Bullying WAS: Re: Prodigal Sons

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 141121

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > So, do you think *all* of those students James and Sirius hexed 
> > throughout their time at Hogwarts were somehow wrong or evil?
> > <snip>

> >>Valky:
> No and Yes, I certainly don't think all of the students that got the
> wrong end of this pairs wands were evil and wrong. But I do think  
> the comparison between the F/G and the J/S pair is telling in      
> regard to the kind of situations generally presiding when J/S did   
> get mean.

Betsy Hp:
Ooh, you picked a wrong analogy for me there Valky <g>. Since I'm 
kind of hoping one of the twins turns out to be evil as an 
explination of their general creepiness they're not a really good 
example of doing it for the principle.  (The twins generally do 
what's best for the twins, IMO.)  Which is why *I* think the 
comparison made between James and Sirius and the twins is telling in 
an entirely different way. <g>

> >>Valky: 
> <snip>
> OTOH, he does really believe in championing good principles, and so
> does Sirius, that's their inner self, and it doesn't change IMO,   
> they just misrepresent it out hormone driven teenage self          
> righteousness, I think.

Betsy Hp:
Is there any canon on this?  I know Lupin says (or is it Sirius) that 
James hated the Dark Arts (which...okay.  A bit weird for an eleven 
year old, IMO, but has the war started or something?) but that James 
thinks he can tell if someone is worthy of punishment or not is a 
bit... well, it doesn't impress.  Frankly I think it's something he 
needed to get over.  Sirius deciding that someone was worthy of death 
gave James a much needed wakeup call, I think.  (I don't care *how* 
old you are.  Setting yourself up as the decider of right or wrong 
is, well, wrong, IMO.  Even Dumbledore hesitates.)

> >>Betsy:
> > James didn't rush out to befriend a werewolf.  Lupin was his 
> > friend and then James *discovered* he was a werewolf.
> > <snip>

> >>Valky:
> Yes, but Lupin *was* the little guy, *before* James found out he   
> was a werewolf. He'd been isolated all his life, was wary, afraid   
> and very alone when he came to Hogwarts, this was because he was a 
> werewolf, but it was also debilitating in itself.

Betsy Hp:
Oh, James was a good guy I think in general.  If you weren't 
obviously weird I think he gave people a chance.  And even adult 
Lupin is quite good at telling people what they want to hear, so I 
imagine he had that gift as a child (for the reasons you point out).  
But I'm not sure that James noticed the incredibly strange child and 
decided to befriend him.

> >>Valky:
> <snip>
> I doubt his haggard, shabby, mutilated appearances would have been 
> very endearing to the general population...
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
First, Lupin is not, and never was, mutilated.  That's movie 
contamination.  Canon Lupin is never described as having a single 
scar (except for his bite?).  He just looks really, *really* tired.  
Second, we don't know that Lupin's parents were as poor as Lupin is 
now.  *They* weren't werewolves so they may have been able to afford 
decent clothes for their son.  (Lupin's not described as "shabby" in 
the pensieve memory that I could find.  He looked a bit peaky, that's 
all.)  And third, Lupin *does* get chosen as a prefect.  So even if 
the Marauders weren't the only Gryffindor boys of their year, Lupin 
must have stood out, in a good way, from the rest of the boys.  All 
of that makes it very hard for me to see Lupin as a "little guy".  
*Shy* I'd buy, but not oppressed.

I *do* think it speaks well of James that he *remained* Lupin's 
friend once he found out about Lupin's "furry little problem", but 
merely making friends with Lupin in the first place doesn't impress 
me tons. 

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > <snip>
> > Sirius remained a Black until he was sixteen, IIRC.  So 
> > again, James wasn't choosing to befriend an oppressed outsider.

