Ginny Weasley: Manipulative Schemer?
I thought I might post my canon reasons for thinking Ginny will become the manipulative schemer I made her be in Empire of the Senseless.
Starting in chronological order, we see her in PS as a little girl clinging to her mother - but the moment she learns Harry is on the train, her mother can go hang. Note that she doesn't know Harry at all; he's just The Boy Who Lived (Molly even tells Ginny he's not some circus attraction!). I've seen many interpretations of her clinging to Molly as being indicative that she has a needy personality and is still "mommy's little girl" at that point in time. I don't doubt Ginny's been sheltered, but if she can all of a sudden enthuse (and quite vocally - a truly timid child would never say that aloud) that she wants to go on the train to see a symbol, I don't think she is very needy as it comes to her mother. My opinion is that she is clinging to Molly because she knows that it plays to her advantage. And please don't tell me she's too young to do that; toddlers do that all the time.
Then we have CoS, the motherlode of all Manipulative!Ginny arguments. Much as been made of Lucius’s decision to slip Tom Riddle's diary into Ginny's cauldron; the counter-argument goes that Lucius had no way to know that the Weasleys, let alone Ginny, would be in Flourish & Blotts. Between one thing and the other, I don't read much into the fact that Lucius slipped the diary to her.
I do read quite a lot, though, in the fact that she kept it secret from everybody. She has not only been brought up surrounded by magic, her father's whole job is dealing with misuse of Muggle artifacts. If Harry had been the first to find the diary, he'd probably think that diaries that write back are a staple of the wizarding world. But Ginny knew the diary could be dangerous - Arthur said so himself, when he berated her at the end of CoS. And what does she do when confronted by a potentially dangerous magical object? She keeps quiet about it. In fact, she keeps on using it merrily.
Yes, I am aware that she confides in the diary because she appears to have no friends in CoS, but if she has no friends, why doesn't she make an effort to make some? Friends don't grow on trees, after all; friendship always begins by an approach, even if there is a propitiatory event. Ron and Harry might have sat together in the Hogwarts Express until the Apocalypse and they still wouldn't have become friends if they didn't start talking. But Ginny now... if she's so sweet and nice as some people say, she shouldn't have many difficulties in making friends. The fact that she doesn't seem very successful at that is enough to put a damper on the whole "Ginny is nice" train of thought.
So what does she chose instead of flesh-and-blood friends? An evil diary. Sure, she doesn't know it's evil, but she knows there may be something wrong with it, and still she keeps on using it. She became addicted to it at some point, yes (more on that later), but there was a period of time during which she was writing out of her pure free will. And even if she felt too intimidated to make friends at Hogwarts, there was a considerable period during which she wrote in the diary while surrounded by her family. Yes. Surrounded by loving, doting Weasleys, she bares her soul to an enchanted object.
Why? Read Tom's quotes of her diary entries (yes, I know Tom lies about several things, but there's no reason to think he was misquoting her). Because he's the first person who really understands her; because he gives her a perpetual chorus of support. Real friends don't do that; real friends mean arguments, and mutual support, and messy issues. Real friends mean effort. So Ginny weighs the effort involved in making a real friend and the effort involved in keeping writing on the diary and she chooses to keep writing on the diary. Don't tell me Tom was possessing her. She chose to keep the diary secret from the start. And because of the reasons I've mentioned: because the diary was a massive ego-massage. Because she wanted a constant hossanah and someone who said yes to everything she wrote.
And that was why she became addicted to the diary in the first place. Tom specifically states he was able to pour his soul into her only after she poured her soul into him (in another of those moments in which it is unlikely he is lying - incidentally, his choice of words there - "her darkest secrets" - is telling). But does he come to dominate her completely, as it is claimed? Was she really in a full trance when she released the basilisk, etc? The answer, I think, is no. First of all, we have the very telling fact that she decided to throw away the diary; had she been completely innocent, would she have tried to get rid of it? Even if she had been having doubts, would she have resorted to such a course of action? She knew it could be dangerous and she kept on using it, after all. The fact that she threw it away is the sign of a guilty conscious; remember the addiction thing? Well, Ginny here is a junkie trying to go clean.
But then, Harry, of all people, finds the diary. What does she do? By this point in time she knows it is dangerous; even the kindest interpretation of her actions at this jointure give the lie to the notion that she was completely dominated by the diary - if she truly did not believe the diary was dangerous and that she had her share of guilt, why would she steal it back from Harry? But she fears Harry will learn about her actions - and she doesn’t want Harry to learn about her actions. Why? If she was completely innocent, what is she afraid of? Even if she was completely innocent and Tom convinced her otherwise (unlikely, given the quotes from her entries), wouldn’t she be glad at being finally released from it? Frankly, if I were a little girl and the boy who I have a crush on and who happens to have defeated the Dark Lord twice found the strange diary I had thrown away, I’d be relieved in the extreme. On the other hand, if I believed the diary was in fact evil, and that it was leading me to do bad things, would I not warn the boy I had a crush on?
But Ginny does not warn Harry, in fact does not say anything to Harry at all. What does she do? She steals back the diary. She is afraid about how she may come across in the diary’s entries, not about the fact that there is a basilisk at large in the school and people are being petrified. So when she sees it in Harry’s hands, she decides to steal it back, and steal it she does. (Notice how very discreet she is - she has absolutely no reaction when she discovers Harry has the diary.)
It is not until the very end that she decides to tell Harry and Ron, and even that comes when Dumbledore has been set aside and Hogwarts faces the risk of closure. And let us not forget she does not tell them at all - she makes a feeble attempt to tell them, but at the slightest interruption by Percy, she scuttles away. Back to where? Back to the diary, of course. Never mind that people may die.
And then, of course, comes the scene in the Chamber of Secrets. She has been rescued; the spell over her has been destroyed. What does she do? She fears that she may be expelled. She doesn’t worry about the people who have been petrified, she doesn’t worry about Harry, who is covered in blood and has just fought a freaking giant snake (some crush, eh?). She doesn’t even ask about her brother, who, being Harry’s sidekick and all, cannot be very far. No, she worries about herself. If you were looking for signs of a guilty conscience, look no further. Of course, she immediately plays the clingy innocent with her parents; for someone who kept such a secret for so long, that is quite a transformation.
From CoS onwards, her almost complete absence means that the signs are much more subtle (the whole "fading into the background" thing), but I believe the most telling moment occurs in GoF, when Ron suggests she could go with Harry to the Yule Ball. What is interesting is not that she turns down Harry because she has been invited by Nevill; what is interesting is her explanation for accepting Neville’s invitation: because it’s the only way for third years to go to the Ball.
Subtle? Yes. Discreet? Certainly. Manipulative? You bet. Nice? In your dreams.