Raised to be evil, grown to resist it

Is Draco evil? Or just a product of his upbringing?

I've often wondered about this question, not just in the context of Harry Potter but also as it might apply to children in the real world too.

Draco Malfoy is raised in a family where allegiance to the Dark Lord is a way of life, where brutality to house elves is normal behaviour, where intense malevolence toward people who are not of pure blood families is commonplace. Should we then see Draco as evil simply for following the beliefs with which he was raised?

Especially when he is still a young kid, perhaps too young to question those beliefs?

This is why I find the movie portrayal of Draco Malfoy to be so interesting, almost more so than the original literary character. In the films, it becomes very clear that Draco, at 16 and 17, is starting to question his parents' behaviours and beliefs that were so much a part of his upbringing.

He can't bring himself to kill an unarmed Dumbledore, even though he knows he will be punished for his failure. He refuses to identify Harry to Bellatrix when Harry is dragged to Malfoy Manor by the Snatchers. He weeps over the death of his friend in the all-consuming Fiendfyre in the Room of Requirement.

And, when push comes to shove in the final battle of Hogwarts, he and his parents walk away from Voldemort and his army.

As I've written before, Draco is redeemed by his own refusal to commit the most egregious acts of evil that are demanded of him as he approaches adulthood.

In an interesting parallel, Dudley Dursley also gets a brief moment of redemption, at least in the book version of The Deathly Hallows, when he says he doesn't feel that Harry is a waste of space and actually comes over to say a proper goodbye to his cousin. Dudley, raised in a household where Harry-hating is an accepted form of behaviour, actually comes to recognise some value in his cousin. As he grows up, he is able to set aside the prejudices his parents have fed him for his entire life and redeem himself. (Oddly, this scene was shot for the film but left on the cutting room floor. You can see it as part of the "Deleted Scenes" section of the DVD/Blu Ray).

My point is that, although J.K. presents both Dudley and Draco as the epitome of evil to the young Harry in the early novels, she recognises that, as they grow up, they gain the ability to question the beliefs among which they have been raised. They are only truly evil if, once they reach an age of awareness, discernment and decision, they choose to embrace their parents' evil teachings.

And both choose a different path in the end.

And I think the filmmakers go even further to bring that point home in the case of Draco Malfoy.