Hermione and her parents

[vegablack]

What do you think of Hermione's relationship with her parents? Do you think it is typical of a muggleborn's with their parents? Or does it shed light on Hermione's own personality? Do you find it sad, understandable, refreshing?

[vegablack]

Yes I'm replying to my own question which probably violates a rule some where. I can add this to my question if people object but I wanted to speak to one aspect of Hermione's relationship with her parents.

I was appalled by the way she obliviated them and sent them to Australia. I know it was indicative of how worried she was for them and how far she was willing to go to support Harry. It was also in character for a teenager who I think is more likely to act without thinking through what her actions mean to others. I think that is behind her treatment of Marietta for instance.

That said, to me her act was one of the most appalling in the books. She took away her parents lives and memory of what their lives really were without their permission. This was an appalling display of wizard power against muggles and justifies muggle fear of wizards. Her parents are defenseless before their own child and she uses her power against them according to her own needs without their permission. I'm sure they still love her, and they probably would forgive her. Most parents can forgive almost anything from their child.

I wonder if they will ever trust her again.

[MWPP]

Um.... we don't know that it was without their permissions. As logical as she is, it is quite possible that the three of them had a discussion and all decided this was the most optimal route. It would follow that she would be the most emotional about it because she had to "kill" them to save them, at least temporarily.

The whole family seems to be quite intellectually oriented. I could see Mom and Dad saying, "But what about our practice and everything we've worked for all these years?" and Hermione saying the same thing Harry told Ginny - "The evil wizards will hurt you and use you to destroy me." The Grangers' logic and love of their only kid would easily let them go along with Hermione's plan. For them it would be a win-win situation - - either it works and Hermione finds them afterwards and un-modifies their memories, where upon they all live happily ever after - or - things don't go well and Monica and Wendel live in blissful oblivion in Austraila.

So, we don't know that they weren't in agreement with it all.


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[vegablack]

If they agreed to this then that was to my mind a great act of self sacrifice in the book equal to Harry's own. I can not imagine giving up voluntarily the knowledge that I had my children, all memory of our times together, who they were and that I loved them.

I would rather be dead to be frank.

If that is true I wonder if while they had the conversation with Hermione they truly regretted the day they sent her to Hogwarts, because that lead to them losing her completely.

[birdg]

If they did agree to it, then somehow I don't think Hermione told them the truth. I could see her instead telling them a "little white lie" that she's going to Obliviate them so they forget about the wizarding world, someone else will do a similar charm on her and then they'll leave for Australia together.

I could understand why she did it, she wanted to protect her parents and I doubt they would have left for Australia of their own free will. Hermione's proven herself to have a ruthless streak in her (it's one of my favorite things about her!). I could see her being acutely aware of the implications and how she's violating her own beliefs regarding Muggle equality to wizards but deciding the ends justify the means.

If that is true I wonder if while they had the conversation with Hermione they truly regretted the day they sent her to Hogwarts, because that lead to them losing her completely.

I would love to read a fic that addresses this head on and the Grangers' feelings about what happened to them. I know on Checkmated there was a discussion about this and many people could see the Grangers as having divorced if one of them agreed with what Hermione did but the other didn't.

[pigwithhair]

It's an odd one in my view. She's their only child, or at least it appears that way, and yet they allow her to go to Hogwarts in the first place where she is separated from them for most of the year. It's one thing to send your intelligent child to a school you know quite a lot about, a famous boarding school in England for gifted children, say. And it's quite another to send her to a school you've never heard of, know nothing about that exists in a world you know nothing about where anything could and does happen.

That's my first clue that perhaps the Grangers, loving parents they may be, are somewhat distant from their daughter or distracted with their own lives at the very least.

Then she is with Harry and Ron over Christmas her second year, she leaves a planned family holiday during her fifth to stay with Harry and the Weasleys - that must have hurt the Grangers exceedingly, whether they knew about Harry and Voldemort or not, and I'm betting they didn't.

