Sometimes I Think About Your Ginny And Harry And That Scene At Slughorns Dinner And How Parlor Ginny

Sometimes I think about your Ginny and Harry and that scene at Slughorn’s dinner and how Parlor Ginny saves Harry (and probably Neville) from doing saying and doing something he’d regret. But how different that is from how she usually saves him by being Cloister Ginny. Does it make any sense? Maybe not.

This one got me thinking. I think you definitely makes sense, though I may be interpreting your ask incorrectly. The way Ginny protects Harry (and others) in public is very much about weaponizing her carefully collected information and her persona, like at that Slughorn dinner. (Though I am honestly not sure that she did that just to keep him from doing something he’d regret as much as refusing to let him feel like no one at that table has his back. She stops EVERYONE at the table from coming after him or making him uncomfortable for the rest of the evening, mostly because it pissed her off and she’s always had way low impulse control when it comes to Harry.) 

Harry defends Ginny in public very similarly, only instead of those much more ‘Slytherin’ tactics, he physically puts himself between Ginny and any danger or attack, like during the DADA NEWT exam where he uses magic to protect her, throwing up an enormous protective shield in reaction to her getting hurt, and then physically putting himself between Robards and Ginny when he seems to be angrily advancing on her. He’s ready to take the hits for her if he has to (as Harry is very willing to do for almost anyone he considers an innocent or in his in-group).

Now who they are in spaces like the cloister is incredibly different because that isn’t public. In these private spaces, they ‘save’ each other in very different ways, and I think that is a fundamental part of who they are to each other. In private, they don’t have to fall back on those other thing–which for both of them is a rare thing, not to mention that those parts of themselves, while fundamental to their character, are also not things they necessarily are comfortable with. In spaces like the cloister, Harry doesn’t feel like he is only good for throwing spells and taking hits, and Ginny doesn’t feel like she is only good for manipulating people and making the hard decisions. They are each most helpful to the other in simply giving space and having enough trust built between them to allow them to be themselves. They ‘save’ each other just through being there, by having space to talk and wonder and be wrong, and through physical comfort. Just like Ginny allowing Harry to talk through his thoughts about his confliction over his father and Snape or what he did to Malfoy. Or Harry holding Ginny and letting her cry over George. These things are not about what they can do for the other person, but how they provide space for them to just be themselves. 

Do you think Ginny’s need for everything to be under her control (which we still have to discuss how different it is from Hermione’s), besides the emotional and traumatic aspects, may also come from her fear of being powerless? Better put, of not having power? And that makes her strive for it more? If it is, it’s a very Slytherin trait for sure

Oh, yes. She would much rather be in a position to have power that she chooses not to use, than to not have power at all. I think it is definitely a Slytherin trait. But also definitely out of her trauma from Tom, from being completely powerless and swearing to herself that she would never find herself in that position of weakness again. I think this is something both Ginnys have in common, and was honestly one of the reasons I thought she could actually work in Slytherin. She isn’t interested in controlling others, only interested in controlling her own destiny and path, and anyone who would try to take that away from her.

And, yes, I think Hermione’s need to control comes from a different place. Primarily the belief that she knows better than everyone else. It probably sounds egotistical, and it is a bit, but it also comes from what I imagine is Hermione’s feeling that she is Very Smart, that this smartness has been ingrained in her as being her core characteristics, her one valuable trait. (She’s bad with people and emotions and does not easily make friends, and maybe panics under stressful situations and doesn’t make the best leader or dueler, but she can always count on being smart, on Knowing Useful Things, and it’s the one thing that if she puts her effort into it, it always pays off, whereas other areas it never seems to matter how hard she tries, it always goes wrong.) Hermione isn’t interested so much in power in and of itself, as in Doing What’s Right, and Knowing More Than Everyone Else What’s Best.

How did the parlor come to exist? Who would Ginny be by the end of the changeling if it didn’t??

I imagine The Parlor was born out of information, practices, and people being slowly marginalized, maligned, and outlawed. In ancient cultures women’s knowledge might have been valued, but it was also probably also always secret or protected or at least ‘kept to the women’s quarters’ so to speak. But as male knowledge, power, and systems evolved and grew more powerful, women’s knowledge had to go underground--back to the earth from which it came, one might say. Both to protect itself, but also to ensure that it was never lost.

The Parlor is an extension of this vast network, this vestige of beliefs, practices, and knowledges patriarchy says is all better forgotten. And it far predates Hogwarts.

It’s hard to say who Ginny would be by the end of The Changeling without it. She would still be Ginny, she would still be tested, still find strength. I keep thinking of what Antonia said to her in in my head we do everything right when Ginny say she didn’t know who she would be without Antonia and she answers, “You’d be you. Only less interesting.” But something else Ginny might have been, was far more like Snape. Though what kept Ginny from that fate was a combination of The Parlor and the DA. So it’s hard to know. It’s all so thoroughly entwined.

…hey Harry Potter fans, we’re all in agreement that Dumbledore brought the Philosopher’s Stone to Hogwarts in Harry’s first year as a test to see whether Voldemort was paying attention and what sort of state he was in, now that Dumbledore’s chosen champion was old enough to hold a wand, right?

Like, Harry learns what magic is and it’s time to start moving towards the full and final destruction of Tom Riddle Junior, so Dumbledore has a chat with his long-time alchemy friend who’s been keeping this thing safe for literally six centuries straight, and ‘borrows’ the easiest source of immortality he can find as bait for a trap to lure Voldemort out into the open so Dumbledore can get the lay of the land to prep for the next seven years.  This is canon, right?

Remus Lupin: Sirius you did what.

Inspired by this post and others by lotstradamus

So here’s the thing. There is no logical reason that Ginny Weasley, as a nearly 17-year-old at the end of Deathly Hallows, would be good at taking care of babies, that she would somehow be this amazing Teddy-caring-for figure. Like, she was (nearly) 17. Her family is big, but she’s the baby, the youngest child and there seems to be a conspicuous canonical absence of Prewett or Weasley cousins in the narrative that could have maybe exposed her to younger kids. She probably has zero baby experience in her entire life. So the concept of her becoming a primary care giver or even being the most competent caretaker of a months-old if not weeks-old infant in the face of Harry bumbling about is so weird to me. (And makes me wonder if this is some ‘women are inherently, biologically nurturing and great at caring at babies because that is what they are meant to do’ cult of true womanhood bullshit that is crazy toxic and makes first time mums feel like they are somehow deficient when they struggle to care for an infant because babies are HARD, yo. anyway, I digress)

Honestly, the Ginny and Harry care for baby Teddy shit would probably go more like this if you ask me:

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