Draco redeemable? (was Draco and Rufus Johnson)

[Amy Z]

No: HPFGUIDX 11444

CM wrote:

>Is Draco redeemable? That's like asking if Rufus Johnson is 
redeemable.

Interesting parallel.  Well, is he?

To continue the parallel, I would say O'Connor is more interested in 
Sheppard's redeemability than Johnson's.  So is there a Sheppard in 
HP?  Someone who trusts too far, probably as an expression of his 
self-loathing and ambition?  Uh-oh, I see a hazy shape in my crystal 
ball . . . long, white hair . . . half-moon specs . . . 

Nah.

Dragging this back to matters Draconian:

That last scene in GF definitely establishes, if we weren't sure 
already, that Draco is way worse than a school bully or petty bigot.  
I'd be disappointed if he turned around just because of one incident. 
 (Being saved by Harry might create interesting dynamics, but it's too 
much like James/Snape.  Give us a new story!)

The fact is, though, that even Nazis are redeemable.  I was just 
reading up on a man who was a passionate activist for an Aryan 
supremacy group for 15 years* and now works for the Simon Wiesenthal 
Center (Los Angeles group that monitors racism and anti-Semitism).  If 
JKR has set herself the challenge of showing what can make a little 
Nazi turn around, I take my hat off to her.  And I look forward to 
seeing how it happens.

Amy Z

*Despite his family's being Catholic, his mother's being disabled, and 
his brother's being a cop--making them all candidates for 
"elimination" in his group's grand scheme.  Draco doesn't even have 
these motivations to see the other side; everything in his upbringing 
tells him he'd be on top in a world ruled by Voldemort.