[HPforGrownups] In defense of James (yes, the berk). Was: Cockney rhyming...

[Batchevra at aol.com]

No: HPFGUIDX 106308

In a message dated 7/14/04 1:58:41 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
nkafkafi at yahoo.com writes:
>Neri:
Since nobody seems to step forward, I'll take the defense of James 
(can't stand a good character maligned). My line of defense will be 
simple. I'm not going to belittle anything that happened in Snape's 
pensieve memory. I'm going to claim that Pensieve!James is most 
certainly James at his worst. This is the worst thing he ever done in 
his life, and we judge his character solely by this moment. How do I 
prove that this is James' worst moment? Easily. We have canon that 
Snape was the person James hated the most (well, he probably hated 
Voldemort even more, but that's different. Voldy was his mortal 
enemy). We know that this was Snape's worst memory. Ergo, this is the 
worst thing that James had ever done in his life.

Think for a moment about the worst thing you ever done in your life. 
Put it in writing as objectively and detailed as you can and send to 
my e-mail. Then tell me if it's fair that I'll judge your character 
solely by this incident. This is what we are doing to James.

If you want to contrast James fairly with (say) Snape, you should NOT 
compare Pensieve!James with Pensieve!Snape. You should compare 
Pensieve!James with the worst thing that Snape ever done in his life. 
How about Snape in PoA trying to hand an innocent man to be executed 
because he has a 20 yrs old grudge against him, and won't even listen 
for one minute to this man defending himself? And as several members 
recently posted, Snape was a DE, and it seems highly improbable that 
he managed not to take part in any of the favorite sport in that 
club. After all, Snape placed three "worst memories" in the Pensieve, 
not one. Would it be far-reaching to speculate that one of them 
contains the worst thing he'd ever done during his DE career? And 
suppose Harry would have picked this memory instead of the James' 
memory. Would it be fair to judge Snape's character solely by this 
moment?

The Pensieve may be objective, but JKR is highly subjective in her 
choice of what to show in it. As in the case of Ron and Ginny, whom 
I've just defended here, JKR uses Harry's point-of-view as a powerful 
but very narrow-beam spotlight. She points this spotlight to what she 
wants us to see, while living all the rest in the dark. Even when we 
know what must be in the dark parts, we tend to disregard it, or at 
least give it less weight. At this moment in the plot, JKR wants (for 
good reasons, of course) to trash James. So she shows Harry and us, 
in perfect detail, the worst thing he ever done in his life. This 
incident is the only direct broadcast we ever got from James' life. 
Well, there was that "I'll delay him, take Harry and run!" but this 
low-quality audio (some members are not even sure it's James) is 
extremely short in comparison with the Pensieve scene, and all the 
rest we know about James is second-hand. In the past JKR had 
portrayed him as a saint. Now she portrays him as a heartless bully 
and a berk. We shouldn't have bought it then, and we should not buy 
it now.

Your'onor, the defense pleads "not guilty" on the ground of biased 
evidence.

Neri


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