[HPforGrownups] Bullying WAS: Re: Prodigal Sons

[P J]

No: HPFGUIDX 140974

Magda says:
>People who find Snape objectionable seem to feel very threatened by
>those of us who find him a deeper character who still has a lot of
>information and backstory to impart.

PJ replies:
Not threatened... puzzled and maybe a bit frustrated.

I can't speak for anyone else of course but sometimes I'm not at all  sure 
we're all reading about the same characters.  :-)   Everything I've ever 
read of Snape, both in the books and the interviews the author gives, show 
him to be a bad guy through and through.  So, if JKR *says* he's bad and 
*writes* him as bad, where does the idea of "good Snape" come from?  Other 
than Dumbledores assertions that he trusts Snape (while never saying he's a 
GOOD guy), there's absolutely no canon for it that I can see...

For me the frustration comes into play when I read that from just one 
snippet of memory it's decided that James MUST have bullied Snape without 
any provocation through out 7 years of school.  But we don't know what came 
before or after that small bit of memory, whether it was unusual (if it were 
a normal everyday thing why would it be singled out as "his worst memory"?) 
or what came before or after.  Regardless,  from that one snippet James is 
tried and convicted of being the biggest bully on the playground while 
despite of all the solid canon available on how bad Snape is, people turn 
themselves inside out to make excuses for him and paint him as a "good guy".

It's a mystery...


PJ