Cynicism and Betrayal in Canon

[David <dfrankiswork@netscape.net>]

No: HPFGUIDX 51260

Jim Ferer wrote:

> It's not hard to find speculation here about Evil!Lupin,
> Evil!Dumbledore, Evil!McGonagall, Evil!Sirius, and so on; who did I
> miss? Someone, I'm sure.

That would be Ron.
 
> If JKR ever did write Evil!Dumbledore, etc., it would be nothing 
less
> than the worst betrayal of readers ever by an author, and I could
> never forgive her for it.  JKR writes for all readers, not just 
young
> ones, but many of her readers are young and she knows it. What
> attitude would that send to her readers?
> 
> 1. People are no damn good.
> 
> 2. Everyone will betray you sooner or later, so look out for 
yourself
> only.  Get them before they get you.
> 
> 3. Goodness and friendship is illusory; only evil is real. Loyalty 
is
> for chumps.

I think that would in fact depend on the circumstances of the 
revelation of the 'evil' character.  If Dumbledore turns to evil, 
and good wins out anyway, that would be a powerful positive message 
by the standards of most of us, wouldn't it?

If Draco were to turn good (in some admittedly vague sense since we 
don't know to what extent he can be regarded as evil), and thus 
present Voldemort with an opportunity to attack the trio as they 
start to trust him, how would we interpret that?

And there's the more subtle messages like 'people are no damn good, 
but that includes me, so I will show respect and care for these no-
good people' 

As far as many of the theories alluded to above are concerned, it 
seems to me they are put forward within the existing framework that 
we have, where somebody is not who they seem: Evil!Quirrell, Evil!
Ginny, Evil!Scabbers, Evil!Moody (yes I know Ginny and Moody aren't 
evil, but you could argue, for instance, that the message of COS is 
that you can't trust the Ginnys of this world because they are 
susceptible to being taken over).  Admittedly those characters were 
not in the front rank of the trusted, but it seems to me quite 
plausible that *someone* fairly major who is already an established 
part of the series will turn out not to have been what they seemed 
all along, without damaging the themes JKR is plugging.

My money would be on McGonagall, with Lupin turning out to be one of 
those whose courage fails at a crucial point, without actually 
having been or turning to evil (in the sense of supporting 
Voldemort).  Of course, we have polls now for all that - go vote!

David, cooking up his evil!Hermione theory