Canon for OFH!Lucius

[dungrollin]

No: HPFGUIDX 160904

> > Pippin:
> >
> > My goodness where to start...

Dung:
Tell you what, I'll have a go too, then you can pick it all apart 
and tell me why I'm wrong... Though I have to say that, 
specifically, I'm contesting SSSusan's implication that Lucius is 
more slippery than Snape, I'm not actually denying that Lucius is at 
all slippery, which it appears to me is all you (Pippin) set out to 
provide canon for, so I might appear to be unfairly disagreeing with 
you. 

Pippin:
> > After VW1, He pleaded that he was under the Imperius curse, 
> dissociating himself from his own sister-in-law who proudly went 
to Azkaban for Voldie.  

Dung:
Yes, agreed, many other DEs did so too. It was bonkers!Bella and a 
few others who'd rather have died or gone to Azkaban than renounce 
Death Eating and the Dark Lord. In this sense, yes, Lucius is self-
serving rather than loyal to Voldemort. 

However, if it was Lucius who sent Crouch and the Lestranges after 
the Longbottoms where they got caught, and if he *intended* them to 
get caught, and if he counted them as personal friends rather than 
colleagues (highly speculative, but that doesn't stop me liking the 
idea), then yes, that would be strong evidence to suggest that my 
theory of him helping Snape out is less likely than I supposed.  

Pippin:
> > He later used Voldemort's precious Diary in a scheme of his own, 
in the course of which he secretly threatened to curse the families 
of his fellow members of the Board of Governors unless they backed 
the ouster of Dumbledore.  

Dung:
Again, agreed. Self-serving, rather than loyal to a Dark Lord he 
belived dead.

Pippin:
He backed Fudge with gold  while secretly returning to 
> his DE activities, 

Dung:
Are you talking about OotP, or before Voldy's return? On whose 
orders do you think Lucius was handing out all that gold in OotP? I 
very firmly think he was doing it on Voldy's orders. Do you think 
he's sneaking around the Ministry behind Voldy's back trying to 
cushion the blow if Voldy mark II falls again? Or do you think he's 
trying to screw over other DEs? I'm not sure I'd count following 
Voldy's orders as being OFH.

Pippin:
and of course Voldemort himself labels him 'my 
> slippery friend' for using his Death Eater connections to organize 
a pleasant evening of Muggle-baiting instead of seeking the return 
of his Master.

Dung:
Voldemort does call him 'my slippery friend', but IMO it's not clear 
why. I think it refers to his claiming Imperius, I don't see why one 
has to be particularly slippery to get a group of thugs together to 
torture some powerless Muggles. In fact, Voldy seems to see that 
(keeping up the old ways) as a show of loyalty to him and Death 
Eating. On the other hand, the fact that he wasn't seeking Voldy 
o'er hill and dale is simple loss of faith and dereliction of duty, 
not slipperiness per se, isn't it? 

Pippin:
> > Snape, OTOH, may be slimy but he's not slippery. He changed 
sides, but that seems to have taken a huge effort on his part. He's 
pretty rigid, actually. 
> 

Dung:
Really? He changed sides before Godric's Hollow. He kept Voldy from 
getting the Philosopher's Stone, he called the Order when Harry et 
al. didn't come back from the forest (whether you think he called 
them late or not, he still called them to the MoM and their arrival 
compromised a whole load of his supposed friends - Lucius included). 
And after all this, he *still* managed to worm his way back into 
Voldemort's good graces *and* kept Dumbledore on-side, and utterly 
unsuspicious. He then throws the whole lot up in the air by 
murdering Dumbledore and spiriting the setter of the trap (Draco) 
away to safety. 

If Lucius were as slippery as Snape, I very much doubt that he would 
be sitting in Azkaban now. We do mean the same thing by slippery, 
don't we? Difficult to pin down, able to "slither out of action" <g>.

> Neri:
> Hmmm, it seems to me that you don't compare Lucius and Snape on 
equal footing here. You compare Canon!Lucius against DDM!Snape. No 
wonder you find that Lucius is more OFH. That's basically managing 
to prove what you were assuming from the outset.
> 
> If you want to be fair to Lucius you need to compare Canon!Lucius 
> against Canon!Snape. In this case killing Dumbledore would hardly 
> appear "rigid" of Snape. Nor backing Fudge when he wanted to 
execute Sirius. Nor avoiding any responsibility (from both sides!) 
to the DoM fiasco. Quite slippery, in fact.
> 

Dung:
Agreed, absolutely; but I think that even DDM!Snape is more slippery 
than Lucius. And I still don't see that having avoided his duty to 
Voldemort on a couple of occasions makes Lucius unable to look out 
for those of his DE friends who also look out for him.

Dungrollin
Still insisting that there's canon to suggest Lucius's loyalty to 
Voldy has wavered, but none to suggest he's happy to betray his DE 
friends.