[HPforGrownups] Re: Draco being redeemed

[Amber ?]

No: HPFGUIDX 23994


>From: "Tandy, Heidi" <heidi.h.tandy.c92 at alumni.upenn.edu>
>
>Amber, you know I adore you, but...

*grin* Now how did I know you were going to reply to this post...

>Happens every day. In canon, Barty Crouch (to come full circle :)
>rejected whatever messages he heard at home that Dark Wizardry was
>something not to be practiced, yet he knew every unforgivable curse
>(likely when he was in his teens).

Well, Hogwarts students are taught the unforgivable curses at school (at 
least that's my impression, though there's no hard evidence). And it'd be 
hard to forget spells are horrid as those. But besides that, he's a good 
example.

>Tom Riddle was likely not raised to be a serial killer, yet he
>turned out to be one.

Does anybody raise a child to be a serial killer? But since we don't know 
details about how Tom was raised, I don't know if it's exactly a pertinent 
example...

>As a child, Peter Pettigrew never gave his friends any indication that
>he would commit mass murder, or that he would betray his friends to
>save his own skin, yet he did.

Good example. While we don't know much about Pettigrew's past, the shock 
that those who know him experienced when finding out he was the traitor 
suggests that they thought it out of character for him. I do wonder how 
Peter's homelife was...

>And on the other side, Harry Potter was raised in a house of
>intolerance, bigotry, snap opinions, belief in the death penalty and a
>hatred of imagination and wizardry. And look what he's turning out to
>be.

Another excellent example.

>In the real world, it's also a daily occurance. Look at all the people
>who change religions, for a simple example. Or the newspaper article I
>read about a year ago about the granddaughter of one of the men
>involved in a race-related killing in the South in the 60s (it has >been 2 
>years or so since I read the article, but I think he was
>involved in the Birmingham Church Bombing). Of course they all needed
>to see and especially *feel* something to make them effect the change.
>But it does happen.

Good points. *shrug* I said that in my post that I could be wrong. 
Psychologist, I am not. I know there's the possibility for Draco to reject 
his upbringing. I guess in my limited experience, I have seen people more 
likely to hug to their upbringings than reject them. And it takes a LOT for 
someone to radically change their life; people are stubborn in my experience 
and most likely to believe that THEY are right. I think that Draco has to 
experience a terrible loss to make him reexamine his life. My pet theory is 
that Lucius is going to be killed by Voldemort before the books are done and 
what Draco does in reaction is going to be a telling indicator of his 
character. (Of course, JKR will most likely prove me wrong!)

As I said before, JKR had better handle Draco's "conversion" carefully if 
she decides to go that route. It's possible to be done well and I hope she 
plants seeds of this happening. I don't think that this is quite the 
situation where a surprise turnabout would be effective. But with three 
books/years left, she has the time to do so.

~Amber
(Who's forgotten how tough it is to argue a point on this list...twenty 
Whomps by a Whomping Willow for me!)

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