[HPforGrownups] Re: in defense of sirius black (Long, Rambly)

[Sheryll Townsend]

No: HPFGUIDX 14518

--- monika at darwin.inka.de wrote:
> --- In HPforGrownups at y..., heidi.h.tandy.c92 at a...
> wrote:
> 
> > You can't even spend 12 years in such a place,
> starting when you're 
> > 21, and end up unscarred and permanently changed. 
> 
> Of course not, you are absolutely right here. 

This, of course, applies not just to Azkaban but to
any prison.
>  
> > I don't know if any of you have ever spoken to
> someone who was sent 
> > to prison at 21 (which is, as we extrapolate now,
> the age Sirius 
> was 
> > when we went to Azkaban). I have, when I was in
> law school. 
> 
> No, I haven't, and your comment is really
> interesting, because it
> confirms what I had suspected but didn't have any
> proof for. And I 
> always thought that Sirius was a few years older
> when he went to
> Azkaban, but if he was only 21 he literally hasn't
> had any "adult"
> life yet in PoA.
> 
I do know someone who spent 13 1/2 years in prison
(I'm married to him), and he went in at the age of 20.
BTW, I did recall that Sirius was that young when he
went to Azkaban.

> > You lose 
> > the ability to age and grow - or at least, it
> becomes completely 
> > twisted onto itself. 
> 
> I think this would be even more true for Azkaban. It
> strikes me as a
> place where any human life and feeling is suppressed
> by the presence
> of the dementors, and the prisoners in there are
> barley alive, they
> exist in a physical way, but they deteriorate
> mentally.
> 
This is very true. If you are treated like less than a
human being for an extended period of time it does
have a profound effect on you. Besides missing out on
life experiences that help shape who you are, you also
lose large parts of who you were before you went in.
In learning to adapt to such an environment, you
sometimes learn to suppress the good parts of yourself
in order to survive. I can only imagine how difficult
Azkaban would in comparison to one of our prisons.
Imagine being in constant solitary confinement (anyone
see Murder in the First and recall the effects
solitary had on that prisoner?). Then add to this the
constant presence of the Dementors.

On the other hand, progress can be made in leaps and
bounds upon the prisoner's release, though this is not
always the case. Sometimes just learning to cope with
the freedom of being able to make your own choices in
everything is traumatic in itself. I could go on and
on, but let me just finish by saying that I am amazed
by how Sirius manages to be the caring, loyal person
he is by GoF. He might certainly be considered the
exception to the rule for prisoners emerging from our
system, and we certainly have no precedent for judging
the effects of long term incarceration and release
from Azkaban.

Okay, I think I'm starting to ramble, but I just
couldn't let such a great thread about Sirius go by
without throwing in my 2 cents (considering how 'dead
sexy' he is <g>).

Sheryll 
 



=====
"Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for thou art crunchy and taste good with ketchup."

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