Dumbledore asking Harry to kill (Was: High Noon for OFH!Snape)

[nrenka]

No: HPFGUIDX 149510

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Jen Reese" <stevejjen at ...> 
wrote:

> Jen: That side-steps the point, though. The point is Dumbledore 
> seems to believe there are times when a person should be killed for 
> the greater good. His beliefs may be relevant to what happened on 
> the tower whether they are relevant to what Harry ends up having to 
> do or not.

I can see that point, since the meaning of the events on the Tower 
seems determined by what spin Dumbledore would put on them (if he 
weren't dead).  If it were done on orders, then it's okay--general 
fandom thinking.  (Now I wonder if anyone wants to take that argument 
on, or whether it might be confronted in the books.)

But if Dumbledore's statement to Harry that *Harry* must kill is 
brought into question, as I think it's going to be, I'm not unsure 
that his hypothetical statement of the same to Snape wouldn't be, 
too.  After all, consistency is a small virtue, but a virtue 
nonetheless.

Could JKR be retaining our impression of Dumbledore's essential 
goodness and nobility but deconstructing the facade of Lawgiver from 
on High?  I certainly think she started that in OotP and kept the 
flame very much alive in HBP, when she didn't have to.  It doesn't 
make him a 'bad person', but it does put a lot of complication into 
the usual Wise Old Mentor archetype to have him foul up in ways 
corrected by the younger generation.

> He got his message across though, what he personally believes about 
> killing, and his beliefs are the important ones here: There are 
> times when it serves a greater purpose. 

If the denoument is not centered around that principle, after we've 
been explicitly prepared for it, it would undercut it.  That 
undercutting is a strong possibility, at least from where I'm 
sitting.  YMMV.  While there are times we've been shown that it's a 
noble thing to die, I can't think of any situation so far where 
*killing* has been put into the same category.  That may have been 
the Tower, but it's hardly settled yet.

-Nora hopes for something nice and elegant above all