More PTSD and also Intention

[Michelle]

No: HPFGUIDX 141216

Eggplant wrote:

It's remarkable that Harry isn't suffering from Post Traumatic Stress
Disorder after all the hell he's been through, but Snape? All Snape
has experienced is that minor little bullying incident many years 
ago;
and if something like that can send him into a lifetime emotional 
funk
then he is quite a wimp. Harry is made of stronger stuff.

Myra:

Yes. Maybe Snape is just weak, and Harry is a lot stronger. Not 
everyone deals the same.  Harry has to be strong to retains his 
sanity and 
stuff after everything he's been through.

Michelle:

I completely disagree with you Eggplant.  JKR has also shown us a 
cowering Snape in a corner while a woman (we presume his mother) is 
being yelled at/bullied by another man (her father?  Snape's 
father?).  CHildhood trauma (physical, psychological) can stay with 
a person their entire life and manifest itself in different ways.  I 
am severely arachnophobic because of childhood psychological 
trauma.  

Of course, different people react to different things in different 
ways.  Harry has been through quite a bit, but he CHOOSES to find 
the good and truth in his situations.  No it was not good that 
Sirius died, and by all rights, Harry could've mourned all through 
HBP and been a big blubbering mess.  Instead, he chose to see the 
truth and reality of the situation.  Sirius died and that sucks, but 
Sirius died fighting to protect him (Harry) and even though Sirius 
died, Harry had to continue with his ultimate "quest".  

So who is stronger?  Harry or Snape?  I think they are both strong, 
but for different reasons.  It cannot have been easy for Snape to be 
a double agent until Voldemort was Vapormorted or since his return.  
Of course there is the eternal debate about whether he is (insert 
many, many acronyms here), but the fact remains, he has to have 
quite a bit of inner strength to maintain his roles in both camps.

My point in all this ... PTSD is non-discriminatory.  'Strong' 
people, 'weak' people, it doesn't matter, all it takes is the right 
set of circumstances.  For me it was a gun in my face and then being 
tied up and put in a closet.  For many FDNY firefighters, it was 
pulling their brothers out of rubble for weeks on end.  Eggplant, do 
you think they are weak people?

And for my next topic ... Intention in Magic.

I think intent has A LOT to do with the power of a spell and its 
effects.  I believe the reason Harry couldn't pull off Cruciatus is 
because while at the moment he really didn't like Bellatrix, he does 
not have the capacity to loathe and hate and have all the feelings 
that are required to create an effective cruciatus curse.  Harry 
doesn't have the capacity for BEING evil, therefore, he can't do 
something that is purely evil.  Sectumsempra isn't necessarily an 
evil curse, per se, it probably has good use when carving turkeys at 
Thanksgiving, but the intent of the user makes it bad.

Consider a "real life" example.  A person goes into a store with a 
gun and takes the money from the cash register and then kills the 
clerk.  Is he bad?  By general consensus, heck yes!  Another person 
is sitting at home one day when another person breaks in and 
attempts to rape his daughter.  The father reaches into a drawer, 
pulls out a gun and shoots and kills the intruder.  Is he bad?  By 
general consensus, no he was protecting his daughter.  

Both people killed someone.  They both committed MURDER.  One is 
seen as a criminal, one is hailed as a hero.  They both committed 
the SAME act ... but their intentions were different.

Same goes for the wizarding world.  Fred and George, in my opinion, 
weren't trying the HURT Dudley by dropping the Ton-Tongue Toffy, 
they were trying to have a laugh.  Was it still mean?  Sure, but it 
wasn't INTENDED to be mean.  Had they MEANT to HURT Dudley, would 
anything different have happened?  Perhaps they would have dropped 
more.

So was Snape's INTENT to AK DD, or was it to make it LOOK like he 
AK'd DD?  Only a year and 9 months to go to find out!

Michelle, who intends to stop typing now! :)