Harry using Crucio

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 174693

Geoff:
> We are all like this; we all have moments which we wish we could 
> remove from our experience. I think I lean towards Dennis Grant's 
> view that Harry is a figurehead for humanity – not for good as 
Magpie 
> suggests. I have argued on many occasions that  he cannot be Christ 
> or a Christ figure but is an everyman, in whom I think we all see a 
> little of ourselves. As a result we see the best – and the worst – 
of 
> Harry and his friends. This is what makes him so believable as a 
> character and one reason why I like him so much. He isn't the  
> squeaky-clean type who never puts a foot wrong. He is flawed like 
> everybody else. He makes mistakes because he is rash; because he 
> is tired; because he ignores advice and goes his own sweet way.

Magpie:
Actually, I think Dennis Grant's reply to me made it seem like I was 
suggesting something I wasn't. I only said "good" meaning the 
relative good of the good vs. evil in the books. Harry is the 
figurehead of the good side, and even in saying that he is a 
figurehead for humanity, that means the same thing. He's the person 
we're looking at as our hero.

This does not mean I'm asking him to be perfect at all--he can make 
mistakes, even bad ones. But as I said, the trouble isn't that he 
makes mistakes but if they're presented as such, and since Harry 
doesn't struggle, but rather is presented as a human with 
*exceptionally* good instincts for good who never has any moments 
where I see him really looking at his own behavior and being humbled, 
it doesn't seem like he's a very good figurehead for humanity or the 
good side either. I don't think he's that great of an everyman--not 
because he makes mistakes, but because of the way he seems to deal 
with mistakes, or how his mistakes are dealt with. 

He begins to sound more like a private fantasy to me, in the end, I 
mean the type of character who's satisfying because he gets to 
indulge in all sorts of fantasies of being better than everyone you 
hate or getting back at people...but then he's also the guy kicking 
the butt of evil because of the context. 

In terms of the Crucio, it seems many people have said that what 
disturbs them in the scene isn't that Harry uses the curse--it's not 
even the first time he's tried it. It's that it's suddenly presented 
as a cheap feel-good moment. Harry doesn't regret it or take it 
seriously. That, to me, adds to the idea that there's just something 
kind of shallow about the fantasy here. Harry is almost always 
presented as being in the morally correct position, even when some of 
us think he's going to get a wake-up call. And yet even sometimes, 
like in the Sectumsempra scene you quoted, it feels flat, like 
Harry's said the words that show he's a good guy yet the actual 
issues that one might expect needed to be dealt with aren't. That's 
more about the story than Harry, but still, in the end it doesn't 
feel like Harry needs to worry much at all even about that. Again, 
this isn't blaming Harry. Is Harry's mistake with Sectumsempra even 
really dealt with as a terrible choice that actually effects him? I 
don't think so at all. 

Geoff:
 They wanted to test 
> him because the law stated that stoning was the punishment for a 
crime 
> like this. Jesus waited a while and then said "Let him who is 
without sin 
> throw the first stone". They all crept away leaving the woman on 
her own. 
> Their consciences had pricked them. We are quick to point the 
finger at
> other folk when we might well take the same route if we were in 
their
> position, however moral that may be. And I think the intelligent 
reader
> will see that in the story and take note.

Magpie:
We're not actually pointing the finger at anybody, though. This is a 
fictional character and we're analyzing the story for what it says 
and what we're being shown as a hero. I think that's completely 
different than judging a regular person or condeming them. As I think 
others have said, as wise as the advice might be to say we should 
look at moments where Harry does the wrong thing in, say, the Crucio 
scene and remember that we might have made that mistake too, Harry 
actually isn't presented as having made a mistake *at all,* and 
that's the issue. If Harry made a mistake and JKR was exploring the 
effect of the mistake on him and the world, I don't think there would 
be a problem. People wonder why it isn't. There are times when I've 
read things about this scene that actually seem to be just pulling 
everything down to Harry's level so that Harry's still on top--or 
else any idea that Harry was ever supposed to be better than average 
was not canon. This is a surprising way to be speaking about the hero 
of a series like this after it's over, imo. (And even when Harry is 
presented as having a mistake, it often isn't that serious--not even 
as serious as I expect it to be reading. Like, he feels less bad 
about it than he feels badly about getting kicked off Quidditch in 
the scheme of things. Maybe for plot reasons, but still.

Geoff:> 
> Harry is not a Christ figure. He's not a plaster saint. 
He's "Harry. Just Harry."

Magpie:
He does seem to my admittedly not that educated about the subject 
eyes, to be one of the Elect. Even in his own world he isn't "just 
Harry" to anybody, and he's long since stopped seeing himself as one 
of the masses-not that he ever was that. Even at the Dursleys he was 
special. He's quite often praised in the books as being exceptional. 

-m