I think it's a relationship that's rather representative of Hermione: she's very intellectual and, as a first year that's her top priority. She'll take death over expulsion. That also says a lot about her parents view on the importance of education. And it says a lot about the huge sacrifice it was for Hermione to leave school to go off with Ron and Harry instead of finishing up her final year.

Also, her total fear of failure hints of either disinterested parents, which doesn't seem to be the case entirely since the Grangers see Hermione off and pick her up at King's Cross, or of extrememly high parental expectations. I think the later is the case. Only children are typically very responsible children and will constantly strive for approval and accomplishments. Hermione takes this to extremes, so I feel she somehow feels her parents' acceptance is conditional, whether this is in truth or only her perception.

She does that the ability to go to any extreme when she feels she's in the right, causing her to feel justified in doing anything to save the lives of her parents who she obviously loves.

I was not horrified that Hermione might change their memories; I thought it very in character for Hermione. She would do the same to Ron or Harry if she thought it would save them. Unlike Ginny, Hermione is maternal and she's sure she knows what's best for everyone, something that annoys the hell out of Ron and Harry. She obviously wasn't above doing the same to her parents.

I thought it was very brave, actually. I interpretated that to be that Hermione lives in fear of how her parents will take the news. She has to feel she may lose their acceptance, their love for ever - obviously we know from Ron's mention of Grandpa "Weasley" that the Grangers are a part of Hermione's life. Yet she still did it. I think she would have to have done incredibly complicated stuff to pull it off, and Ron and Harry won't be able to appreciate what she did until the trip to Australia.

But eventually the Grangers forgive her.

I would say Hermione is already atypical, so her relationship with her parents must be. It seems difficult to understand, and I can't help but wish we'd seen a bit more of Hermione's life away from the wizarding world.

[vegablack]

Pig with hair I think you give a very good picture of Hermione's view of the situation, but I think her parents would think about it differently.

No parent imagines a scenerio where their 17 or 18 year old daughter acts for them in their best interests. Even when they are very sick or incapacitated they would mourn the fact that their child would have to treat them as a parent treats a child. Parents act in the best interests of their child, taking on the tough decisions. Children do not act that way toward their parent. (A parent would have to be senile or have some kind of mental impairment not to feel that way. The role reversal would be a tragedy.)

You say Hermione acts very maternally. An eighteen year old might act maternally toward her peers and may feel that way toward her parents but she very rarely acts that way toward them. She very rarely has the opportunity.

I can't help feeling in this instance Hermione has begun to take on the patronizing attitude that wizards often feel toward Muggles. I will act in their best interests not what they may want. Even doctors and lawyers don't act in your best interests unless you are too incapacitated to make the decision.

I find the idea of being obliviated unless over the most trivial things -- I saw a man fly on a broomstick -- offensive. I don't want anyone taking the memmory of my own life experiences away from me for any reason. They are mine and are in a sense the most basic thing I own. It's an exertion of power over me that says you have a right to decide what I can have in my brain.

Part of this is emotional. I can't imagine a situation where I'd want to forget that I had a child.

In a sense Hermione has chosen Harry and his needs over them. You can't tell me they wouldn't have wanted her to flee to Australia with them? She could have convinced them that she had a destiny to defend the wizarding world by helping Harry. But she obliviated them to protect Harry. They weren't completely protected even now. (Though I agree sending them to Australia was about the best she could do other than going to defend them herself.) If the Lestranges were happy to torture the Longbottoms into a state where they couldn't give information, they would have been happy to torture the Grangers even after being obliviated. It did protect Harry from the release of any information they had. Being un magical their minds would have been open to any wizard capable of legilimency.

[MWPP]

I have to disagree with the statement that Hermione Obliviated her parents to protect Harry.

She states she did it to protect them first and foremost. It also protects Hermione, Harry and Ron, possibly others. But, if the Grangers were in agreement, then they didn't have their memories permanently erased, only until Hermione finds them after V is defeated.

The Grangers could easily and logically have agreed to a plan that would save the life of their only daughter. It isn't outside the range of the kinds of sacrifices parents would do.

