Betrayal (was Rowling and Philosophy)

[dicentra63]

No: HPFGUIDX 53722

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Tom Wall" <thomasmwall at y...> wrote:

> I reply:
> Hmmm. Well, Riddle would have had to *earn* her trust, I agree with 
> that. And I also agree that Ginny probably *felt* deeply betrayed by 
> Tom Riddle. But, is that the same thing? I mean, if Riddle didn't 
> love and care for Ginny and then later change sides to her demise, 
> ala Pettigrew, then I'm not persuaded that it's an indictment for 
> Voldemort on betrayal.
 
> Pippin wrote:
> All that said, I see what you mean. But of course it's impossible 
> for Voldemort to betray anybody he really cares about, since 
> according to Dumbledore he doesn't really care about anyone, 
> even his own followers. 

I'm not sure that it matters how Riddle felt about Ginny.  He knew how
much she trusted him and he used that trust against her.  It seems to
me that it's just as vile to do that to strangers as to friends.  The
magnitude of the crime is measured not by the betrayer's connection to
the betrayed, but by the betrayed's level of trust.  

Ginny's level of trust would have been the same if Riddle had
genuinely cared about her; her wound is the same wound.  If the story
had been that he liked her at first but then changed his mind, is that
going to hurt her differently than finding out he never liked her but
pretended to?  I don't know that it would.

This means that in unequal relationships, the person with the
strongest investment is also the most vulnerable (duh).  For example,
Harry can hurt Neville and the Creavey brothers far more than they can
hurt him.    If Harry betrays Colin, isn't that worse than Colin
betraying Harry?  (Assuming, of course, that Harry is fully aware of
how much trust Colin has in him.)

If Colin were to stop worshipping Harry and do something deliberate to
harm him, that crime would be measured on the spite scale, not the
betrayal scale.  (Hey, that rhymes!)

--Dicentra