Humanity, Kant, Caricatures, and Draco (was Re: Real child abuse)

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 146212

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > <snip>
> > In order to make that argument with any sort of sincerity you'd 
> > have to show that the bounced child either doesn't feel pain, or 
> > is somehow so wrong in essentials they actually deserve to be    
> > treated so brutally.
> > <snip>
 
> >>Nora:
> Interpersonal comparison of emotion and utility is a no-no, or so 
> I always get told by my social science type friends.  But again,  
> I think the specifics around each situation make the world of 
> difference.
 
Betsy Hp:
I'm not actually sure what your first sentence above means, Nora.  
Within the real world I'm fairly confident that bouncing a child on 
a stone floor is considered a bad thing, so I'm a bit befuddled on 
where Social Sciences enter into it and how it affects my original 
statement.

But in the world of fiction there are times where a bouncing child 
*is* hilarious.  Bugs Bunny cartoons, for example, use this sort of 
physical comedy as their bread and butter.  But part of the humor is 
based on the fact that Daffy Duck or Elmer Fudd aren't really hurt.  
Daffy's bill may be blown backwords, but he's not really suffering. 
In Draco's case JKR tells us straight out that he is in pain.  And 
not an exaggerated form either.  Draco is hurt and he's trying to 
hide it.  There's not a lot of cartoon humor in that.  

So we move on to the next criteria: Draco is so inhuman he deserves 
to be brutalized.  IOW, the situation calls for it. JKR *does* set 
us up to think this way initially.  Especially with Fake!Moody doing 
his hew and cry about only cowards attacking from behind.  But by 
the end of the book (and I think it's all laid out within GoF) we 
learn that a. Fake!Moody's argument was as fake as the rest of him, 
and b. even the good guys will attack from behind with the right 
provocation.
 
> >>Nora: 
> <snipped and taken from another part of the post>
> It's Barty on a nasty personal vendetta, we get from the re-
> read--but it's still Draco instigating and attacking from behind.  
> That means (for me at least) there is this undercurrent to the 
> scene the second read-through, but the urge to indulge in          
> Schadenfreude isn't eliminated because the instigation remains and 
> is not mitigated in any way.
> <snip>
> I think that degree of instigation *does* matter, even through JKR 
> does also paint the violent response as not intelligent, in many   
> cases.  Why does instigation matter so much?  It seems to have to 
> do with the skepticism towards institutions and the glorification 
> of the individual.

Betsy Hp:
And yet, Draco doesn't attack in a vacuum.  He *doesn't* instigate.  
Harry has just insulted his mother.  So Draco does have motivation, 
and rather noble motivation as well (as any schoolboy can tell 
you).  Not that Draco is pure as the driven snow.  He did insult 
Molly.  But this isn't a case of Draco launching an attack out of 
nowhere.

Interestingly enough, the twins have less of an excuse for their 
attack from behind.  It's not like Cedric was their friend, and it's 
not like Draco was interacting with them.

So again, it comes down to the argument that Draco is somehow less 
human than our heroes.  He's not allowed to love his mother as much 
as they love theirs; he's not supposed to feel pain like they feel 
pain.  And this just doesn't seem to be the direction JKR is going.  
Especially since a Death Eater was the dispenser of "justice" in 
this particular situation.

Betsy Hp, who hit enter a tad too early, so please, please ignore 
the mess that came before this post <g>