Some Questions, if I may

[Rita Winston]

No: HPFGUIDX 5039

--- In HPforGrownups at egroups.com, stephanie75 at a... wrote:

> How had Slytherin won the house cup 6 years in a row? If they
> haven't won the Quidditch cup alll of those years also, where are 
> they getting the points? Cheating? They don't seem to be the most
> intelligent, was Snape giving them extra points or something?

I think they *did* win the Quidditch Cup all those years. In fact, my 
timeline problem is that PoA makes it sound like Slytherin started 
their winning streak of the Quidditch Cup one year before their 
winning streak of the House Cup, which doesn't fit.

Also, just because Crabbe and Goyle are stupid (big and stupid: now, 
that's a stereotype!) doesn't mean that all Slytherins are. Even if 
all the ones in Harry's year were stupid, that doesn't mean that the 
older ones were stupid.

> And the big one is why does Snape hate Harry so much? I know why he
> hates Harry's dad and James' friends, and he thinks that Harry
> thinks he's special and above rules. But if Snape is so trusted by
> Dumbledore I would think he was a responsible adult. Instead he 
> acts like a jealous 10 year old holding a  grudge against an 
> innocent person.

The problem is your assumption that Snape should be a responsible 
adult. It is quite possible for a person to have a brilliant mind 
and a big talent (such as Potions) and a loyalty-to-the-death to an 
honorable cause, and still be immature, childish, and so on. My 
friend Lee's late father springs to mind. He was brilliant and 
honorable, and helpful to a zillion people, but for Lee's whole life, 
the way he treated her was exactly like sibling rivalry. E.G. when 
she was a teen-ager, he used to deliberately scratch her records (who 
remembers vinyl? shellac?).

> And why does he like Draco so much?

As he seems to have favored Draco from the first moment of meeting 
him, perhaps it was because Draco is the enemy of his enemy (Potter). 

Another possibility: maybe Draco really is a good student and *very* 
good at Potions, and Snape loves just about anyone (except Hermione!) 
who is *very* good at Potions. 

Another possibility: Draco looks like Lucius, maybe Snape likes Draco 
because of liking Lucius. I don't mean deliberately showing 
favoritism to a friend or financial benefactor's child, I mean the 
unconscious tendency to have a good feeling about someone who looks 
like your friend and a bad feeling about someone who looks like your 
enemy.