What HP Character Scares You Most?

[nikkalmati]

No: HPFGUIDX 191914



--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "pippin_999" <foxmoth at ...> wrote:
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> Pippin:
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> If Dumbledore should have protected Sirius from the "legal" system when he was arrested for the deaths of the Muggles, then why was it wrong for him to protect Harry, Draco, Lupin and Snape, not to mention Sirius when he set Snape at Lupin?  It seems to me that for some readers what seems to be a moral issue is really a partisan one -- Dumbledore is not wrong for interfering or failing to interfere with the law, but only for doing so on behalf of someone who, in the eyes of a particular reader, didn't deserve it. 

Nikkalmati

This is not a fair comparison.  I was suggesting DD should have inquired into Sirius' situation, not that he should have protected him (unless the inquiry showed he was innocent).  Just like he protected Harry from the Wizengamot.  Protecting Sirius after the Prank and Draco in the last year was not protecting the innocent.  Lupin was, of course, innocent, but he needed no protecting at that time.  DD was the legal system at Hogwarts, so if he ignored the events - there was no justice.  

Nikkalmati
> 
Pippin
> I think the moral issue for Dumbledore is whether interfering will protect the lives of innocent people. He does not assume that the law, or those who enforce it, will always act on behalf of the innocent, nor does he have any confidence in the ability of what passes for due process in the wizarding world to determine who is guilty and who is not. His own ability to do so is not perfect and Sirius is the proof of that. But his record is better than the Ministry's. 
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Nikkalmati

So, why didn't he look into Sirius' conviction?

Nikkalmati


 
> 
> Pippin:
> Where do you get the idea that Dumbledore was obliged to protect Order members from Voldemort? Their job was to put themselves in harm's way if necessary in order to protect others. A general shouldn't waste the lives of his troops. But that's a far cry from promising to make sure one in particular is not going to be killed by the enemy. 
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Nikkalmati

Even I don't think DD would fail to protect Lily and James after he had been told they were marked by LV.  If he thought he could easily lose more of his own people, he must have had more followers than we know about.  :>) I don't doubt he would have done just what he did do.  He advised them to go into hiding, offered to be their Secret Keeper, and probably cast the Fidelius Charm.

Nikkalmati  

> 
> Pippin:
> It wasn't an unbreakable vow: and presumably Snape was not under duress in all the years he chose to keep it. Snape had many opportunities to leave Hogwarts, in fact he did leave it every summer. If he had chosen to disappear, probably Voldemort could have tracked him down, but I don't think Dumbledore or the Ministry could have done it. There was indeed duress involved, but it was the obligation placed on every Death Eater of a lifetime of service or death, and Snape brought that on himself.

Nikkalmati

Presumably Snape felt obliged by having given his word.  He also must have wanted LV dead and believed that DD knew how that could be done.  There was duress or at least manipulation involved but I am not sure comparing DD' service to the obligations laid on his Death Eaters by LV reflects well on DD at all.

Nikkalmati 

>  6.  DD didn't tell Snape that Harry would have to die by LV's hand whenever it was he first knew it, but let Snape continue thinking he was acting to protect Lily's son.
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> Pippin:
> Now this, I think, was indeed selfish and cowardly, and carried the underlying presumption that Snape's interests did not matter one way or the other. Dumbledore had come to take Snape's cooperation for granted. 
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Nikkalmati

Agreed