LOL! People are indignant at that? That goes right to my point. Thinking that you have to do the brave thing rather than just get yourself out of there, even if there's no point either way. He obviously wasn't on the DE's side--and I was like you, it was the best Malfoy moment in the book. Otherwise they were just nothing, completely unable to do anything. I think this was probably JKR's point, but rather than sounding like something meaningful she was saying, it seemed to me that they just became plot devices. I don't know if she thought she had to give them any clear arc or motivations. We're just supposed to get it--they're cowards, so of course they can't do anything for themselves. The best people like that can hope for is that they won't fight against the Order so they can be allowed to live because the can experience parent/child love.