Draco and Sirius (was Re: Apologies and responsibility)

[rlai1977]

No: HPFGUIDX 139363

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, <lady.indigo at g...> wrote:
> I have to disagree to a small extent here. Draco has a conscience
left, but 
> he doesn't fail to murder Dumbledore based on some moral principle
bubbling 
> up and saying 'it's just not right!' It seems like any switch of
allegiance 
> he might have would be more out of fear. A mixture of both at the
very least 
> 

Oh I agree, I can't ever imagine a Draco doing anything out of purely
selfless reason, the kid is just not conditioned that way ^^ All I
have been arguing is that while he bears full responsibility for what
he has done, it's really not his fault that he was lead to believe, or
think he believes in the things he believes in. Draco's biggest
problem pre-HBP wasn't that he was a racist IMO, but being an
unthinking person who simply took whatever daddy said as facts- but
other kids in the series do the same too, Ron for example, starts most
of his comments about WW politics with "Dad reckons...", but lucky Ron
we readers likes/can accept what *his* daddy thinks! 
 
> No, but a character from another background and history, plus a decided 
> sociopath who needs to think of himself as 'the specialist little
wizard of 
> them all'. Admittedly I'm only going by my interpretation of Snape
here, but 
> nothing I've seen outside the Lily incident has indicated to me he'd
go by 
> Voldemort's rules. (Though his trouble with his dad at home might have 
> created negative thoughts about Muggles, true.)

We really don't have enough information from the books to say how
young Snape really perceived his half-blood status, that he identified
much more with his pure blood parent hence the 'half-blood prince'
nickname or that he held little to no prejudice against a group that
would have included himself, are both theories yet to be confirmed. I
was just saying that being a half-blood, in itself, wouldn't seem to
be strong enough a point to argue that Snape thusly wouldn't have held
much of a prejudice against the muggle-born folks, considering
Voldemort's precedent. 

Argh. I really don't want to sound like I am actually arguing *for* a
case of big, flaming racist!Snape, I really do not lean more toward
this scenario than I do the opposite scenario. 


> Again, completely different situation IMO. We'd seen Draco show
pureblood 
> sentiment repeatedly, before and after this and in a number of
different 
> contexts.

No, not *before*, never before. Like I said it was the first time he
ever used that word in the series, and I think it's significant that
Rowling made sure to create a situation in which he had other (and
bigger) motivation to dish out the 'M' word than racial prejudice. And
I highly highly doubt the two situations are supposed to be
"completely different", as IMO the hints for a James/Harry Snape/Draco
parallel have been pretty heavy-handed. And by parallel I don't mean
Harry is this generation's James or Snape, or Draco this generation's
Snape or James- the Harry/Draco conflict is an imperfect replica of
the James/Snape conflict, but nevertheless, the similarities between
the two scenes in terms of Snape/Draco using racial slur as a
weapon/face-saving tool I believe were put there intentionally by the
author.     

>Snape used it *once*,

Once, because we are mostly dealing with an adult Snape, whose past we
only got brief flashback of. We don't know if that truly was the only
one time Snape had used the M word- though I would think if Rowling
had intended to suggest a deeply racist! young Snape, she perhaps
would've showed a scene in which he was using the word casually
instead of in a desperate in a desperate mood.

Oh and I've never quite figured out if it was a careless mistake on
Rowling's part or not, but in COS the password to the Slytherin dorm
was 'Pure blood'- and I thought it's normally the HoH who sets up
passwords?
 
> in my opinion simply as the insult that'd 
> show him to be a big bad Slytherin and hurt the most, and Lily seemed 
> surprised by it - as if by age 15 it had never happened before. 

Yes Lily did seem surprised didn't she! I think this perhaps suggests
it was the first time Snape ever used the M word ever, or ever in
public, or at least ever to Lily.


>Snape has 
> targeted students, including and sometimes especially Hermione, for 
> everything else and not gotten in trouble with Dumbledore...
Wouldn't he 
> have shown further bias for Slytherin at some point by using someone's 
> heritage as a weapon?

Oh I personally don't believe adult Snape values heritage much if at
all, I don't think he picks on Hermione because she's a muggle-born, I
think he is nasty to her because a) she's not in Slytherin and b) she
is Potter's friend and c) she, like Potter, is way overrated in
Snape's opinion ;-)

I rather think Snape has grown out of his muggle-born's-are-inferior,
or at least
inferior-enough-that-I-see-no-wrong-in-joining-a-group-that-is-hostile-to-them
belief, and I wouldn't be too surprised if it turns out Snape never
had much of a prejudice against the muggle-borns to start with. I was
just saying that while you appear to be pretty unforgiving to a kid
who parroted his dad's opinions, you are quite willing to interpret
Snape's similar actions (the M word and joining the DEs) in the most
harmless light?

I could say Draco likely has joined the DE mostly for power, glory,
and a place in the new world order too (wasn't he harping on all the
power & glory in the tower top scene?). That saying neither Draco nor
Snape seems to have a deep-seated, personal hate-on for the non-pure
blood is not to make them appear less guilty, IMO, just saying that
they both thusly have a better chance of turning away from Voldemort.

> Er, yes. Which is why I said it was my opinion.

Er, yes you did, I am sorry to have unwittingly suggested otherwise ^^;;
 
> True. I just get the feeling that's not the case. Snape's a lot of
things, 
> worse things IMO, but I just don't see this as being one of them.
<snip>
> The Death Eaters offered power, glory, a place in the new world
order, and 
> all that good stuff. Any number of wizards could have fought on
Voldemort's 
> side for those reasons instead. Pinning Snape as a definite racist
makes as 
> little sense to me as the opposite does to you, so I guess we can't
really 
> know for sure. (Unless the Snape/Lily theory is proved right, of
course. 
> ^_^)

Both the Snape-as-definite-racist and Snape-as-not-racist-at-all
theories do not make much sense to me, actually ^_^ I hope I have
explained a bit more clearly in this post what I really disagree with
you- it's not your reading of Snape, which I quite agree with, actually.

RP