Being Good and Evil ( Draco and a bit of Ron)/Harry as DD man

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 154663

> >>Magpie:
> > Some of these things he would hear about and, with the bias he   
> > has, and be unlikely to look at them the way we do.  He's not   
> > sitting off detached and making a rational judgment, he's       
> > reacting in the moment to different knocks and jolts.  We are, I 
> > think, dealing with a kid far more influenced by his emotions    
> > about the people involved. Which is not supposed to be an excuse 
> > for his behavior either, it's just not surprising.

> >>Alla:
> See, the funny thing is that the way you put it, I do not have    
> much disagreement with you again. :)
> I think I was reacting to Betsy statement ( I think and I hope I   
> do not misinterpret it) that Draco does not see the good things   
> that good guys do, that good guys do bad things and Draco, poor   
> dear cannot distinguish between them or something ( again, Betsy   
> please correct me if I am wrong)
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
I hope I wasn't *quite* as condescending to Draco as that <g>, but I 
am pretty much saying what you agree with above, Alla.  Draco is 
coming at the world with a certain set of values and a very strong 
love for his parents, and I think it's expecting too much of Draco 
to expect him to suddenly say, for example, in GoF "Oh, Father is 
being cruel to those muggles.  Father *must* be evil.  I will now 
disavow Father and everything he stands for and flee to Dumbledore's 
side!"

And I look to Harry's response to the twins toying with their chosen 
muggle to back up the argument that the person doing the action 
*will* affect how that action is perceived.  Yes, it's morally more 
mature, I think, to look at the action and divorce it from your 
emotional feelings about the people involved.  But it's *hard*.  And 
for some reason Draco is expected to make this massive leap, but 
Harry is not. 

Though I'm also pointing out that the "good guys" are not actually 
shining examples of goodness (especially the students).  They aren't 
really all that good at recruiting people to their side.  I think 
Luna is their only real recruit (based on who was fighting at the 
end of HBP) and Luna *does* have the ability to divorce emotion from 
her judgements.  

I don't think they're really *trying* to recruit people (well, 
Hermione may have been, but she blew it) but once again I don't see 
how Draco could have looked to them and said, "Ah, these are the 
people who are on the right side of things."  There's not a moment 
in canon that I can think of where the Trio (or anyone, really) 
offered Draco an alternative.  Not until the Tower, anyway.

Not that I'm saying Draco is dependent on the Trio for acheiving his 
own moral maturity.  I just disagree with the idea that Draco should 
have realized he was evil because he was around the goodness of 
Harry.  If anything, because of the rivalry between Draco and Harry, 
Draco would naturally shed *away* from anything Harry was a part 
of.  So that's two obstacles standing in Draco's way: his love for 
his family and his dislike for Harry.  

So now Draco is having to realize that he must choose a path based 
on his *own* sense of right and wrong, not one formed by the 
positive influence of his parents (they went this way, so I will 
too) or the negative influence of Harry (he went that way, so I must 
go another).  If Draco does gain the ability to think and choose for 
himself than he'll have gained something that Harry is, at this 
point, still missing.  Which is why I think Harry will be forced 
into a similar position via DDM!Snape.

> >>Alla:
> What you are saying makes total sense to me - Draco reacts often 
> based on his emotions, BUT again it is not the same as to say that 
> he sees bad things - he is unable to distinguish between them,    
> sure, and your reasons seem plausible to me , especially since you 
> do not state them as an excuse.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
For me I *do* see Draco showing a certain discomfort over his 
father's activities (or the activities of his father's colleagues).  
I think Elkins is the one who pointed out Draco's almost feverish 
state whenever something bad is going down.  Which is why I think 
that when Draco *does* start to question he turns it more to himself 
(I'm weak if this bothers me) than to his beloved father. 

> >>Magpie:
> > I'm not saying that he has no personal responsibility for what   
> > he does because of his family, but rather saying that you can't 
> > understand his actions without taking that into account. I just 
> > don't see anything that should have forced Draco to reflect upon 
> > this stuff earlier at all. In every book before HBP there's some 
> > reference to the fact that death isn't even real for Draco, much 
> > less something he's reflecting upon.  It becomes real for him in 
> > HBP.  Sure it would have been great for him to have reacted to 
> > Cedric's death by changing sides, but it doesn't bother me that 
> > he didn't.

Betsy Hp:
I think it would have been unrealistic for Draco to change sides at 
that moment.  Epecially since he's close to his parents.  It seemed 
pretty obvious to me that Draco *was* shaken by Cedric's death (that 
scene on the train ride home just screams "boy on the edge" to me).  
But who is he going to turn to to ask, why?  Who is Draco going to 
depend on to help him get a handle on what happened there?  His 
family of course.

I *like* the fact that JKR made sure Draco wasn't a second Sirius, 
just looking for a reason to rebel.  That would have been the easy 
way out, IMO.  Instead Draco has to go through this horrible process 
of realizing that his father *isn't* a god among men.  That Lucius 
may have made a terrible choice that actually *endangered* his 
family (a massive Slytherin no-no, I think) rather than ensured 
their survival. 

> >>Magpie:
> > I find the character a lot more compelling the way he's 
> > written.  Had he changed sides earlier, in fact, we would lose a 
> > lot of the punch of his personal responsibility because he would 
> > just have been an observer on the sidelines.  Who cares which    
> > way the Malfoy kid leans unless the Malfoy kid is a player?

Betsy Hp:
I agree. :)

> >>Alla:
> What you say about him changing when stakes went up makes sense,   
> BUT I would love for JKR to drop me a SIGN, small sign that Draco 
> is not totally bad. I mean one can argue that there were signs  in 
> earlier books, but I did not see any.
> What I mean by signs would be, I don't know, Harry noticing a     
> tinge of guilt in Malfoy's eyes when he hears about Buckbeak      
> execution, for example.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Mm, but that wouldn't have made sense for the character.  For one, 
death isn't real for Draco at this point.  For another, Draco is no 
where around when Buckbeak is about to be killed.  So there's not a 
moment where he could have had a "final realization" to feel guilty 
over.

> >>Alla:
> Or in the similar fashion narrator noticing that Malfoy was a bit 
> upset when he hears about Cedric's death.

Betsy Hp:
For me it's the quivering smirk. [GoF scholastic hardback p.729]  
Too small? <g>  It is more than we get from either Harry or Hermione 
over poor Marietta's fate. <eg>

Betsy Hp