Harry's mistakes (was What Harry "knows")/Why Sirius Had To Die/Petunia's Ey

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 169902

> > Sherry:
> > Did you forget about Draco in HBP?  Because Harry had a gut 
feeling,
> and he
> > was sure right!  It's the turning point, where Harry is right, 
and now
> > nobody will believe him, instead of the tired boring, Harry is
> always wrong.
> > it's time for Harry, the *hero* to be right.

> colebiancardi:
> 
> Harry is always willing to suspect Draco - they've been at each 
other
> since the beginning.  He notices that Draco drops out of Quidditch,
> that Draco is becoming pale and withdrawn, that Draco is acting in 
a
> secretive manner.  Also, Harry did spy on Draco on the train to
> Hogwarts, so he "knew" something was up with Draco, due to the
> conversation that Draco had with his cronies.  If it wasn't for 
that,
> I don't know if Harry would have tailed Draco with such 
determination
> thru-out the year.

Magpie:
Right, it doesn't start on a gut feeling--he sees and hears that 
Draco is doing something. He's not assuming things he doesn't know.

Though at the same time, this *is* a case where Harry's instinct is 
better than other people's because of something he understands, and 
I don't think that's completely unheard of for Harry. He's 
not "always wrong" as people are saying. He had a feeling Snape 
hated him the first day and he was right, for instance. 

In this case, Harry is right about Draco not just because of the 
facts that he sees but because he is in a position where this time 
Harry's experience gives him more insight. He understands Voldemort, 
knows he doesn't care how old Draco is, and he also understands the 
kind of situation Draco is in in ways that the other characters 
don't. (It even harkens back to PoA when Ron and Hermione were 
amazed that Harry was "listening to Malfoy" about Sirius Black when 
Harry said "Malfoy knows..." Harry does have a nose for certain 
things and an understanding of certain things that other characters 
don't--every character has more instinctual understanding of 
feelings that they kind of share.)

colebiancardi: 
> If you are referring to Draco's last stand, where Harry *knew* that
> Draco wasn't going to kill DD, again, Harry observed the wavering 
and
> the lowering of the wand.  The DE's then entered, so we will never
> *know* if Harry was correct in that observation (although I 
believe he
> was), but again, that wasn't a gut feeling - he saw Draco's 
actions.

Magpie:
Harry actually doesn't say he "knew" that Malfoy wouldn't have 
killed Dumbledore. He perhaps significantly uses Dumbledore's 
term: "believe." The quote is:

"His animosity was all for Snape, but he had not forgotten the fear 
in Malfoy's voice on that Tower top, nor the fact that he had 
lowered his wand before the other Death Eaters arrived. Harry did 
not believe that Malfoy would have killed Dumbledore. He despised 
Malfoy still for his infatuation with the Dark Arts, but now the 
tiniest drop of pity mingled with his dislike. Where, Harry 
wondered, was Malfoy now, and what was Voldemort making him do under 
threat of killing him and his parents?"

So Harry thinks of the facts first, and those are the fear in 
Malfoy's voice and that he *saw* him lower his wand. He now 
*believes* that Malfoy would not have killed Dumbledore. It's a gut 
feeling, but he acknowledges it as such. He's using Dumbledore's 
term. He believes it--and this has led him to see Malfoy's situation 
very differently than he had at the beginning of the year. Now he 
sees the situation from Malfoy's pov, from the eyes of someone who 
is not a killer but is being threatened to do things that are not of 
his own desire under threat of killing him and his family.

This, I think, is the opposite of the sort of thing we're talking 
about, where Harry "will never forgive Snape--never!" or where he 
says, "The hat wants all the houses to be friends?", looks at Malfoy 
at the Slytherin table and says "Fat chance." Harry is now open to 
more possibilities and uncertainty.

colebiancardi:> 
> The reason why I like Harry - despite all the times he is wrong, he
> still manages to get the job done.  Although, it seems, that his 
some
> of his actions in one book opens up another can of worms that 
keeps us
> thru the series - such as saving Wormtail from the hands of Sirius 
and
> Remus.

