[ SECRET POST #3863 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #3863 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.



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02.
[Alex James from Blur]


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03.
[Night Court]


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04.
[Top: Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Chris Pratt
Bottom: Dave Bautista, Josh Brolin]


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05.
[Stephen Fry and Elliott Spencer]


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06.
[Anna Faris and Chris Pratt in Mom, S04E11 "Good Karma and the Big Weird"]


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07.


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08.













Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 24 secrets from Secret Submission Post #553.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

08. http://i.imgur.com/Igc4oeW.jpg

[(Anonymous)]

Get outta here.

[(Anonymous)]

Oh but it is.

[morieris]

Fair enough, she could be super vindictive and never really...learned on screen (page?) why actions like that weren't appropriate and it always worked out for her.

In context they are pretty cool spells and at least disfiguring Marietta for possibly putting their rebel group in danger was more justified than sending birds after Ron because she didn't tell him her feelings but yeah she doesn't actually face repercussions, does she?

[(Anonymous)]

I mean, what a ridiculous framework

[(Anonymous)]

She's not particularly unkind...? What's wrong with valuing intelligence?

[(Anonymous)]

Give me a kind idiot over an intelligent jerk any day.

[sadiesockmonkey]

I agree with this secret at least in the sense that ime, Harry Potter fandom idolizes Hermione and puts her on a pedestal where they seem incapable of even acknowledging her flaws.

Like morieris points out, Hermione is vindictive and violent, and I always got the impression from the books that Rowling treated it like a quirk because there weren't really ever any consequences for her actions.

Hermione can be quite terrifying in her own right, and it does a disservice to her character to treat her and talk about her like a perfect goddess who never did anything wrong in her entire life.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, agreed. I personally like her as a character, but the fandom things about how "Hermione actually did everything and was just held back by the boys" (often in the name of some sort of feminism) really bother me, too.
But then, fandom these days really likes screaming YASS QUEEN at things, it seems.

OP

[(Anonymous)]

This post (and the one below!) is basically my brain when writing the secret. Thank you!

[(Anonymous)]

She's still a favourite character, but this attitude was one of several reasons I jumped the H/Hr ship. Like, I don't care how much you quote Rowling's "she wandered off on her own", it won't magically make her the "actual heroine" of the books and thus H/Hr the perfect ~feminist~ ship she deserves instead of "getting stuck with the sidekick".

[(Anonymous)]

Seriously, though, I have so many issues with Hermione. She's a fantastic character but between the way she got away with absolutely everything horrible in canon (like, oh, keeping a human being in a jar for days and days because she was snooping??? Rita was in the wrong for snooping but that doesn't justify kidnapping and imprisonment and blackmail in the least; or permanently disfiguring a peer because she tattled on them due to pressure from the Headmistress at the time; the absolutely appalling way she sends those canaries after Ron--he still has scratches weeks later...; the way she erased her parents' memories without their consent and understanding of why which actually put them in more danger because if they knew the danger they could avoid it, instead they were forcibly uprooted without their memories to Australia without their consent uuuuuuuugh) and the way her fans treat her like she can do no wrong and she's the kindest, most self-less, most wonderful bookworm ever gets to me.

[(Anonymous)]

Some of that is probably because most of these events weren't treated very seriously by canon, either... Which it would have been nice if they had been, yes.

[rosehiptea]

I agree on most of this but I think the issue with her parents is that they couldn't avoid the danger. She had enemies who could read minds and find anyone anywhere in the world, so she did the only thing she thought she could under the circumstances. That said, canon does kind of just brush it off like it's not a big deal which is weird.

[(Anonymous)]

Was the memory erasure meant to be permanent? I can't remember if that was ever addressed. Seems like a practical issue when Hermione is barely an adult and probably doesn't really have any financial assets of her own or anywhere to go besides Hogwarts and the Weasley's house. Plus, there was no reason not to restore their memories after the battle was over.

Also, does she not have any extended family? What about her parents' friends? Neighbors? Even if her life is basically 99% Hogwarts and 1% parents, other people would know she exists. Did she erase everyone's memories?

[kutsuwamushi]

She's a fantastic character but between the way she got away with absolutely everything horrible in canon...

I disagree with people singling Hermione (or any other individual character) out for this. As other people have said, the canon doesn't treat these events seriously--and that's because the entire canon's perspective is different than ours. Things that would be absolutely terrible in the real word are underplayed because it increases the whimsy; there's a kind of slapstick element to it. Children get battered in a violent sport, mauled by wild animals, dropped out of windows--but it's okay because this is a world where psychological repercussions don't really exist and magic means none of them are permanently hurt. Things only become serious when it's important to the narrative that they be serious.

It's one thing if you want to interpret the canon as being full of terrible people making terrible choices. But I just don't think it's good evidence that a particular character is awful, etc, because it's hypocritical to apply the standards of our world just to the characters you dislike.

