queerpotters

[queerpotters]

Reconciling Kindness and Callousness: A Discussion on Hermione and Emotions

One of the aspects that people struggle a lot with when it comes to Hermione is how she deals with emotions. This is a struggle that I, personally, find to be fair because she is quite complex in this regard.

Hermione can analyze people's emotional states well and is often shown manipulating emotions to get what she wants. We can see this as early as Philosopher's Stone where she, for example, flatters Hagrid to get him to reveal more information about the Stone.

“Oh, come on, Hagrid, you might not want to tell us, but you do know, you know everything that goes on round here,” said Hermione in a warm, flattering voice. Hagrid’s beard twitched and they could tell he was smiling. “We only wondered who had done the guarding, really.” Hermione went on. “We wondered who Dumbledore had trusted enough to help him, apart from you.”

As the series goes on, we will find more and more examples of Hermione perceiving, analyzing, responding, and even using other people's emotions with great accuracy and sensitivity. Most notable perhaps is her explaining Cho's emotional state to Harry and Ron in OotP, but several smaller examples are littered all over the books like her being the first to notice Neville's distress in GoF, correctly reading Harry's feelings about the Goblet of Fire, and giving a similar analysis for Tonks in HBP among other.

For as many examples as we can give of her perceptiveness and sensitivity to emotions, it also cannot be denied that Hermione commits massive social blunders over the series, many of which are attributable to emotional stupidity or failing to read the room. Most notable perhaps is her reaction to the death of Lavender's bunny where she uses it as a jumping point to try and convince her of the bogusness of Divination. There are many other examples of course, ranging from her haranguing Harry and Ron early in PS, to her approach with the house-elves, to insisting Harry teach them DADA in OotP despite his obvious discomfort.

How does one then reconcile Hermione's great sensitivity to people's emotions with her just as great callousness, both being prominent and consistent aspects of her character all throughout the series.

To me the answer is three-fold.

First, Hermione is incredibly cerebral even when it comes to emotions.

It is worth noting that Hermione's assessments of people aren't actually instinctive or even very empathetic. Rather, they are often profiles she builds about people based on observation and inference.

Let us take a look at the way she dissects Cho's feelings for example:

“Well, obviously, she’s feeling very sad, because of Cedric dying. Then I expect she’s feeling confused because she liked Cedric and now she likes Harry, and she can’t work out who she likes best. Then she’ll be feeling guilty, thinking it’s an insult to Cedric’s memory to be kissing Harry at all, and she’ll be worrying about what everyone else might say about her if she starts going out with Harry. And she probably can’t work out what her feelings toward Harry are anyway, because he was the one who was with Cedric when Cedric died, so that’s all very mixed up and painful. Oh, and she’s afraid she’s going to be thrown off the Ravenclaw Quidditch team because she’s been flying so badly.”

Hermione says what Cho's feeling and then follows it up with the circumstances that might have created those feelings plus her evidence for them. She lays everything out in a clean and methodical manner very reminiscent to when she's lecturing the boys about some sort of fact in their missions.

While certainly not cold or emotionless, it does become readily apparent that Hermione processes the emotions of people around her the same way she processes most other forms of information. She "studies" people around her, and from there, builds a baseline of information against which she infers what they are feeling and decides how to respond accordingly. In many ways, people's emotions to her are information just like any other.

Secondly, as kind and as warm as Hermione is, she prioritizes problem-solving over caretaking and is amazing at compartmentalizing emotions away if that's what it takes to get things done.

The fact that she understands what someone else is going through does not always mean she prioritizes these feelings. As mentioned above, what she understands of other people's emotions is just another bit of information she holds - and how she uses these facts vary wildly depending on whichever problem she was trying to solve at the time. Whenever she makes a social blunder, it is almost always traceable to her needing to solve some problem first and insisting on solutions that require significant emotional costs from the people around her.

The most extreme version of this is probably her insisting that Ron focus on their mission right after Fred dies.