Basically, I don't have any problem with the premise. Consenting adults makes it quite acceptable.


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[vegablack]

You are right Hermione is protecting them. The first part of her conversation talked about making it more difficult for Voldemort to hunt them down and interrogate them about Hermione and Harry, but the second part talks about keeping them safe and happy.

That is my problem with the situation. Hermione says, "Assuming I survive our hunt for Horcruxes, I'll find Mum and Dad and lift the enchantment. If I don't -- well, I think I've cast a good enough charm to keep them safe and happy. Wendell and Monica Wilkins don't know that they've got a daughter you see."

I can't imagine a set of parents agreeing to be safe and happy not remembering that they had a daughter and that she was murdered by death eaters. Can you imagine them saying, "yes dear you go fight people who want to kill you. We will emigrate to Australia safe in our ignorance of your existence. If you live you can come and bring us back. If you die we're content to have never known you lived."

Any parent would fear for their child's safety. They had to be intelligent enough to think that if this was necessary than their child's life was at risk. I find it either amazingly brave and self sacrificing of them or strangely detached to send her off to fight and themselves to safety, unaware of her existence. They never wanted her to emigrate with them? They never thought she should join them in safety in Australia. They preferred she fight a war among a people alien to them? They agreed to her fighting with Harry?

I find the scenario of a teenager sending her parents off against their will more believable.

[mo]

This is a really hard topic to flesh out, because, frankly, the issue is contradictory and glossed over even in canon. Yes, Hermione somehow left her parents with the belief that they are a childless couple whose fondest desire is to move to Australia, but then just a few weeks later she says she's "never done a memory charm." Then, when asked in interviews what happened with Hermione's parents after the war, JKR just says that Hermione goes to fetch them soon after the war and they have a joyful reunion.

I think the whole storyline is largely a convention to remove Hermione's parents from the picture without having them in danger of any kind. JKR reformulated her parental storyline plans a few times, with the goal being to emphasize the primacy of the Voldemort situation and to keep Harry as the only orphan of the Trio. (I'm speaking of an abandoned "Hermione's parents get divorced" storyline and "Arthur dies of his Nagini bites" respectively) I think that the Wilkins plot existed to serve the Voldemort/Harry Quest storyline and little else.

[pigwithhair]

Vegablack, I disagree with you and I think it's harsh to say that Hermione was patronizing.

Regarding your comment that she put Harry first, she was really putting everyone first. She stopped her life and left school to help save not only the wizarding world but the Muggle one as well. HBP had shown that Muggles were not exempt from the Death Eaters; Hermione's parents would have been in much more danger than most Muggles, given their relationship to her. So, she was putting everyone before her parents, not just Harry. It was about saving far more than just Harry.

And yes, I do see Hermione as maternal by nature - to everyone. She's protective of those she loves and will go to extremes to do what she thinks is right when it comes to them, hence her decision which. obviously from her manner while speaking of her parents. was very upsetting for her to do.

[vegablack]

Yes I probably went to far in what I said. She was putting everyone first and doing the best she could as she saw fit in a very dangerous situation.

[Mirabelle]

I find the scenario of a teenager sending her parents off against their will more believable.

I don't think Hermione erased her parents memories with permission because, like Vegablack, I can't see any parent willfully agreeing to having memories of their only child erased for whatever reason. If they did agree to it, then I think Hermone lied to them about the situation. She may have implied she was coming with them or that they'd be able to to remain in England if they didn't know anything of Hermione's whereabouts, but I don't think the Grangers knew they were going to be sent to a new life in a new country with new names and no memories of their daughter.

I also don't buy any fic scenario where Hermione finds her parents and they instantly forgive her for uprooting their lives and erasing their memories of her.

[queenie]

Feb 21, 2009 1:49:13 GMT -5 vegablack said:

Hermione says, "Assuming I survive our hunt for Horcruxes, I'll find Mum and Dad and lift the enchantment. If I don't -- well, I think I've cast a good enough charm to keep them safe and happy. Wendell and Monica Wilkins don't know that they've got a daughter you see."

