Humanity, Kant, Caricatures, and Draco - Perspective

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 146277

Betsy Hp wrote:
> <snip> I agree, Draco was asking for it.  And if Harry and Ron had
jumped him at this point, or if he'd lost tons of house points from
Slytherin and earned a detention to boot he'd have only himself to>
blame.  But it was beyond weird for Fake!Moody to get involved in the
manner he did.  Of course, we learn later that Fake!Moody (who loves
to attack from behind) was just looking for an excuse. <snip>

Carol responds:
Exactly. "Moody" roars,"OH NO YOU DON'T, LADDIE!" and Harry spins
around to see "Moody" pointing his wand at a white ferret and bouncing
it. As I read the scene, Draco is probably facing the same way as
Harry, who's leaving, so Draco's back is probably turned when "Moody"
attacks him, just as Harry's back was turned to Draco. (Harry's POV
makes it impossible to determine this with any certainty.) Yet he
calls Draco a coward for attacking when his opponent's back is turned
(highly hypocritical when we see what Fake!Moody does later in the
books). 

But even if Draco's back isn't turned when "Moody" attacks him, he
certainly could not have anticipated being attacked by a teacher (no
other teacher has used a spell to punish a student at this point in
the books) and "Moody," as a teacher and a supposed ex-Auror has a
distinct advantage over Draco, who can't fight back even after he's
restored to his normal form. If he dared to try (which he wouldn't,
being a coward and knowing his duelling skills to be inferior to
"Moody"'s, he'd be expelled. 

So however much Draco deserved detention in this scene, he didn't
deserve the punishment he received. This scene, for me, immediately
threw Mad-Eye's integrity or sanity or ethics into doubt, long before
I suspected that he was an imposter (certainly not Barty Jr., whom we
hadn't learned about yet). Draco may be a DE-lover and a Voldie
follower, and "Moody" may have a vendetta against Draco's DE father,
but he's revealing a moral or spiritual kinship to the DEs in this
scene, as he does again when he Imperios his own students and Crucios
the spider in front of Neville.

Crouch!Moody is a bad guy, evil through and through. He hates Draco
not because Draco's father was a DE but because he denied that he was
ever loyal to Voldemort. He hates Snape because Dumbledore got Snape
off the hook and he suspects that Snape in return is loyal to
Dumbledore. (How else could Voldie have suspected that Snape had left
him forever unless Crouch!Moody informed him of Snape's loyalties?) He
has helped to Crucio the Longbottoms into insanity; kidnapped and
Imperio'd the real Moody; Imperio'd his own father, whom he later
murders; he later Imperios Krum to force him to Crucio Cedric; he thas
transformed the TriWizard Cup into a portkey so that Wormtail can
kidnap Harry, use his blood to resurrect Voldemort, and Voldie can
kill Harry.

The whole idea of this incident, which may make the unsuspecting
reader laugh when he first reads it, is to foreshadow the evil nature
of this character. He punishes Draco for breaking the rules of fair
play by breaking them himself, not to mention breaking the rule
against using Transfiguration as a punishment.

Whether Draco deserves punishment or not is beside the point. "Moody"
should not have punished him in *that* way, even with fair warning (as
in, "If you do that again, I'll turn you into a ferret and bounce you
sky high." The scene shows Draco, the cowardly future DE, and
Crouch!Moody, the loyal DE disguised as a paranoid Auror, as kindred
spirits, with Crouch!Moody at this point by far the more evil of the two.

This is, of course, just my opinion and I expect others to disagree
violently. But just as Umbridge's punishment of Harry by having him
write lines in his own blood would be unjustified even if he were
really lying as Umbridge claims and perhaps believes, Crouch!Moody's
punishment of Draco is unjustified regardless of his infraction. He
should have lost points for Slytherin and received a warning that he'd
get detention if he did it again. That's how things are done at
Hogwarts under Dumbledore. McGonagall is right to reprimand "Moody"
and "Moody" is wholly unjustified in breaking the rules in this
instance. I'm betting that the real Mad-eye, who never killed if he
could bring a DE in alive, would not have used Transfiguration on a
helpless student, even if that student had set fire to Hogwarts.

Carol