Snape and Harry WAS Re: Pensieves objectivity AND: Dumbledore's integrity

[jwcpgh]

No: HPFGUIDX 79732

Wow, you Snape apologists need your own version of the DENIAL. Is 
there nothing the man can do that you would find objectionable?

 Pip!Squeak said:
Snape didn't delay Harry at all. Snape calling Harry 
back (to find out what he was doing in front of Dumbledore's office) 
probably saved a lot of time. Certainly a lot more than the 20 
seconds he 'wasted'. From our POV, we cannot actually see if Snape 
was 'gratuitously interfering'. It's entirely within Snape's revealed 
characterisation for him to enjoy the spectacle of Harry hopping up 
and down, whilst knowing that Dumbledore is coming down the stairs 
right now. 

Laura:

Nice save, Pip.  On re-reading the scene it does seem possible that 
SS knew DD was right behind him.  But really, that gratuitous 
nastiness to Harry, especially when Harry is *not* trying to smart 
off to SS but is trying his best to convey crucial information.  It's 
not the time delay that I wanted to bring up, it's the behavior.

 Pip again:

Despite consistent evidence in PS/SS, CoS, PoA, GoF and OOP 
that Snape cares so deeply for *all* the Hogwarts students that he 
will fight trolls for them, fight werewolves and (he thinks) escaped 
murderers for them, charge into the office of a powerful DE for 
them, and face a Forbidden Forest full of angry centaurs for them. 

Even when its the students he likes least.

And there's all the little protective-of-students side comments, as 
well. 'Crabbe,loosen your hold a little...' 'We'll be carrying 
what's left of Finch-Fletchley to the Hospital Wing in a 
matchbox' 'Snape gripped the back of a chair very hard' [when Ginny 
has been kidnapped in CoS.]

Laura:

Tell me, what do you think Snape would do with himself if Hogwarts 
closed?  Losing students is a sure way to get the place shut down, 
as, indeed, it almost does in CoS. All this alleged protective 
behavior is not as it seems, imo.  Let's see-fight trolls for them?  
He didn't have to do anything, as it turned out, and if he had had 
to, he had Quirrell (yeah, I know but he didn't at that point) and 
McGonagall with him.  Fight werewolves and escaped murderers?  Oh, 
come now-he couldn't wait to nail Remus and Sirius.  Once he saw them 
together on the map, *nothing* would have stopped him from going 
after them.  Who's the dangerous DE?  If it's fake!Moody, DD already 
has him well under control.  If you think it's Umbridge, I believe 
that has yet to be proven.  The centaurs?  Well, if he wants to keep 
his place in the order, what choice did he have?

As for protective remarks about students, that's a matter of 
interpretation, but I think you're giving him much more than the 
benefit of the doubt here.  Except for the Ginny reaction, they just 
seem like typical mean-spirited jabs.  

Pip:
If Harry had remembered that Snape was an Order member, Snape could 
have contacted Sirius for him, safely. 

Laura:

Assuming he would have cooperated.  Can you imagine how that little 
chat would have gone?

HP:  Professor Snape, I just saw Sirius being tortured in the MoM by 
LV!  Please, can you check at Grimmauld Place and see if he's there?

SS:  Potter, if you'd done your Occlumency lessons properly you 
wouldn't have to be bothering me about your helpless, nasty, pathetic 
godfather.  Now get out.  

Notice that not even Hermione thinks to check with SS before Harry 
breaks into Umbridge's office.  Usually she can be counted on for 
clear thinking, even about people she doesn't like.  But despite her 
belief that SS is one of the good guys, she doesn't suggest asking 
him for help.  Maybe she understands that when it comes to Sirius, 
Snape just can't be trusted.  

Sevvie does what he has to do to make sure Hogwarts will stay open, 
even if it means exerting an effort on behalf of non-Slytherin 
students.  Snape wants 2 things, I think: to teach at Hogwarts, where 
he can have a lot of power and authority (and thus try to redress the 
humiliations he suffered there as a student)and to defeat LV, which I 
think he's doing out of principle (no LOLLIPOPS here!).  Everything 
he does is directed at those 2 ends.  Verbally abusing students won't 
get the school shut down nor will it get him fired, as long as DD's 
in his corner, so he can get away with it.

Pip:
when the order comes through that Snape 
and Harry have to work together, it's Snape who makes sarcastic 
comments-and-soldiers. Harry is the one who obstructs the lessons as 
much as he can by the passive method of I-haven't-done-my-homework-
Sir and the active method of breaking into the pensieve. It is Snape 
who tries as much as he can to be adult about the Occlumency lessons. 

