The Train Scene GoF (was:Re: JKR and the boys (and girls)/Harry, Draco and bath

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 162408

Alla:
<snip>
> I am convinced that Draco was making a death threat and evaluate the
 scene accordingly. <snip>

Carol responds:
But a threat is an expression of intent to inflict damage, in this
case, intent to commit murder or arrange someone's murder (as, say,
Voldemort or a Mafia don might do). Draco has no intention of killing
any of the Trio himself, nor does he have the authority to order their
deaths. He's saying that Voldemort will want all of them dead, which,
however unpleasant and however much pleasure Draco takes in it, is the
simple truth, along the lines of "You'll be next, Mudbloods!" after
Mrs. Norris is found Petrified--a prediction that comes true when
four(?) Muggleborns including Hermione are Petrified. (I'm not
counting NHN since he's a ghost and we don't know whether he was a
Muggle-born or not.)

So nasty as Draco's conduct in this scene is, particularly, his
reference to Cedric Diggory's murder (even though it's really an
aside, correcting his assertion that the "Mudbloods" will be first),
he's not *threatening* to harm or kill HRH. He's not yet ready to
become a DE himself since his father is still "walking free" and
influencing Fudge with his gold while secretly working for Voldemort.
Draco is simply sure that he's been right all along, that the
pureblood agenda will triumph, with Voldemort's enemies destroyed and
his supporters rewarded. Draco actually says:

"You've picked the losing side, Potter! I warned you! I told you you
ought to choose your company more carefully, remember? When we met on
the train, first day at Hogwarts? I told you not to hang around with
riffraff like this! Too late now, Potter! They'll be the first to go,
now the Dark Lord's back! Mudbloods and Muggle-lovers first!
Well--second--Diggory was the f--" (GoF Am. ed. 729).

Provoking as these words are, I would characterize them, not as a
death threat or a threat of any kind, but as a warning or a taunt in
the form of a sneering prediction of doom for Harry's friends and
perhaps Harry himself as a "Muggle-lover." (I wonder, BTW, if he has
Dumbledore in mind here.) He is antagonizing his opponents, not
harming or threatening to harm them (much less to kill them) but
predicting that they, like Cedric Diggory, will fall victim to the
Dark Lord. Again, it's exactly comparable to "You'll be next,
Mudbloods!" in CoS, where Draco is predicting what will happen to
people he holds in contempt and taking pleasure in the prospect
without having either the intention of helping the perpetrator or the
ability to help him.

At any rate, we have not yet reached the point where DE!Draco is ready
to serve the Dark Lord himself, much less commit murder. At this
point, he's a bullying, loudmouthed kid with the wrong values, but he
is posing no threat to HRH. In fact, his provocation is more dangerous
to himself and his friends than it is to HRH, as the aftermath clearly
demonstrates. If he and his companions had entered the compartment
with drawn wands and threatened to harm HRH themselves, it would
indeed have been self-defense to attack them. But no wands were drawn
and no threats to commit harm were made--only a warning and a
prediction that "Mudbloods" and Muggle-lovers were in danger--a
perfectly true statement, however sneeringly delivered. His words have
their intended effect: they make the hearers angry--a little too angry
because HRH and the eavesdropping Twins retort with hexes instead of
retaliatory words. Might it be that there are no words to answer with
because, just as he was in CoS, Draco is right? Not about picking the
losing side, of course, but about the murders of "riffraff"
(Muggleborns and Mugglelovers and other nonsupporters of the Dark
Lord) that will soon follow and which we begin to see in HBP? Harry
and friends have no answer for these words so they react *as if* the
words constituted an attack.

Carol, who is not excusing Draco's support for violence and
oppression, just pointing out that Harry and friends accepted the bait
by becoming angry and attacking when a more suitable response would
have been to send him back to his compartment with feigned
indifference to his intimidation tactics