They seemed to be wrestling together, and for one mad second Harry thought that they were embracing again; then he saw that Hermione was trying to restrain Ron, to stop him running after Percy. “Listen to me—LISTEN RON!” “I wanna help—I wanna kill Death Eaters—” His face was contorted, smeared with dust and smoke, and he was shaking with rage and grief. “Ron, we’re the only ones who can end it! Please—Ron—we need the snake, we’ve got to kill the snake!” said Hermione. But Harry knew how Ron felt: Pursuing another Horcrux could not bring the satisfaction of revenge; he too wanted to fight, to punish them, the people who had killed Fred, and he wanted to find the other Weasleys, and above all make sure, make quite sure, that Ginny was not—but he could not permit that idea to form in his mind— “We will fight!” Hermione said. “We’ll have to, to reach the snake! But let’s not lose sight now of what we’re supposed to be d-doing! We’re the only ones who can end it!” She was crying too, and she wiped her face on her torn and singed sleeve as she spoke, but she took great heaving breaths to calm herself as, still keeping a tight hold on Ron, she turned to Harry. "You need to find out where Voldemort is, because he’ll have the snake with him, won’t he? Do it, Harry—look inside him!”

From the section I bolded, it is obvious that Hermione knows that Ron is grieving and that she too is feeling the horror of Fred's death as well. It is worth noting though that she doesn't actually spare any words to comfort Ron. She doesn't stop to talk him through his feelings - rather she is telling him over and over that their mission has to come first. They both watched Fred die, but her focus even now is seeing the mission through.

This leads us to the final aspect:

Hermione projects this ability to compartmentalize to the people around her, especially when she believes them to be working together.

It is noteworthy that not only did Hermione set her own emotions aside, she asked that Ron do so too. And when Ron finally calms down, she then asks Harry to go and look into Voldemort's head. Not only is she compartmentalizing her own emotions away, she expects both boys to do so too.

Once more, there are many smaller instances like the above that cropped up all over the series. The Lavender problem, her campaign with the house-elves, her insistence that Harry teaches them DADA, her many many arguments with Harry - all of these are traceable to her insistence on setting emotion aside to solve a problem.

Doing the right thing holds primacy over people's feelings - both her own and those of the people around her.

Conclusion:

Hermione is a sensitive individual who reads people's emotions well and has many times reacted with great kindness and empathy to distress. This ability to read emotions however happens in line with her very cerebral personality, and while she can be sweet and caring, when push comes to shove Hermione focuses on problem-solving. This oftens leads to a disregard for other people's feelings and a consistent streak of callousness.

All in all, I find Hermione's relationship with emotions to be utterly fascinating. It is complex and dynamic, something that we see grow with her over time. Her reactions and tendencies are not clear-cut nor easy to map. Not only does Hermione defy the false dichotomy of book intelligence versus emotional intelligence, both are integral in the way she processes and reacts to emotion.

[queerpotters]

I'e been fairly clear about the fact that I don't like Draco (I stand by this), but I will say his arc wouldve been far more coherent if he hadnt tried to actively capture Harry during the battle of Hogwarts. As it is, he made a few steps towards the beginning of what could be a redemption arc, and then ran 20 ft backwards, slapped someone on the head, and everyone reacted like he had taken steps forward. maddening.

Having him helping Harry would be out of character I think (even if you like him, you have to admit that Draco Malfoy's primary, most consistent and enduring trait is cowardice), but even that would work better than what happened

[queerpotters]

Essay by Josie Kearns, October 2009 

Even though I’ve read the Harry Potter series many times over, I have always more or less lumped Fred and George together in my mind as two parts of a single character. Whenever I see “Fred and George,” my mind interprets it as “FredandGeorge;” whenever I see the name of just one of the duo, I treat it as “FredorGeorge,” not really noticing any differences between them.

Nor am I the only one who feels this way. Even their own mother, when she encounters a boggart and sees her family members dead one at a time, only sees the twins together. Even Harry gets his own boggart, but as with everything else, the twins are a package deal.

This viewpoint seems to even be true for J.K. Rowling herself. After all, once Fred is killed, she has said in interviews that she sees George as marrying Angelina Johnson – the girl Fred took to the Yule Ball. Could they really be that interchangeable?

