Snape's Psychology: WAS: More thoughts on the Elder Wand subplot - Owner?

[dumbledore11214]

No: HPFGUIDX 187473

Parantap :

Wouldn't it be a little bit too idealistic to do otherwise ?? Person X is
fighting a war against Y, and one of the spies of Y comes to X for help. Isn't
it natural for X to take as much advantage of the situation as possible? When a
person is leading the battle to save their country/community, the first and
foremost consideration is the welfare of the community. Everything else comes
next.

It's not like I am trying to argue that end always justifies the means –
certainly we cannot support Crouch's authorization of torture and suspension of
justice system. But in this particular case – it would have served no purpose to
ask Snape to think things through and decide. It might have been better for
Snape himself, but the order would/could have lost its most valuable future spy.

Alla:

Well, that is why there is no right answer in these debates, right? One person thinks that no, it is not too idealistic to ask Snape to cool off and decide before committing himself to be a spy and another person thinks it is and  it is always a question of what one considers going too far.

But see, to me it is also a question of slippery slope, because really, didn't Crouch Sr. wanted to win too? Why can't we support his authorization of torture then? After all if winning is ALL that matters, he also worked for good guys to win.  No, I do not support it, but neither do I like what Dumbledore does here. How far is too far? Who will determine the line that cannot be overstepped without good guys turning into bad guys?

Dumbledore does not put any physical enslavement here on Snape, he binds him metaphorically because Snape loved Lily.

Prince Alessan in book "Tigana" goes several steps furhter than Dumbledore here. He physically enslaves wizard Erlein, because his goals are noble and brave and (he thinks at first) any means are good for him to help him save his country. Is he going too far? 

But again, to me it is not even a question of whether Snape deserved it or not, I think he did. To me it is a question of Dumbledore's character.  And yeah, I think he went too far, even if Snape deserved it ten times over.

Parantap:
One more thing, Potters are two adults who are supposed to be capable of taking
care of themselves and their kid. So it's not likely that people will think
about nothing but their well-being, if they come to know that Potters are
threatened, unless they have special interest in Mrs Potter. Agreed, one should
not try and increase the danger, but that is not what DD is doing here. He is
just trying to make the most of the situation. <SNIP>

Alla:

I  was not saying that Dumbledore is trying to increase the danger though. I was responding to Pippin's suggestion that Dumbledore is already working hard to save the Potters and I did not see it at all. I think he started thinking about it only after Snape came to him.

And sure, he is trying to make the most of the situation, I agree. I just do not like the way he goes about it.

JMO,

Alla