Hagrid and Draco / Why Dumbledore did not ask Snape to kill him

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 166139

> > Magpie:
> > After six books of very consistent Hagrid, I just can't conceive 
of 
> > how he would become a significantly better teacher if he hadn't 
had 
> > a run-in with the Malfoys in PoA and if only he'd had a mentor. 
> He'd 
> > be different if everything was different, but so would everyone. 
> 
> Alla:
> 
> I absolutely can conceive of that happening. That is no guarantee, 
> for sure, but what I had saw on that lesson was Hagrid being 
> enthusiastic and genuinely wanting to teach ( mistakes and all), I 
do 
> see him losing his enthusiasm **after** that lesson. I think it is 
> conceivable that it influenced him that much.

> If what Luna said was before that lesson, I would have given it 
more 
> weight, but for all I know that lesson indeed traumatised Hagrid 
that 
> badly that he gave up.

Magpie:
I don't think he gave up. Luna is speaking in OotP, where Hagrid is 
still teaching away making the Trio as uncomfortable as ever for the 
same reasons. Sure he's not as enthusiastic as he was on the first 
day, but most teachers probably aren't. 

Alla:> 
> Should he gave up that fast? Of course not IMO. Should he let 
> Malfoy's family to get under his skin that much? Not IMO again and 
> maybe indeed that means that he does not have a stamina to be a 
> teacher in Hogwarts, but that does not mean that what Malfoys did 
did 
> not hurt Hagrid a lot. IMO.

Magpie:
We can speculate that it did--we know Hagrid doesn't like the family 
and certainly he was upset at the whole ordeal. But if he really did 
just give up as a teacher that first year because of it then no, he 
shouldn't be a teacher and that's due to his own issues. Though I 
don't see him giving up. Sixth year he's trying to guilt Harry about 
not taking his class and Harry's having none of it. Fifth year Harry 
wishes he were more popular than he is. Fourth year, iirc, there's a 
marked difference between Hagrid losing interest due to the Rita 
Skeeter articles and confident Hagrid who wants everybody to come 
after school to look at the Skrewts he enjoys showing them.

> Magpie:
> > I don't see self-confidence as always being a problem with 
Hagrid, 
> > though where it is it's in a way that's consistent since Book I. 
It 
> > was bad luck for him that the student that got injured had a 
parent 
> > who would want the animal destroyed)
> 
> Alla:
> 
> I think bad luck for Hagrid was that said student came to the 
lesson 
> from the start with the intent to sabotage that lesson.

Magpie:
Whatever Draco may or may not have come to the class to do, there's 
no sabotage plot uncovered in canon. He's muttering to his friend 
when Hagrid says the thing about insulting Buckbeak and whether he 
was muttering about how to ruin the class or not (as Harry imagines) 
he follows the directions he's heard well enough and there's no 
indication he insults Buckbeak in order to get himself hurt. That 
would be a bit much. If I'm looking for a student who actually 
sabotages a lesson I'm going to have to go with something more 
clearly sabotage, like Harry throwing a firecracker into another 
student's cauldron to create a distraction. Having a kid in your 
class who's predisposed to be resistant to you as a teacher is I 
think pretty standard for a new teacher. The way Hagrid set up the 
class it didn't need sabotage.

Alla:
> 
> I think bad luck for Hagrid was that said student was erm 
> exaggerating his injury for whole year to help Lucius make sure 
that 
> Hagrid will be fired and Buckbeak as you said destroyed.

> Magpie:
> (I don't think Draco's milking 
> > of the incident mattered to him one way or the other--I think 
most 
> > of the kids there were far more influenced by what they saw than 
> > anything else), but years later it's Draco whose behavior has 
> > directly changed due to what actually happened. He's still 
> > insulting, but he's also jumpy and makes sure to listen to 
> > everything Hagrid says--Hagrid won, after all, didn't he?
> 
> Alla:
> 
> Um, Draco's milking accident did not matter to Hagrid? 

Magpie:
I don't think it mattered that much. It may have annoyed Hagrid, but 
not as it would if, say, he was worried about Draco. He's worried 
about Buckbeak. I don't think he's much bothered by Draco's wincing 
manfully to Pansy Parkinson.