Well, a closer inspection reveals a slightly different story.

Keep reading

[queerpotters]

The thing that I really don’t get about Harry Potter fans who are desperately trying to justify playing the incredibly antisemitic new game is… why aren’t y’all the most mad about this? Like the correct response to “they turned my favorite piece of wizard school childhood nostalgia into literal blood libel” is “WOW FUCK THAT”, not “oh ok, then I guess I like blood libel now :)” How do you diehards not see turning your fandom into actual pro-genocide propaganda as a betrayal? Why aren’t those of you who still love Harry Potter mad as hell that Hogwarts Legacy exists, and shouting that from every possible rooftop that no one should play it?

(…I mean, I guess I know why, but still.)

[queerpotters]

I've rarely seen a more validating sentence in my entire life.

[queerpotters]

my headcanon is that no one can stand them

[queerpotters]

A particularly nasty side to antisemitism — it’s been part of Ye’s message recently though it is by no means unique to him — is this implication that they’re just the ones saying out loud what the rest of us are thinking. And I just want to say, unequivocally, fuck you. You don’t get to claim me. You don’t get to use me as a bullet against people I care about. It’s not what I think, and I’m confident it’s not what any of my friends think because if I wasn’t confident, they wouldn’t be my friends. I’m not silently agreeing with you — I’m VOCALLY disagreeing with you. Your beliefs are pathetic. Go fuck yourself.

[queerpotters]

here’s a picture of hermione I forgot to post!

[queerpotters]

Why did Voldemort force Peter to move in with Snape?

Long ago, I said my next piece would be about why Peter went back to Voldemort. HOWEVER there has been some recent interest from readers regarding the subject of Snape and Peter living together, and I’m grateful for the encouragement and for the reminder! It’s been a while since I’ve added a new essay to the bunch, and I admit that this is one of the periods of Peter’s life (not to mention a plot of Voldemort’s) that I find especially fascinating.

Voldemort’s decision to place Peter at Spinner’s End likely happened immediately after the events at the Little Hangleton graveyard in Goblet of Fire: Voldemort has a body now. He no longer requires full-time care, nor would he want to remind his followers that he ever needed it—it wouldn’t do to have Peter remain by his side. Plus, all this one-on-one time and physical/magical reliance has given Peter an unusual amount of knowledge about Voldemort, and perhaps the knowledge has made Peter…overly familiar. So, Voldemort removes Peter to Spinner’s End, and likely moves back into the Riddle House in Little Hangleton by himself.*

*Between the World Cup and Triwizard Tournament, Voldemort and Peter were living at Barty Crouch Sr’s home, which has now been compromised due to Barty Jr’s arrest. Voldemort doesn’t move into Malfoy Manor until right before Deathly Hallows begins.

Therefore, Peter is out of a job. I expect that Peter—with his fancy silver hand and Voldemort’s apparent gratitude—thought that he would now take his place at the Adult Table with the rest of the still-loyal first-tier Death Eaters that showed up at Little Hangleton when Voldemort called them. But…no.

Instead, Voldemort removes Peter from the Inner Circle, where all the action is happening and the plans are being made, and places him not only in Snape’s company, but in Snape’s own house, and therefore—it could be argued—under Snape’s authority. 

Snape is, admittedly, not in the most secure position among the Death Eaters and Voldemort. He’s only just reemerged after living in essentially Dumbledore’s lap for the last 15 years. But he has over a decade of information that is valuable to Voldemort, and Voldemort isn’t foolish enough to disregard that, even if he doesn’t fully trust Snape (yet).

I suspect Voldemort placed Snape and Peter together for a couple reasons:

1. to have them spy on each other;

2. to get Peter out of his hair (or lack thereof), but not out of his orbit;

3. to stir shit.

Voldemort doesn’t fully trust Snape yet—he needs to hear some of that alleged Dumbledore/Order information first—and he’s never seen Peter operating as a full-time Death Eater**; there’s plenty of reason to believe that Peter might try to make a run for it.