OP

[(Anonymous)]

Crap, of course this posted the one day this week I wasn't home for it. I was going to put this in the first reply if I'd been near a computer:

Just because I know someone is going to misinterpret me, I do not equate "liking" with "worship". I had a whole spiel explaining the difference, but eh, you're mostly grown-ups; you get it. Carry on.

[(Anonymous)]

Socially inept as a child and capable of taking cold, non-emotionally-affected decisions during wartime, does not mean unkind. I fail to see how anyone could come away from the series without seeing that Hermione has kindness in her, even if it is not her ruling characteristic.

She may not have acted correctly on that kindness with the whole house elf liberation, considering many of them had no desire to be liberated, but her motivation was born of caring. She's always cared about those that wizarding society treated as lesser. She's always been characterized as a caring friend after bonding with Harry and Ron, even when those friends exasperated her or when they had different opinions on what a friend ought to do/say in any situation. She may be a know-it-all without much ability at initially making friends and getting close to people, and she may speak harshly when she doesn't see eye-to-eye with someone, but she has always been presented as someone willing to put work into or make sacrifices for the well-being, safety, and happiness of others, particularly those who few people consider the well-being of. How is that not kind?

[(Anonymous)]

Idk if I would exactly call Hermione unkind. She's more vindictive and petty really. Unfortunately she never gets called out or any comeuppance for it. Although she was an asshat to fleur but that's a Rowling issue more than a Hermione issue.

[(Anonymous)]

i feel like a lot of that boils down to rowling writing in a very classic children's book style. you have that with a lot of her characters – fred and george testing their instant-illness candy on literal children (and a lot of other shit they pull, lbr), i think it was ginny and a couple of others at the end of some book hexing malfoy & co until they resemble big slugs (? i don't remember the exact quote, but that's the basic gist), all the hermione things cited above, the list goes on. and it's that very common theme you have in kids' books – physical punishment for bad deeds, because it's a little funny, it's a little satisfying, and it's usually so over the top that it's comedic rather than truly shocking. but then, she goes on to contrast the over the top comedy-punishment – like gilderoy lockhart forever losing his memory – with very real, very realisticially written human hurt – like neville's parents being tortured to the point of insanity in a society that obviously can't seem to cure psychological ills. and that's kinda why the whole thing feels disjointed: as a reader, you either have to switch between the humour and the seriousness by yourself, or you're gonna feel like what you're reading is morally pretty messy.

BUT back to the point.

and as others have pointed out, the whole worship-culture fandom has adopted isn't really helping, because how dare anyone imply hermione isn't perfect and flawless, because as we all know, the true sign of feminism is that... women aren't allowed to be real human beings who have flaws and/or make mistakes. (funniest thing: the extreme ron hate you can so frequently see is the other side of the coin: how dare ron feel overshadowed or experience any kind of jealousy at all? it's like he's a person, get the pitchforks!)

personally, i don't think hermione is downright unkind, that would just ignore too many aspects of her character and too many things she does and contributes. hell, she even says herself that kindness and friendship matter a big fat lot (probably also not the actual quote). i do think she's logical to a fault, and that logic occasionally bulldozes kindness – her parents are a good example, because lbr, erasing their memories and relocating them as far away as possible is the only way they could possibly stay safe, but that doesn't mean it isn't a pretty cold thing to do.

[ninety6tears]

I hate that there's a lot of that attitude going around, but Hermione is great, and also kind.

[diet_poison]

I don't think Hermione was unkind.

A lot of these comments make me think of the Fred and George wank. Yeah they did things that would be horrible IRL. But the books were not supposed to be gritty, and that stuff was supposed to be slapstick humor. I enjoyed it for what it was. I honestly have to wonder how anybody who got really hung up on the pranks or some of the stuff Hermione did that was mentioned here managed to enjoy the books at all.

I'm not saying Hermione was perfect or didn't have flaws - characters are more fun when they are nuanced, anyway - but this particular criticism sort of misses the point of the books to me, and takes aspects of it seriously that were not written to be that way.

[cbrachyrhynchos]

Harry Potter wank not involving Snape or James? A refreshing change.

[(Anonymous)]

what if the fact that she's driven as hell, loyal, hardworking, and fucking ruthless is all more important to why I like her than the fact that she's smart?

[(Anonymous)]

I love book Hermione. She was definitely a lot more flawed and nowhere near the Miss Perfect the movies made her out to be.

One downside of the movie is that it gives a lot of other characters cool lines and moments to Hermione. Especially Harry and Ron getting portrayed as incompetent idiots despite being pretty good students themselves and capable of solving problems from a different perspective. I mean, Harry is actually pretty intelligent himself (even in potions according to his O.W.L results) when he's not having to deal with Voldemorts mindfucks.