.

Maybe JKR thought we would forget how brilliant Hermione is because I know I did. :|

* Understand, of course, that this is all Voldemort doing that.

This sometimes makes me wonder if Harry is actually good at anything (but of course that's blasphemous). Does that mean that maybe Voldemort conquered himself all those times? Now I have a freaky image of a serious case of MPD... including Nagini, heck all the horcruxes. :)

Now that Harry's in CoMC his eyes are fixed on Malfoy, whose own eyes are fixed on Umbridge.

I have an insane love-triangle in my head now that I really wish wasn't there.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Well, remember cruel aristocrats need to make sure they have kids the same age as good kids so they can torment them. Lucius had to be the same age as Harry's parents (nearly) because he had to know Snape, who had to be bullied by them.

[merrymelody.livejournal.com]

In the ongoing list of things the movie people apparently decided were too obnoxious to include, no. 5893406 is that there's no 'Slinkhard' book with it's pinko ideas about negotiation and non-violence and pussy shit - it's just a children's level book.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Ha! Funny how that works. Especially since it's sort of more consistent. Umbridge is already treating them like kids, so if you just have her doing really beginner stuff they could still be frustrated, but we'd avoid the ill-conceived jaunt down Philosophy Lane which is always going to lead straight to a thicket of thorns in these books.

[montavilla.livejournal.com]

The movies do seem a little more consistent (except for the casting of some minor characters). I think that's probably due to two key things:

One, a movie needs to make internal sense in a way that a book doesn't. It's okay if a reader gets kicked out of the book for a minute, since they're likely to reading in bits anyway. But if your lose your movie audience, they might just walk out and demand their money back.

Also, as opposed to a book, when maybe a half-dozen people have to read the thing before it's published, there are hundreds of people working on a movie, and some of those people are paid big bucks just to crawl all over the script and criticize it.

There's a rumor that DH is going to be split into two movies, because the scriptwriter can't boil down the story into a single film length. I think that's a stupid solution, but I can easily imagine the guy tearing his hair
out trying to come up ways to make Harry's obsession with Dumbledore interesting.

[ellecain.livejournal.com]

I think McGonagall shares Hermione's magical "dissing Umbridge" power, being the only two people who seem, almost arbitrarily, to unnerve her where others can't. Note they are both female and remember Maya's essay about that

Huh, where do I find this essay? Got links? If it's anyhow related to the fact that Hermione's becomes "OMG,a rebel!!" in the only book where Authority is incarnate in a woman, I wanna read it. Funny how she lost this rebellious power in the next book and it only came back to hit her in DH so she could be rude to Scrimgoeur...

Harry will teach her his mad dueling skillz, the two of them will defeat Voldemort and rule the world together!!

LOL, this reminded me so much of Locket!Hermione from DH. Why aren't there any Dark Lord (well, lady) Hermione fics out there? Out of the Trio she's the one who seems the most fiercely utilitarian out of the Trio.

Hermione's right and being censored because nobody can win an argument with a Mary Sue, ‘specially a fat girl.

Don't you mean fat, ugly girl? I still am surprised at how although Hermione's appearance is described in unflattering terms, her antagonists are made positively UGLY so she looks better in comparison. In DH, of course, she's so hot that strange men in London whistle at her; it's like every bad Ho-mione fic at the Pit! (I remember being gobsmacked at JKR's Fat Rant where she used "the Pansies of this world" to deplore skinny, pretty girls. Pansy was never described as anything but pug-faced and ugly.) So Hermione is alternately pretty or plain depending upon what JKR wants at the time...

[merrymelody.livejournal.com]

http://mistful.livejournal.com/61583.html

I still love the Fat!Rant, almost as much as 'You're a woman, you'll know!' Especially the part where the Innocent Male can't understand why girls would judge each other's appearances, since as we all know, no men anywhere care about how women look. Although I'm also fond of JKR's insane defensiveness about how it's okay to be fat, rilly (I know, Jo, I got that from the tolerance shown in your books towards the overweight!) except she totally isn't, OMG!!1!! as if anyone cared.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

I was annoyed at myself for not posting a link to the essay when I wrote this post originally. Then I thought "I'll bet Slinkhard will have a link if anyone wants it." And there she is, right there with the links!

I love fics where Hermione goes dark, though there aren't too many I can think of off the top of my head. The one fic I'm reading now is doing it well--"The Golden Age" I think it's called, and it's on ff.net.

Yeah, I love the whole ugly thing in canon. Ron in the end is the only one who seems like he's genuinely ordinary looking. Hermione's got her faults as a first year, but winds up pretty much on top of the dating field in her year.

[go-back-chief.livejournal.com]

I'm surprised Snape didn't give Ron and Hermione both F's--err, that is, T's—because he could easily tell she wrote his for him. Hermione doesn't seem like she'd be able to dumb down her work to make it sound like the person she's doing it for.

I'm not sure she did though, since she gets a "A" and Ron only gets a "P". This must have been the one time in canon where Ron actually did better than Harry, I wonder if that's why I hang onto a stupid vain hope that he wouldn't be second-best in absolutely everything?

