[HPforGrownups] Sirius: Sensory Deprivation and Slashing the Fat Lady

[Sherry Garfio]

No: HPFGUIDX 47654

Audra provided evidence that Sirius was suffering from the effects of solitary
confinement rather than PTSD:
> Slashing the portrait -- This was an aggressive reaction, but I
> would like to point out that the portrait was only an object, and I
> consider it to be the equivalent of breaking down a door.

Judy countered with much evidence of the Fat Lady's sentience:
<huge snip>
> The strongest evidence that the paintings are sentient, though, is
> what happens *after* Sirius slashes the Fat Lady.  Most of the other
> paintings refuse to take on her job, which implies that they have free
> will.  Sir Cadogan takes the job, but acts unpredictably, letting
> Sirius back in. The staff of Hogwarts then enter into negotiations
> with the Fat Lady, persuading her to return by offering guards for
> her.  They don't just change the spell on the painting, or reprogram
> her.  These interactions strongly imply that the paintings are
> inhabited by beings who act independantly and can make decisions.

Hopefully I'm not too late with this, since I still have about 160 posts to
read (I took Thanksgiving off; apparently I was the only one <G>).

I think Judy is getting away from the original purpose of Audra's argument
here.  Whether the portrait people are sentient or not, is irrelevant to Sirius
in his state of mind.  To get back to Audra's statement that slashing the
portrait is equivalent to breaking down a door, let's say that the entrance to
Gryffindor Tower is instead an ordinary door with an actual Fat Lady as guard. 
She asks for the password, Sirius doesn't know it, and she says "I'm very
sorry, but I can't let you in without the password."  What would Sirius do?  He
is desperate to get up there and apprehend Wormtail (he hasn't met Harry yet,
so I assume his object was to get to Wormtail more than to protect Harry), and
he's already committed to doing so by entering the castle and risking discovery
(kind of like how a simple robbery can turn into a murder - the intruder is
desperate).  He's not going to just say, "Thanks anyway, I know you're just
doing your job" and go away.  No, he would probably shove her out of the way
and break down the door.  What he actually did to the portrait is really no
different: slashing it didn't kill the Fat Lady (whether she *could* be killed
or not is moot), she was able to get out of the way, so all he did was "shove"
her out of the way and break down her door.  This is a perfectly plausible
reaction, especially for someone who has been confined for 12 years.  Yes, it
appears in retrospect that he caused the Fat Lady a lot of stress (maybe
*she's* the one who has PTSD!), but that's not Sirius' concern at this point. 
He slashed the *painting*, not a person, even if we can make a wonderful case
that the Fat Lady is a person.

I also think it's plausible that Sirius' change in behavior was caused by the
Shrieking Shack scene.  Before the SS, he is suffering from solitary
confinement (aggravated by the Dementors).  He is obsessed with getting revenge
on Peter.  Everybody thinks he's a murderer, so he has to expose Peter while
hiding himself for fear of being thrown back in Azkaban.  He is the only person
alive who knows the truth, and the truth is in fact much stranger than fiction,
so nothing less than showing Peter for who he is will do.  He's desperate:
desperate to stay out of Azkaban, desperate to prove his innocence, desperate
to prevent Peter from doing any more damage, and desperate for revenge on Peter
for what he has already done.  [That last one may be less than noble, but I'm
not trying to prove that Sirius is perfect <G>.]

After the SS, Peter is at large, but Sirius' focus has changed.  He is now
concerned with Harry's well-being, and all of the people he cares about now
know he is innocent of both betraying the Potters and the Muggle massacre.  The
people he trusts are aware that Peter is the one to look out for, so Sirius is
part of a team rather than "Sirius against the world".  He's still on the run
from the majority of the world, but the people who really matter to him know
the truth.  Everything he was desperate to accomplish before the SS has been
accomplished.  This is how I reconcile his sudden transformation from raving
lunatic to caring godfather.

I would also like to point out that Sir Cadogan's actions imply that if the
portrait people *are* sentient, they don't operate the same way as people do. 
If the guard were a person, the authorities would simply show him a picture of
the known criminal and say "Don't let this man in under any circumstances, no
matter how many passwords he knows," and he could be reasonably expected to do
that.  Sir Cadogan lets Sirius in because he has a list of the whole week's
passwords.  Sounds like an automaton to me: hear the password, open the door. 
Of course, Sir Cadogan could just be a moron, in which case this argument
proves nothing <G>.

- Sherry, Sirius Apologist in Training


=====
"The one thing that unites all human beings, regardless of age, gender, religion, economic status or ethnic background, is that, deep down inside, we ALL believe that we are above-average drivers."

      -Dave Barry, "Things That It Took Me 50 Years to Learn"

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