Harry's protection

[cubfanbudwoman]

No: HPFGUIDX 112954

SSSusan earlier:
>>>> And with that segue, SSSusan begins yet again, with her spiel 
on Sacrificial Love.  [Some are sure to be running for cover just 
now.]
 
Plain Old Love, as it were, can definitely include or involve those 
kinds of damaging, stiffling side-effects Kneasy has cited.  Yet it 
seems to me that Sacrificial Love - or a willingness to die out of 
love for others - doesn't include the more negative side-trappings 
of Plain Old Love *and* has the bonus that it deals with this 
willingness to die that Harry seems to have.  Voldy doesn't have it -
he wants to live forever - and so he would NEVER consider 
sacrificing himself, for love or any other motive.  

So I'm going with Sacrificial Love as the Power that Lord 
Voldythingy Knows Not *and* which is somehow studied in that room in 
the Dept. of  Mysteries.  <<<<

 
Kneasy: 
> Um. I'm having trouble with this one. 
> How often does Sacrificial Love turn up in the books? Once -  
> maybe.

SSSusan:
Yep, NOT often at all--precisely my point.  It's a RARE thing to 
encounter.  And I think it would HAVE to be a rare action to be true.


Kneasy:
> Yeah sure, Lily sacrificed herself - the 'maybe' was because it 
> happened before the books kicked off, but gets referred to later. 
> I'd expect the boys in the back-room of the Ministry to 
> concentrate on something that has a wider application, or at least 
> something they can get examples of to study. Can't study lovin' 
> Lil's mind set or emotions - she's gone; an ex-witch, joined the 
> choir invisible, etc. How do you study that?

SSSusan:
Actually, for some reason I've not even articulated to myself, I 
HAVEN'T been thinking of Lily at the times that I have written about 
sacrificial love.  Maybe because all the talk about THAT [Lily] has 
had to do with "ancient magic"...setting up a protection...something 
that lives in someone else's blood.  My vision of Sacrificial Love 
w/ Harry in mind isn't like that at all.  In fact, it really isn't 
magic so much as it's just HUMAN.


Kneasy:
> All very nice and fluffy of course, which is probably one of the 
> main reasons for my dubiety, the other main one is that it seems 
> to be as rare as hen's teeth. 

> We've had a few examples of sacrifice - most notably the 
> metaphorical and literal sacrifice of Ron in PS/SS. Not made out 
> of feelings of love, I think - just necessity.


SSSusan:
Yes, I'd agree that it's rare as hen's teeth. And I'm not sure how I 
feel about Ron's action in PS/SS as it related to sacrificial love; 
you may well be right its having been about "necessity" rather 
than "love."  But I also really don't think that what I'm talking 
about is fluffy either.  Perhaps it would be so to you or to others, 
but in my mind a willingness to sacrifice oneself, potentially 
enduring torture or a gruesome death, isn't really fluffy.  [And 
just to be clear--I'm NOT talking about romantic love for some ONE, 
either.] 

As to the Ministry studying it, you've got a point that it may be 
difficult to study if it's so rare.  Hadn't thought of that.  But 
since I know nothing about HOW they're studying it, I'm not sure 
what "evidence" or materials they would need in order to do so....  
Maybe there are other means.


Kneasy: 
> I'm not even sure that thoughts  of sacrifice crossed Harrys' mind 
> on his rescue mission to the Ministry, more the impulse to act, to 
> do something to help Sirius.
> 
> And if, as DD says, Harry is full of this stuff, he doesn't seem 
> to show it at the critical moment when Voldy grabs his mind at the 
> end of OoP.
> Sure, he seems willing to die - but for no purpose. He will see 
> Sirius again, but that won't save Sirius or anybody else; it's not 
> really a sacrifice in the way that most would understand it.


SSSusan:
Oh, I'm not sure sacrifice crossed Harry's mind then, either.  In 
fact, I doubt that it did.  I've in mind something Harry likely 
won't be ready to seriously consider until he grows more, probably 
not much before the end of 7th year.  I *don't* think, in year 5, he 
WAS at the point of being capable of true sacrificial love.  You're 
quite right that it was more of a SELFISH thing in the Ministry:  
end my pain; reunite me with Sirius.  Understandable, of course, but 
still a self-centered focus.  No, I'm thinking of Harry's learning 
over the next two years to be even more other-directed.  I'm less 
skeptical than you, in general, about Harry's motives, but even I 
think he will need growth in this area to be ready to sacrifice 
himself, not out of a selfish desire to be done with it all, but as 
a conscious means of saving others whom he loves.

 
Kneasy:
> Mind you, I don't doubt that DD sees Harry  sacrificing himself for
> the greater good of the WW - he just hasn't got round to letting
> Harry in on his plan. He'll manoeuvre Harry into a postion where
> it becomes an inevitability. "We are defined by our choices, Harry;
> and your choice, should you choose to accept it, is to lay down 
> your life for the WW.  And Voldy would probably get you anyway. 
> This owl will self-destruct in 10 seconds." 

SSSusan:
Hee.  This is, of course, a possibility.  But I'm hoping for a more 
TRUE choice on our Harry's part.

Siriusly Snapey Susan