Moody!Crouch and defence against Imperius

[Berit Jakobsen]

No: HPFGUIDX 95376

vmonte wrote:
We don't really know why Moody taught Harry how to 
protect himself. He may have been testing Harry, to 
check his strength as a wizard.
 
Maria Alena wrote:

<snip>There's the obvious answer - that Crouch is playing Moody, and 
has to behave like Moody would, but IMO the persistence he shows in 
the lesson is too great for it to be simple pretense. There's also
the fact that he really does seem to target Harry there. 

<snip>It could also be that Moody!Crouch was trying to weaken Harry's
mind by repeatedly casting Imperius on him, and thus making him more 
vulnerable.

<snip>And I really think that however he justifies these lessons and 
whatever practical reasons he has for them (which he definitely 
does), a good part of his motivation comes from trying to make sure 
that Harry, just a few years away from nineteen, doesn't have the 
same ghastly experience that Barty Crouch had himself.

Berit replies:

As a few others have already pointed out; it's unlikely that Barty 
Crouch Jr's motivation in casting the Imperius curse on Harry was to 
help him resist it so he would never experience what Barty 
experienced. After all, Barty is nothing less than Voldemort's most 
faithful servant.

I agree that part of the reason for casting the Imperio curse in DADA 
class might have been to put on a believable "Moody-show". But of the 
posts I've seen on this subject, I think vmonte is closest to the 
real reason: That of testing Harry, to check out his strenghts as a 
wizard. After all; what is Barty's task: To prepare for the handing-
over of Harry to Voldemort and making sure nothing comes in the way. 
Thus making it very important to also know Harry's strengths, not 
just keep prying teachers like Snape out of the way.

Also, being the deadly practical DE he was, I believe Barty's 
intention was to find out whether Harry was suspectible to the 
Imperio curse. IF he had been, this would have been a very useful 
tool for Barty to use on him if, by chance, Harry would have 
neeeded "help" in finishing the task in the maze. Instead, the 
experiments in class taught Barty that Harry could not be controlled 
that way. It might have changed Barty's plans, who knows, but at 
least now he knows and can prepare for other ways of dealing with 
possible difficulties that might arise.

So, in short, I believe Barty Crouch JR didn't familiarize Harry to 
the Imperio to be "nice" or just to keep up appearances, but that the 
reason was a very practical and cynical one: He wanted to find out if 
Harry could be controlled by it. If not; 'bad luck; we'll have to do 
it another way then'.

Berit
http://home.no.net/berjakob/snape.html