Savior complex? (was "Harry and Tom")

[Susana da Cunha]

No: HPFGUIDX 110851

Matt wrote:
> Do you really think it is all that odd for a person to go out of his 
> way to help others?
> More generally, most of the adventures in the books begin when Harry
> is put in a situation in which he feels that if he does not stick his
> neck out to help someone (or solve a problem), no one will:
<snip examples>
> Rather, it's a sign of a young man who knows right from wrong, and is 
> willing to stand up for what is right. <


Pippin wrote:
> Yes, but he keeps trying to do it in such ridiculously extravagant ways. <snip>
> Take the situation in PS/SS and transpose it to the real world--suppose 
> there's a  plot to steal the secret formula for Coca-Cola, which is, I 
> am not making this up, guarded in a vault in Atlanta, Ga. You discover 
> that a friend of yours has inadvertently told a member of the gang how
> to get into the building. You try to alert the president of the company,
> but he's out of town. You find yourself talking to a VP, who doesn't 
> take you seriously, mostly because you haven't told her about your 
> friend.
>
> For most of us, this would resolve into a dilemma about whether to give 
> your friend away or not (and Rowling/Dumbledore recognizes this by 
> rewarding Neville.)  You wouldn't in a million years decide that the 
> only way to save the formula would be to break into the vault and steal
> it yourself--but that's what Harry does.
> It's excusable, because in PS/SS Harry's an eleven year old kid who 
> thinks he's fallen into a fairy tale, and that the world really is an 
> arena for him to demonstrate his heroism, but at almost sixteen, he 
> really needs to stop thinking like that.
---------------

I agree, but I don't think it's a savior complex.
Harry is an 'action' person. If he sees something that has to be done, his
first instinct is to do it (maybe that's why he's a good seeker). I was
actually surprised he waited so long before setting of to the ministry.

In PS/SS I thought it was unrealistic that those particular eleven-year-olds
would think the stone would be safer in their hands. But they were eleven
(oh, what an adventure!).

At fifteen and with their life experience (they haven't been sitting around
watching telly)... it's simply dumb!

Did Harry think he could fight V & DE all by him self? (He had Luna, Ginny
and Neville - such a reassurance.)

Wouldn't you think by that time he should have remembered to have a plan?
(Or wouldn't Hermione remember to ask if he had one?)

Well at lest Harry cleared something up for us:
'Hermione, it doesn't matter if he's done it to get me there or not -
they've taken McGonagall to St Mungo's, there isn't anyone from the Order
left at Hogwarts who we can tell, and if we don't go, Sirius is dead!' -
OotP

He was obviously willing to give himself in exchange of Sirius' life. But
being Sirius such an important person for him, I wouldn't call it a
"saving-people thing".

Anyway, whenever he had the urge to put himself in danger to save someone
he remember to alert someone in a better position to help. But unfortunately
he was unable to:

* Hermione and the troll - he never planned a rescue; he was going to tell
her to get back to the house dormitories.
* Going after the stone - McGonagall wouldn't listen (and he was eleven).
* The polyjuice impersonations in CS - he wasn't trying to save anyone; he
was playing Dick Tracy.
* Following the spiders into the forest - he was playing Dick Tracy again,
following Hagrid's clue (he learned a lesson, I think).
* Going to Lockhart about the Chamber, - very reasonable of him - and then
entering it - the chamber was there (only he could have opened it) and it
was too much to resist (I would have sent Ron or Lockhart for the other
teachers, though).
* Fleur's sister in the lake - after almost being killed by a dragon, is it
that farfetched to assume they were in danger? If you thought she was in
danger, wouldn't you have done the same?

I don't think he has a saving-people thing because he doesn't set out to
save people (except for Sirius, but he went to McGonagall first).
I think he's an action person that just can't stay put when there's action
to be taken.

Susana