Power vs. Trust (was:The Possibilities of Grey Snape...)

[lupinlore]

No: HPFGUIDX 143110

Carol <justcarol67 at y...> wrote:
> At any rate, there's nothing trite about it. That's what life 
> is about. If we knew everything there is to know at eleven, 
> if we learned nothing from experience, then adults would need 
> to step aside and let children rule the world. 

Lupinlore wrote:
LOL!  They could hardly make more of a mess of things than the 
adults have.  Where the trite comes in, or the -- shall we see 
that essence of Cheddar that exists in the Great Hoop of Being 
between the Form of Brie and the Idea of Gorgonzola -- is that 
Harry is supposed to simply trust in DD and allow some Great 
Plan to carry him through to adulthood, even if that Great Plan 
involves folly, injustice, and abuse.  Nonsense.

Carol wrote:
> Maybe Draco is right and Dumbledore is just a "stupid old man" 
> who's wrong about Snape. After all, that's just a stronger 
> version of Harry's view that Dumbledore is wrong to trust 
> Snape. The kids, both the newly minted Death Eater and the 
> Chosen One, agree that the old mentor's judgment is not to be 
> trusted. Their instincts are more sound than the judgment of 
> a highly intelligent old man who distrusted Tom Riddle from the 
> beginning and defeated the Dark wizard Grindelwald.

Lupinlore wrote:
ROFL!  So, Harry is simply supposed to trust in DD despite the 
fact that he tolerates the abuse of Snape and the Dursleys, 
despite DD's proven failures, and despite, finally, his own 
witness of DD's murder? "Just trust authority," the singsong and 
reprehensible mantra of Ceasar, Hitler, Stalin, and every 
oppressive social system, abusive parent, and idiot general in 
history.


Carol wrote:
> How, if I dare ask, is it "insipid and morally revolting" for 
> the protagonist to grow up, to know and understand more at 
> seventeen than he did at eleven? Why have the books at all if 
> the child protagonist knows no more about anything except how 
> to cast a spectacular spell or two at the end of the series 
> than he did at the beginning? I honestly don't understand how 
> having Harry learn that Dumbledore was right to trust Snape 
> (or about choices and death and all the other lessons he
> attempted to teach Harry) would be "morally revolting." 

Lupinlore wrote:
Hmmm.  If these lessons involve making a hero out of a child 
abuser, and that is what Snape most definitely is, I'd say they 
are indeed morally revolting and reprehensible.  To put it 
another way, they do have the aromatic quality of that substance 
which is the most excellent leaving of the digestion, and which 
doth make the grass grow and the flowers bloom.


Carol wrote:
> (*I* think it would be "morally revolting" to have Harry's 
> primitive, childish desire for revenge presented as heroic, 
> and I sincerely hope that Harry will never cast a successful 
> Crucio against Snape or anyone else.)


Lupinlore wrote:
ROFL!  Primitive and childish?  You mean the natural and 
perfectly correct desire for justice in the face of cruelty, 
abuse, and maltreatment?  If JKR simply waves her hands and 
dismisses Snape's abuse, especially with the reprehensible excuse 
that it was part of some fool plan of Dumbledore's to "prepare" 
Harry for his destiny, then once again there is a great cloud of 
that which makes the grass grow and the flowers blossom hanging 
over the HP series.

As for the Crucio, it does seem an imperative with many that 
Harry not use it.  Interestingly enough, Snape's use of the AK 
seems perfectly all right.  Now why on Earth is that?  Because it 
was part of DD's plan?  Or because Our Lord and Savior Severus 
Snape has, by definition, only Harry's best interests at heart 
and therefore HIS Unforgivables are perfectly... well... 
forgivable?


Lupinlore