Laura:

There's wrong-headed behavior on both sides here, I concede.  Harry 
is going to have a heck of a hard time getting to neutral on Snape 
after 4+ years of persecution.  Granted, he doesn't make much of an 
attempt.  And there's no excuse for looking into the pensieve-that 
was just rude, and stupid as well.  But I agree with Sarah and 
msbeadsley that learning Occlumency wasn't just another lesson.  It 
requires the learner to make himself completely vulnerable to the 
teacher.  How could DD ever have thought that Harry could do that 
with Snape?  That's why it would have been so much more constructive 
to have just about anyone else teach Harry.  Snape barely makes an 
effort to explain what the technique is-well, it's kind of like 
throwing off Imperius, kind of.  

And Snape let himself get way out of control.  If a teacher in the RW 
behaved toward a student the way Snape behaves toward Harry in that 
pensieve 2 scene, he'd be fired in a red-hot minute.  I don't see 
that Snape behaved in a particularly adult way at all.  Maybe he 
started out with good intentions (hah), but the first remark out of 
his mouth is "I can only hope that you prove more adept at 
[Occlumency] than Potions."  He then spends the next 4 pages berating 
and baiting Harry instead of simply answering his questions and 
instructing him.  He should be ashamed of himself.  That's where his 
complicity in Sirius's death comes in-and if you think he has had a 
moment's guilt about that, think again.  He's perfectly happy to have 
Sirius dead-he just wishes he could have been the one to do it. 






 --- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "ellejir" <eberte at v...> wrote:
> Melpomene wrote:>
> > <snip> 
> > This "abuse": Harry is now FIFTEEN. We have to stop seeing him as 
> > ELEVEN. Should Snape have grabbed and pushed? No. But was it 
child 
> > abuse? I think not. I think had Severus wanted to abuse Harry he 
> > could have done a HELL of a lot better than that. He did not 
throw 
> > things "at" Harry, he threw ONE jar OVER his head. 
> > <more snipping>
> > NO, it was not a mature grown up thing for a teacher--any adult 
to 
> > do. But he retained enough control not to send it right through 
his 
> > head, a feat I have no doubt he was capeable of.
> > Am I making excuses? No not really. But I am tired of this 
argument 
> > sounding like Big Huge Severus beat up on ickle innocent baby 
Harry 
> > AND took away his lolly.
>  
> Me (Elle):
> It is amazing to me how *far* the Snape apologists will go to 
excuse 
> his bad behavior.  Snape basically threw a two-year-old toddler 
> tantrum when he found Harry snooping in the pensieve ("but that's 
OK 
> because he was mad", sayeth the Snape apologists.)  Why do so many 
> people see him as either black or white?  IMO, Snape's complexity 
and 
> contradictions are what make him so interesting.
> 
> I find SS an absolutely fascinating character, but that doesn't 
mean 
> that I think that his behavior is correct or mature.  He verbally 
> abuses Harry from Day 1 out of jealousy over Harry's status as a 
> living hero and hatred of Harry's father (obviously things over 
which 
> Harry had no control.)  He verbally abuses Neville from Day 1 
> (presumably because he is such an *easy* target.)  He constantly is 
> trying to humiliate Hermione.  Generally, he is a *super-nasty* guy 
> with a streak of insecurity/immaturity a mile wide.  
> 
> Does that mean that there is no good at all in Snape?  *Of course* 
> there is good in him.  He (apparently) is risking his life spying 
for 
> the Order, he agrees to teach Harry Occlumency even though he hates 
> him, he saves Harry's life in SS, he gets sassy with Umbridge (you 
> gotta love that!), and he basically launches the rescue effort in 
OoP.
> 
> The glimpses that we were given in OoP into Snape's memories show 
us 
> a lonely, awkward boy with a sad home-life.  It is not too hard to 
> pity Snape for his childhood, but I do not think that the trials of 
> his youth can excuse all his adult nastiness.      
> 
> 
> 
> Melpomene again:
> > There was NO excuse for Harry to look in that Pensieve. NONE. I 
> > don't care if Snape was baiting him. <snip>
> > Why would it enter Snape's mind that Potter was looking in that 
> > pensieve for information on James and Lily? Oh no, Potter wasn't
> > looking for Potters, he was looking for more "Fun with Snivellus"
> > and we all know it. 
> 
> Me again (Elle):
> I think that Harry was just being nosey (as usual.)  If he were 
> really looking to have some "Fun with Snivellus" to laugh about 
later 
> with Ron and Hermione, he totally *hit paydirt* with what he saw in 
> the pensieve.  But he never even told Ron and Hermione what he 
> saw, now did he?
> 
> Elle (not a Snape-hater, not a Snape apologist)