A sandwich/Defining the Other

[delwynmarch]

No: HPFGUIDX 178751

Prep0strus wrote:
> The one that seems most valid to me is 'don't 
> hesitate to judge a book by its cover'.  That 
> actually turns out to have been true... except
> that she's used 'don't judge a book by its cover' 
> several times over the series, so I think readers 
> still get that message, even if in the overall 
> series, the seeming bad guys really are just bad 
> guys.

Del replies:
A few exceptions don't invalidate a rule. And though
Harry may have been superficially wrong a few times,
he was never *truly* wrong. Anytime he had a really 
strong reaction to someone he knew, he was right.

> One of the primary themes of SS/PS is don't judge 
> a book by its cover, based on Snape

Except that even then Harry got a whole load of things
exactly right: Snape truly was a mean person, Snape 
truly hated Harry, and Snape wasn't on the side of Good
because he actually morally believed it was the right 
thing to do. Sure Harry got some "superficial" things 
wrong (like Snape wanting to kill him), but he was exactly
right concerning the deeper sides of Snape.

> and the theme could be observed also in CoS(Lockheart),
> PoA(Sirus), and DH(Snape again).

Harry was never taken in by Lockhart, he only hated Sirius 
as long as he hadn't met him, and though he eventually 
recognised Snape's courage, he still was exactly right 
about Snape not being a good person and about Snape's 
"natural" loyalties: Snape started as a Death Eater, and 
would have gone on being a Death Eater till he had died, if
it hadn't been for the half-heard Prophecy.

> I don't particularly CARE why Slytherins think these 
> things.  Maybe I should, and maybe if she had invested 
> more in that, the story would be more interesting... 
> but I don't need the reasons or explanations or
> background to know that what they're thinking is wrong. 

And I totally understand that, in the context of the book.
My problem is that this is a very dangerous message to send,
IMO: "you don't need to know why others think like they do,
you just need to know that they are wrong". In a book where
Right and Wrong are clearly defined, that's all fine, but 
what about Real Life? Right and Wrong are NOT clearly defined
in Real Life, in fact they are highly subjective and personal
values. So the message above becomes: "whatever you think is 
right is Right, and whatever you think is wrong is Wrong, and
you are totally entitled to disliking people who do what you
think is wrong, no matter what their reasons for doing it
might be". This message is quite simply an endorsement of
bigotry, in my opinion: "don't hesitate to make the rules
and to discriminate against people who don't follow them."

Just because JKR, through Harry, seems to be mainly in line
with the current PC opinions, doesn't mean that her message 
is anymore acceptable *to me*. Bigotry is bigotry, even when 
it comes from the good guys and it's based on Good Values.

Just my opinion,

Del