Wands and Wizards...Again (Was: Epilogue ...)

[littleleahstill]

No: HPFGUIDX 183578

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Steve" <bboyminn at ...> wrote:
>> OK, let me amend that then, Amycus would have directly and
> actively conspired to cause Harry's death, and would have
> easily and casually killed any student, teacher, parent, or
> random person that he thought threatened him in even the
> slightest way.
> 
> No matter how you slice it and dice it, this was an incredibly
> dangerous man with many equally dangerous accomplices, in an
> incredibly desperate situation (Voldemort has been called). 
> 
> I just don't see how Harry could have possible been in a more
> dangerous and potentially deadly situation. Consequently, I
> say, rules of war are in force. You see the enemy; you shoot
> him, no questions asked. 

Leah: Except that Harry didn't 'shoot' him.  If you're happy with 
Harry using Unforgiveables, then an AK would actually have made more 
sense in that it would have removed Amycus permanently as a danger.  
If we're talking about Hary responding as a soldier to a 'dangerous 
and potentially deadly situation' then he did probably the worst 
thing he could, inflaming an enemy without taking him out of the 
action on a temporary or permanment basis. If McGonagall hadn't been 
there too, Harry could have been in some 
trouble. 'Stupefy', 'Petrificus 
Totalus, 'Expelliarmus', 'Incarcerous' would all have been far more 
effective in disabling Amycus and allowing him to be removed as an 
active participant in battle. Harry merely indulged an impulse to 
cruelty, which did nothing to Amycus once the curse stopped. (note 
that when Harry is Crucio'd at the end of HBP he immediately resumes 
his pursuit of, and attack on, Snape.    

> 
> Further more, as I have pointed out several times before,
> Harry did not extend the 'torture'. It lasted two seconds
> and wasn't repeated. He did what he had to do and stopped.
> I find it hard to believe that some one can be hurt within
> any definition of torture when it only lasts 2 seconds and 
> is only done once. No matter how painful, that just doesn't
> fall into the realm of torture in my book.

Leah: I assume that stubbing out a cigarette on a child only takes 
about two seconds. Ir's still torture. Harry can only have been  
Crucio'd in the Forbidden Forest for a very short time before Snape 
stepped in, but Rowling's description is of agonising pain. I would 
like to have read the reader reaction if Snape had said, "Carry on 
with that, Amycus (or whoever), as long as it's only for a little 
while, it's not torture".  As to Harry, he did not do 'what he had 
to do'.  As pointed out above, he had a number of options, all of 
which would have been more effective than the curse he employed.

My concern here is not to excuse Amycus, who is indeed a 
thoroughly nasty piece of work, but with Harry's eagerness to put 
himself, however briefly, on the same level and with the eagerness 
of the author (either in person or through McGonagall) and some of 
the readership to excuse him on the grounds that what Harry does has 
to be right. 
Leah