Death, Killing and Harry's Angst (WAS: A Simpler Scenario

[elfundeb]

Kneasy:
Death doesn't seem to be such a big deal in HP. 
The loss of the Stone means sure and certain death for the Flamels.
Does anyone care much? Apparently not. It's treated as no more
than an interesting change of circumstance; not an end but a phase
boundary.

Debbie:
That may be what Flamel and DD think, but for many of the WW, death is a 
*huge* deal. Hogwarts is full of ghosts who could not face death. The MoM 
fears death sufficiently that it has decreed that AK is so unforgivable that 
the perpetrator deserves to spend the rest of his life with the Dementors at 
Azkaban. 
 Kneasy:
"There are worse things than death, Tom."
 Debbie:
Indeed there are. Ask Barty Crouch Jr. But many in the WW have yet to learn 
that lesson, and it is those people who are most vulnerable to Voldemort. 
Surely that is what Wormtail fears most ("'You don't understand!" whispered 
Pettigrew. 'He would have killed me, Sirius!"). Willingness to die for what 
is right, OTOH, marks someone as Good. Harry, for example, marked by Fawkes 
as "pure in heart." Or Sirius, despite his manifold faults ("Then you should 
have died . . . rather than betray your friends, as we would have done for 
you.") And, of course, Dumbledore.
 Kneasy:
And glugging down that
potion could well have been one of them.
 Debbie:
Yes. See Dementor references above. 
 Kneasy:
In which case death would
be an escape, a release. I appreciate that there are fans who don't
agree, but death, in some circumstances, is the merciful option. And
if a helping hand is needed? Fine. If I can't manage it myself, I hope 
there's someone around to help me when things get really bad.
 Debbie:
So you think DD was begging Snape to put him out of his misery? That doesn't 
seem very . . . noble. I'm more inclined to the view that it was part of the 
Grand Plan, in which DD died to save both Snape and Draco. The entire Tower 
scene was one massive delaying tactic by engaging Draco, and then the DEs, 
in conversation until Snape arrived to do the deed in accordance with the 
Plan, allowing Draco to escape with his soul intact. 
 Pippin: 
But I want it to be a fake AK because I don't think you can use one
to kill a person without evil intent. After all, the wizards have
lots of potentially fatal spells at their disposal.
 Debbie:
Borrowing from what Bellatrix says about Cruciatus, "you need to mean them . 
. . you need to really want to cause pain . . . righteous anger won't hurt 
[me] for long." So for AK to be effective, you need to mean to kill. But 
Bella acknowledged that she derived *some* hurt from Harry's Crucio. It just 
didn't last long. So why wouldn't righteous anger – or any anger – be enough 
to fuel an AK? It may not last long, but it would last long enough to do the 
trick. Surely Snape wasn't lacking in anger that could be channeled into a 
powerful AK. Anger at Narcissa for getting him into this situation in the 
first place, for example.

But I have another question. Assuming the AK was real, did that action split 
Snape's soul, if he killed DD to further DD's agenda, and with his full 
understanding and permission? Slughorn tells us that soul-splitting only 
occurs in the commission of "the supreme act of evil. By committing murder." 
Murder. Not killing. Not AK, either. He then states that "[k]illing rips the 
soul apart," but the statement is made in the context of the previous 
sentence. Murder, which is what Slughorn says tears the soul, turns on the 
killer's intent, not on the choice of weapon. A club would be just as 
effective at tearing the soul as AK.

Based on what Slughorn says, . I think a good case can be made that Snape 
did not further damage his soul by killing DD, depending on his motive. 
There's an embedded assumption in the WW's labeling of AK as "unforgivable" 
that killing another human being is inherently evil, but it's not borne out 
by reality. The label is meaningful in applying the WW legal system, but WW 
law is not necessarily based on the magical principles underlying the AK 
spell. Even under WW law, there must be exceptions; otherwise, how could 
Crouch Sr. Have authorized the use of Unforgivables on suspects? Surely he 
didn't order the Aurors to split their souls. 
Jen: 
We may get more about the nuances of killing in self defense,
or mercy killing or killing in a time of war. Some explanation of
Snape's AK could help this part of the story along. 
 Debbie:
Yes, though Snape's soul is undoubtedly already plenty damaged.
 Jen:
But in the end I don't think Harry will kill him in a traditional
way.
 Debbie:
I think the morality of killing Voldemort to save the WW will not be 
presented in more than a theoretical sense. And this brings me to Anne's 
dilemma.
 Anne:
In OoP, Harry heard the prophecy. Not only did he find out why LV
wanted to kill him, he also found out that (supposedly) Harry was the
*only* one who *could* kill LV. So, things went from "somebody's got
to stop him" to "I've got to stop him."

