In Defense of Snape (long)

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 122090


Naama: 
> I have two objections to make here. One, on a plot leve. 
Second one,  on a "meta" level, regarding the methodology of 
interpretation.
> 
> My first point is - if Snape is nasty to Harry et al. in order to 
maintain his spy cover - why is he even nastier to Harry when 
they  are alone? <

Pippin:
Snape doesn't trust everyone that Harry trusts. Do you think 
Snape wanted Harry telling Quirrell that Snape treats him okay 
when they're alone?

 Naama:
> Second point - which holds to most conspiracy theories, 
actually. If  you hold a theory that explains a character's behavior 
in terms of a  hidden agenda, you have to be very careful about 
consistency of  interpretation. For instance, taken one by one, 
which of Snape's  moments of nastiness do you interprete as 
necessitated by spy cover,  and which are authentic, expressing 
his true feelings and  personality?<

Pippin:
 Snape's  hidden agenda is revealed when we would expect 
nasty behavior and don't get it; in OOP when he gives Umbridge 
fake veritaserum (the Order's secrets are in little danger since 
they are under fidelius), in GoF when he stands with the others 
to honor Harry at the leaving feast,  in PoA when he conjures 
stretchers for Harry and the others,  in CoS when he has a 
"shrewd and calculating look" instead of the discomfiture you 
would expect if his sole purpose in having Draco conjure the 
snake was to humiliate Harry, and of course in PS/SS when we 
find he has been shadowing Harry not to get him into trouble but 
to protect him from Quirrell.

His words are nasty, but that goes back to the nice vs good 
conundrum. "Nice" is dependent on social convention, whereas 
most of us like to think goodness is not. Whether it's nice to 
belch at the table depends on who you're dining with; the Queen 
of England or a South Seas islander. 

There are cultures where casual insults are just the way you 
establish yourself in the pecking order...I remember reading a 
translator's note to the stories of Sholem Aleichem which 
explained that all the insults had been toned down, because no 
English-speaker would believe that people who actually liked 
each other could talk like that.

Slytherin is definitely one of those. When Draco tells "Goyle" that 
if he were any slower he'd be going backward, he's asserting his 
social dominance, not trying to pick a fight. Phineas Nigellus is 
as insolent to Dumbledore as he dares to be, because that's his 
way of saying, "I was a Headmaster too." He makes a big show 
of not co-operating, but it's clear that he does.

Sirius falls back into this way of relating at Grimmauld Place and 
tears into Kreacher, though he preaches, as a good 
Gryffindor, that you are judged by how you treat your inferiors.

Snape has, by the conventions of Slytherin House, and of 
authoritarian societies generally, the privilege of insulting his 
inferiors. If he didn't exercise it, he'd be no true Slytherin and he 
would lose the respect of his House. How much genuine spleen 
there is behind the insults is anyone's guess, but we know that 
Harry tends to equate  casual put-downs and hatred, so he's not 
our best witness. He's convinced that Lily hated James and that 
Sirius hated Kreacher, and he's told this was not so.

Pippin