**Unlike some, I don’t believe Peter was a fully Marked Death Eater until after Voldemort regained a body. I don’t think he was involved with/loyal to Voldemort at all during the First War—he spilled the beans to save his own life, not out of loyalty to or love of evil.

It kills two birds with one stone to give these men the task of checking up on each other—it fosters competition, and it doesn’t require any extra manpower. Each takes care of the other.

There’s a sort of apocryphal legend about Pharoahs and their tombs. I’m not sure how true it is, but it illustrates my next point well. When a Pharoah—along with an architect—designed and built his tomb, he wanted to ensure that his was the largest, grandest, and most spectacular tomb that had ever come before or after. So, when the Pharoah died, the architect might be killed and placed in the tomb with the Pharoah. This way, the royal architect would never be able to improve upon that which he had made, and never share the secrets of the Pharoah’s tomb with anyone else.

This is the principle upon which Voldemort is working with regards to removing Peter from his side and his confidence. Peter, frankly, knows too much. He was Voldemort’s sole confidant for nearly a year.

It is EXTREMELY likely that Peter is the only Death Eater who is clearly aware that Voldemort has not only one Horcrux, but several.^ Peter likely knows how Horcruxes are made and was almost certainly there when Nagini was made into one. He has seen Voldemort at his most vulnerable as well as at his most evil. Peter has proven himself not only a competent wizard, but an extraordinary one. Not to mention a dogged survivor!

^Snape doesn’t become aware of this until Dumbledore shows up with a rotting hand and the Peverell ring between OotP and HBP.

Peter’s not worth killing, either. A man who is willing to do anything to live is a valuable tool for someone like Lord Voldemort. Peter has proven that he’s willing to do the dirty work. (Bertha Jorkins, for example.)^^

^^In this way, Peter:Voldemort::Snape:Dumbledore. It’s a delicious and compelling parallel that lends itself beautifully to this circumstance.

Besides, Voldemort created his own insurance in the form of the silver hand, which seems to be programmed to kill Peter should he show an inclination to disobey Voldemort. Regarding the circumstances of Peter’s death as a consequence of sparing Harry’s life, there’s some confusion regarding the Life Debt business, but both the text and Pottermore heavily imply (or claim outright) that Peter did indeed show Harry a moment of mercy†, and the hand turned on him and strangled him to death as punishment for that mercy.

†The canon text grants this only grudgingly—Peter himself seems surprised to have done it, which muddies the waters a bit re: the hand and its motives/purpose.

Now, to my third point:

Almost nobody would argue with the idea that Voldemort is a raging drama queen. So when I say Voldemort was absolutely stirring shit by putting Snape and Peter under the same roof, you shouldn’t find it at all surprising.

It’s not just the fact that Peter ran with the two boys that made Snape’s life a living hell for almost a decade (and contributed to that hell, I’m sure, in his own right), not to mention with the werewolf who nearly—through no fault of Remus’s own—killed Snape. By the time Goblet of Fire ends, Snape is well aware that for all of his other awful and infuriating personality traits, Sirius is indeed innocent of betraying the Potters. Which can mean only one thing:

Snape knows that Peter Pettigrew is the one responsible for Lily’s death.

Snape’s feelings for and relationship to Lily were not a secret, especially to Voldemort (since Snape asked him to spare Lily’s life) and to the people Snape went to school with—especially James, who was fixated on and jealous of Snape and Lily’s friendship. Peter would, of course, be aware. I have no doubt that Peter immediately realized the position he was being put in when Voldemort ordered him to live with Snape in Spinner’s End, and I’m sure he was quite rightly nervous.

Isn’t that a delightful little mindfuck move on Voldemort’s part? Putting Snape and Peter together in time-out is a very practical punishment. He puts Snape with his childhood tormentor and the one who got the woman he loved killed, as punishment for perceived abandonment. And naturally Voldemort would be aware that Snape would hate and resent Peter because of their shared childhood and because of Lily; so what a fitting punishment for Peter, who is a man terrified that his past will catch up to him. All because he dared to witness Voldemort at his weakest. (Voldemort is SO petty, you guys.) And it dovetails so nicely with the primary reasons for placing them together: both Snape and Peter will be on edge, each desperate to prove his own loyalties as well as extra sensitive to any flaw in his roommate’s.

