Hagrid the Insensitive
by John Gilberotoes
Throughout my reading of the Harry Potter series I have come to the conclusion that Hagrid, not Voldemort, is the biggest risk to Harry’s health. Now I know youre all saying, Hagrid!?! Hagrid?!? You’re a friggin’ idiot! Go jump off a cliff! But hear me out first, then you can tell me to jump off a cliff.
First of all I would like to say that I don’t think Hagrid wants to kill Harry, and I don’t think that Hagrid is a taller, fatter, hairier version of Voldemort (but that would be wicked awesome). I just think Hagrid is an extremely ignorant, slow, dim-witted fellow. He can be a good, nice guy sometimes, but he has endangered Harry’s and other students lives too many times. I will prove this to you with various examples from each book.
The first example of Hagrid’s carelessness is when we first meet the guy. Remember, he banged on the door of the shack on the rock and told Harry that he was a wizard. After he finished filling Harry in he saw Dudley eating Harry’s birthday cake. Here’s where Hagrid screws up. Not only does he use magic (which he was forbidden to do), but he uses magic on a helpless Muggle child, in front of Muggles, and doesn’t even perform some sort of memory modification so they would forget the magic. Here we see Hagrid being ignorant, criminal, and even a bit mean to Dudley, which could be a type of Muggle abuse no better than exploding toilets or biting doorknobs.
Furthermore, in the first book, we see how mean Hagrid can be to his friends. After obtaining Norbert, Hagrid stops caring about his friends health and well-being and becomes obsessed with a very deadly creature. On page 237 of Sorcerer’s Stone, Ron returns from Hagrids hut with a bite from the dragon, after trying to help Hagrid feed the beast.
“It bit me!” he said, showing them his hand, which was wrapped in a bloody handkerchief. “I’m not going to be able to hold a quill for a week. I tell you, that dragon’s the most horrible animal I’ve ever met, but the way Hagrid goes on about it, you’d think it was a fluffy little bunny rabbit. When it bit me he told me off for frightening it. And when I left, he was singing it a lullaby.”
So, not only does Ron get badly bitten (and ends up in the hospital wing for it), but Hagrid yells at him for scaring his precious Norbert. Obviously Hagrid cares more about the dragon than his friends. Moreover, when Harry, Ron and Hermione kindly volunteer to bring Norbert to the North Tower, they get in trouble for it. The person that is carrying out their punishment is Hagrid, whom you would think would be extra kind to the trio (since they were taking Norbert to the North Tower for him in the first place). But no, all he says is ”Yeh’ve done wrong, an now yeh’ve got ter pay fer it.”
As if it couldnt get any worse, Hagrid splits the group up and lets two first years, Malfoy and Neville, go ALONE into the Forbidden Forest that has some creature in it that drinks unicorn blood. Not a very wise decision. Neville and Malfoy could have easily died, but it didnt even phase Hagrid because ”Yeh’ve done wrong, an now yeh’ve got ter pay fer it.”
Later in Sorcerer’s Stone we find out that Hagrid’s stupidity gave away the secret to Voldemort. Hmmm…guy in a hood, in a questionable bar, interested how to tame a three-headed dog. How couldn’t it be some one trying to get the Sorcerer’s Stone?
In the second book we get to see even more of Hagrid’s ignorance and selfish love for animals. The biggest flaw Hagrid makes in Chamber of Secrets is his effort to try to clear his name. When he was being dragged off to Azkaban he yells to the cloaked Harry and Ron, “Follow the spiders.” Why he didn’t just tell Fudge to follow the spiders instead of two inexperienced second years is far beyond my reasoning, but once Harry and Ron actually follow the spiders they almost die. Furthermore, they didn’t even find out who the heir of Slytherin was. All they found out was that it wasn’t Hagrid. Thus Hagrid cleared is own name, at the severe risk of his friends’ lives.
In the third book, no one really is endangered, besides the whole Buckbeak incident and the foolish decision to require the Monster Book of Monsters. But we do see how good of a teacher Hagrid really is. Yeah, sure he starts out fine, but after Malfoy’s injury, Hagrid throws all of his opportunity for teaching and the students’ education away. Dumbledore gave him a chance to be a teacher, and all he did was waste time on useless Flobberworms the entire year. This was all because he loves a creature more than he cares about his friends and his students.
The fourth book shows even more of Hagrid’s great teaching. Here we see some more of Hagrids dim-wittedness with the blast-ended skrewts he devoted the first half of the school year to. These animals prove themselves to be radically dangerous with their blast-ends and stingers. Throughout the year students complain about the injuries they get in Hagrid’s class. We later find out that Hagrid broke a wizard law to create these creatures. Blast-ended skrewts are actually a lethal mixture of fire crabs and manticores. Why did he break a law? Because he was just having some fun at the expense of the health and well-being of his students.
Finally, in the fifth book we get to meet Hagrid’s little brother, the giant. A giant whom Hagrid made Harry and Hermione promise to take care of. Let’s take a step back and look at this. Hagrid asks two students to take care of a full grown giant that most well-trained wizard adults wouldn’t dare approach. We saw how the giant treated Hagrid. Think how those bruises Hagrid got would look on Harry or Hermione. Why would Hagrid ask a few students to take care of a giant that beats the snot out of him? It’s because Hagrid cares more about his little projects than he cares about his friends.
Even with all of this evidence that Hagrid is an ignorant death machine, I still hear people say, ”But he’s just a big cuddly teddy bear.” Hagrid does have friendly moments, but they make no dent on all of the terrible things he has done.