James, a paragon of virtue? Was: Why Do You Like Sirius?

[nrenka]

No: HPFGUIDX 123239


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "justcarol67" 
<justcarol67 at y...> wrote:

This is, of course, round 1984765903 on this argument, but what the 
heck?

> Carol adds:
> I think that James's admirers are generally the same people who like
> (I won't say admire) Sirius. They praise James for his "values" or
> "principles" because he would never call Lily a "mudblood." (He 
> didn't say that he wouldn't use the term to insult a Muggleborn he 
> didn't like, but I suppose it's fair to say that he wouldn't do so, 
> just as some people would never call a girl a b***ch even if they 
> hated her. It's just a word that he's been taught not to use and so 
> he doesn't.)

Yes, but...from the perspective of literary economy (and there is a 
bunny sitting next to me at the present, a soft, fluffy bunny), 
there's something very significant about that whole scene.

To be direct: JKR likes to use little shorthand things and 
descriptions that, when we think about them, tell us a whole lot more 
about a person.  "Mudblood" seems to certainly be one of them.  It is 
not a word that travels alone; it immediately labels someone who uses 
it as of a certain ideological bent.  And as I've argued before, 
*everyone* has ideology whether they are conscious or not of it--and 
this was an era where ideology seems to have mattered, greatly.

It *is* a strong insight into how James has been raised that he 
reacts so categorically to the word, just as it's an insight into 
Draco, Young!Snape, and Voldemort--the three people (I think...) 
we've heard use it.  It's been so reserved in actual use in the 
series that it really hits you when you hear it--and it tells you 
something fundamental about the user.

<snip>

> Neither of them has any legitimate reason for their unprovoked 
> attack on Severus Snape, who is absorbed in studying the test 
> questions he has just answered at great length in the DADA exam,
> which he clearly takes more seriously than they do. (And Sirius 
> states that he doesn't need to study for the Transfiguration exam, 
> either. Thinks highly of himself, that one.)

Remember the canon from PoA from McGonagall about Sirius and 
James, "...very bright, of course--exceptionally bright, in fact..".  
How fondly I remember all the times I didn't have to study in high 
school...oh, those were the days.  Arrogant, yes; true, 
(unfortunately?) also yes.

[That's enough canon, McGonagall and the studying, to argue that 
James and Sirius were actually much brighter than Severus in school, 
right? (take that with a grain of salt, everyone)]

> James bases his dislike of the studious Severus on the mere fact 
> that he exists. 

I have to repeat the "schoolboy visceral reaction that can be parsed 
ontologically" line here, because it just says it so well.  That is 
to say, ontology is frequently not a 'mere' reason, but a very 
profound one.

> No doubt being a Slytherin and greasy-haired has something to do 
> with it, too, as do all the hexes Severus knows. No fun to attack 
> an opponent who can't fight back, but it's okay to do it when he's 
> unprepared and to go two against one.

See, I don't want to dispute the account given--and I'm not going to, 
on a certain factual level.  But I want to throw a very particular 
wrench into the works, and it's a comparative one.

We always go, in the evaluation of Snape's various actions, "But we 
don't KNOW, there could be so much more going on", etc., ad nauseam.

Is it too much to suspect that we have a moderate case of that 
situation going on here as well?

For one thing, we don't have the ability to seriate here while we do 
with PresentDay!Snape, and that argues even more strongly for a 
suspension of evaluation.  You can't make good statements about a 
hapax.  [Umm, to make that clearer--we have one event witnessed by us 
(albeit in an unusual way), and some sketchy accounts of other 
behavior.  With PresentDay!Snape, we have a whole string of 
observations of behavior.  The latter can be seriated, the former 
cannot.  The term comes from classical philology, and is used there 
and in semiotics, as well as archaeology.]

Second, it feels (IMO) like a literary setup very smartly done from a 
phenomenological point of view; we the readers, riding on Harry's 
shoulder, react much as he does.  It's arguable that this will 
ultimately be revealed as an incomplete reaction.  (And I enjoy 
turning the 'limitations of Harry's POV' argument to completely 
different uses than it is usually set!)

So many things unaccounted for but hinted at.  If we get nothing 
else, I am happy to revert back to this presented analysis as a kind 
of base-level most obvious reading of reality, but I don't think 
we're going to get nothing else.  

For analysis, however, it is methodologically incumbent upon us to 
extend to all characters the grace that we extend to one.

And, from a large-scale view, it's still rather telling on the virtue 
scale (if we wish to think that way) that some of these obnoxious 
kids went on to become Death Eaters and thus AT MINIMUM commit sins 
of omission worse than not stopping your friends from hexing people 
in the hallways, and some of them chose to actively fight that.  
That's not to mention the sins of commission, really.  The point 
seems to be that the ultimate White Hats can have their profound 
failings, and that a Black Hat (before conversion) is not made any 
better by being the object of abuse.

"No one deserves to be subjected to the appalling instruments of 
cruelty. Nevertheless, even at the cost of misanthropy, one cannot 
afford to pretend that victimhood improves anyone in any way. If we 
do not remember that anyone can be a victim, and if we allow hatred 
for torture, or pity for pain, to blind us, we will unwittingly aid 
the torturers of tomorrow by overrating the victims of today. One may 
be too easily tempted to think of all victims as equally innocent 
because there cannot, by definition, be a voluntary victim. That may 
have the consquence of promoting an endless exchange of cruelties 
between alternating tormentors and victims." (Ordinary Vices, p. 19)

We certainly don't have to like or dislike any character by objective 
criteria.  But it's really much more fun here, I think, to play in 
analytical realms.  The cage match can wait for when the canon is 
done, no? :)

-Nora gets ready to put the harm back in harmony