Harry's Use of an Unforgivable Curse

[Jim Ferer]

No: HPFGUIDX 96064

Geoff: "Have you never been exposed to a situation where you are
goaded to an extent when you really wish harm on someone – even for a
few fleeting seconds? I'm sure many, many of us have briefly gone down
that road ."

Amen. I sure have.  I didn't do anything, but if I'd had the means, I
don't know what I might have done, and my provocation was
infinitesimal compared to Harry's.  I'm also not known at all as being
prone to violence; quite the opposite.

Geoff:"There is a real truth in "seeing red". Later I also richly
enjoyed the fact that, at the age of 21, he was put away for three
years for rape."

Yes. People can only take so much.  We're asking too much of Harry to
criticize him the way we have when what he was showing is that he
doesn't have the hate in him the DE's do.
OT: You only get three years for rape in the UK? Wow.  

I'm sure you were sorry a woman was raped, but it's just human nature
we can't stop our sense of satisfaction watching someone get their
comeuppance, like when Draco and the Knuckles Twins get theirs on the
train.

BTW: In some personality tests there are questions like "I have wanted
to get back at someone."  If the subject denies this it's taken as a
warning sign the person isn't honest about himself.

Geoff: "Why then did he choose a Cruciatus curse and not Avada
Kadavra? Maybe because it was the first one that came to mind; maybe
because part of him hoped that Bellatrix would be captured and there
would be further punishment. Do we think rationally when we are
aroused to that extent? Perhaps with experience but not when we first
encounter such emotions."

I'm not saying Harry thought this out consciously, but Cruciatus is
Bellatrix's favorite – a taste of her own medicine, perhaps?  Thinking
of Neville back in the Death Room, Neville's parents? Harry had seen
Bella cast Cruciatus not ten minutes before. Those things could be why
Cruciatus was the first thing to come to mind.

Jim Ferer