ACID POPS and Teenager Draco

[Ceridwen]

No: HPFGUIDX 157489

Neri:
> > This sounds to me like Draco has a serious grudge against Snape 
personally. He doesn't want just to prove that he can do it by 
himself. He wants Snape demoted. He wants to be more important than 
Snape. Are we not supposed to ask why?

Tonks:
> As to why Draco would want to dethrone Snape, isn't that normal teen
behavior? He would want to show the world that he was better than
his teacher. The student wants to outdo his mentor. Show the world
(and himself) that he is a real man now and no longer just a
student. And the kid in him would want to make daddy proud for
once. Just imagine what Lucius would say if Draco had been
successful. I sure that Draco had that in mind as well.

Ceridwen:
While I thought it was strange for Draco to hide things from Snape, 
the reason that immediately came to mind is what Tonks said: he's 
breaking away from his familiar childhood aids and protection and 
wanting to do it on his own.  The same thing happens in nature, with 
the younger lions challenging the older dominant male for supremacy.  
Sooner or later, one of the younger lions wins and there is a shake-
up in the pride.  It's a coming-of-age thing, and it satisfies me.

Neri: 
> > who notes also that nobody's interested in discussing the juicy  
SHIP clues in Spinner's End, which is quite strange for HPfGU.

> Tonks:
> I was once in the Snape loves Narcissa camp until I switched to the 
Snape Loved Lily camp, so I can understand some of your POV. Chapter 
2 does easily lend itself to the ACID POPS theory.

Ceridwen:
I hadn't given ACID POPS any thought at all until I read Spinner's 
End.  Then it leaped out at me like one of those young lions.  *g*  I 
think, though, that if Snape was like other children, he probably had 
crushes on a few girls during school.  He may have adored both 
Narcissa and Lily at different times.

I had friends in school who stuck with the same boy all through high 
school, but many more friends who went from one crush to another, and 
dated several boys before graduation and finally finding The One.  
Granted that the WW has a lot fewer potential mates for its citizens, 
but after school, graduates would go out into the world and meet 
other people who were older and from different houses, and therefore 
not on their in-school crush radar, for the most part.

Maybe it's my age, but I really don't see a schoolyears crush 
influencing any of the adults in the story.  People move on from 
their crushes, probably a lot faster than they move on from their 
grudges and dislikes.  Sometimes, old crushes embarrass people, even 
when no one else ever knew about them.  I'd rather go for a 
friendship between Snape and Lily (and between Snape and Narcissa).  
Friendships hold longer, and the fall-out from a broken friendship 
lasts as long as a grudge.

Ceridwen.