Neville and Snape (was What standards are we using)/Stigmatizing Slytherin

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 144381

Lupinlore:

> Actually, I don't remember Dumbledore saying any such thing.  

Magpie:

Yes, I should have said what Pippin seems to be getting from 
Dumbledore's attitude, like about the Occlumency lessons when he says 
he was wrong to think Snape could have gotten over his old wounds. He 
is offering that as the reasons behind the lessons being a disaster, 
and to me it sounds like he's speaking to Harry as someone he hopes 
will understand that, if not now, then in the future.

Lupinlore: 
> Snape's damaged?  Join the club.  As Pippin points out, lots of 
> people in the Wizarding World are damaged.  Boo hoo.  Poor 'ickle 
> thirty-eight year old Severus.  It in no way excuses his abuse of 
> Harry and Neville, nor does it in any way release him from 
> punishment for said abuse.  Any more than any damage Tom Riddle 
> might have experienced in any way releases him from his ultimate 
> fate.

Magpie:

Well, exactly--boo-hoo!  If it's boo-hoo for Snape then it's boo-hoo 
for everyone else.  At 38 Snape is no longer the little child crying 
in the corner, and Harry and Neville at 17 are not little boys of 
11.  

Bookworm:
I would argue that the Slytherins don't see themselves as stigmatized
or suffering `negative traits'. Given the attitudes we have seen from
Draco and company, they see themselves as better than everyone else.
It is only students in the other house who we have seen through
Harry's point of view, who seem to think less of them.

Magpie:

Which is interesting, because it seems like this sort of thing goes 
on on both sides.  Slytherins are seen as being snobby and thinking 
they're better than everyone, yet Harry on sight thinks they even 
look like an unsavoury lot.  Even Hermione speaks of them as a group 
not to be trusted. Seems like everybody pretty much thinks they're 
better people than they are.  Harry and Blaise "hate each other on 
principle."   I mean, isn't it natural for any group that's hated by 
another to decide they are, in fact, superior? Nobody wants to be 
stigmatized.

-m