Pensieve revisited (was Fourth Man and Jokes and Law)

[davewitley]

No: HPFGUIDX 38409

I asked:

> >I can well believe that the 
> >Pensieve trials are directly based on material JKR saw when she 
> >worked for Amnesty International. Does the apparent lack of due 
> >process really make these scenes unconvincing?

and Cindy kindly responded:
>
> Seriously, the scenes strike me as FLINT-y because they seem 
> designed to read as though Harry is seeing the entire 
> trial/sentencing/plea bargain from beginning to end:
> 
<description of Pensieve scenes snipped>
> 
> So we don't have a situation in which we are only seeing snippets 
of 
> the legal proceedings.  These 9 pages contain the complete legal 
> proceedings (the plea bargain, the return of verdict, and the 
> sentencing).  Even then, most of the 9 pages consist of things that 
> aren't the proceedings themselves (Moody muttering, Harry's 
> observations).

All the above, including the snipped bits, would be my impression 
too.  Would a plea bargain normally count (in the Anglo-saxon Muggle 
world) as a legal proceeding?  I think I'm saying I don't give them 
names, to me they are just Bits of Stuff That Happen.  They have no 
context in the sense of a putative legal system.
>
<Things missing or wrong snipped>

> Now, I assume that there are legal systems in the world where this 
> sort of kangaroo court happens.  Unless JKR really intends to send 
a 
> message that wizarding justice is a farce, I would have expected 
her 
> to change a few things to make these scenes more realistic and 
> believable.  

Ah, now I think that *is* exactly the message JKR intends to send.  
When I first read GOF I found these scenes more disturbing than any 
other part of the book - more so than Pettigrew cutting off his hand, 
or Cedric being killed.  The only rival in my evaluation is Winky's 
slide into degradation, and only the Dementors have a similar impact 
on me in the rest of the series.  I think that's because they are 
either drawn from life, or are believable in a way that Voldemort or 
the Dursleys are not.

However, I have realised that there is a possibly important 
distinction.  Kangaroo courts and unfair trials usually have in 
common that they are, at some level, knowingly unfair - they are for 
show, in order to make the historical record reflect the authorities' 
preferred view of events.

I suspect that the Pensieve scenes show a Wizarding World which is 
trying to be fair, and more or less thinks that it is fair.  Perhaps 
these are not show trials but they are more like children in the 
playground inventing frontier justice as they go along?  Or perhaps 
they are more like the kind of justice that goes on around our dinner 
table - sometimes one of us parents will intervene with the other in 
defence of one of our children, sometimes we unite in condemnation, 
sometimes they get off, like Bagman, on charm alone.

> So, yes, the legal scenes in GoF are rather FLINT-y to me.  Or 
maybe 
> it is more precise to say that they are frustratingly imprecise.

They *are* very imprecise - it is possible that they are filtered for 
Harry (and us) through Dumbledore's rather un-forensic mind.  
Dumbledore remembers only the things he feels are relevant - the 
general sense of injustice, the emotional appeals, Karkaroff's names -
 though to my mind this slightly defeats the purpose of the Pensieve 
which in part should be to keep memories which would otherwise be 
rejected.

Somebody else on this list with legal training mentioned that the 
Pensieve scenes are unconvincing: I am intrigued by this because I 
had rather assumed a list consensus that they merely reflect the 
parlous state of Wizarding Justice.  Thoughts, lawyers?

David