Maligning Lupin was Re: JKR has Mystery Writer-related to Tower Theories-long!

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 149610

Kim:
.  Though I also admit I growl at anyone who so maligns Lupin's character 
as to make him evil.  He's my hero.  But I think that when the last book 
comes out we'll all find that we are way off track.  
<snip>
> But I beg of you all to please keep on trying because your posts are a 
wonderful substitute to keep us fulfilled until the real thing comes along.  
Just do me one favor, please?  Leave Lupin alone?  Thanks.  :-)

Pippin:
::looks innocent:: You're not talking about _me_ are you? <veg> I'm
not the one saying Lupin is too weak or passive to do the right thing.
I'm not even saying he's a monster (though I'll admit I've theorized it 
in the past.) I'm saying he's made  conscious, rational, human choices 
that set morality aside. 

That's not unthinkable for a hero...plenty of people have said they'd like 
to see Dumbledore or Harry do it, especially  if morality
means protecting people like the Dursleys or Voldemort, or 
Umbridge. And the books often seem to laud rule-breaking and even
law-breaking on occasion. But one view is that rules and laws are only 
machines to help us make moral choices, and like all machines they 
can't be  expected to function perfectly in every situation. Sometimes
what they ask you to do is not right.

But knowing that what the rule or the law asks him to do *is* right,
and yet choosing not to obey it  is a choice that Lupin has made,
by his own admission, many times. I think what Rowling wants to 
show us is that the moral sense is fragile -- it can be damaged even 
before birth, as Riddle's was--but it can be damaged also by misuse. 
Ignore your principles too often and maybe they won't kick in when 
you need them.

It's true that if JKR reveals Lupin in this light it will destroy
some of our sympathy for him -- but I think JKR might be okay
with that. She's an activist, you know -- just follow the
links from her site and you'll see. I don't think she means to allow
us the luxury of feeling sorry for werewolves -- or single parents, 
or people with ms or children in cage beds. She'd rather we were 
fighting mad.

She's got no use for sympathy, IMO. Sympathy says it wishes
there was something it could do. Sympathy turns the page. It's
anger that says, "This can't go on."

Pippin