And now the thing gets even worse: Hermione says "I think I've cast a good enough charm to keep them..." We know that certain spells, like the Full-Body Bind that Dumbledore cast on Harry at the end of HBP, fall apart if the caster dies. We can assume that Memory Charms don't follow that rule, otherwise the death of any given Obliviator would cause great consternation in the magical and Muggle communities - however, Hermione says later that she's never performed a Memory Charm. That, I attribute to JKR not thinking through this plotline, "contradictory and glossed over even in canon," as mo put it.

But it's still worth thinking of: What if Hermione didn't cast a good enough charm? What if she died and the charm on her parents broke or faded? Perhaps it was already beginning to fade as the year went on? Imagine waking up every day trying to remember that you have a child, having these odd, half-memories, half-dreams, but thinking "they're nothing," and trying to hide them from your spouse, while secretly the spouse is going through the same thing.

It's really a scary idea. And I didn't think about it this way before, but I agree with vegablack, this idea is more appalling than comfortable. (Then again, I just wrote a fic that deals with the tense relationship between an Obliviator and a Muggle, so I'm a little invested in the topic.)

Will they ever trust her again? I don't know. I wonder if she would ever tell them everything about her adventures at Hogwarts.

[pigwithhair]

It's very intriguing to me and something I wish JKR had spent more time on - Hermione's relationship with her parents, I mean.

I agree with the earlier poster that I cannot see her parents just having a joyous reunion with their daughter once she lifts the - whatever she placed on them.

It's also an interesting question as to how much she's told them over the years. My guess would be as little as possible. I've always felt they couldn't have known she was Petrified. You'd think they'd have been there or would have written Dumbledore demanding to see her if they had been told - or I'd think so.

My feeling is that their reunion was fraught with tension and that it would be a very long, hard road back in terms of trust. I'd think they may even be frightened of their own daughter, and I can see Hermione being wracked with guilt, wondering if she did the wrong thing.

[vegablack]

That's the issue with both Hermione and the other muggleborn parents. None of them come to visit their children. Were they told anything happened? Were they kept from seeing them? In some ways JKR may have kept them away or simply not mentioned them to keep the story from being cluttered. It's possible that the parnets visited but Harry didn't know, but for how long. Most parents board with a child at a children's hospital and try to accompany them through out an illness. Especially when the children who are only 12 years old. It's hard to believe that none of the sets of parents had a qualm about sending a child back to school after a near death experience in which they were attacked because of who they were.

I think that they weren't quite informed of the incident and were kept in the dark largely. Sort of like when Dean Thomas admits to keeping his parents from hearing of Cedrics death and the events of the triwizard tournament. This is another way that Muggle parents aren't given the rights of real parents to make decisions for their kids. I read a story about Colin's parents and their attempts to visit him after he is petrified. Dumbledore politely informs them of the accident but can't understand why they want to make decisions about his care and sees no reason to allow them to come to visit. They become quite upset and in the end are obliviated. It's creepy, but believable.

The muggle parents relationship with the school reminds me of those old indian boarding schools where the children were supposed to leave their old culture behind and learn to be civilized and live among white people.

[queenie]

Apr 15, 2009 20:19:49 GMT -5 vegablack said:

I read a story about Colin's parents and their attempts to visit him after he is petrified. Dumbledore politely informs them of the accident but can't understand why they want to make decisions about his care and sees no reason to allow them to come to visit. They become quite upset and in the end are obliviated. It's creepy, but believable.

That's super creepy. Ugh. I can actually almost see Dumbledore doing it, but not in a "how can you think you know how to take care of your child" way, but in a "this is something you can't really understand; you can't do a thing about it, and if you see him you will only be more upset." That, I can see Dumbledore doing. (On the other hand, an author writing pre-DH would have a great case for a sinister Dumbledore right there.)

