Motivations for Joining DEs - Pure blood and Propaganda

[ellecain]

No: HPFGUIDX 140914

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "nrenka" <nrenka at y...> wrote: 
> So we, of course, don't know what Young!Snape knew about the DEs.  
It 
> seems safe to say that the blood thing was their public face, so 
we can 
> assume that Young!Snape knew all about that and at minimum had no 
> problems with it.
>And I think it's also supported that Young!Snape 
> had 'issues' with the blood thing.  

Elyse: I'm not so sure Young!Snape was all that comfortable with the 
pureblood issue. 
He was in Slytherin, so he must have been wary of revealing his 
parentage; I'm guessing there was a lot of pressure attached to it. 
Maybe he had already heard terms like Mudblood applied to other 
people.
If,in an uncanny parallel to Harry's first meeting with Malfoy,
11 year old Snape had overheard a conversation that included things 
like
"I really dont think they should let the other sort in, do you?"
he would have realised that having a Muggle father was not 
exactly "something you bandy about" when youre in Slytherin.
So if nobody knew about it, he could have pretended to be pureblood
well into his fifth year, when he made that Mudblood comment.

Nora wrote:
  We have the 'Half-Blood Prince', however one wants to 
> read that.  [I tend to agree with a correspondent, who said they 
found 
> it "pathetic and cringeworthy and pitiable and contemptible and 
> embarassing - and absolutely perfectly so."  But that's a tangent.]

Elyse: It sounds like a typical nickname a lonely teenager would 
invent to make himself sound more impressive, even if it is a little 
cheesy.

Nora: 
> This has no information to connect it to Present!Snape, but I 
think it 
> belongs firmly in the mix for Young!Snape.  It's a little too 
marked, 
> put in places to be *noticed*, not to be relevant. 

Elyse: Oh youre absolutely right. If he wanted to hide the fact that 
he was a half-blood, writing it in the front of his potions book was
really stupid thing to do. A sixteen year old trying to hide how 
pure his blood is in such a glaringly obvious place would have made 
a terribly incompetent spy dont you think?

So I guess that information was *meant* to be found. It was supposed 
to be read by people, and then our Sevvie would proudly declare that 
he wasnt ashamed of his parentage. Somewhere between his fifth and 
sixth year, he had stopped passing himself off as pureblood. Now he 
was ready to show which side he supported on the blood issue and he 
wanted to be asked, wanted to be questioned about his parents.
(Maybe by a certain green eyed, redheaded Gryffindor who was good at 
potions herself, and might want to borrow his potions book for the 
notes he had made in there?) ;-) 

Nora:
 What I wonder is 
> whether there were associates of Voldemort in the school spreading 
the 
> siren song of his Dark Magic skillz, as well.  There's always the 
> possibility of unrelated factors, but I'm not going to speculate 
about 
> what I don't know I don't know, when I have shiny information in 
front 
> of me.
> 

Elyse:
I think that might have been the case. I remember in PS/SS where 
Dumbledore says to Mcgonagall "Weve had precious little to celebrate 
for 11 years" which would mean this sort of terror was going on 
while Snape and the Marauders were in school. So there must have 
been pro-Voldemort propaganda around. 

It strikes me as a little unlikely though that he would toot his own 
Dark Arts skills as an advertisement. 
We have been told that Snape was an oddball.
There is no canon to say it was because of his fascination with the 
Dark Arts, but it doesnt seem to be a very normal thing among 
Hogwarts students. Even Draco Malfoy who was a child of Death Eaters
has shown no particular interest in or inclination to invent the 
kind of curses young Snape was "upto his eyeballs" in.

We do know,however that pureblood issues were used to get people 
over to the Dark side. So really, this blows my theory of Snape 
having had a change of heart in sixth year to smithereens.
If he really was proud of his parentage, he would not have become a 
DE. Even if he was okay with exterminating Mudbloods, he must have
known that people would find out he was half blood eventually.
So assuming that Dark Arts usage wasnt one of the advertised perks
for being a DE, and the inherent insecurity of being exposed as a 
half blood even if Snape agreed with the whole philosophy,
the question remains, why did he become one?

I am wondering how one goes about advertising for the Dark Arts 
without putting up a
billboard in Knockturn Alley proclaiming:
         Are you proud of being a Pureblood?
            Do you enjoy Muggle Baiting?
      Lord Voldemort has the ideal job for you! 
         Just send an owl to 1800-Dark Side*
*Job description may include burning tattoos into forearm, being 
subjected to the Cruciatus curse on a regular basis and having 
family members sent on suicide missions in case of failure.

Sorry, couldnt resist :-)
Elyse