Magpie:
Exactly--I think this is in many ways the basis for the victory in 
the books. Harry and the kids in his generation will make plenty of 
mistakes, but will learn enough in time, and make the kind of 
mistakes, that will lead to victory (at least some--I don't think 
every mistake is just a good thing, some they may have to fix or 
live with). While the adults are important to the plot, they also 
will probably eventually just have to get out of the way. I think 
this is particularly true in the Cabinet Plot. Would it have been 
better, for instance, if Draco confided in Snape about his plan? In 
the short-term and superficially, of course! Assuming Snape was DDM, 
if Draco had told him the plan Snape would have just headed him off 
at the pass. Draco would have been neutralized, perhaps ultimately 
packed off to witness protection, and Dumbledore would not have 
faced the DEs on the Tower. But I believe (heh) that in the end it 
will probably work out far more for the best what they really got--a 
Draco that went through everything he did right up until the end and 
then couldn't just accept protection.

Debbie:
Dumbledore states that Harry inherited the house because Sirius 
named him in his will, not because Harry is some sort of heir at law 
under some sort of convoluted analysis of the tapestry (the version 
JKR wrote with Charlus Potter on it). In any event, Harry is not 
literally a Black through the male line, so this only works 
symbolically based on Sirius' choice of Harry as heir. I think 
that's what you meant, but wanted to clarify.

Magpie:
Yes, that's exactly what I meant. Harry inherits the family because 
he and Sirius are family through love and through Sirius' choice of 
Heir. Harry isn't a Black by blood (at least in any significant way 
as far as we know, whatever Potters might show up on the Tapestry). 
Harry and Sirius became family through James and the events we 
learned about first in PoA. 

Debbie:
Sirius is much more like his family than he would like to admit. We 
witness his mother railing against the enemies of pureblood 
domination -- mudbloods and blood traitors and the like -- but it 
isn't substantially different from the way Sirius rails against his 
own family, or Crouch Sr. or anyone else on his enemies list.

Magpie:
I love the moments where Sirius sort of has these little snob echoes 
in what he does--like specifically, when he's telling Snape not to 
do something in Grimmauld Place which is "his house, you see," he 
does it while addressing the ceiling. 

Debbie:
But that's an aside. The main point I have here is that, rather than 
simply uncovering Black family secrets (although there are clearly 
horcrux secrets to be discovered) I see Harry's pureness of heart as 
a cleansing or purification agent of the pureblood tendencies of 
12GP itself. The Order taking over was not enough to scrub it clean 
of dark influences. Only Harry can do that, just as only Harry can 
defeat Voldemort.

Magpie:
I would even go further and say it was a mistake to try to scrub it 
clean. Harry describes them as "making war" on the house, a war 
Sirius fully supports, and the house is fighting back from 
being "cleansed" in a way that pretty much wants the whole family 
wiped out. I think there needs to be more healing in the family in 
order to drive out the dark influences--learning on the side that 
supports it, and willingness to accept them if they do. 

Ken:

Not so fast. "She is a Muggle, but—[Laughter]." What *was* JKR
laughing about???

We do have the example that Merope gave up her powers at the end or
lost them to traumatic shock. I have to agree with Debi, 
Deeoblockedo. and some others that it is at least possible that 
Petunia too was a witch. Her dislike of witchcraft seems intense and 
deep. It might be a native personality trait, not a reaction to 
Lily. 

Magpie:
How can it be possible that she was a witch when she is a Muggle? 
Never has and never will do magic. If she is a witch she has done 
magic and she is not a Muggle. Refusing to go to school does not 
make you a Muggle or take away your magic. Harry (and all the kids) 
did magic before they went to school. Hagrid can do magic despite 
being expelled.

JKR:
So where's the indiscretion? Is it hiding behind that pair of buts?

Magpie:
Well, she could be "squib-like" in that she knows stuff about the WW 
despite not being able to do magic. At least I think that fits what 
she says without flat-out saying she's lying, which is what she is 
doing if she's saying Petunia is a Muggle when what she really means 
is that she's a Witch.

-m (who also notes that Merope Gaunt was no more ever a Squib than 
Neville ever was--Squibs don't blow things up accidentally--and is 
hoping that if any Squibs do magic it will be Filch)