GOF Chapter 3: The Invitation

[oryx_leucoryx]

This is the obligatory Dursley chapter, in which we are treated to the home life of this family and learn how inferior they are to wizard families.

Dudley takes up a whole side of the square kitchen table. Ahem, I doubt a square kitchen table (as opposed to a dining room table) was designed to seat 8 people, 2 on a side. His parents excuse away his teachers' accusations of bullying. As opposed to the Weasleys who never receive reports making such heinous accusations against the twins (we'll see the school does occasionally owl their parents, but I don't see any awareness that some of what the twins do is bullying behavior). (This starts the theme of parents dealing with wayward sons in this book.) Dudley is forced into a diet of fruit and vegetables rather than his favorites. From the descriptions we get of the food Harry eats at Hogwarts I get the feeling Harry's favorites are closer to Dudley's than to the health foods, nor does he limit his intake. But somehow Harry remains thin, regardless of whether he gets starved by Petunia or stuffed by Molly or the House-elves.

Changing the food choices of the entire family is a good thing! However adjusting Harry's serving size to Dudley's (perceived?) emotional needs isn't. I don't begrudge Harry for working around a diet he doesn't need, but then I also sympathize with Dudley who does. Changing eating habits of years is hard.
This is also the place to say Dudley must have grown up as an emotional wreck. Knowing that his parents were capable of such physical and emotional deprivation of someone in their care - what if he ever failed to please them? I think a big part of his misbehavior is both making sure his parents know he *isn't* Harry as well as wanting the reassurance that they still love him, no matter what anyone else thinks.

Of Harry's 4 sources of help only one sends food he appreciates. Odd that even Hagrid managed to send an edible birthday cake. But how edible is it (or any of the others) 3 weeks later?

Harry is surprised that the Weasleys wrote directly to the Dursleys. Vernon is embarrassed that they didn't know how many stamps to use. But really, how hard is it to find out? Didn't they go to the post office to buy the stamps? What does it say about the exchange rate between Galleons and pounds that a family so poor finds it reasonable to spend on so many stamps for one letter? Molly's letter sounds as if she is trying too hard to make the Quidditch World Cup sound special and to make Arthur sound important. And of course she doesn't have enough imagination to realize that sending a letter by owl isn't normal for the Dursleys.

Harry is offended on Molly's behalf when Vernon calls her 'dumpy'. Since Molly likes Harry nobody is allowed to notice she is overweight.

I must say that the scene where Harry threatens Vernon with Sirius looks a lot less humorous now that I have seen Harry enjoy torturing a man for punishment, and Sirius engaging in Muggle-baiting.

If I am correct in my understanding that Ron is claiming that he and Molly wrote their respective letters at about the same time, then I am impressed with the UK post. Molly's letter arrived on Saturday morning. Pig arrived the same morning. Considering the speed of owls elsewhere, it looks as though Ron's letter was sent earlier that morning. So a letter got delivered the morning it was sent?

I am less impressed with the Weasleys. They plan on taking Harry regardless of the Dursleys' consent. One could argue that eventually Molly and Arthur realized their sons were not exaggerating when they said Harry had been imprisoned and starved, but seeing how Arthur views the treatment of Muggles, both in this book and in COS, I doubt this made a difference.

Harry is happy specifically because Dudley is suffering and he isn't. The seeds of the bully of HBP and war criminal of DH.

Comments

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

I'm a little taken aback at the hostility I perceive in your first line, since I've no clue what I've done to you to provoke it. Just because we don't agree doesn't mean you aren't welcome to share your opinion; this is an open forum. We'll just have to agree to disagree on whether or not it is cheating.

And no-one has stated that his cheating is *equivalent* to war actions, so please don't set up that straw man. We (or I at least) simply don't see why the fact that a war was going on excuses what I and others see as an ethical violation that is completely unrelated to the war. The war does not change the nature of his action, it does not create a necessity for it, and it does not excuse it. Nor does it mean that we shouldn't interrogate the ethical status of actions taken during it no matter how small or unrelated; it's all part of Harry's character, which is among the subjects up for debate here. There's my opinion whatever you think of it.

[cured4life.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure how Harry's work in school relates to any war effort. however, I will say the "little" things give us clues as to the ethics of individuals.

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

The little things like this do actually involve his relation to other people; just not on the scale of cutting them into pieces. He's still thinking as if other people are not his equals, and he is not treating them fairly or dealing with them honestly. It's not about his 'pure at heartness,' it's how he actually behaves in a social setting.

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

Ah, ok. The perils of text format, lol. Hope no offense taken.

And while I see you point about the *practicalities* of the situation in so far as what people might *do* (though I don't really think so many people see it that way anyway), the mere fact that people might do it more often doesn't change it's ethical status *as an action,* in and of itself (it doesn't make it more right or wrong), whatever one thinks that status to be. IMHO. (The use of 'ethical violation' by me doesn't indicate a particularly high *magnitude* of wrongness, it's merely a descriptive term indicating that I'm talking about how one treats other people and generally acts rightly or wrongly on any scale and in any situation. It's the *aspect* of his action that I'm concerned with in particular. It's marking the fact that I'm not critiquing his action in terms of, say, practicality, or believability, or some other way of talking about it. And I'm probably getting too long-winded here.)

And just because it's a common feature of people, doesn't mean it's not a *critiqueable* feature of Harry's character in particular ('everybody else does it' is not an acceptable defense for any action; how many people do something not change how right/wrong it is). I'm saying that Harry doing it is one instance of it, so it is a feature of Harry's character as well perhaps as of human nature; it's how human nature plays out in Harry's personality and he is responsible for the actions he takes whether they are 'human nature' or not. IMHO.