So in HBP, DD explains that the prophecy did not have to come true;
that the reason it does seem to be coming true is that LV believes it
and acts accordingly; that Harry has free choice in the matter. DD
asks Harry what his choice is, and Harry replies he'd like to kill LV.

My problem? I thought that in OoP it wasn't the idea of "destiny" that
bothered Harry so much, it was the idea that he would either kill or
be killed. Then in HBP, DD takes away the idea of destiny. But where
did the angst about killing go? Was it ever there, or did I read OoP
wrong? It's the process of Harry reconciling himself to killing that
we never see
 Debbie:
It seems that Harry's epiphany occurred right there in ch. 23. "He thought 
of his mother, his father and Sirius. He thought of Cedric Diggory. He 
thought of all the terrible deeds he knew Lord Voldemort had done. A flame 
seemed to leap inside his chest, searing his throat. 'I'd want him 
finished,' Harry said quietly. 'And I'd want to do it.'" 

What I don't understand is how Harry has really upgraded his task from a 
necessity to a choice. Harry is *not* "free to turn [his] back on the 
prophecy." He doesn't really have much choice except to decide how he will 
approach the confrontation that Voldemort is insisting on ("the difference 
between being dragged into the arena to face a battle to the death and 
walking into the arena with your head held high"). In GoF, Harry *was* 
dragged into the arena to face a battle to the death, but still he held his 
head high. From ch. 34: 

"[H]e was going to die, and there was nothing he could do about it . . . but 
he wasn't going to play along. He wasn't going to obey Voldemort . . . he 
wasn't going to beg . . . "

and 

"He was not going to die crouching here like a child playing hide-and-seek; 
he was not going to die kneeling at Voldemort's feet . . . he was going to 
die upright like his father, and he was going to die trying to defend 
himself, even if no defense was possible . . . "

The only difference is Harry's knowledge of the prophecy. Without knowing 
the prophecy, he might be satisfied with escaping him again, or he'd want to 
bring Voldemort in alive and send him to Azkaban. Even so, he doesn't say he 
would want Voldemort killed, only finished. 

Pippin:
For Harry to kill Voldemort because the prophecy said he must, which
was the situation as he understood it at the end of OOP, would be
murder. "Yeah, your Supreme Mugwumpness, I did it because Trelawney 
said I had to." "Sure, kid. Here's your order of Merlin, and a writ of
committment to St Mungo's." Can't have people running around killing
because they heard voices, after all. 

To challenge Voldemort because Voldemort is trying to kill him, and
will kill others as he killed Harry's parents if he isn't stopped,
makes it different.

But isn't this what Harry articulated all the way back in PS/SS? Harry 
wasn't ever going to kill Voldemort because the prophecy said so. He assumed 
he would have to kill or be killed along with the others who resisted, as 
well as many that did not. At the end of OOP, Harry felt resigned to his 
burden because of the Prophecy. But his understanding of what he needs to do 
and why has not changed. If it's not murder now, it wasn't murder then. 

David: 
The classic way to deal with this is for Voldemort's own plans to
somehow recoil upon his own head, triggered in some way be Harry's
presence or intervention, hostile to Voldemort, yes, but not
directly aimed at his life at that point. Not sure how I feel about 
that one.
 Debbie:
I think I would likely feel cheated by that outcome, too. 

But even if Harry has reconciled himself to killing, he has not faced down 
the ethical issue of its appropriateness. In the past, Harry has always 
responded to each confrontation with Voldemort by using non-lethal weapons. 
He touched Quirrell, used Expelliarmus in the graveyard, and dove behind a 
statue in OOP. In CoS, he destroyed a Hoarcrunch, but unknowingly, and 
because there are more, it was not fatal. As a result, I find it hard to 
believe that when the time comes, he will simply pull out his wand and yell 
"Adavra Kedavra!" in righteous anger, even though I accept that it sometimes 
becomes necessary to kill to protect the greater good. I think Harry would 
find any use of Voldemort's methods repulsive.

Harry might kill him inadvertently, as he destroyed Diary!Tom. Or he could 
sacrifice himself. This is why I like Hx!Harry theories; it would allow 
Harry to kill Voldemort by allowing Voldemort to kill him ("either must die 
at the hand of the other, for neither can live while the other survives"). 
Debbie
who was drafting a further response on Hoarcrunch!Harry but thought too much 
time had passed to post it


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