Why are Potter-Haters Still Here? (Ranting)

[justcarol67]

Barbara Roberts wrote:
>
> I noticed that the tone of the list changed (in different ways)
after the last two books.  (After the last book especially, I felt the
quality of posts went down).  Snape "may be a gift of a character,"
but the many, many posts about him were redundant. <snip>

Carol responds:
Ah, well. Snape is the character who aroused the strongest emotions in
the series and whose loyalties were the longest-standing mystery. The
main plot and chief subplot of HBP involve him (he's the eponymous
character of the subtitle) and the first chapter of DH focuses on him
as well. Harry's epiphany involving Snape is central to the
self-sacrifice Harry has to make. It's really no mystery why so many
posts still focus on him and why so many readers are still fascinated
by him, either before or after DH.

If you don't like Snape or aren't interested in him, you can always
skip those threads. (Unfortunately, we posters keep forgetting to
change the subject line when the topic shifts, so a post with Snape in
the title may not be about Snape at all and vice versa.)

I personally think that the quality of the posts "went down" after DH,
when most of us were too overwhelmed by our emotional reactions to
look at the books analytically, but perhaps that's least evident in
the Snape threads. (I saw it most in the threads expressing
disappointment in JKR's handling of Slytherin House and the supposed
broken promise of "House unity.") A lot of posters were and remain
bitterly disappointed with the books. Others of us are trying to
discuss them with a reasonable degree of objectivity and to present
canon-based arguments.

I'll never get tired of Snape, but I'm certainly tired of whining
generalizations with no canon support. All I really want is for those
who are lambasting JKR and DH to sit back, take a deep breath, and
reread DH for what she wrote rather than what she "failed" to write.

Carol, who would find HPfGu a less interesting place without the
frequent discussions of Snape