I'm not saying Harry is totally unlike anyone else in this or that it makes him the omg worst villain ever in history, I'm simply pointing out that (according to my understanding of ethics and academics) what he did is wrong and deserving of critique as an action, and why I think that. My opinions on the matter.

As to it not 'harming' anyone: well, perhaps we're talking about different relative levels of harm, but to me the fact that Harry won the Felix with the help of material nobody else had access to and that let him do work that he wasn't otherwise able to do (it's not his natural skills or knowledge giving him the edge, it's artificial) harms the others to a degree. It's the same principle as that at issue in the banning of steroids in athletes, except there the stakes are a bit higher in terms of money, etc. But the magnitude of the stakes doesn't change the essential features of an action that make it morally or ethically acceptable or not. (It's wrong to steal 30 million dollars in the same way it's wrong to steal the neighbor's silverware, for example; both are theft.)

This choice on Harry's part does not allow the others in the class a fair shot at a rare commodity, it distorts the teacher's ability to judge his students and rate them fairly in comparison to one another and the general level of work the class is capable of, and in essence tells me he does not consider his classmates his equals with whom he must deal fairly. His grade in his mind is more important than being honest with his professor or classmates. They are merely obstacles to be gotten around in whatever manner necessary to achieve personal satisfaction, not beings with rights fully equal to his that he must respect.

This choice then, IMHO, demonstrates arrogance on Harry's part, a setting himself above others that develops over time and that enables him to go from not caring about being fair with others, to not caring about truly harming others - Draco, Amycus, Filch, etc. I am not saying that every instance of this arrogance is *equal* (nearly killing someone is not the *equivalent* of cheating to get ahead of them), or that the one necessarily and directly *leads to* the others. But the same *mindset* is in play in all of them, and becomes more and more acceptable to him and ingrained in him with every repetition, small or large. It's a gradual process of dehumanizing people whom he does not like or who are otherwise inconvenient to him and I'll decry every instance that he is permitted to get away with it, no matter how small or large, because IMHO the little things matter too; they psychologically set the stage for and if not dealt with *can* (not must, but can) contribute to worse things being able to happen later.

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

I think Dumbledore, over the course of the books, did Harry no favors by allowing him to get away with minimal or no punishment many times and never thinking that Harry needed to really face up to the things he did do wrong. He harmed Harry in this way just as Petunia harmed Dudley. In PS/SS Harry was not perfect, but he was a generally likeable little boy with some clear good qualities along with the bad ones. By DH he's far less likeable and his worst traits have developed considerably. His dealings around the Prince's book simply mark one part of his development on that front.


Oh, and if Harry had shown someone in authority - like Slughorn - the book as soon as he discovered the notes in it, even if just to ask if he could use them as he ought to have done, they might have noticed the spells in the margins and taken the book away, thus preventing Draco from ever having been sliced up by Harry. (If feeling reckless, insert very wild speculation about the possibility of Harry having cut off a possible change of heart in Draco here. ;) ) That's another aspect of harm that comes from Harry's *keeping the book secret;* but it's not otherwise directly related to my argument about cheating so it's rather incidental in that respect.

*restrains self from launching into Snape-centric rant about Harry's treatment of the Prince himself for the sake of readers* Sorry for length and thanks for sticking with me. I'm not sure we will come to much agreement (maybe so?) but it's useful to have to try and put into words what bothers me about the incident.

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

It's exactly things like Dumbledore's favors, what has shaped Harry's character for the worse. That's one thing we agree on. :)

Well, at least we agree on that! Lol. :)

I disagree that it doesn't show a flaw in Harry's character, for reason's I've already outlined. Among them arrogance and not respecting others' right to be dealt with fairly and honestly. It's understandable, but still a flaw. Just as Snape's anger and defensiveness is understandable but contributes to his flawed nature. But I'll shut up now, I've written enough.

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

"IMO for most ordinary people war and similar extreme situations change exactly these “little things” – even for otherwise very honest people it suddenly isn't so much of a problem not to tell the truth, steal a little thing, or cut a few corners via the Prince's book..."

But Harry's not a normal person -- he's the hero of the series and JKR's chosen Christ-figure. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned in my literary tastes, but I've always felt that protagonists should be slightly more moral than the average person, to give readers something to aspire to (while not, obviously, being so moral as to seem annoying and priggish, or impossibly, Mary-Sue-ishly pure).

Also, as Condwiramurs says, "everybody does it" is not a valid excuse, especially in a series which supposedly supports questioning authority and thinking for yourself. "The one thing that doesn't abide by a majority vote is a man's conscience," and all that.

[condwiramurs.livejournal.com]

Exactly - he's not an everyman no matter how much JKR wants him to be that. And while I'm personally fine with antiheroes and less-than-saintly protagonists, it doesn't work here IMO precisely because, as you point out, he's supposed to be the Christ-figure of the series. He's supposed to be *better* than the normal guy, at least in so far as being tolerant and loving and treating the people around him with basic human respect. That's supposedly the way he's to defeat Voldie. And for me at least that image of him is seriously undermined when he can't even be bothered to make the effort to treat the people around him with basic decency over relative trifles. If he can't be bothered to do it on the small scale (and it's repeatedly; one or two isolated lapses would be more understandable) how am I to believe that he's suddenly willing to die for them all out of pure love and the cause of tolerance and respect for differences? As opposed to getting revenge on his enemies and all that.