What HP Character Scares You Most?

[dumbledore11214]

No: HPFGUIDX 191916



.> > 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). 
> 
> Pippin:
> But that's just it. Dumbledore's enquiries showed that Sirius was guilty. We don't know what evidence James and Sirius contrived to persuade everyone that Sirius was the secret keeper, but it's canon that they planned to do so,   and that everyone, including Dumbledore, was fooled. That, plus the eyewitness testimony of all those Muggles (which couldn't be checked since they were all memory charmed afterwards), clinched the case. 

Alla:

Which inquiries did Dumbledore conduct? 


Pippin:
> Dumbledore didn't randomly interrogate prisoners to get their side of the story. He looked into Hokey's case and Morfin's because he suspected there was a connection with Voldemort which the Ministry was refusing to see. 
 
> There was no need to do that with Sirius -- the Ministry had no problems believing that he was connected to Voldemort.  So from Dumbledore's point of view there was nothing he needed to find out. 

Alla:

But he interrogated him in PoA, no?


> 
> Nikkalmati:
> 
>  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.  
> 
> 
> Pippin:
> Dumbledore knew the Ministry was out to get Harry and using the Wizengamot as its tool. He had no reason to think there was some political grudge against Sirius. 

<snipping prank, because I cant change my view on it>

Pippin: 
>  While Draco undoubtedly deserved some punishment, even Harry did not think he deserved to be murdered, and that's what would have happened to him if Dumbledore had exposed his crimes.

Alla:

By whom? By Voldemort or somebody else? And if protection of the innocent was so important to Dumbledore, Draco was guilty not innocent, all the students who were exposed to the murderer in training were innocent IMO.

Pippin:
> If by justice you mean punishment for the guilty, then yes, Dumbledore believes protecting the innocent is more important. Reasonable people can disagree about that -- but I wouldn't call either viewpoint sinister. 

Alla:

I think we just disagree on who was innocent in each situation, because I actually also agree that protecting the innocent is more important then punishing the guilty. It is not for me about interfering on behalf of who deserved it, or I guess it is if by "who deserved it" you mean who was innocent in the situation.

Anybody who had been posting for a long time knows how much I hate Snape, but even I pity Snape so much every time I think of a young man who came to Dumbledore for help and instead got himself in the lifetime of slavery. Yes, I know, he could have left in theory and it was not unbreakable vow. I think Dumbledore had the power to bind people to him without any vow. And before you ask, no Dumbledore did not owe anything to Snape, but I wish (of course mostly for Harry's sake) that Dumbledore would have told him to leave, because I do not believe for a second that he would not have done anything to protect Potters anyway.

> 
> 
> > 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.
> 
> Pippin:
>  James and Lily were already at risk before Harry was born -- they had defied Voldemort three times.  JKR is maddeningly vague about what James and LIly did for the Order. But look at what the others did: guarding Harry and others who were unable to defend themselves, negotiating with Giants, breaking into restricted areas of the Ministry, fighting wand to wand with Death Eaters.  Activities like those are not safe, and they were, as Lupin says, being picked off one by one as they did them. If they had let the threat of assassination stop them, there couldn't have been an Order at all.

Alla:

But Snape increased this threat in my opinion.



Pippin:
> So I am not sure how that compares to  the obligations laid on Death Eaters. Dumbledore was not going to murder Snape if Snape didn't agree to serve him. 

Alla:

I want to believe that he was not going to murder Snape, but I am pretty confident about speculation that he would have cheerfully let Snape go to Azkaban. He 100% deserved it if you ask me, but no, I do not consider the choice "Azkaban or servitude" to be a real choice at all.

Alla.