Alla:
And I am not 
> sure Hagrid knows that he as you said, won. Damage IMO is done.

Magpie:
What all does he need, then? To have Draco not have gotten hurt at 
all? That isn't going to happen--and Hagrid's partially responsible 
for it. Responsibility is part of being a teacher. Why would he 
think he didn't win? Buckbeak's alive, he didn't lose his job. He 
might not have been awarded an extra good prize, but he didn't lose 
anything. He's not entitled to popularity as a teacher. He had a bad 
time of it his first year, but he gets a second chance.


> Magpie:
>  In the end 
> > the message certainly was, just as it was to Draco in first 
year, 
> > that if he doesn't like something Hagrid's doing he's going to 
have 
> > to just deal.
> > <SNIP>
> 
> Alla:
> 
> Um, certainly if he is not injured enough to warrant the death of 
> animal and the firing of the teacher, he should just **deal** and 
not 
> behave as he did. I agree with that.

Magpie:
Sure it would have been better if he didn't behave as he did, but 
that's got nothing to do with Hagrid. Draco, in the end, is not the 
one who's got the power at school. Hagrid has more. So he doesn't 
also get to be the only child and the victim. He got his hippogriff 
and his job. He has not managed to also get the respect of the many 
students he teaches. I'm not going to blame that on other people, 
especially when even the Trio who are trying to like him as a 
teacher don't trust him. Draco's behavior throughout third year is 
his own problem and it doesn't seem to be fooling anybody. Hagrid's 
behavior is his own problem. However Hagrid feels, Draco's watching 
out for himself in later classes.

> Quick_Silver:
> This is just an interesting side note but when you describe the 
whole
Dumbledore Snape
> thing throughout HBP it comes across as bearing an incredible 
resemblance to
Sirius's
> plan to protect the Potters. Not in details but in...essence...you 
have a plan
that requires
>someone to risk their life (Sirius and Snape), there's an 
underestimation of a
key
> component of the plan (Peter and Draco), someone who should have 
been in on
the plan
> is left out (Dumbledore and Harry), and the person that dies is 
not as planned
(James
> and Dumbledore). And then you have Snape at the end of HBP, 
seemingly losing
it,
> which bears a resemblance to Sirius's infamous bout of the 
crazies. Plus you
have the
> fact that Snape seems to be alone among the enemy rather like what 
happened
when no
> one believed that Sirius was innocent.

Jen: I like this as a loose parallel; there are just a couple of 
things I'm not certain about. Are you saying Dumbledore/Snape 
planned the events of HBP from the beginning, before
the UV and including the cave? And I wasn't sure what you meant 
about 'the person who dies is not as planned' when you said James. 
Well, and also Dumbledore--who was supposed to die that night? (I 
really hope this is not a 'duh' question and I'm missing
something very obvious <g>).

Magpie:
Not my theory but I love it so I'm jumping in.:-) I would say that 
Dumbledore and Snape do not have to have planned the events of HBP 
from before the UV. Once the UV is in place, which could only happen 
after Draco had been given this assignment, that's when I think 
they're arranging things. After all, Narcissa showing up is not 
something they could count on. They may have worked out a general 
plan about protecting Draco once Snape learned about the task, and 
Snape may have in his mind taken the UV as part of that.

The cave (in terms of DD being weakened when Draco confronted him) 
was *not* planned--that's part of the whole snafu at the end. The 
cave was just part of destroying the Horcruxes. It unfortunately 
occurred the night Draco also surprised them all by getting DEs into 
the castle. That was never supposed to happen.

No one was supposed to die that night, just as no one was supposed 
to die with Sirius' Secret Keeper plan. Snape was drawing the danger 
on to himself just as Sirius was drawing the danger to himself. No 
one was supposed to die, and the person who did die was not the 
person who thought he was in the most danger--Sirius and Snape.

Jen:
I get that Peter didn't guess LV would become vapor--is the parallel 
that Draco didn't realize he wouldn't be able to kill Dumbledore?

Magpie:
I think the parallel is that Sirius et al. didn't guess that Peter 
was a competent Death Eater rather than an inconsequential friend of 
James. Snape and Dumbledore didn't realize Draco could get DEs into 
the castle. It's not Peter and Draco who were unpleasantly surprised 
by the people putting together the plan. 

-m