Draco and the Case of the Boy Evil

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 124754


Draco and the Case of the Boy Evil

You'll notice that I titled this post 'Case of the Boy Evil' and not
'Case of the Evil Boy'. That is because I don't think Draco, so far,
is an 'evil boy'; although, he certainly is a nasty boy. 

So far, Draco is not evil, he is merely playing a boy's game version
of evil. He has grown up hearing the Pureblood-Superiority ideology,
but he has always been sheltered from the Pureblood-Racist reality.
So, he plays the game, he knows the right words to say and the right
attitude to take, and struts around convinced that he is superior to
all around him including other purebloods and other Slytherins.

Here is my take on Draco's underlying psychology. Draco has led a
sheltered life of wealth, priviledge, and entitlement. In a sense,
everything, including the spotlight, belongs to him by virtue of the
fact that he is who he is. 

I think subconsciously Draco viewed himself as not only King of the
Slytherins, but King of Hogwarts. He expected to come to Hogwarts and
be love, admired, and feared by everyone including teachers. I'm quite
sure Draco imagined that during his entire career as a Hogwart's
student, he would be surrounded by fawning admirers, and quite
convinced that the teachers who didn't love him, would at least fear
him as an extention of is father's power. 

In his mind, everywhere he went he woud be the best and the brightest,
the most popular socially, and the best in sports. He had visions of
himself walking down the halls of Hogwarts and every head admiringly
turning in his direction. All the girls would crush on him, and all
the boys would envy him. Everywhere he went a halo-like spotlight
would shine down on him; he would stand out even in a crowd.

Then fate threw a spanner (wrench) into the works; that spanner -
Harry Potter. How could Draco live up to his dream of being Hogwarts
student /royalty/ when Harry Potter was grabbing the spotlight all the
time? I mean, what's so great about that Harry Potter? Famous because
of some foul scar on his forehead. 

In Draco's view, that worthless muggle loving Potter has robbed him of
his rightful, fully deserved, full entitled position of 'center of
attention'. To make it worse, despite his best efforts to show
everyone what a worthless wizard Potter is, Potter has bested him at
every turn. Consequently, Draco becomes more obssessed with Potter at
each encounter,  more convinced that all his problems and failures are
all Harry's fault, and absolutely more determend to undermine that
worthless Potter and prove that Draco's wealth, rank, and pureblood
make him truly the superior one.

Unfortunatly the more obssessed he becomes, the less rational and
therefore less effective his attempt to show Harry up become. So, he
is now trapped in an every downward spiral of degridation and
humiliation which he causes himself, but of course, blames on Harry.

This obssessed ever-more irrational psychology is classic behavior for
Junior and Senior 'evil overlords'. If Draco would forget about Harry,
he would stop making a fool of himself, and earn his own place in the
world of Hogwards. Similarly Voldemort; if every one of Voldemort's
plans to conquer the world didn't start with conquering Harry Potter,
he probably could have taken over the world several times. 

So far, Draco has merely been playing a schoolboy's slightly obssessed
version of light-weight bad-boy bully and archrival. So far, it has
been childish pranks and schoolboy rivalries. 

But where does it go next? Given Draco's frustration at Harry having a
hand at sending his father to prison, the father who is the
base/foundation of Draco's preceived power, priviledge, and indentity,
and Harry's continued defiance of Draco's rightful position of crowned
prince of all he surveys, I see the potential for things taking a turn
for the worse.

'Order of the Phoenix' is not only a turning point in the story, it is
a turning point for Draco. I don't have any trouble seeing Draco's
antics turning from schoolboy teasing and bullying, to a real and
genuine intent to do harm. What was annoying, now has the potential to
turn vicious.

Even though I see the story taking that turn, I don't think it would
mean that Draco has quite crossed the border into 'evil' yet. From
schoolboy bad to just plain bad, yes, but not quite to truly evil.
Whether Draco will cross the threshold and do something so vicious as
to be irredeemable, or whether he will see the 'light', I'm not sure.

I am sure that Draco has been sheltered from what it truly means to be
a Death Eater. So far, it is just a lot of rhetoric, ideology, and
pureblood catchphrases. I think if there will be a turn around for
Draco, it will occur when he has to face the realities of the Dark Side. 

I think Draco sees himself and his father as lording over everyone
with their wealth and power. Draco is bowed TO, he does not bow to any
man (at least not in his own mind). When he sees his father bowing,
crawling on the ground-kissing Voldemort robes, when he see the price
that is paid for even the slightest failure, when he is asked to
betray or kill other purebloods because it serves the Dark Lord's
needs or whims, when he see just how perveted, twisted, and self(dark
lord)serving the current version of ideology is, I can see Draco
changing his mind.

HOWEVER, and this is a big 'however', just because Draco becomes
'good' doesn't mean he will become 'nice'. It appears that Snape is on
the good side, but by no stretch is Snape even remotely nice. Even if
Draco ultimatly chooses to work against Voldemort, he will not be
handing out flowers and kisses, and spouting poetry. Draco will always
be Draco, he will always be at odds with Harry, he will always despise
and torment Harry even if they develop a begruding admiration for each
other. That's just the dynamic of their relationship. Even a
good-Draco will not be a nice-Draco, he will always have a sense of
priviledge and superiority, that's just who he is.

Finally, people like Draco are very self-seving. Draco may work for or
against the Dark Lord, but he will never work for the good side. That
is, he will realize that working /for/ Voldemort is not in his best
interest, so he will work against him. It has nothing to do with right
and wrong, or good and bad; it's merely a matter of economics. If
Voldemort losing serves Draco's economic interests best, then he will
work against him. 

The same applies to Draco's father, if Lucius decides that it's not in
his best interest to work for Voldemort, then he will join the side
working against him, but he will never be anything more that he has
always been, an opportunist.

"There is no good and evil, only money, and those unafraid to take it."

Just a thought.

Steve/bboyminn