> >>Valky:
> Hmm, I think that is a matter for debate. As far as I can see,      
> Sirius was oppressed by his parents while he lived with them.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Oh, I fully buy that Sirius and his mother went at it hammer and 
tongs from the moment Sirius learned to talk <g>. And I'm sure James 
picked up on the fact that Sirius was *not* the favored son.  (Which 
if James really *was* against the Dark Arts so fundamentally would 
only be a good thing in his eyes.)  But I'm incredibly leery of an 
eleven year old making a political choice. (It's why I can't except a 
sweeping condemnation of Slytherin house.)  I think the politics came 
later (around the time Sirius turned sixteen).

But you saw Sirius in the pensieve.  Again, I find it hard to believe 
that the eldest son of the House of Black didn't know how to give 
good face.  I doubt Sirius brooded much.  I'm betting he was in the 
thick of things from the moment he arrived.  (This is all guess work 
of course.  I don't think canon has much to say either way.)

> >>Betsy Hp: 
> > As to Peter, I'm going to agree with colebiancardi here.  Nothing 
> > in canon points to Peter being so magically challenged as to be 
> > considered a "virtual squib". 

> >>Valky:
> In POA MacGonagall gives us the canon that refutes this statement
> Betsy. Nobody thought Peter was anything of a wizard. 

Betsy Hp:
*Hem hem.  Pulls out hardback scholastic PoA* <g>

Professor McGonagall says this about Peter:

"Never quite in their league, talent-wise." (p.207)

She's comparing him to Sirius and James of whom she said earlier:

"Both very bright, of course - exceptionally bright, in fact..." 
(p.204)

So Peter is not quite in the league of two students Professor 
McGonagall classifies as "exceptionally bright".  That's a long, 
long, *long*, way from "near squib".  Again, it's *Harry* who links 
Peter with Neville (clever JKR encouraging us to think Peter's a 
nothing wizard).  But the professor who knew him as a student did no 
such thing.  At least, not that I can see. 
 
> >>Betsy Hp:
> >  For me, the most disturbing part of the pensieve memory was how 
> > *comfortable* James was with Peter's fawning.  It seemed that    
> > Peter worked to be James's friend, not the other way around. 

> >>Valky:
> I think this is true by around the time of the SWM scene. By then
> Peter has become quite accomplished I'd imagine, and he is playing
> James against himself.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Interesting.  So you're thinking Peter was already turning towards 
the Death Eaters at this time?

> >>Valky:
> But in the initial stages of their friendship, I maintain Peter was 
> definitely an outsider with lacklustre potential in the friends    
> department, mostly because he ws an easy target due to his feckless 
> wizardry, like NL. James and Sirius most likely protected him in   
> the beginning.

Betsy Hp:
Huh.  See, that's why I think Peter *turned* to James and Sirius.  
Doesn't Sirius sort of imply that Peter scurried for the strongest 
guy in the playground?  It just reads to me that *Peter* sought out 
James.

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > I have a hard time reconciling this with the memory. Snape wasn't 
> > doing anything wrong.  He wasn't picking on a poor big-eyed first 
> > year.  He wasn't torturing puppies.  He was studying for his     
> > OWL. And Sirius was bored.  James decided that as a good friend   
> > he'd entertain Sirius by picking on the outsider, the weird kid   
> > with bad social skills and a funky homelife. 

> Valky:
> Yes I agree that this reads right. But again it reads all wrong
> outside the pensieve so how can it be the right of the story?

Betsy Hp:
Ah, here's where we have our breakdown.  For me it reads right 
*outside* the pensieve as well.  From the language of the Map, to the 
way Sirius treats an unconscious Snape, to what Lily says about 
James, to what Sirius and Lupin say about their school-days, to what 
Harry reads in those old detention cards it seems fairly clear that 
James led his own little gang of "trouble makers", and that Snape was 
their most favoritist victim.

> >>Valky: 
> Inside the pensieve, Snape is all those things, but all other canon
> says there is much much more to this story and Snape is not all he
> might seem there in that scene. I cannot step outside the pensieve
> scene without questioning the opinion that they were picking on an
> outsider because of his bad social skills and funky homelife. And I
> wonder how anyone else can.

