Snape Theory

[silver_wendigo]

No: HPFGUIDX 56366

Okay, this is partly in reply to a post of Darrin's saying something 
about Snape perhaps hating muggle borns...but I sent the post off to 
an elf to see if my theory was already documented and I just hadn't 
seen it...got it back with permission to post but...I forgot which 
post I was replying to! Sorry! Anyway, here's what I was intending to 
send.


I don't know if I agree that Snape hates muggle borns. Obviously, as 
a Slytherin, it's likely that he has a bias against them,  but the 
only people I've seen him really treat as though he hated are Harry, 
Lupin, and Sirius...people who have to do with his past...one of
whom we know isn't muggle born!  But as to his behavior with other 
students...

Neville is from a wizarding family, not muggle born. And 
he sees Hermione as a know it all, which is, in my opinion, the 
source of his ire, rather then the blood in her veins.  

I have a theory which I didn't see listed in the vfaq or anywhere else, so 
I'll put it out here. I think Neville is a target because he is 
extremely incompetant at something which Snape cares a lot about - 
potions. Snape deals his annoyance with Neville by bullying him. To 
dip into psychology a little, he was teased as a kid due to 
characteristics about him that other people thought were strange or 
didn't like. So Snape's solution to seeing something he doesn't like 
in another person is to do what was done to him. 

The same tendancy is seen with Moaning Myrtle at the end of Chapter 12 of CoS(pg226)...she was teased a lot, and that teasing indirectly lead to her death...but yet she teases Hermione about the effects of the polyjuice potion.  

As for Hermione, as I said, he sees her as a know it all, and for some 
reason that really bothers him (which maybe has something to do with 
someone in Snape's past who Hermione reminds him of), so he treats 
her poorly as a result.   

"Silver Wendigo"