Wands and Wizards...Again BIG SPOILERS for TIGANA

[dumbledore11214]

No: HPFGUIDX 183667

Pippin:
<SNIP>
> I think JKR had Harry violate taboos so we could be faced with the
> same doubts about him that he had about Snape and Dumbledore.   But 
we
> don't get the luxury of looking inside his head. We're left to judge
> Harry's character based on the actions we know about, just as we 
would
> in real life.
> 
> I don't think there's a wrong answer; it's just that much of the 
story
> becomes pointless if you don't think the Trio could really make much
> difference with the rest of their lives.

Alla:
OMG Pippin so well said and I again find myself agreeing with you and 
want to mention the event from Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay that I 
mentioned few days ago.

So basically at some point one of the main characters who is engaged 
in great and noble cause, and I say it without any irony whatsoever, 
to me his cause is great and noble decides that he needs a wizard to 
help his cause. Mind you this character cannot perform any other 
magic, but by the virtue of his birth he can make a wizard to serve 
him.

And lo and behold that is what he does, he enslaves the wizard. 
Basically poor man must go where he orders him and do his bidding or 
suffer pain. And believe me, this man would much rather NOT be there.

I will make the point related to Potterverse, I promise, just bear 
with me. So at some point the guy, who made wizard to serve him 
forcefully seems to realize that no matter what ends do not justify 
the means and there are limits he is willing to go to even for his 
noble cause and he lets wizard go.

Do you guess how this plotline is resolved? Well, wizard decides that 
he likes the cause after all and he will help them out.

So do you know how it relates to what Pippin just wrote in my mind?

I am not sure if I *buy* that the guy who did the enslaving did it 
because he truly understood that the ends do not justify the means 
and he has no right to violate the desires of other human being who 
would much rather not to be there. I am not sure if I realize it 
**despite the fact** that guy says that he did, loud and clear. I 
have a sneaking suspicion that the bastard did it because he saw 
already that wizard  begins to accept their cause and it is much 
better to have him there freely doing what needs to be done rather 
than to waste a mental energy trying to force him, especially for the 
last battle.

I am not sure I buy it **because** of his actions, because him not 
releasing the wizard earlier when he was upset and suffered one time 
even physically when he tried to run away, etc.

Now, in Potterverse as you said we are left to judge Harry's 
character based on the actions we know about, and those actions to me 
say much more than moment of Harry beating himself over the head 
about Crucio would have said. I trust that teenager who saves Draco 
from the fire, who shields everybody including Narcissa would have 
indeed realized that using Crucio is a wrong thing to do. Do I read 
it in canon? No, but I believe that my trust is valid based on the 
actions which I have read in canon.
As I said, sometimes even if character speaks that he was wrong, I do 
not trust him, I just do not believe him based on what he did 
previously. But I do believe in Harry.

Now to go an a little tangent I still think that even though in their 
moral core books are simplistic enough, JKR  writes with enough 
subtlety to show how the characters are changing .

Take Hermione saving Xeno Lovegood. I just realized recently that I 
think it is meant to tell us that Hermione may not be so sure that 
traitor always needs to be marked and punished if there are 
mitigating circumstances – re infamous Marietta. Hermione takes care 
of saving Xeno who betrayed him because his daughter was taken, which 
is sort of reversal of situation with Marietta, isn't it? Wasn't the 
argument that she did it because her mother was involved? I mean, I 
know that her mother was working for the ministry, so she was 
involved, I just never bought it, and I thought that to show it 
Marietta should have gone to her mother instead of Umbridge, but if 
she was, well I find it interesting.

JMO,
Alla