Wherefore Art Thou Draco

[arcleveland]

No: HPFGUIDX 37943

More thoughts on Draco, his comments on Cedric, and whether or not he 
has or should have started questioning his beliefs.

Marina:
>"But if
>Cedric Diggory's death hasn't made him start questioning if 
>Voldemort is really good, then what the heck will it take? Cedric 
>was not a Mudblood, and while he may have been a Muggle-lover, 
>we don't see him conspicuously hanging around with any Muggle-
>borns the way Ron and Harry do. He's a nice, pureblood wizard 
>from an inoffensive house. There's no indication that he ever 
>had any problems with Draco. Now he's dead just 'cause he 
>happened to be standing next to Harry at the wrong time -- and 
>Draco doesn't seem to see anything wrong with that. Would it 
>have been different if he actually saw Cedric's dead body, or
>heard Voldemort coldly saying "Kill the spare?" I don't know."

Marina, in a later post:
>"But Cedric really is dead; Ron and Hermione really are targets 
>for future killings. And Draco *gloats* about it."

Heidi:
>"We don't even know if Draco knows that Cedric was
>killed simply because he was standing next to Harry.
>They were told that Cediric was a good, kind boy who
>was killed because he crossed the path of Voldemort -
>what does that mean?"

  
I'd say that it's a combination of these things that leads me
to believe that there's more to that speech than we're
seeing. First, I doubt that Draco knows how Cedric's death 
happened.  He may believe that Cedric was acting against Voldemort 
and was killed because of it.  The primary evidence for this 
would be that Voldemort killed him – circular logic, yes, but
quite 
reasonable if you've grown up believing that Voldemort was good 
or right.

Second, I don't think Draco is gloating over the fact that
Cedric's dead.  He's at least outwardly gloating over the
Dark Lord's return and the fact that his worst enemies are prime 
targets, but I don't think he planned to say that about Cedric.  
It seemed more like he was saying what he wanted to about the 
people who were there, and it simply occurred to him that really, 
Cedric had died first, and he said it without really thinking.  
Still callous and cruel, yes, but not gloating. 

Taking Marina's points that Cedric's death ought to make
Draco understand death and Voldemort are largely what makes me 
suspect that he doesn't, actually, or that he's uncertain and 
trying to hide it.  Draco, as far as we know, had no reason to 
dislike Cedric, and had spent the entire year rooting for him.  
It would make sense for this to lead him to question why Cedric 
died and death on the whole, but it's only been a week or so.  
It may not have sunk in.  Also, we don't have evidence that he 
and Cedric were close, or really knew each other.  It may have 
been a distant enough death, on a personal level, that he could 
still have viewed it in the abstract.  Alternately, this is also 
a big part of my basis for my theory that he really is questioning 
things, or is at least somewhat conflicted, and trying to make 
sure no one suspects how he's feeling.  

Heidi: 
>"Nowhere does Dumbledore do a big speach about living together 
>and building bridges among the houses (schools, yes!
>houses - never a word!) and becoming understanding of
>other witches & wizards regardless of background. He
>never does it."

David:
>"I believe that from Draco's POV, it is very obvious what 
>the 'Hogwarts Doctrine' on Muggles, people of partial wizarding 
>blood, and magically disabled people, is. 
 Draco knows that 
>this is a man who lets Muggle-borns into Hogwarts, employs a 
>Squib, and allows ghosts, werewolves and half-giants (and of 
>the alleged servant class) to be on the teaching staff."

I agree that Dumbledore's philosophy does show up in daily life
at Hogwarts, but that doesn't mean that it shows up in a way 
that Draco can respond to.  Draco's been raised with a rather 
poor opinion of Dumbledore, too.  Moreover, he sees in Dumbledore 
someone who extensively favors his enemies, particularly Harry, 
and has been known to steal the House Cup away from his own house 
and hand it to their archrival, once in a very cruel way.  In 
this, Dumbledore definitely could be seen as increasing the 
divisions among houses, rather than bringing them together.

Dumbledore does bring all sorts of people into the castle, but
let's take a look at Draco's interactions with them.  We
don't know if there are any Muggle-borns in Slytherin, but I 
would guess that there aren't any in Draco's year, at least.  
As such, the Muggle-born he has the most contact with is a 
Gryffindor know-it-all who's friends with Harry and Ron and 
who's had the gall to beat him academically, thus getting him 
into trouble with his father.  Logically, Hermione is a high 
recommendation for the abilities and general worth of Muggle-
borns.  From Draco's perspective, at least emotionally, not at
all.  

As for the staff, he may not know Filch is a squib (and none of the 
students that we see like Filch anyway), and Lupin and Hagrid are his 
least favorite teachers.  He primarily doesn't like Lupin because
he wears shabby robes, which is a bad reason to dislike someone, 
but we don't know whether Lupin's ever done much to endear
himself personally to Draco.  The Gryffindors love him initially 
because of his handling of Peeve's and Neville's boggart; the 
Slytherins wouldn't have seen him with Peeve's and could
dislike 
him additionally due to the boggart incident.  Draco is cruel and 
rude to Hagrid, also primarily because he thinks of him as a servant, 
but Hagrid's not so sweet to him, either (usually responding to
Draco), and is another friend of Harry's.  Draco thinks very
little of Hagrid's teaching abilities and tries to get him fired, 
but then again, plenty of people on this list don't think much of
Hagrid's teaching abilities either.  

Yes, Dumbledore's got a lot of people around who don't fit 
Draco's "ideal person" bill, but none of them, that
we've seen, are in a position to make Draco really question his 
beliefs.  That said, though, Draco's getting to the point where 
his prejudices can't be blamed on his father but are becoming his 
own, even if that's just because he's never felt the need to 
question them.

Manda, who likes her characters as psychologically complex as possible