Snape and Harry again.

[dumbledore11214]

No: HPFGUIDX 113188

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "pippin_999" <foxmoth at q...> 
wrote:
>. Harry is frightened of 
> Snape and  he thinks it's wrong to feel that fear.  So he tries to 
> show, with his petty defiance, that he's not afraid. But who is he 
> fooling? Mostly himself, I think.
> 
> If Harry could forgive  himself for being  afraid of Snape, not 
> detentions, not sarcasm, but Snape himself, then maybe he 
> could realize how irrational that fear really is.  And it is
> irrational. What's Snape ever done to Harry, except make him 
> look bad in front of the Slytherins? And it's not as though they 
> were ever going to be paid up members of the Harry Potter fan 
> club in the first place.
> 
> Harry, like Neville, needs to learn to laugh at his fear of 
Snape.   
> But he won't do that, as long as he can't forgive himself for 
being 
> afraid in the first place. As Lupin said, Harry's great fear is 
fear.
> 
> But if he could manage it, then, maybe, Harry wouldn't be so 
> invested in defying Snape.   Talking back to Snape was 
> harmless except that it aggravated Snape even more, but when 
> the defiance extended to not practicing occlumency, it had 
> serious consequences (no pun intended.)  
> 
>

Alla:

Where to start? Pippin, didn't you consider James to be "evil" based 
on what he did to Snape in the Pensieve scene?

What exactly did James do to him, except making him look bad in 
front of the whole school?

I think we kind of agreed that psychological kind of bullying is the 
worst one ever.  I really don't want to recite all the canon again, 
but I will probably make a nice long list of examples over weekend, 
if I have time , of what Snape ever did to Harry and some other 
Gryffs.


But I say that now - if the only thing Snape did to Harry and 
Neville was to cause them humiliation and enjoy it, he really did 
enough, in my book for children to despise him. And, IMO he did that 
many many times.

Snape enjoys watching children being afraid of him. I want to refer 
you to Nora's excellent post yesterday (113106). I really cannot put 
it more eloquently than she did.


Right now, I think it is extremely unrealistic to expect Harry not 
to be intimidated by Snape and really, his defiance led to the fact 
that his Boggart was not professor Snape.

Yes, his defiance extended to not practicing Occlumency, which was a 
shame, but if you tell me that Harry is the primary party to blame 
for that, I really disagree with you. :)