Moody's death/In Defense of Scrimgeour - Authority

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 179544

--- "lizzyben04" <lizzyben04 at ...> wrote:
>
> > Pippin:
> > The Ministry had made it an imprisonable offense to 
> > transport Harry from Privet Drive by apparation, portkey 
> > or Floo powder. I speculate Scrimgeour's motive for wanting
> > Harry trapped was to force him to endorse his regime. <snip>

> > a_svirn:
> > This is the whole conspiracy theory you spin. Don't you 
> > think you are  casting slurs on the memory of a brave man, 
> > who wanted the same thing as Harry had, and died heroically
> > without betraying Harry's whereabouts even under torture? 
> 
> lizzyben:
> 
> ... trying to remember what was so awful about Scrimgeour. 
> Didn't he want Harry to be involved in the Ministry's fight 
> against Voldemort? ...he said that Harry the hero's 
> involvement would lift people's spirits & give them hope. 
> And of course, Harry self-righteously rejects this ...
> After DD's funeral, Scrimgeour again attempts ...& Harry cuts
> him off ..., ... & again asks him to release Stan Shunpike. 
> At the time, I was self-righteously nodding along w/Harry - 
> you tell that Scrimgeour! Stand up to authority! 
> 

bboyminn:

Well several people have made some valid points, including,
much to my surprise, Mike, so while good small points are
being made, I think more important larger points are being
ignored.

For one, Scrimgeuor was NOT asking Harry to join him in
fighting Voldemort. He was asking Harry to help him create
the perception that the Ministry was doing a good job,
which they absolutely were not.

That is the problem with politics in the real world today,
everything is about perception and nothing is about substance.
Even the News is not so much about truth as it is about
validating preferred perceptions.

Scrimgeour wasn't asking Harry to help in the substantial
efforts of the Ministy, he was asking Harry to help him 
create the false preception that the Ministry was doing 
good, when if fact, they were making the most insubstantial
and ineffective effort.  

When ever this subject comes up, I'm reminded of the 
'Bartimaeus Trilogies', most noticably in 'Golem's Eye'. 
The hero, of sorts, John Mandrake works in Magical Law
Enforcement which is a collection of wizards who are 
bend on positive perception. That is, they spend their 
time crushing their colleagues and ignoring the problem,
while trying desperately to make themselves look good.
It is all about status; it's all about perception over
substance. Not only does it remind me of the HP-Ministry, 
but it reminds me of the DE's.

The hero solves the problem because he is the only one
working on it, 'The Ministry' is spending all it's time
trying to make each other look bad, and themselves better
by comparison.

Notice the the Ministry is never anywhere to be found in
any of the final battles, or if they do arrive, it is far
too late. Yet Harry IS there, because he is actually 
searching for the answers and trying to find the culprit.

Also, notice that when the time came, the Ministry tumbled
like a house made of tissue paper. They were gone and 
thoroughly corrupted and co-opted in a blink. If they
were creating substantial efforts rather than perception,
they might have stood a chance.

So, the heart of the Harry Potter story is not about defying
Authority, that's not the lesson at all. It is about knowing
when to defy authority, and this is a very critical lesson 
for kids to learn. 

Further I think most kid readers could see that the Ministry
was a flawed and ineffective organization. If it had been
left up to them, the resident authority, the wizard world
would have been lost. Harry won, not by joining the Ministry,
but by actually following the clues, solving the problem,
and fighting the good fight regardless of what impression
that left on the Ministry or the public. Again, the fight
is not about looking good, it's about winning. A lesson
the Ministry would do well to learn.

Generally, we tell kids to obey adults (teachers, parents, 
elders, policemen, firemen, etc...) but we do them a great 
disservice if we do not also teach them that there are times 
when the right thing to do is to NOT obey adults, to not yield
to authority. When an adult says 'get in my car, and I'll give 
you candy', 'come with me and I'll show you a puppy', or anyone
one of several common lines. Good sweet children who are 
rigidly train to ALWAYS obey adults are in deep trouble. Those
who are taught that sometimes authority must be disobey, are 
going to be alright. 

> lizzyben:
>
> Except Harry was really just submitting to another authority
> all  along - Dumbledore's authority. ... He also says that 
> DD's been "very protective" & hasn't allowed Harry to meet 
> w/anyone after the OOTP fiasco. Srimgeour implies that DD 
> has kept Harry from any other officials who might want his 
> support or might want to gather more information about LV.
> 

bboyminn:

While Dumbledore is protecting Harry from clearly corrupt, 
self-serving, and ineffective Ministry, that does not mean that
Dumbledore is not keeping the Ministry informed. At Harry's
hearing, Fudge mentions a tale about 'the reversal of time'
which implies that Dumbledore gave him an account of what
happened in Prisoner of Azkaban. There are several other hints
that the Ministry is aware of events that have happened to
Harry over the course of the years. So, it is not like he
is keeping them totally in the dark.

Yes, there are secrets Dumbledore is holding, such as, as 
Mike pointed out, Dumbledore not telling people about the
Horcruxes. But as we all know the Ministry is worse than
a leaky cauldron, it is more like a colander. If you tell 
them a secret, you might as well publish it in the paper,
and that doesn't bode well for the plan. It is essential
that Voldemort NOT KNOW that people are aware of his
Horcruxes for as long as possible.

It is also important to keep the information away from 
Voldemort so he won't change his pattern. He has hidden the
Horcruxes under a certain premise; notable places, places
that are significant to him. If he had know, he would have
moved them to more random places, places that had no
discernible logic which would have made them impossible
to find. It would have also encourage other Dark Wizards
to do the same, which would have made the task much harder.

Dumbledore kept the secret because he is actually trying to
solve the problem, the Ministry would not have kept the 
secret because all they are trying to create is a positive
though thoroughly false perception. Personally, I'd rather
win than look good. 

I think Scrimgeour was a basically good guy, and was grateful
and impressed when he went down without betraying Harry. But
I think he spent too many years as a bureaucrat in a political
organization. I think, once becoming Minster, politics and
impression became more important than results. 

But then, that's just my opinion.

Steve/bboyminn