Do people like SYCOPHANTS?

[kiricat2001]

No: HPFGUIDX 36552

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "lucky_kari" <lucky_kari at y...> wrote:
> Sycophants make great characters at point. Note Grima Wormtongue 
and 
> Peter Pettigrew. But do people actually like them? Do you ever feel 
> sympathetic with a sycophant? When you read Elkins' Avery posts, do 
> you feel an urge to put your arms around Avery and tell him it'll 
be 
> all right, or do you think "Another stupid sycophant. They deserve 
> what they get?" 
> 
> When you read the Shrieking Shack scene for the first time, were 
you 
> feeling it more from Sirius/Lupin's angry POV or Pettigrew's 
> desperately afraid POV? 
> 
> Well, it might be something strange in me but I was seeing it from 
the 
>  second POV. I have this tendency to get along well with 
sycophants, 
> neurotics and the rest. One of my first fanfics was about how 
Gollum 
> survived Mt. Doom and Merry and Pippin brought him back to the 
Shire 
> and reformed him by taking him swimming and on picnics. (I was very 
> young.)

> Is this wide-spread phenomonem? Or are we only a few whose supply 
of 
> pity is infinite? Are we the same people who start pondering 
whether 
> Tom Riddle was cute as a baby? 
> 
Well, I'm one of those people who dissolve into puddles over puppies 
and kittens, but who see babies as noisy, smelly things that are not 
generally particularly attractive. Call me a hard-hearted bitch, but 
I could care less about how cute Tom Riddle may have been.

I'm also a lapsed Catholic, for what that's worth.  And, no, I have 
no sycophantic sympathy.  My reading of Pettigrew in the Shrieking 
Shack scene was pretty much "do whatever you have to do as long as 
you can prove Sirius' innocence.  Tie him up, burn him at the stake, 
strip him naked and paint him blue - I don't care."  

I would have had more sympathy for Peter had he once expressed any 
remorse or regrets for his actions.  But, there was none. No regrets 
for being the agent of James and Lily's death.  No concern for 
orphaning Harry.  No regrets for sending Sirius to Azkaban for 12 
years.  No second thoughts about what Remus suffered with his support 
network gone.

 Peter grovelled and whined to everyone in the room looking for a 
soft touch to save him.  Frankly, had I been in either Sirius' or 
Remus' shoes, I would have blasted Peter into next week and taken the 
consequences.  He got off easy in my opinion.

Marianne, she holding the hammer of retribution high in her doughty 
right hand!!!