What's annoying about Harry (WAS: Characters you hate)

[Grey Wolf <greywolf1@jazzfree.com>]

No: HPFGUIDX 51462

All references posted here are from CoS, Sp. Ed., liberally translated.

Tom Wall wrote:
> 
> Grey Wolf & Melody wrote:
> You know, I still haven't seen your explanation of how, exactly, 
> would Harry telling Dumbledore about the voice would help - I've 
> given you my arguments, but have yet to see yours. But if you want to 
> disagree, it's OK with me.
> 
> I reply:
> Wouldn't that be patently obvious? *IF* Harry had been forthcoming 
> about what he knew, I think that the fact that he's a Parselmouth 
> would have been very useful in locating the Basilisk, in tracking its 
> movements, and in possibly preventing some of the attacks. I can back 
> this up by saying that Harry is able to find the victims by following 
> the voice of the basilisk. With some powerful wizard backup and a 
> little more preparation and communication, it is not unthinkable that 
> they could have found the creature. The fact that Harry kept his 
> hearing of the basilisk secret allowed the creature to go on killing, 
> and left the staff in no position to do anything about it.

Let me throw you back your favouite answer: there is no canon for that. 
However, I'm willing to give it a go at fighting back, nevertheless. 
Let's take your example a bit further. Harry had indeed told Dumbledore 
that he could hear disembodied voices. Assuming that Snape hadn't 
grabbed on the oportunity to send him to St. Mungos ("But the child 
*hears voices*, Dumbledore"), or at least taken the pleasure of making 
comments all over the place about it ("That potion looks too yellow to 
me - were you listening to the advice of the voices instead of mine, 
Mr. Potter?"), and that Dumbeldore had realised that Harry was hearing 
the basilisk (which requires, of course, knowledge of the basilisk to 
begin with), what would've been the consequences?

1) Harry would turn, by your words, from a normal student to a fire 
alarm. Since the safety of the students depends on Harry, he *would 
have to be* put under close guard. After all, if he's alone when he 
hears the voice, he wouldn't have time to tell anyone before the 
creaturre stroke - he's late as it is. This is, of course, wrong. 
Whatever happens to the school, Harry (and everyone else) should be 
free to be themselves and receive an education ("The only reason to 
keep the school open", according to McGonagall).

2) Harry would've been surrounded by teachers all they long, ready to 
strike at a moments notice as soon as harry heard something. this has 
two further consequences (neither of them good)

2.1) Ginny would notice, which would mean that Tom would know and he 
would take measures to compete against that - like making the basilisk 
be quiet during his attacks

2.2) Harry wouldn't have had the occasion to prepare the potion, which 
would mean that he wouldn't have got to know Myrtle, which would mean 
that he would've never been able to piece toghether the mystery of the 
secret entrance to the chamber. Or, to put it briefly, the lack of 
liberty to explore would've stopped Harry from saving the day.

Conclusion? If Harry had told Dumbledore about the voices, they *might* 
have stopped the attacks (or simply tipped off Tom), but they wouldn't 
have been able to stop the basilisk (Harry on his own wasn't fast 
enough to find the basilisk - why should a group, which by definition 
is slower than an individual, be able to get on time?) and they 
*certainly* wouldn't have been able to stop Tom from taking over Ginny, 
which would in turn give Voldemort a new body (in the best of cases. In 
the worst, you'd suddenly have *two* Voldemorts running around).
 
> Grey Wolf & Melody wrote:
> It's interesting that you, that don't even support with arguments 
> your argument of Harry telling Dumbledore about the voice are telling 
> me that I need to find a line where Dumbledore says "I knew it was a 
> basilisk all along" to accept my point. 

> I reply:
> Oh, I respectfully disagree. I've used canon three times to support 
> my position, and you haven't used it once.

I've looked up your canon in the first post, and I've already posted 
reasons against it. But nevermind that, I'll give you explicit canon.

Dumbeldore knows the chamber exists:
"It means that the Chamber of Secrets has indeed been opened again"

He also knows that it was Tom Riddle who opened it last time, and knows 
Voldemort is (still) behind this time:
"The question is not *who*, the question is *how*"

We can also asume that he knows about the legend - even if he never 
personally mentions it, so he knows that Slytherin built it. He also 
knows Slytherin was a Parselmouth - "his rare gift, parselmouth"

He also knows that Voldemort was a Parselmouth "you can talk parsel 
because Voldemort, that is the last descendant of Salazar Slytherin, 
can talk parsel. If I am not mistaken, he transferred some of his 
powers the night he made you that scar".

And of course, the *whole school* knows Harry speaks Parsel after the 
duel club.

Thus, Dumbledore knows that there is a chamber, and that Slytherin 
could control snakes, and had an afinity to them (why else put a snake 
on one's own shield?).

