“I think I’m starting to get it”, Hermione rubbed her temple. “I mean, what we talked about, how I managed to be stupid enough to fall for Ron, and what we talked about with Andromeda later”, she looked at her family over sandwiches and tea. “It all boils down to that insane feminist ideology the muggle world is marinating in constantly for the last hundred years”.
“What do you mean?”, Harry sipped his tea.
“Well, the core ideology goes like this. They reframed men from protectors to the main threat a woman can possibly face. Essentially, they would take a Voldemort-like man, someone who is a one in a ten thousand minority, the worst of the worst, and generalise him as something any man can be, so all women necessarily have to guard against”, she smiled as she looked at their horrified faces. “So, since every man is a potential Voldemort, a woman must at all times remain strong enough to not only survive on her own, but never show any weakness or vulnerability to any man, because it is certain to be exploited. Men are basically the enemy of women, and if you absolutely need to be with a man in order to have children, pick the weakest, safest one who can’t hurt you”, she finished.
“I don’t know who made that stuff up, but they should be permanently locked up in the muggle equivalent of St. Mungo’s department for the incurably mentally ill”, Lyra muttered in shock. “I can’t say I never heard anything more insane because I lived with Voldemort and the Death Eaters, but it’s up there”.
“Exactly”, Hermione nodded. “It took me a while to actually become aware of it all, but you are exactly right. It’s a completely insane ideology, but since I was exposed to it and adopted it inadvertently as a child, the way you adopted the Death Eater ideology of your parents to a degree, I simply went through the motions of manifesting it in my life, which meant crushing on the weakest, least aware, most incompetent member of our group. Someone I could keep in check if it went really bad”, she grinned bitterly. “However, what I didn’t realise is that Ron is the exact profile of that one in a ten thousand man who will hurt a woman. He’s weak, prone to lashing out on his friends or family to make himself feel stronger, and because he’s least likely to suffer consequences for it. He lacks awareness and empathy and only cares about his comfort and unearned privileges, he’s lazy, sees nothing wrong about being a burden on others, and sees nothing bad about treason if it benefits him”, she finished.
Harry and Viktor looked at each other and then at Hermione. “But why would you choose someone who’s actually the most likely person to hurt you? Especially since he already had a history of hurting you?”, Harry managed to put it into words.
“Because I thought I could manage it. It was survivable. I thought the worst he could do was something I could live with. And I was completely unaware of what I was doing, and insecure enough to never actually dig into it”, she nodded. “Now, because of the three of you, I’m feeling so secure I can think out loud and completely unguarded, and explore this stuff”, she smiled at Lyra, who just kissed her hand very gently.
“I think I see what you mean”, she looked at Hermione. “I had to deal with it when the Wizengamot asked me how can they know that I won’t abuse my power. It’s the question any woman has to ask regarding a man – how do I know you won’t hurt me, or leave me, because of course they technically can. If it’s someone like Voldemort, or the worst of scum he tended to collect, a woman would be well advised to steer clear. Such a man would truly be a nightmare. But the answer isn’t to destroy your life with constant paranoia and vigilance against all men because you lack discriminative abilities. The answer is to watch men carefully before and during the courting phase. Watch how they treat others. Especially watch how they treat those weaker than them, those who are vulnerable and in need of protection. I watched boys on my mom’s list very carefully during the first year at school. I watched what they do, how they react. Very quickly, I watched only Harry, because he was brave, protective, loyal, chivalrous, smart, he opposed injustice, even if it hurt me to realise that I ended up being on the wrong side of that, and he resisted authority when he thought he knew better, but was humble enough to apologise when he was wrong. And at some point, I realised there were no other names on my list. He was the one I will marry. He was the one I would say ‘yes’ to when he asks, and he’s the only one I will ever say ‘yes’ to. Of course, at that point he thought I was a devil child and he held me in utmost contempt, but that was a different problem”, she smiled as she returned to her sandwich.
“I wish I had known all that”, Harry nodded in dismay.
“Would you have treated me differently had you known?”, she retorted.
“I don’t know. Probably. There was the Voldemort problem, and I kept thinking there was that problem even two years after it stopped being one, so you can see how foolish and stubborn I’ve been, but it actually took Hermione to make me realise that you chose me and you were so serious about me so early on. I was too immature and too absorbed in all the other stuff that kept happening, and it was actually important stuff, like Voldemort, or Sirius, or Dumbledore. I realised fragments, like the fact that our talks or touching meant more to me than anything else, but my brain refused to connect the dots, because of what it would mean. And it was very hard for me to emotionally survive facing the truth because I realised what I’ve done to you with my idiocy”, he looked into her silver eyes with deep regret.
“In the end, it was watching the two of you that made me realise what a mistake Ron was”, Hermione looked at them adoringly. “Harry was the most competent, wise and dangerous Wizard of our generation. He literally dismantled Voldemort and killed him in a duel in front of the entire school, winning the war. According to the feminist theory, he was exactly the person a woman should select against, because he couldn’t be kept in check or controlled or protected against. And yet, he was the safest, most protective friend I could ever hope for. I looked at the two of you and I saw Lyra in absolute heaven, and then I felt pain in my heart because that’s what I wanted, and I chose the exact opposite for myself, and then I rebelled against it and saved myself from a lifetime of regret and pain”, she looked at her husband lovingly. “I ended up choosing the man who couldn’t be controlled or managed, but who didn’t have to be, and who made me feel safe, seen, and looked after”.
“This stuff can’t end well for the muggles”, Viktor mused, smiling at his true love. “This kind of hostility and paranoia between men and women has to eventually tear them apart”.
“It’s getting there”, Hermione nodded. “But it will get worse, and I don’t know if it can get better after that, or if their entire society will implode from the consequences, because if men and women don’t have each other to love, they will get so angry and miserable they will start outright killing each other”.
“This is a realistic problem, I’m afraid”, Harry acknowledged. “Realistic enough that we must account for it in our own national security analysis”.
“You have a point there”, Lyra nodded. “We need to write an analysis for our next security report to the higher-ups”.