[HPforGrownups] Re: Bathroom Scene - A Different Perspective

[Magpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 165138

>> Magpie:
> <SNIP>
>> Hey, I'm "okay with it" too. I'm not horrified by Harry in the
> scene. I
>> liked Draco being sliced up (we Draco fans often love our
> hurt/comfort).
>> And I don't have to pretend Harry was afraid of being insane to be
> okay with
>> it either, which I don't think he was at all.
>
> Alla:
>
> Pretend? I would say that assumption that Harry was horrified that
> he would become insane after knowing what he was tortured at
> Graveyard and what happened to Longbottoms has more canon support
> that he was not.

Magpie:
I think that's intentionally exaggerating Harry's feelings. He's afraid of 
Crucio as we've always seen it, he hasn't developed a fear of insanity from 
it. Crucio's thrown around a lot in the books, including by Harry, and it 
doesn't mean insanity. Harry's thrown Crucio in the same state of mind as 
Draco has before and he's never been intending to drive the person insane 
either.

> Magpie:
> <SNIP>
>> Maybe I want to analyze that a bit beyond "Harry's a great kid so
> of course
>> he feels badly at hurting someone...even if he was totally
> justified and it
>> was all Malfoy's fault and the detentions are totally unfair!"
>>
>
> Alla:
>
> That is your right, but if your analysis reaches a conclusion that
> Harry had an intent to hurt Draco beyond defending himself against
> enemy, some people (me) would continue to disagree with that and I
> do not think I should not do so as well.

Magpie:
It seems more like going into that first part of the sentence, "Harry had an 
intent to hurt Draco..." for any reason is too much--if it reaches any 
conclusion other than Harry is good and it was good Draco got hurt and it 
doesn't matter that Draco got hurt. As long as one treats Sectumsempra as if 
it were a stunning spell it's okay.

Julie:
I believe it was the same thing with McGonagall. She lectured Harry about 
the bathroom incident, and told him he could have been expelled because *he* 
is the one whose character matters. What's it to her if Draco ruins his 
life? She might feel a passing twing of pity for  him, but he's not her 
problem or her concern. For her it's not about  Draco, it's about Harry. Let 
Draco drown kittens, but Harry better not look
crossways or she'll be all over him.

Magpie:
I don't think I'd judge McGonagall that harshly. She's a teacher and I don't 
think she wants any kids falling into a pit. So I doubt she's just given up 
on Draco and would be fine with him destroying himself--she finds her places 
to deal with Draco like any other student who's under her care. Snape, as 
his Head of House, is the one to deal with him on this, though, and Harry's 
not seeing what was said to him. I would guess Snape read him the riot act 
too, and probably used his own injuries against him to do it too.

For me, I don't think it's always a case of just holding the good guys to a 
higher standard, though that's part of it. It's also dealing with whatever 
issues a particular character is dealing with. There's far more things in 
canon that I would point to and say are being done wrong by Draco than I 
would be Harry, but they don't always come with an obvious way of 
improvement since he's a supporting character and we just don't see him the 
same way. All there is to say about it is "That's bad" with little to say 
about improvement. And often talking about why the character might be doing 
such a thing is considered giving the character a free pass anyway, maybe 
because to understand is to forgive and only good guys earn forgiveness, I 
don't know.

Like with Snape, of course he should grow up and stop picking on a kid half 
his age because he reminds him of his father, whom he hated. But there's 
very few scenes in canon where we see any real possibility of Snape learning 
that, so it's just a given that Snape does this bad thing consistently. Same 
with Draco's picking on Harry. It's something he does wrong, but to stop it 
he's probably going to have to deal with different issues first.  So when 
there's a scene where it seems like he might be able to deal with those 
issues, people pounce on that. Likewise when Snape does stuff that seems 
like it could be his road to becoming a better person, they pounce on that. 
More often they're left with thinking about how Harry can deal with the 
situation better.

I'm not saying nobody ever takes the position that the bad guys are right in 
any situation--that happens all the time. Identifying with a bad guy in a 
scene is sometimes going to happen, just as identifying with the good guy 
is, and when it does happen people probably aren't going to be moved by 
people saying they're identifying wrong.

Alla:
Thrown all over the place? I seem to remember Harry thrown them twice before 
that bathroom scene with no adults AFAIR knowing about it. For all I know if 
anybody knew about it, Harry would have ended up just there.

Magpie:
So Harry--our hero--has thrown them twice,with no repercussions whatsoever 
and no thoughts of Azkaban. My point being that a) Harry certainly doesn't 
consider them so off-limits that he would never throw one himself. He throws 
them without even thinking about possible life in prison and b) in terms of 
it driving people crazy, we see it thrown a lot without having that 
effect--Voldemort uses them all the time, and both Harry and Neville have 
been hit with them. Draco's attempt to cast it in the bathroom is treated 
with far more seriousness both in terms of its potential effects and its 
guarantee of a lifetime in jail than any other Crucio in canon.


Alla:

Harry **thought** he was having true Crucio thrown at him? Harry did not let 
him finish the way I read it, so as far as I know Harry has himself to thank 
for that he responded when Draco was still saying
the spell and shut him up right away.

Magpie:
What's the matter with saying Harry thought he had one being thrown at him? 
I said, quite reasonably imo, that we have seen a teenaged boy try to throw 
Crucio and apparently not really "mean it" in the correct way to throw one 
for real. So the same could have been happening here, and we don't know that 
Draco was able to cast one. I then went on to say that from Harry's pov it 
is a real Crucio, period. I said that to specifically avoid this accusation 
that I'm saying that Harry isn't reacting to getting a real Crucio at him 
and is supposed to take into consideration that Draco might not be 
capable--which I am not saying. Why am I not surprised we're back to it 
anyway? Yes, Harry thought it was a true Crucio. He can't *know* because it 
wasn't completed and we've seen teenaged boys throw Crucios in the heat of 
anger and be told they didn't "mean it."  My mistake for thinking about what 
might be going on with Draco for a second, there, as if he's a character 
too.

Alla:

Since Longbottoms are the **only** victims of longterm Crucio I seem to 
remember in canon, I'd say they are supposed to be an example of what 
happens, not an exception to the rule. IMO of course.

Magpie:
The Longbottoms are the only victms of *longterm* Crucio. We have plenty of 
victims of just plain Crucio, which is what most people throw. Why are you 
leaping to this being a longterm Crucio? The circumstances all indicate 
otherwise. Plain vanilla Crucio isn't enough for Harry in this scene?

Alla:

So, what does that mean if not underrestimating the effects of 
Unforgiveable? Thanks to Harry, Draco Crucio ended up in nothing, it could 
have ended totally different.

Magpie:
It could have ended in a blast of great temporary pain for Harry, yes.

Alla:
Oh, and yes Harry still fought Voldemort after the Crucio. Harry is also the 
only person who is still living after AK. I hardly think that is the reason 
to think that AK effects are less deadly now.

Magpie:
It's possible to OVERestimate the effects of a curse to, which I don't think 
Harry is doing, since one would think that Harry protecting himself from 
Crucio was enough. Harry has gotten up after Crucio, so has Neville, so has 
every single person we've ever seen be Crucio'd except for the Longbottoms 
who were subjected to Crucio in a different way than its used every other 
time we see it used, a way that probably required a lot of things that Draco 
does not have in this scene. Draco's using it the same way Harry uses it.


-m