Harry's Compassion

[ericoppen]

No: HPFGUIDX 114987


One thing that a lot of the people who're saying that Harry isn't 
compassionate tend to forget is simply that _he's a teenage boy,_ and 
one from an emotionally-abusive background, to boot.  (Incidentally, 
much as I'd love to see the Dursleys sacrificed to Yog-Sothoth, I 
can't, offhand, remember Vernon or Patooty ever physically laying a 
glove on Harry.  Allowing Dudders to do so was reprehensible enough, 
but AFAICR the senior Dursleys' abuse was all non-physical)

At the age Harry was at during the Troll Incident, in PS/SS, it 
wouldn't have occurred to me to do anything about it if I heard some 
girl I didn't know very well or didn't much care for was crying in 
the girls' bathroom.  Even if I did want to do something, _this was 
the *girls'* bathroom,_ and I'd have had to recruit a girl or two to 
help me winkle her out of there before I could do anything.  (Yes, I 
_was_ rather shy and inhibited.  I'm talking about before I got to 
the teen years, OK?)  I'd have probably sighed and figured that "this 
is girl business," and turned back to whatever I was doing.  

(Come to it---I wonder if Hermione ever thought about talking to 
Professor McGonagall back then?  I also wonder whether she was 
popular, or had friends, when she was in Muggle primary school.  Like 
it or not, most children resent those among them who "make it look 
easy," if only because this increases the expectations laid on them.)

At most of the other times cited in the "Harry's not compassionate!" 
thread, Harry has some reasonable excuses---he's got a _lot_ on his 
mind, he has serious troubles of his own, and he's already got enough 
on his plate without being expected to turn into the Bhodisatva of 
Compassion.  Note, though, that it is specifically stated that he'd 
gladly share his fortune with the Weasleys if they'd only accept it---
he would do this _because he knows how unhappy Ron and his sibs are 
with being poor,_ and he knows what that feels like and wants to make 
them feel happier.  If that ain't compassion, at least of the sort to 
be expected from a teen boy, _I,_ my learned colleagues, am the King 
of Romania.  And if Harry doesn't feel compassionate toward Neville 
after learning about his parents, and doubly so after _meeting_ his 
parents in the Locked Ward of St. Mungo's, I am the Tsar of all the 
Russias.