Harry Potter on loving enemies

Harry Potter has a lot of enemies. He is the 'chosen one', the mortal enemy of Lord Voldemort, and all Voldemort's supporters hate him. He survives attempts to capture, injure or kill him dozens of times, and yet Harry always shows his enemies mercy.

When Petter Pettigrew is exposed as a traitor and murderer, Harry won't allow him to be killed, but insists on taking him to the authorities. When Harry is competing with Cedric Diggory in the Triwizard Tournament (and in his love life), he still insists on giving Cedric the inside information he has learned about the first task, and later agrees to tie for first place when he could have won outright. When Draco Malfoy, who has taunted Harry for seven years and is a fully fledged Death Eater, is trapped by a fire in the Room of Requirement, Harry insists on risking his own life to save Malfoy and his friends.

There are dozens of examples, but perhaps the most interesting is that Harry always seeks to disarm rather than injure or kill his enemies. Even when he faces Voldemort himself, Harry casts a disarming spell while Voldemort performs the killing curse. In the end Harry doesn't kill Voldemort; he blocks Voldemort's killing curse, which backfires and kills its originator. Harry may not exactly love his enemies, but he is scrupulously fair, even to people who don't deserve it.

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