Snape at end of OotP (WAS Re: Who was responsible for Sirius' death? ...)

[Zara]

No: HPFGUIDX 167580

> Dana now: 
> I am not saying this to blame DD but he was responsible for his own 
> decisions and these decisions had great disastrous effects. 
Something 
> DD had to live with and did not take lightly, I am sure.

zgirnius:
Snipped lots of stuff with which I agree, along with this conclusion.

Dana: 
> But I agree with many others that JKR did a very poor job on the 
way 
> she handled the DoM aftermath scene. She shoves the blame into 
Sirius 
> shoes by letting DD say, that if Sirius had handled Kreacher 
> differently then none of this would have happened. I cannot for the 
> life of me think of any good reason, why she needed to add this to 
> the scene because if it was to point out that every action a person 
> takes can have consequences then why on earth does she have DD 
defend 
> Snape's actions. 

zgirnius:
One reason she may have DD defend Snape's actions is that the person 
to whom he is talking (Harry) already blames Snape, and in a way that 
is not rational. Snape and Sirius participated in a rather nasty 
argument at Christmas, and Harry bases his blame of Snape on that 
incident. I do not think this can be tied directly to Sirius going to 
the Ministry. Snape did express a frustration Sirius was feeling and 
threw it in his face, but first, that was months before, and second, 
Sirius would have gone anyway, in my opinion. 

> Dana:
> If Snape had treated Harry better then Harry would not have 
forgotten 
> to go to him as the last Order member present at Hogwarts and also 
> when you hold Snape actions of that evening against the light of 
day, 
> then the man did a pretty bad job of making sure Harry was safe. 

zgirnius:
You realize Harry forgot Snape twice, don't you? After repeated 
attempts at mental communication with Snape and the cryptic Padfoot 
comment he threw at Snape as the later departed, he never even 
bothered to check what the only Order member at Hogwarts had done 
about the warning. The fact that Harry had confirmation of Sirius's 
absence in the late afternoon, after all, does not mean Sirius was 
still in danger at nightfall, several hours later. 

Snape checked on Sirius immediately, and Sirius was safe, so Snape 
did nothing further. Had he checked and confirmed the possibility of 
Harry's vision being true, his next move should have been to notify 
Dumbledore and the Order to arrange a rescue. 

Which means, in my view, that Harry should have checked back with 
Snape once he was free to do so before haring off to the Ministry. If 
time was the issue in his mind, he could have done so on Thestral-
back. If he feared Snape would try to stop him/would let Sirius die, 
he could have delegated the task of communicating with Snape to 
someone he wanted to keep from the Ministry, leaving himself free to 
go if Snape messed with the messenger in some way. However, the 
thought never crossed his mind even after he realized in Umbridge's 
office how stupid he'd been in the first place not to think of Snape.

I can understand Snape not being top-of-mind for Harry when he first 
had the vision and felt compelled to use Umbridge's Floo to find out 
what was happening. But twice? 

> Dana:
> He lets Harry been taken to the Forest by the person that already 
was 
> responsible for DD's exit, for Hagrid's exit and with it 
McGonagall's 
> and she had already tried to get sensitive information out of Harry 
> twice, fake veritaserum or not, but he just lets them go into the 
> forest without following them? 

zgirnius:
How does Snape know they are off to the Forest in time to follow? His 
first thought, quite properly, was to verify that Sirius was safe. 
Voldemort strikes me as a greater potential danger than Dolores 
Umbridge had shown herself to be thus far. The removals you credit to 
her involved the Minister of Magic and a number of Aurors, none of 
whom were present at Hogwarts.

> Dana:
> He even lets three other kids go into 
> the forest without a teacher and does not go and ask Draco what the 
> hell is going on or does not follow them in. 

zgirnius:
And how the hell was Snape to know this while trying to secretly 
communicate with 12 GP?

> Dana:
> No according to DD, Snape is even surprised that Harry still thinks 
> Sirius might be a captive of LV after he has given Snape the 
cryptic 
> message. 

zgirnius:
I would be surprised too, were I Snape. I imagine Snape got the 
message loud and clear two or three times in the office scene, and 
figured that after repeatedly tossing the problem to him, Harry would 
check with him to learn what he, Snape, had done about it.

> Dana:
> I am not trying to blame Snape but I do wonder why the emphasis is 
> made on how Sirius treated Kreacher but not how Snape treated Harry 
> compared to the actions of both man in the course of OotP. 

zgirnius:
I have noticed that a lot of arguments about whether Rowling writes 
characters consistently or not hinge on differences of opinion about 
what the characters actually do. Snape ain't a nice teacher, and 
especially not to Harry, but in OotP he seemed to be making an effort 
(not to be nice, that would be overstating it. To give occlumency 
lessons a chance, I guess is how I would phrase it). 

I realize many readers consider this opinion risible, but I was 
always struck by Snape's willingness to answer questions and explain 
things to Harry in the first Occlumency lesson. I was shocked how 
much non-technical 'why should I learn this crap?' questioning he 
tolerated, and would compare his instructions regarding how to do 
Occlumency to Lupin's Patronus lessons as equal or better (in terms 
of being more varied and more detailed - he lacks the rapport with 
Harry that Lupin enjoyed).

However, I did not take the meaning of Dumbledore's words to be that 
Sirius was a lot meaner to Kreacher than Snape was to Harry, or 
anything of the sort. Rather, Dumbledore seemed to me to criticize 
Sirius for underestimating Kreacher and the harm he could do out of 
his twisted loyalty to the worst ideals of the Black family. Snape 
and Harry, at least in Dumbledore's opinion, share the same 
loyalties, so it is a comparison of apples and oranges.

> Dana:
>He even blames himself for the 
> occlumency lesson fiasco and not Snape's ridiculous schoolboy 
grudge, 
> which makes him truly hate Harry from the bottom of his soul.  

zgirnius:
I don't believe Snape's ridiculous schoolboy grudge had much,if 
anything, to do with the failure of Occlumency lessons. Nowhere in 
the first lesson does Snape so much as mention Harry's father or 
Sirius. Yet Harry never does the homework Snape assigns at the end of 
the first lesson and keeps insisting is necesary for the achievement 
of this skill.

That Dumbledore chose not to bring that up was entirely appropriate, 
in my opinion.