AK and guns- both unforgivable, and sometimes necessary!

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 167169

Carol earlier:
> 
> > It's better (IMO) to be decapitated by a guillotine, clean and
quick, than to be hanged. It's better to be hanged, horrible as a
death by strangulation would be, than to be drawn and quartered.
Better to die from an AK than from a slow poison eating at your
insides or an untransformed werewolf tearing at your throat or lying
in a pool or your own blood from Sectumsempra.
> > 
> > I think that Snape chose the best and most humane means available
to him, and I think, based on his closed eyes and composed features
(he looks as if he's asleep) that Dumbledore knew that and forgave him.
> 
Pippin responded:
> AK may be painless and quick but I doubt that it's peaceful. <snip>
I think the AK is powered by more than the intent to kill. I think it
is powered by hate, and even Moody's spider could feel it. "almost as
though it knew what was coming, the third spider scuttled frantically
around the bottom of the jar, trying to evade Moody's fingers, but he
trapped it and placed it on the desk top."
> 
> Dumbledore might have been reconciled to die, but I don't think he
would be reconciled to hatred. If he had died seeing genuine hatred in
Snape's eyes would he have died in peace? <snip>

Carol responds:

First, I haven't ruled out the possibility that DD died from the
poison or that Snape "unstoppered" his death or whatever. I'm only
saying that *if* Snape is DDM (and I believe he is) and *if* killing
Dumbledore (as opposed to appearing to kill him) was the better of two
terrible options, then the AK was the most efficient, logical, and
painless way to kill him. (Do you see? I'm not saying that he did kill
him. I'm leaving the way open for your argument.)

I did not use the word "peaceful." I said that Dumbledore's eyes are
closed and he looks like he's asleep (canon, right?), which implies
that he was reconciled to his fate. There's no indication that he
feels that Snape has betrayed him--no surprise, as we see on Cedric's
face, no horror, as we see on the Riddles'. So *if* Snape killed him,
he accepts that necessity and bears him no grudge. I think he forgives
him his trespass because the alternative would have involved Harry's
death and no hope at all for the WW. (There is, of course, the
possibility that Snape didn't kill him at all, which would also
explain his composure.)

I agree that Dumbledore would not be reconciled to hatred, and I agree
that Snape didn't hate him. Again, as I've said repeatedly, I think
Snape's look of "hatred and revulsion" is actually self-hatred and
revulsion at the deed he has to do--harder to explain if he's only
faking the killing, I think. And, as many other posters also have
said, the look parallels Harry's feelings of self-hatred and repulsion
at forcing DD to drink the horrible green potion.

But I don't agree that an AK requires hatred to cast. What cause did
Fake!Moody have to hate the spider or Bellatrix to hate the fox or
Wormtail to hate Cedric or LV to hate Frank Bryce or Bertha Jorkins? I
don't think he even *hated* Lily Potter. She was just in his way.

So *if* an AK does not require hatred to cast, only the intent to kill
(as opposed to premeditated criminal intent, which is why I still
don't like using the word "intent" here--maybe "volition" is better,
and yet DDM!Snape is acting against his own will), then Dumbledore
would not have seen hatred of himself in Snape's mind. I think, given
the exchange of glances, each understood the other's thoughts and
feelings, as well as the consequences if Snape broke the vow, and
Dumbledore won, just as he won the argument in the forest.

Speaking of which, I can't find the full passage quoted on the list
despite all the references to it, so here it is again--what we have of
it, at secondhand from Hagrid:

"'Well--I jus' heard Snape sayin' Dumbledore took too much fer granted
an maybe he--Snape--didn' wan' ter do it anymore--'

"'Do what?'

"'I dunno, Harry, it seems Snape was feelin' a bit overworked, tha's
all--Dumbledore told him flat out that he'd agreed ter do it an' that
was all there was to it. Pretty firm with him. An' then he said summat
abou' Snape makin' investigations in his house, in Slytherin. Well,
there's nothin' strange abou' that!' Hagrid added hastily, as Harry
and Hermione exchanged looks full of meaning. 'All the heads o' house
were asked ter look inter that necklace business--' (HBP Am. ed. 405-06). 

I think we can safely reject Hagrid's interpretation that Snape was
feeling overworked, and whatever he promised to do and wants out of is
not the investigations into his House, which is a separate reference
and which Snape apparently continues to do or he wouldn't have been
following Draco around when Harry cast Sectumsempra. So we're back to
what Snape promised to do and now wants out of and what DD takes for
granted (that Draco can't get DEs into Hogwarts? that keeping Draco
and DD apart is sufficient?)

I *don't* think that what Snape promised to do is to fake DD's death.
I think he must have promised him that, if worse came to worst, he
would actually kill him. And now that he sees Draco still determinedly
doing whatever he's doing in the RoR and unwilling to listen to his
former mentor, Snape, Snape is starting to get worried and wants to
pull out, but DD won't let him. He promised, and that's that.

Anyway, I'm still saying that an AK does not require hatred to cast
and that, *if* Snape had to kill DD once the vow was triggered because
that's what DD thought best, because not to do so would be far worse
than doing so, then an AK was the best and most efficient way of
killing him.

I don't think DD's expression proves that Snape didn't cast an AK. It
only shows that he was satisfied with the outcome, that he did not
feel that Snape had betrayed him. I think he knew full well that Snape
did what he had to do, very much against his own will.

Carol, who again is not rejecting the hypothesis that the AK was fake,
only this particular argument against it