Betsy Hp:
I can, because for all the talk of Snape having a "Slytherin gang" we 
don't really see him with a group of friends.  The memories Harry 
dragged up point to a lonely little boy from a not so great home.  
The very fact that a child arrived at Hogwarts with a strange 
knowledge of Dark Arts speaks to a not so great homelife, IMO.  If an 
eleven year old knows about, oh smoking or drugging or porn or 
something I generally suspect he learned it at home.

> >>Valky:  
> If James was picking on Snape because of his looks and isolation,  
> then what meaning does "Snape was neck deep in Dark Arts and James 
> always hated the Dark Arts" have, except to argue point blank that 
> Sirius and Lupin are a pair of liars.

Betsy Hp:
They aren't liars.  I'm sure Snape did know a few curses. (Did he 
witness his mother flinging them in defense at an abusive husband?  
Or a grandfather or brother using them against the sister or daughter 
who shamed them by willfully marrying a muggle? Did cousins use the 
nasty little half-blood for target practice?) But I'm also pretty 
confident that Snape (who seems to be fairly poor in the pensieve 
memory) also had shappy clothes and second hand books and probably a 
gigantic chip on his shoulder.  For all we know James made a well 
meant joke and Snape replied with out of place anger and maybe a 
curse.

> >>Valky: 
> If Snape was really a lonely boy who minds his own business, then   
> how on earth did he end up walking into the Shrieking Shack, if    
> Sirius didn't hogtie him and drag him down there? Can't you see the
> contradiction, or do we really think Sirius is ESE?

Betsy Hp:
Oh, by the time of the Shack I'm quite sure Snape saw the Marauders 
as his business.  I love Snape dearly, but he does have a problem 
with letting things go <g>.  No, I fully believe Snape went to the 
Shack hell bent on finding the Marauders in some sort of wrong doing, 
either to tell on them and get them thrown out for good or to 
blackmail them or something.  

What I *do* have a hard time buying is that sweet St. James *never* 
did a thing wrong to Snape.  He was just trying to save him from his 
sinful ways.  Or that Snape was considered too far gone by James and 
James was merely trying to save the innocents Snape preyed on.  That 
the two boys hated each other on sight I can belive.  I just think 
they're probably equally calpable in their enmity. 

> >>Valky:
> <snip>
> However, returning to the original context of my statement
> about this, I don't think it would do Snape any harm to get chewed 
> out for his horribleness, it might not be his biggest lesson, but
> regardless of what his intent is, just like James, he should have   
> the truth thrown in his face for him.

Betsy Hp:
I think Snape *has* had this happen.  At the very least I think 
Voldemort killing the Potters is Snape's version of a "big lesson".  
I have LOLLIPOP tendencies, so I think the fact that Snape put Lily's 
life in danger and then was unable to save her gave him a whole heck 
of a lot of truth to deal with.  I think it's a truth Snape is still 
having to wrestle with.  And one he'll need to reconcile if he's to 
be truely redeemed.

But I think, in many ways, James's story has been told.  He started 
off as a bit of spoiled brat, learned a mighty big truth at the time 
of the Prank, managed to improve himself enough to win Lily's hand 
(and the rank of Head Boy), and proved his overall goodness by dying 
while trying to protect his family.  It's a good story and one James 
should be proud of.

Snape's story is still out there.  And we've only seen flashes of 
it.  Snape joined the Death Eaters, for some reason, he left them (or 
did he?), for some reason, he spied for the Order (or did he?), for 
some reason, and then he either betrayed the Order or served it to 
the fullest extent...for some reason.   Basically we're waiting to 
find out how it started, where it went, and how it'll end.  So it's a 
bit harder to judge how well Snape has done, IMO.

Betsy Hp, who cannot believe the length of this post, congratulates 
(or apologizes) to any who made it through, and will now go to bed!