What more do we know? Well, "last time the Chamber was opened, there 
were several attacks, and one girl was killed". Since Dumbledore 
recognizes the state of Collin when he's petrified, we can asume that 
last time the attacks on the people also paralized them - if not, 
Dumbledore couldn't have been sure that "the Chamber of Secrets has 
indeed been opened again". So last time there were several people 
paralized too.

Finally, I'm going to say that Dumbledore is an intelligent person. 
He's definetely capable of deduction. There is no explicit canon for 
that, but I hope you're not going to discuss that point.

So, putting all the things together: Dumbledore knew about the chamber, 
and Slytherin, and the effects of the creature on the victims. He knows 
that Voldemort controlled the beast, which means it was probably a 
snake - which is backed by the fact that Slytherin would certainly use 
a snake to guard his chamber. The victims are paralised, and one was 
killed. EVERYTHING points towards a basilisk. It certainly is NOT the 
work of an acromantula - but we can go into the nuances of Hagrid's 
expulsion and why Dumbledore had to allow it later. As I've said, all 
the pieces are there, and we know that Dumbledore knew about them - as 
I've demonstrated. The last piece, i.e. Dumbledore saying "did you kill 
the basilisk?" is not in the books, but then neither did Dumbledore say 
he hadn't thought it could be a basilisk when Harry told the tale. So 
you cannot say, backed-up by canon, that Dumbledore didn't know, 
anymore strangly than I can say he did. In fact, in the face of all 
evidence, I think that my position is much stronger than yours.

Just in case, I'm going to go through your "canon" again:
"No second year could have done this," said Dumbledore firmly. "It 
would take Dark Magic of the most advanced -". 

That means nothing in favour of your position - as I said already, he 
says that it cannot be a student, because it requires advanced magic. 
That doesn't discount a basilisk. It only discards students as possible 
causes of the paralysis. And he says that because he doesn't want 
accusations to start flying - but neither does he want panic at the 
knoledge that the king of snakes is roaming the school's halls.
 
> Grey Wolf & Melody wrote:
> Oh, and in case you are not yet convinced, I've got a little more 
> circunstantial evidence - how did Dumbledore know that Harry was 
> going to need Fawkes and the sword if he didn't know that it was a 
> basilisk? In the other books, it is him or Snape that come to the 
> rescue (i.e. humans), but in this case he sends a bird that *just 
> happens* to be immune to the basilisk's gaze, peck out eyes and can 
> cure its venom. It certainly looks as if Dumbledore knew something, 
> didn't he?
> 
> I reply:
> Sorry, going to ask for canon again. If you don't have it, please 
> just say so this time. 
> 
> Where do we find out that Fawkes is immune to the Basilisk's stare? 
> (This is the question I care most about, incidentally.)

Since he had to look into it's eyes to peck them out (which he did with 
pin-point precission), I assume that phoenix, as in the rest of 
literature, are immune to paralysis gaze.
 
> How do you know that Dumbledore sent Fawkes? How do you know that 
> Dumbledore gave Fawkes the hat? How do you know that Dumbledore put 
> the sword in the hat?
>
> We know that Harry called Fawkes to him. "Nothing but that could have 
> called Fawkes to you." (CoS 332)
> 
> We do not know that Dumbledore sent Fawkes, we do not know that 
> Dumbledore gave Fawkes the hat, or that Dumbledore sent the sword. We 
> assume.
> 
> -Tom

I'm certainly not going to believe that Fawkes, upon hearing Harry's 
inflammed defence of Dumbledore, got up from his pearch and decided - 
"umm - maybe I should take that sorting hat along. Never know when you 
might find a new student". For one thing, Fawkes doesn't seem 
intelligent enough for that kind of though - I give him the same sort 
of intelligence of a dolphin, which can learn to take things but would 
never decide on his own. So Dumbledore must have told him that he 
should take the hat to Harry. Which of course means that Dumbledore 
knew he would be needing a sword.

And, yes, we assume many things. Like Harry going to the bathroom from 
time to time (to do things apart from brewing illegal potions). We 
asume he does many things - and yet they are not explicit in canon. 
Which doesn't make them less likely. Dumbledore's knowledge of the 
Basilisk is firmly routed in canon, and so, my *circunstantial* 
evidence is a help - but certainly not my main point. Once you accept 
the main point, the rest helps to clarify what happened. Dumbledore 
went into a lot of bother to tell Harry about the phoenix, telling him 
everything he needed to know about it, and then assuring him that he 
could ask for help if he needed it. I've used this expression before, 
and will continue to use it: "Dumbledore certainly had something in 
mind - he *knew* something".

So far, and until someone pokes holes in this, it is what in the list 
is called "hard canon" - not mentioned in the books but closely deduced 
from it - especially since I've yet to see anyone poke holes in it.

Hope that helps,

Grey Wolf