But Snape can’t let on that Lily’s death bothers him, nor murder Peter and risk outing himself as disloyal to Voldemort and the Death Eaters. What Snape can do, however, is make Peter’s time in Spinner’s End unpleasant and irritating. And the chapter Spinner’s End establishes exactly that: Snape treats Peter like a servant, and—as he does to Bellatrix—likely lords his own usefulness to Voldemort (and therefore, his arguably larger worth to him) over Peter’s head in the process.

And Peter can’t fight back. He’s not an idiot—he’s the kind of guy who knows when he knows too much. As to why he puts up with Snape treating him like shit, on one hand, I’m sure Peter is aware he deserves it (and besides, it’s only a couple months until Hogwarts is back in session). On the other, it’s not going to help him one whit to go complaining to Voldemort. As Peter’s been excused from the field of duty (and would frankly be too conspicuous‡), he can’t do anything to earn a reward, and unless he has rock-hard evidence that Snape is a traitor to Voldemort, Peter knows he’s stuck where he is. Which is exactly why he puts so much effort into spying on Snape in the hopes of catching him out and taking the opportunity to restore himself in Voldemort’s good graces. (Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised if Voldemort suggested that was a Very Important Job and the only way for Peter to make his way back to the Adult Table.)

‡Sirius parallel!

Unfortunately, we only get a tiny glimpse into the life that Snape and Peter had made! There’s a massive well of tantalizing possibilities here regarding their interactions in Spinner’s End—how do you think it went? (I have a pet theory that they ended up tolerating each other quite well—they’re both DEEPLY lonely men with a great deal of shared history and references. I think there’s a lot about each other that they understand, which can, of course, be repulsive in this instance, but when it comes to a roommate, sometimes you also have to get on with it and cook a shared dinner and chat about the day’s events.)

I always love hearing your reactions, questions, and observations on these essays—please do keep them coming! If you like this, check out the rest of my Peter collection here.

[queerpotters]

not that i disagree with shunning harry potter, but i do think tumblr is a little out of touch if they think blogs on this half dead site are offering "publicity" to one of the most popular children's book series in the world.

social credit for harry potter really is never going to die down because frankly, those of us that care are VASTLY outnumbered by those that don't, which is why there are fucking theme parks and merch everywhere and movies and shit still coming out. from a capitalistic perspective it'll never die because its a goddamn cash cow, and tumblr users not spreading gifsets is not going to affect that in the slightest, I'm sorry its just not.

harry potter reached a point of social impact and relevancy comparable to a lot of other famous and hugely problematic works, only it suffers from the fact that the author is still alive. its not about debating how the work is mediocre, its not about debating whether people can consume problematic content, the problem with harry potter is that the author herself is a huge cunt still doing cunty things, and unlike the dead authors of other famous problematic things, and she gains the revenue from her series and the popularity and platform from that.

the people who care are already doing what they can to boycott and speak out, and its literally not made a difference. jkr is just getting bolder and more cunty and making just as much money. so no, i don't think some random tumblr user who draws harry potter (probably brown, probably queer anyway) is going to have the social influence to affect jkr in any way.

at best public opinions on hp can be used as a signal for your allyship with trans people, but you're absolutely deluding yourself if you think anti terf people are going to make a noticeable dent in the social influence of jkr and that series.

reasonably i think most remaining fans who aren't assholes are just waiting on the bitch to die so the characters can be reclaimed by the public (like the already have been, lets be honest,) and i don't think that's the part that's giving jkr her popularity, especially when her most vocal defenders by now aren't even harry potter fans.

jkr has become a monster of her own that's gaining a following based on her tweets and her new book, and harry potter only really serves to give her money, if you're buying her merch. otherwise its literally impossible to give her or harry potter any more social credit than they already have, and frankly i think the whole situation has futher associated her with her own book series than fans did before, just due to the discourse.

