Agency in the Shrieking Shack

[GulPlum]

No: HPFGUIDX 52167

(I've been reading all of Tom's recent posts on MD and *most* of the 
replies he got. I've said many times before that I don't like MAGIC 
DISHWASHER so I won't go into my old arguments again, but I wanted to clear 
up a couple of things here.  Big SNIPs throughout. Incidentally, I don't 
have my canon with me right now, so this will be short on direct quotes, 
but I really want to get this out before I go to bed.)

Tom Wall wrote:

>I think, again, this speaks LOADS for Magic Dishwasher, in that all
>of these offshoots aren't questioning the basic idea of a Spymaster!
>Dumbledore ­ they're all just sort of throwing around possible twists
>to the idea, twists that, IMHO, are all very plausible and believable.
>
>In that sense, perhaps Hypothetic Alley could present a kind of
>Spymaster!Dumbledore section in which all of them are listed as
>possibilities.

Err... Spymaster!Dumbledore (which I use in the general sense of Dumbledore 
collating and acting upon information received from open and covert 
sources, rather than in the sense of the specific theory which then became 
MD) isn't a theory, hypothesis or inference. It is pure canon. We get lots 
of instances in which Dumbledore is seen to be keeping tabs on Voldemort's 
whereabouts and creating strategies based on that information. We also know 
that he's the "leader" of the anti-Voldemort camp in wizarding society, and 
furthermore the only person Voldemort fears. The establishment of 
Spymaster!Dumbledore is therefore far from a MDDT creation.

Furthermore, MD, PA/DL (and the newly-established SADDLES) are all based on 
an assumption that *someone* in the Shrieking Shack was acting on 
Dumbledore's behalf (specifically, to manipulate a life-debt and hence a 
flawed potion).

PRESSURE COOKER, on the other hand (at least as I understand it, as one of 
the people involved in the discussion which caused Marina to collate and 
name the theory) makes absolutely no such assumption. PC was created simply 
as a reply to Agent!Snape and to my knowledge, has never expressed an 
opinion on whether or not the SS scene was engineered by anyone to any 
particular end. In any case, that's my understanding and it's on that basis 
that I agree with it.

I have several fundamental objections to MD (and variants). One I don't 
think I've expressed before is that I consider the importance of the 
life-debt element to be a major assumption and leap in the dark, unfounded 
in canon (note, it's the importance and implementation of the life-debt 
which I'm questioning, not its existence). The general concept of a 
"life-debt" bears out the one canon Potterverse example we've had 
explicitly explained to date, namely Snape's life-debt to James. This 
operates on the basis that even though Snape hates Harry, he will protect 
him from potential harm, which has caused him to take action on at least 
two occasions.  Snape's life-debt doesn't manifest itself in purely magical 
ways; it manifests itself, if I can borrow from psychology, as a compulsion 
to act in one way rather than another.

If Wormtail's post-SS scene life-debt to Harry were as real and fundamental 
as posited by MD (to the extent that it would cause a flawed rebirth 
potion), I don't see how it permitted Wormtail not only to participate in 
the plan to kill him, but to cause him immense pain and suffering by direct 
action (casting surses, cutting him open, etc). If Wormtail's life-debt 
were so overpowering, he would not have been *able* to cause harm or pain 
to Harry.  Furthermore, the potion appeared to work flawlessly in the 
graveyard: Voldemort was able to cause pain to and cast curses on Harry. 
The only thing which saved Harry (as far as we know to date) was his 
willpower and purity of thought, which permitted him to overcome the 
strange duel.

I've not yet seen the MDDT explain just how the flawed nature of the potion 
is to manifest itself under the circumstances, in what way the life-debt 
caused it to be flawed, or indeed why the life-debt didn't manifest itself 
in the graveyard scene.

Furthermore, considering all the theories appear to agree that Sirius is a 
major variable here, doesn't the whole plan hinge just a little too much on 
Snape/Lupin/both being able to stop him before he kills Peter himself? 
Sirius could transform at any time and literally bite Wormtail's head off 
before any of the other characters had a chance to react (or even arrive on 
the scene).

Incidentally, and I'm a bit surprised that nobody's raised this point yet: 
somewhere along the line in the present discussion, the spectre of 
Azkaban!Hagrid was raised, and the notion that during his imprisonment in 
CoS, Hagrid MUST have heard the stuff going around the prison. I see 
absolutely no need to draw this conclusion. Azkaban had been described as a 
"castle". It's perfectly possible for the DEs to be confined in the 
dungeons while Hagrid was left in an entirely different part of the castle. 
After all, Hagrid had never been accused of being in league with Voldemort, 
but "only" of having opened the Chamber 50 years previously. There's no 
real reason why he should have been anywhere close to the DEs and their 
mumblings.

--
GulPlum AKA Richard, who hopes all the above makes sense and is off to bed 
before he drops from fatigue.