Emotional Baggage Handler!Snape, was Hagrid/Dursleys and owl post (a little bit of owl post)

[darrin_burnett]

No: HPFGUIDX 41344

Amanda wrote:

> 
> It's been a few eons, so I'm going to throw out my "why Snape hates 
Hermione
> (and others)" thoughts for dissection and general trampling.
> 
> I believe that Snape "sees" James and his friends in Harry and 
*his.* His
> reactions to Harry, Ron, and Hermione are just as much reactions to 
James et
> al., as they are to Harry, Ron, and Hermione. His feelings that 
Harry is
> allowed to get away with murder are compounded and enhanced by old 
baggage
> that James and his friends were allowed to do so, as well.
> 

This entire conversation started with the discussion over whether 
Snape was a good teacher. If this theory is true, Snape has allowed 
something that happened 20 years ago to cloud how he treats a boy who 
never even knew his father, and by extension, two other people who 
never met James and didn't know anything about Lupin or Black for the 
first two years.

A standard that was put forth by the people commenting that Hagrid 
stunk as a teacher was his inappropriate fraternization with the HRH. 

I submit that this same standard should apply to Snape. The grudges 
he holds, and extends to kids who had nothing to do with what 
happened, are unprofessional and inappropriate.

And if it gets in his way of recognizing talent, then he's the one 
with the problem, not Hermione.

 
> I think Snape favors Malfoy because he "sees" himself in Malfoy, 
just a bit,
> as well, if only because Malfoy so obviously Harry's opponent. He 
gives
> Malfoy breaks because he feels he, Snape, never got them. He's 
compensating.
> 
> I suspect that much of this is on an unconscious level. Not all, I 
bet,
> because I think Snape is a ruthlessly honest person. He is a nasty, 
mean,
> vindictive person, but I think he *knows* it. He is perfectly aware 
that he
> acts in a biased manner, and I suspect he knows himself well enough 
to admit why.
>

God, if this is true, it just must be miserable inside that greasy 
head. 

Snape has never seemed able to deal with the fact that James had his 
life in his hands at one point. Perhaps Snape accurately called 
James' motivations -- essentially deciding the prank was going too 
far -- but the fact remains, James saved Snape.

Harry doesn't have a clue about any of this. Yet Snape chews on this 
stuff for 20 years and then unleashes it on Harry, his friends, and 
really, his entire House. It's frightfully immature and incredibly 
inappropriate for a teacher.


> None of this discounts the other motivations anyone has put 
forward. I think
> I was one of the earliest "Snape is doing Draco no favors" 
theorists (i.e., by making things so easy on Draco, Snape is 
deliberately not challenging  him, for the purpose of rendering him 
not-as-prepared to handle difficult
> situations). I also think it's tremendously likely that Snape is 
favoring
> the children of former Death Eaters in order to keep his hand in. 
Snape is a
> complex enough character to have all these factor in his 
motivation, and
> more. I think it very likely that Snape is vicariously 
compensating, through
> Draco, for all the times he thought he didn't get the breaks, and 
at the
> same time rather enjoying the detrimental effect it may have on 
Lucius'
> little pride and joy.


I'm not sure about the hurt-Draco effect. It's strongly insinuated 
that if Hermione is top in the class, Draco is second. (In CoS, we're 
left to believe that without Hermione, Draco wins top marks.) Draco 
is most likely a pretty talented wizard. 

The compensation factor holds some water, except Draco is from an 
insanely wealthy family and has some perks on his own.

The real charity cases are probably Crabbe and Goyle, who may be 
passing just because of the strings Snape pulls.


> This impression of mine, that many of Snape's actions and reactions 
are as much to James/friends as to Harry/friends, is one reason I 
find that last interaction between Snape and Harry at GoF's end-of-
year feast so very tantalizing. From the way they look at each other, 
it suggests that there
> has been some re-examination. I think Snape is only now, after four 
years  and the events of GoF, coming to see Harry as Harry himself, 
instead of an
> extension of James.
> 
> I have always felt that Snape's nastiness and general failure to 
bother with  personal niceties was a function of a sort 
of "autopilot"--he has been through such dangerous and hair-trigger 
situations that the little day-to-day stuff is pretty much menial. 
He's moved past where he cares what many people think, and past where 
much of what goes on really matters a  whole lot. I think he realizes 
he's nasty and cruel, but I think he's been
> in such awful situations that he really doesn't think what he does 
to his
> students is anything but trivial. Only where his past rears up 
before him,
> as in the Shack, or when Moody/Crouch is baiting him in the hall, 
or when
> Sirius transforms in front of him, do we see a genuine, honest, deep
> reaction.
> 

Well, this all may be true, but people react in different ways. 
Sirius spent 13 years in prison, blaming himself for the death of his 
friends, and he seems to have bounced back fairly nicely, even 
finding the heart to give Ron a little gift of an owl while on the 
run. Lupin is an outcast, yet still manages to be nice to Neville. 
Hagrid was unjustly blamed for a horrible crime and been hiding his 
heritage most of his life, yet still is kind and gentle.

So, I'm willing to buy that Snape has seen some serious stuff, but 
he's the one choosing to be a cruel bastard because of it. 

It seems to me that Snape always was a jerk. He's just a jerk who 
decided the winning side was Dumbledore and not Voldemort.


> I don't think he genuinely hates Hermione herself. I don't think he
> genuinely has ever considered her as anything but a Harry 
extension, but as
> *that,* yes, he hates her. It's simply easier for him to fall back 
on old
> patterns, and treat Harry/friends in the pattern he developed for
> James/friends, and treat Draco and the Slytherins in the way he 
thought he
> and his 'gang of Slytherins' should have been treated. Otherwise, 
he must
> invest some real part of himself in honestly seeing these students 
as
> themselves. And I suspect that real interactions are not things he 
cares to
> do for most people, particularly these particular students. 
Possibly not
> until now, when events at the end of GoF have forced him to really 
see Harry
> as his own person and an ally.
> 

All this may be true, but if it is, he's lousy teacher material. I 
like the research vs. classroom teacher theory. He is a useful 
potions maker, creating the anti-werewolf thing, and the Veritaserum 
and may have indeed had something to do with the first fall of 
Voldemort. (I'm not sure about creating Lily's protection spell, 
though; jeez, listen to the "no important female characters" crowd if 
Lily's greatest strength was actually MAN-made.)

Darrin
-- Snape is fascinating, worthy of study and well-acted by Alan 
Rickman in the film-I-am-not-afraid-to-name, but he's a lousy 
teacher. :)