[HPforGrownups] Snape Wars vs Ship Wars was re: Cultural standards for Snape abusiveness/

[Sherry Gomes]

No: HPFGUIDX 144512

Pippin:
This stuff is major --
never mind what JKR said before, folks, it's okay to judge people by
type, the person you suspect most is guilty, guilty, guilty, and only
a fool laughs at fear.

Sherry now:

I actually see it another way.  i think JKR did a brilliant job of setting
us up.  Many fans, certainly not all, but most i've talked to or read in
fandom, either were always Snape fans, or like me, didn't like Snape but
believed he was ultimately on the side of good.  Mostly because Dumbledore
believed in him.  I proclaimed many times that i thought Snape would be one
of those characters who is mean and hateful, but that Harry would have to
learn that not everyone fighting for good is a good person.  HBP, and the
murder of Dumbledore, is what changed my mind.  I firmly believe Snape
murdered Dumbledore, whether as a result of the DADA jinx, or out for
himself, or to save his own neck because he was in a fairly no win
situation, or because that was his order from Voldemort all along.  I don't
think it's a thing of, well, this guy was always bad, I always knew it.  i
was absolutely shocked and devastated.  I had to turn off the CD and pace
around and curse for a while.  I never liked Snape as a person, though I
liked how JKR had written his character, if you get my meaning.  But I
confidently expected Dumbledore's faith in him to be true.  not any more.
Dumbledore, in my opinion, underestimated the depths of Snape's hurt and
hatred and paid the price in the end.


Pippin
Of course there are people who think she did lose control with the
shipping. Come to think of it, the arguments against R/H and H/G
have an eerie similarity to the arguments against DDM Snape.
Many people also argued that Harry could not have misperceived
Ginny's character so thoroughly, and that in any case there wasn't
time for her to develop into anything very different from what
she appeared to be already.

It might be interesting to see whether people who think the 
ships were clumsily handled are also the people who are sure that
Snape betrayed Dumbledore.

Pippin


Sherry now:
i've definitely believed in H/G and R/HR through the entire series, and i've
argued for Ginny and Harry here before HBP was ever released.  i thought
Ginny was meant for Harry from the very first time we meet Ginny at King's
Cross station.  I didn't think as much either way about Ron and Hermione,
but it seemed pretty obvious to me from early on, that was where JKR was
taking that one.  It's a pretty classic way of writing a romance for a
couple, the two who constantly fight end up falling in love and all that.  I
never had a sense at all of anything more than friendship between Harry and
Hermione.  Hermione's anger at Ron over the Yule ball was the clincher for
me.  When she made her comment about how Ron should ask her first next time.


So, I'm one who expected and likes the ships, but I still believe Snape
murdered Dumbledore, and not as a mercy killing or a plan or to save Draco
and Harry or anything like that.  Perhaps to save Draco, but not for the
greater good, more for whatever his true loyalties will be in the end.  

Sherry