[HPforGrownups] Re: Sadistic Snape, Occlumency, etc

[Magpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 140290

I'm wading in here a little nervously, because I think it's getting kind of 
personal--I mean, there's a point where how we react to a character doesn't 
necessarily tell us what that character is up to.

>>Phoenixgod2000:
> In a sixteen year old, yeah, I think its a sign of some pretty bad
> problems. I used to work in some pretty rough schools with some
> dangerous student gangbangers and I can tell you that every last one
> of them could compartmentalize their mind enough to keep a blank
> expression while knifing the guy next to them. They'd be real good
> at Occlumency. Teenagers are supposed to be more like Harry, bundles
> of emotion and hormones who wear their hearts on their sleeves. It's
> what a teenager is. I have enough experience with detached teens to
> know that being that way is a real bad idea.

Um, I would agree that Snape does lose a lot of control (though according to 
this line of thought that seems to be a good sign), but I, too, am a little 
uncomfortable with the idea that all teenagers are supposed to be one way 
and if they aren't it's a bad sign.  All the kids do not act exactly the way 
Harry does in OotP, and I imagine I'd be pretty good at Occlumency if I were 
a witch--I don't think that makes me a sociopath. (And I don't find ways to 
make the lives of people I don't like miserable.)

It sounds like part of the problem with the kids you're talking about isn't 
that they are compartmentalizing but that they are numb.  If you don't 
empathize with another person, you can murder them without needing to 
compartmentalize your emotions.  Compartmentalizing can be a step to 
committing horrible acts, but sometimes people who can cover their emotions 
are mistrusted unfairly too.  And if detachment is always dangerous, I guess 
that Vipassana meditation I spent so much time learning was a bad idea.;-)

> Furthermore, in the mugglenet interview JKR actually says that in a
> way Harry is better off with not being great at occulmency because it
> means he isn't as cut off from his emotions as Draco is. tells me
> that the skill of Occlumency isn't often a skill of the incredibly
> moral.

She also says he's in some ways "too damaged" to do it and gives Dumbledore 
the skill, so I wouldn't want to go too far in assuming that 
Occlumency=evil.  These kinds of skills just tend to change for plot 
purposes. I'm sure Hermione could learn Occlumency, for instance.  Cloaking 
your mind from someone prying into it sounds like a skill I'd want to have. 
It's not what Harry is about, but I don't think it's necessarily a bad 
thing.

>>Phoenixgod2000:
> Not true, his lessons are used in almost every book by Harry and Co.
> I don't think he endangers students for the most part, guys like
> Draco endanger themselves by not listening him because they think
> they know better.

Harry often doesn't listen in class either--most kids don't at one time or 
another.  After third year I think Draco listens in Hagrid's class every 
second.  It's kind of a joke in OotP--"What did he say?"  There's a reason 
that disaster happens in Hagrid's class.

I'm very relieved to say that I think JKR doesn't think Hagrid is a good 
teacher and makes this canon.  The Trio defends his teaching when a person 
they don't like attacks him, but privately usually agrees with the 
criticism.  Harry himself describes Hagrid's classes as dangerous. 
Grubbly-Plank is a better teacher, even according to Harry.  Luna says 
Ravenclaws see him as a joke.  When Hagrid isn't teaching most of the school 
is happy to have a substitute.  The skrewts are Hagrid's personal project 
he's using class time to work on.  In sixth year taking Hagrid's class isn't 
even a question, and in that book, for the first time, Harry stands up to 
Hagrid about making Harry feel guilty about his class.

So yeah, I think Snape's behavior in class is inexcusable, but in some ways 
Hagrid is bad in the opposite way from Snape--neither man is above imo 
embarassing displays where he sinks to the level of a student and takes 
personal shots.  The arc of Hagrid's storyline begins with a disaster on his 
first day, and then constant tension as Harry wishes he were a better 
teacher than he is and sees he's not respected by the rest of the school as 
a teacher.  Finally they all drop his class.  Granted none of them seem to 
want to work with animals in the future, but it seems like they also all 
know they don't like the class.

Getting into the personal area, it may be hard not to just substitute 
whatever teachers remind us of these guys.  I've had snarky, sarcastic 
teachers and gotten along with them--but I don't think I could respect any 
teacher who pulled that "oops, I dropped your potion" trick on Harry or 
picked on him the first day.  It's embarassing.  Likewise I've had teachers 
like Hagrid, and they, too, are "seen through" by kids. The kids' in the 
class are called upon to help Hagrid out a lot, and many have little 
patience for him.  Ron's been on the receiving end of an injury from one of 
Hagrid's animals and got the same response--it was his fault.

 -m