Are you sure about this? I imagine being raised in the Black household would encourage a tendency to treat house elves as low-paid servants that you don’t need to pay a lot of attention to, but I don’t remember Dumbledore saying that Sirius was bad to all house elves. It’s just that Kreacher was a constant reminder of his unhappy childhood.
AClockworkMelon:
Not true. Dumbledore said that Sirius was in general nice to house-elves, but Kreacher was specifically a reminder of the family he hated.
Yes, it’s kind of one of the things that works really well in the books. Snape really did have some reasons for disliking James and Sirius. They were jerks in many ways. They were terrible to him, especially.
OK, now we need the quote. Anyone know where in the books they discuss this?
It’s the conversation between Dumbledore and Harry at the end of Order of the Phoenix, when Dumbledore is explaining to Harry how Voldemort fooled him, and what the prophecy was.
Found the passage, it’s on page 834 of Order of the Phoenix. (American Hardcover edition).
Yep, and you are right.
Sirius is nice to house elves, but Kreacher is a living reminder of his past.
harry: “kreacher stop hitting him!” (with a copper pan.)
kreacher: “one more time, master harry? for good luck?”