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'm sure JKR will crush that vain hope with a few more interviews.:-)

[cressida0201.livejournal.com]

When does Ron ever get as high as second-best, when there are more than two people doing anything?

[(Anonymous)]

Dumbledore isn't the kind of fictional headmaster who's simply earned the love of all the students by running a school they love and being really fair, here. The school really is his political base.

On a tangent: I think because Harry has his TBWL pipeline to the headmaster, people don’t realize just how remote Dumbledore is from the rest of the school. The average student's relationship with him seems as close as that of a random HP fan with Michael Gambon. Those who've spoken to him once are the lucky few. But in the Harry filter, the whole school trembles without his reassuring presence.

* Since I refuse to believe Snape is physically capable of giving dunces high marks just because they are Slytherin (as per HBP he's making Crabbe and Goyle do classes again to pass DADA), I assume Draco passed when he whispers about some people getting Ds.

ITA. That Draco is better than Harry on his own merits seems obvious. In fanfic Harry often turns out a decent Potions maker once he gets away from mean old Snape, but I think it’s the other way round. Harry’s so lazy and inattentive, he’d fail the class completely if Snape wasn’t standing over him with a whip.

* I can see why Flitwick had no trouble with Umbridge while Trelawney got furious. He's actually teaching a class; she's doing a Vegas lounge act.

So Umbridge is exposing the incompetent teachers and approving the good ones. Man, it just makes me want to reach right into the book and strangle her evil, racist ass.

* Malfoy IDs himself as the kid what got injured and Harry helpfully offers that this was only because he was too stupid to do what Hagrid told him to do--damn that Malfoy for letting Hagrid down!

Love how the fact that Malfoy wasn’t paying attention cancels out all Hagrid’s errors of judgment, such as putting his students in lethal danger in the first place.

-L

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

I do love those times--because they make for good fanfic moments--where you can see that Harry filter at work. I doubt JKR is really aware of it a lot of the time; I think she assumes the school really would tremble without his presence since he's the epitome of goodness at all. But it's so easy for a fanfic writer to make a better case for nobody even trusting the guy.

Heh. I love the idea of Harry being crap at Potions when Snape's not standing over him. Well, what do we see in sixth year, after all, but Harry cheating his way through his difficult class.

Love how the fact that Malfoy wasn’t paying attention cancels out all Hagrid’s errors of judgment, such as putting his students in lethal danger in the first place.

Yup. That's why Malfoy's such a valuable student.

[(Anonymous)]

We could play "following the bouncing ball of anger" or "Anger Pinball" throughout the book as it jumps from one target to another.

He-he, I actually find the angry Harry of OoTP to be the most realistic. Frankly, he has good reasons to be angry and his relative equanimity in the previous books seemed rather unbelievable to me. Morever, alternating derision and adulation, neglect and favoritism that he was subject to during his Hogwarts career, was almost calculated to produce an arrogant, stroppy emo brat of OoTP. Not that Harry hasn't been arrogant and stroppy in the previous books, but annoyingly neither author nor the characters seemed to notice it.

She's already done some thinking about how jinxing is necessary, and apparently it was after that class--the one where her actions started the tension that led to the detention where Harry hurt the hand she's caring for--that she just happened to start thinking about starting her own army seeing if other kids want to get together and study DADA.

Why should Hermione be responsible for Harry's idiotic actions? If she can argue with Umbridge and get away with it, but Harry just has to barge in and land himself in detention, that's his own fault.
And while I wholly agree that it _would_ have been vital for them to learn some ethics, they do need practical DADA training too, what with non-existing security at Hogwarts and in WW in general and all manner of monsters trying to jump them with depressing regularity. Recognizing this hardly makes Hermione into an aspiring dictator.
Anyway, it is one of the very few intelligent long-term commitments that the trio undertook throughout the series and the pinnacle of their collective planning ability. It goes downhill from there in the next installments. Sadly.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Ah, but remember, Harry's anger wasn't realistic but supernatural! Even though it sounded like Harry and was logical given his circumstances, it was really just Voldemort making him more angry than Harry himself ever would have been. ::sigh::

Why should Hermione be responsible for Harry's idiotic actions? If she can argue with Umbridge and get away with it, but Harry just has to barge in and land himself in detention, that's his own fault.

She's not responsible for what Harry does, but she's been pointed out here as the person Harry's supposed to be modeling himself after because she keeps her head down about Umbridge--but she does exactly the opposite. Hermione challenges her in class even more aggressively than Harry does. She just doesn't get detention because Umbridge doesn't care about her the way she does Harry. The better advice would be: Harry *don't* be like Hermione because you'll get detention for it.

Recognizing this hardly makes Hermione into an aspiring dictator.