I think it could be super painful to see your child Petrified - it's not even like visiting a child in a coma, where you can hold their hand. Visiting a Petrified loved one, if you're a Muggle, could be very disturbing, I can imagine.

Now it makes me wonder about marriages between wizards and muggles. If the Muggle knows that their spouse and children have magic, but he/she doesn't, what kind of a relationship must come out of that? I can imagine a Muggle spouse feeling neglected, and in an unbalanced relationship. I repeat, Ugh.

Also, odd thing to note: throughout the books, there's only one (oblique) reference to a wizard marrying a Muggle woman, and that's Dean Thomas. Every other time - Mrs. Finnigan, Merope Gaunt, Eileen Prince, Amata and Sir Luckless in The Fountain of Fair Fortune - is a witch marrying a Muggle. Even the proverb that Ron quotes of Mrs. Weasley runs "May-born witches marry Muggles." I wonder why.

[vegablack]

Dumbledore's attitude was exactly like that. Your doctors will not be able to help your child. You can do nothing for him. He is getting the best care and will be cured as soon as the mandrakes mature. You wouldn't have seen him anyway when he was at school any way. Just be patient and trust us. He's gentle but not interested at all in the parents opinions.

I'm skeptical about successful relationships between muggles and witches or wizards. The power relationship seems to wide. The secrets to large. The muggle can't share about the magical spouse to his friends or family. I'm not sure the magical spouse's friends really accept as an equal the muggle marriage partner. How would you even visit? Then there was always the fear that you or a family member would constantly need to be obliviated.

Maybe men have relationships with Muggle women but abandon them so frequently we hardly hear about it. Maybe the witches keep their children with the muggle men so we hear about it.

[starsea]

Apr 16, 2009 17:11:53 GMT -5 vegablack said:

Maybe men have relationships with Muggle women but abandon them so frequently we hardly hear about it. Maybe the witches keep their children with the muggle men so we hear about it.

I think it's more likely that wizards just don't tell Muggle women about their magic. Witches wouldn't want to keep that secret for long. Even Merope eventually gave up feeding Tom Riddle Sr the love potion. If a wizard did tell a Muggle woman he was magical, or she worked it out, it would be up to her to fight for the right to raise her child equally and make sure she was included in all decision-making, and I don't think that would be easy. (I'm writing a story that touches on this issue, so I'm interested in the repercussions.)

[queenie]

Apr 19, 2009 18:29:38 GMT -5 starsea said:

I think it's more likely that wizards just don't tell Muggle women about their magic. Witches wouldn't want to keep that secret for long. Even Merope eventually gave up feeding Tom Riddle Sr the love potion. If a wizard did tell a Muggle woman he was magical, or she worked it out, it would be up to her to fight for the right to raise her child equally and make sure she was included in all decision-making, and I don't think that would be easy. (I'm writing a story that touches on this issue, so I'm interested in the repercussions.)

I've been thinking about this issue myself. No wonder that witches or wizards who associate with Muggles are thought of as weaker - the immediate impression is that, since a wizard automatically has more power than a Muggle, the relationship must be unbalanced to begin with. So the assumption is that, since a happy marriage is one that is balanced (though this is actually a relatively new concept) the wizard must be really weak-willed, or not very bright, or have some other lack that the Muggle must fulfill for them. Heavens forbid it should be love.

It occurred to me that a witch might marry a Muggle - or may at least consider it with less apprehension than a wizard would - because, despite what JKR says in Beedle the Bard, witches would be more likely to be looked upon as weaker, so maybe they wouldn't fear the stigma of being a "Mudwallower" so much.

On the other hand, since the idea of balanced marriage = happy marriage is a fairly new one (and again, things might be different in the WW), a wizard who felt that he lacked power in his own life, or just wanted a marriage where he could be certain of always having the upper hand, might marry a Muggle woman. Now that would probably count as an abusive relationship.

Queenie, still tired, still a a little incoherent, and wondering if this should have its own thread

EDITED because a Stigma and a Stigmata are not the same thing. Witches are not necessarily martyrs.