Unforgivables - from a different angle

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 174541

Carol earlier:
> > Why?  <snip> Snape actually says, "No Unforgiveable Curses from
you, Potter! You haven't got the nerve or the ability!" (HBP Am. ed.
602). Having just killed Albus Dumbledore against his will, summoning
the "nerve" and the "ability" to "mean" a curse he didn't want to
cast, <snip>
> 
> Mike:
> You know I don't like Snape, Carol. ;) But it's the hypocrisy of 
Snape telling Harry that he can't use a UC when he has just used one.
Snape has just proved that one can use the worst (imo) UC for a noble
purpose, yet he's telling Harry he can't do the same. We both thought
that this was a clue and a final attempt at teaching. It turns out it
wasn't, so I reassessed my reading of this passage.
> 
> 
Carol earlier:
> > "No Unforgiveable Curses from you, Potter, because you have to let
the Dark Lord kill you." That's what I think Snape means, but he 
can't say it for another year.
> 
> Mike:
> Except Snape won't find this out himself for almost another year.
<snip>

Carol again:

Oops, Mike, Not true. Check "The Prince's Tale." Snape finds out that
Harry has to walk willingly to his death on the night of the argument
in the forest (DH Am. ed. 685), and we know from HBP that the argument
occurs on Ron's birthday, March 1. Harry hears about it from Hagrid
while they're visiting Ron in the hospital wing after he's been
poisoned (HBP Am. ed. 404). Snape's words to Harry about not casting
an Unforgiveable curse (HBP 602) occur two months later, after DD's
death in early June. Snape does not find out that Harry has to let LV
kill him from DD's portrait after DD's death. He finds it out from the
living Dumbledore, and he knows it as he gives his last advice to
Harry. It's *Harry* who doesn't find out till more than a year later
thanks to Snape's memory.

BTW, I wonder whether Snape, who thought that Harry would die when the
soul piece in his scar was destroyed, intended to AK Voldemort himself
after Harry was dead and Voldemort was mortal. He hated Voldemort and
wanted him dead, and DD's plan, as Snape saw it, would not accomplish
that. In which case, what he really meant was, "No Unforgiveables from
you, Potter. That's my job."

(I still disagree with you on one other point, your view of Crucio,
but I want this post to be about Snape, so I won't discuss it here.)

Carol, who sees no hypocrisy whatever in Snape's words and nothing
weak or ignoble about Snape's love for Lily as the reason he ended up
on the good side