Oh, my impression of Hermione as an aspiring dictator would never be based on just her recognizing that practical DADA training was important!:-)

I admit I didn't like the DA and was perfectly happy when Harry dropped it in the next book--though at the same time logically it didn't say much. I mean, the war's started up in earnest and that means there's less reason for a dueling club? I guess that came from the way the DA could switch back to just a DADA class when they wanted it to be, though it really wasn't a DADA class, because Harry didn't really know anything academic about DADA, he was good at fighting, which is a slightly different thing. He was able to teach the kids things to do with the spells they already knew (except for the Patronus) and just get them in shape for fighting duels.

Had to de-lurk for this

[sarcelle-m.livejournal.com]

* Hermione objects to the idea that "counter-jinx" is a euphemism for "jinx," however sometimes it seems like that's exactly what it is. Sometimes it's something that undoes a jinx, but other times it seems like "counter-jinx" is used to describe the jinx you throw at the guy throwing jinxes at you.

That was the point I really started to question the ethics of the Potter books, I think. It just seemed like such a glaringly stupid thing to say. If you think about it in Muggle terms, you can see just how ludicrous that line of reasoning is.

"Well, that's where you're wrong, officer. I shot him with my counter-gun, so it's quite alright. You can take the handcuffs off me now."

Re: Had to de-lurk for this

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

That struck me too. Someone pointed out to me that there actually are places where counter-jinxes are things that undo jinxes, which is better than what I first thought. But honestly it doesn't seem like that's always what they are. Certainly not in this book where they're learning to duel, and they're not just undoing other jinxes. I don't have a problem with anybody using them always (but you do wonder why you'd need much else than stun, kill and expelliarimus and maybe a few others) but that doesn't follow logically from "counter-hexes are also hexes." You disagree by saying, "No, they're not hexes, and here's why."

[mary-j-59.livejournal.com]

Quite be accident, surely, Umbridge has given herself a name that Muggles associate with cruelty, persecution and censorship.

Sorry, I have to say it - this is when I should have begun to realize Rowling was a Calvinist of sorts. To a Catholic, the name "Dolores" combined with the title "Inquisitor" is really disturbing.

Otherwise, I agree about Hermione and counterjinxes. It seems the wizarding world in general never progresses beyond 8-year-old "he hit me first!" morality.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

And the "he hit me first!" morality also leads to the inspiring reader game of taking any situation and morphing it into one where the heroes were in danger of their lives so they just had to do whatever they did. It's like on South Park where they get around hunting laws by saying "He's coming right at us!" before they shoot anything.

[cressida0201.livejournal.com]

(so far the only parents who have shown much concern for what goes on at school at all are Slytherins)

I think this is one place where the transition from kids' books to young adult books is problematic. I really liked the comment in the Redhen Post-Mortem essay (http://www.redhen-publications.com/PostMortem.html) (am I correct in inferring that jodel_from_aol writes those?) about the difference between children's books and young adult books. The more I think about it, the more I think that a lot of the problems with the overall arc of the series come from an unsuccessful negotiation of that transition from children's story to young adult story. I also think that JKR is much better at writing children's books than young adult books.

In a true children's book, parents who complain and try to stop their kids from doing fun things like riding hyppogriffs are the mean, or at least oppressive, ones. The cool parents are the ones who don't make a fuss when their kids have adventures. Ditto for teachers, which is why Hagrid is supposed to be the cool teacher in PoA and Draco is responsible for his own injury because he wasn't listening. It works in PoA, but by OotP, the tone has shifted.

It seems a bit like referring to one's employee review as an Inquisition.

You think they're not?! *grumbles about the annoying system at her office where nobody ever gets a good review because it might make them think they're doing a good job, and managers are expected to complain about something with every employee to prove that they're really managing*

Godwin’s Law alert. Don’t take this too far, but Fudge is described as gesticulating forcefully on the front page of the Prophet during some kind of speech, and I can't believe I'm not supposed to be picturing Mr. Forceful-Gesticulations himself, Hitler, who’s kind of the standard of all politicians who yell.

Which is an especially weird image to invoke, because don't most people agree that Fudge is supposed to be more like Chamberlain--especially in this book?

"That was me. I was slashed-heh heh—by a Hyppogriff."

Can't help wondering if that's an in-joke. JKR had discovered fandom by this point...unfortunately.

[lachlanm.livejournal.com]

cressida0201: Which is an especially weird image to invoke, because don't most people agree that Fudge is supposed to be more like Chamberlain--especially in this book?

Yes, but he's also closed-minded and violent (or at least closely associated with violent underlings). It's like if Chamberlain decided to keep the peace by beating Churchill to death with his umbrella.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

I wish this side of hers was more pursued in fanfic, I mean beyond the shallow AND THEN HERMIONE BECAME A SOCIOPATH.

LOL! I love this!

But yeah, it's just hilarious that at the end of the series the thing I find fascinating is SO MUCH how awful the good guys are. And not in the way people often accuse people of doing. It's not like I think there's no difference between the good and bad side. Of course the bad guys are worse. They're Nazis. But that's like congratulating somebody for having better eye/hand coordination than a toddler. It's just when you look at what's being said and apply to our world, it's pretty fatuous.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Julius Ceasar: Such a Gryffindor!