Lack of re-examination SPOILERS for Corambis and Tigana

[a_svirn]

No: HPFGUIDX 186592

> Steve wrote:
> > >
> > Harry cast the spell to punish Amicus for what Amicus was doing to Minerva.  Where in canon does it say Harry cast the spell as sadistic torture or that he enjoyed casting the spell in a manner that would indicate he was a sadistic person?  I don't see Harry Potter as sadistic.  
> 
> Carol responds:
> I don't think that anyone is arguing that Harry is a sadistic person, only that he had a sadistic moment that we don't see him regret.

<snip> 
> Again, I'm not saying that Harry is a sadist. I'm saying that, under the extreme pressure of Voldemort's impending arrival, he had a sadistic moment. It would be absurd to compare him with Umbridge or Barty Crouch, much less Bellatrix or Voldemort, and say that he's as much of a sadist as they are. <snip>

a_svirn:
Which is precisely why no one agues it. I agree with pretty much everything you've said, and I only picked on Pippin's thought that a sadistic person punishes sadistically because it leads to further questions, i.e. does a non-sadistic person punishes non-sadistically? Simply by virtue of him or her being non-sadistic? And if a non-sadistic person does on occasion punish sadistically, where does it leave us? 

I feel uncomfortable with this sort of divorcing a person's actions from his or her, well, nature, I guess. That's exactly why I, for example, cannot buy Dumbledore's asserting that Draco's not only "not a killer at heart", but even somehow `innocent' even though he demonstrably is not innocent. He's innocent; we are invited to believe, because of his inner qualities. It doesn't matter what he does – at heart he's "not a killer". Of course it's true only to a point – if he kills by his own hand his inner qualities would change. From which fate he is saved by Snape whose soul Dumbledore is willing to risk for whatever reason.  

Honestly I'd take a murderer at heart who abides the law in practice over an innocent at heart who's running all over the place plotting and executing murders with various degrees of success any day. I also think that when a non-sadistic person like Harry indulges in sadism --it's just plain wrong. It feels even worse somehow than when a sadistic person does it. Precisely because Harry can restrain himself, but chooses not to. And because it rather blurs the line between those two types of persons, if only momentarily. What baffles me is that no one in the series apparently thinks so. 


> Carol, hoping that Harry will not look back with pride on that moment

a_svirn, rather doubting that Harry will spare it a thought.