and I'm not saying that harry potter blogs aren't immediate red flags or that you shouldn't avoid hp content if you want to, I'm just saying someone running a hp blog realistically isn't contributing to the problem surrounding jkr and hp from that alone, and they're still fully capable of being allies or even trans people themselves.

the absolute dsconnect from reality people have by thinking that if they shut down tumblr hp posting that jkr will be dealt with somehow, when anyone i meet irl will talk about and reference harry potter on the regular bc its a household name cemented in childhoods, and most people are not online enough or care enough about lgbt issues or "politics" to give a shit about jkr and her opinions. to the majority of the world, harry potter exists independent of that women, and frankly it seems better to encourage that than have long drawn out discussions with people who do not care why you think they should stop liking harry potter.

i see on a daily basis an incredible amount of people who will never care about trans issues or me as a trans person, which means i see the same amount of people who like harry potter and do not care why they shouldn't. the best i can hope for out of them is that they don't look up jkr and become influenced by her opinions, in which case i don't want to be the one to bring it up in the first place. when something gets as popular as harry potter did in the first place, genuinely i think "seperate art from the artist" is the most realistic and productive goal; not for the purpose of easing guilt of people who still want to enjoy it, but specifically so she as a person doesn't gain the platform and popularity that her series is going to continue to have anyway.

there is a reason we block terfs instead of engaging them in debate, and the jkr/hp debacle seems to have ignored that in favor of constantly demanding the issue stay on subject, which in its own way perpetuates jkr's platform more than if we had moved on from the fact that yes, harry potter is still incredibly popular, and yes the author is a piece of shit. instead every new tweet every month causes the discussion to circulate, pushing itself as a hot topic so people can brag about hating it now and arguing to death why you should too, and I'm seeing people turn terf ally BECAUSE of that discourse, who never would have noticed the topics or thought to have an opinion on them before.

remember, terfism isn't one side of an inherent opinion that all people have on gender, its a violent rhetoric that people get indoctrinated into that's more dangerous than passive transphobia. i would 100% rather accept that most people are going to generally like the harry potter series and move on, rather than turn a widely beloved thing into a hot button issue that pushes the idea of terfism into the view of people who otherwise wouldn't have encountered it.

[queerpotters]

We love Harry’s sass and Ron’s snarky lines (oh, I forgot we were hunting down Voldemort in a mobile library), but did we consider Hermione’s brilliant retorts

And that’s just in one scene!

[queerpotters]

everyone’s alive au where harry writes home complaining about how malfoy bought his way onto the slytherin quidditch team and lily has to spend the next week talking james and sirius out of buying nimbus 2001s for the entire gryffindor team. 

[queerpotters]

can we just talk about the time that Lupin was recovering from a full moon and Snape taught the DADA class and made all the students write essays on how to kill werewolves for Lupin to read when he got back I hate Snape so much it’s not funny

[queerpotters]

Nineties kids, camping.

[queerpotters]

— He must have known I’d want to leave you. — No, he must have known you would always want to come back.

(los pinta toerning)

[queerpotters]

Harry hesitated, but after all, Ron had been honest with him, so he told Ron the truth…

one of my absolute favorite bits from the hp books that never made it into the movies. though admittedly, the ootp movie had to rly condense a lot. i think the relationship between harry and ron is super underrated/overlooked - there’s so much love, trust, and support between them in this scene.

[queerpotters]

Headcanon that an outraged 6-year-old Charlie Weasley writes to an elderly Newt Scamander wanting to know why Gringotts keeps a dragon locked up underground and begging him to fix it. Newt writes back saying that sadly he’s been fighting that fight for years and no one ever wants to listen to him because the powerful families whose money is being kept safe by the dragon always shut him down, and that Charlie is the first person he’s heard of who’s as angry as he is about it. Charlie decides that day to dedicate his life to finding out everything he can about dragons so that one day he can free the poor Gringotts dragon. After the war, when they hear that Harry, Ron and Hermione freed the dragon, they celebrate and immediately begin petitioning to have it made illegal to imprison dragons so that nothing like that ever happens again. It’s only when Hermione becomes Minister that it’s finally signed into law.