What was DU hiding? / Villains in potterverse

[hogsheadbarmaid]

No: HPFGUIDX 116440


Meri wrote:
> > DU states in OP that her fire is the only fire in Hogwarts 
> > that isn't being monitored by the MoM. Why is that? As loyal 
> > to the Ministry as she is, what could she be saying that she 
> > doesn't want anyone, even the people on her own side, to hear? 
> > <snip> Is she hiding something? Or has the "DU is a DE" 
> > speculation finally gotten to my head? 


antosha added:
> DU as DE seems like the LEAST interesting choice, it seems to me. 
> If all the bad guys are simply LV's lapdogs, then life is pretty 
> simple. But if supposedly good or neutral folks can turn out to be 
> that horrible--and DU is, it seems to me, the most despicable 
> villain we've encountered so far; LV seems almost benign in 
> comparison--then who knows what's going to happen? 
<snip>
> 
> As US Senator Joe McCarthy showed us all, just because you're 
> paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you.


now me (barmaid):

This may also fit in the recent villain thread -- but I like it here -
- so there.

First, I completely agree with Antosha that DU is most disturbing and 
despicable.  As others have said in other threads -- LV seems less 
scary or at least less effectual as a villain than some of the others 
we see.  I think part of this is that we see these other villains 
close up and in action.  We really only have the stories of LV at 
full power that we hear from others -- and they are afraid of him -- 
so we sort of have to trust that they would not be so afraid if LV 
was always as lame a villain as we see now.  That said...

I think this complex set of villains is brilliant.  Fudge, DU, Snape, 
maybe Malfoy -- and others -- *for me* are a very important critic of 
the whole idea of villains and of a black and white view of good and 
evil.  LV has become evil personified in the WW.  Not unlike Hitler 
in the RW.  This sort of pure simple evil always feels way too easy 
for me.  It lets people off the hook for the little moral choices we 
all have to make every day.  Fudge, Barty Sr. and DU are on the side 
of "good" but do evil.  They in fact call their evil good.  Snape, on 
the other hand, does not hide under the clock of "goodness" -- but 
does good -- tries to work for the good -- somehow without *being* 
good.  

Interesting that you mention Joe McCarthy -- very much a Barty Sr. if 
you ask me....

  --barmaid