Snape - a werewolf bigot?? Was: Say it isn't so Lupin!!!

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 170201

Carol earlier:
> > 
> > But Hagrid *does* place a great deal of importance on blood, both
in terms of relationships and in terms of how it makes people what
they are, in his view. "Whatever yeh say, blood's important," he says
to Harry at the time that Grawp is beating him up. And he talks about
> > "all Malfoys" as being bad because of their "bad blood." 
> 
> Mike:
> OK, but what does this have to do with Hagrid's bigotted remark? It 
> was aimed at a Squib, someone born to two people with wizarding 
> blood. It's Filch's lack of magical prowess that Hagrid is calling 
> out, not Filch's ancestry.

Carol responds:
My point is that Hagrid shares the Slytherin's views on the importance
of "blood" but in a sort of reverse-discrimination way. He thinks
*their* blood is tainted in just the same way that they think
Hermiones' is. Their blood makes them evil, he thinks. You can't trust
a Malfoy because of their bad blood. But he's a good guy and the
Malfoys are bad guys, so this view is okay? I really don't think so.
Prejudice is prejudice, whether it's based on the absence of magic or
on your ancestry. (In a way, prejudice against Squibs is based on
their ancestry, too; they have magical parents and should have been
magic.) 

And "Squib," an insult aimed at Filch's nonmagical status, is an
insult based on what and who he is as a member of a powerless group.
It's comparable to Hagrid's insulting Vernon Dursley for being a
Muggle. Granted, "Squib" isn't a distortion of a legitimate term as
"Mudblood" is of "Muggleborn," but it doesn't need to be. It's an
insult in and of itself. Squibs are written on the Black family
tapestry and never spoken of even in respectable families like the
Weasleys. I see no difference between insulting someone for being a
Squib, which he can't help, than for being a Half-Blood or Muggleborn
or "Half-breed" like Hagrid himself. If you insult a person for being
Jewish, does it matter whether you say "You stinkin' Jew," "you
money-loving Jew," or "you [substitute racial epithet of your choice]?
It's all prejudice against Jews, and if there were a term comparable
to "Mudblood" for Squibs, I wouldn't put it past Hagrid (who, after
all, gives *Dudley* a pig's tail and would have actually turned him
into a pig to punish Dudley's father) to have used it. Anyway, IMO,
it's not the word that matters. It's the underlying sentiment. Hagrid
thinks that Filch is inferior because he's a Squib; the Malfoys think
that Muggleborns are inferior because of their "blood." The use of the
term "Mudblood" merely emphasizes their contempt; it's a convenient
way of expressing the underlying prejudice in a single word.

I'm also saying that prejudice of various sorts is widespread in the
WW, some of it justified (IMO, Giants are just as dangerous to be,
some more than others, but nevertheless, it would be absurd to admit
giants to Hogwarts). It's not just the purebloods and Slytherins who
are prejudiced against Squibs and Muggles, as Hagrid illustrates.
McGonagall also seems prejudiced against Muggles; Umbridge's prejudice
against the Centaurs as "Half-Breeds" is echoed by their prejudice
against humans as having intelligence and divination skills inferior
to their own. I see no difference between "filthy Half-blood" (used as
an insult by Bellatrix Lestrange and Phineas Nigellus) and "filthy
Mudblood" except that an epithet happens to exist for one and not the
other. Both express exactly the same attitude; the insulted person is
inferior.
> 
> 
> > Carol
> > I'm not sure that he's generally prejudiced against Squibs, 
> > but he's certainly using it as a generalized insult against Filch,
> > for whom, no doubt, he has some sort of personal antipathy, and, 
> > unlike Teen!Severus calling Lily a Mudblood--at which she blinks 
> > in surprise--he is not under duress, humiliatingly being rescued 
> > by a Gryffindor girl who has just been flirting with his tormentor.
> 
> Mike:
> So Snape is not only bigotted towards Muggleborns, but is insulted 
because a *girl* is trying to help him. Hmm, not improving his 
position methinks. ;)

Carol:
But what teenage boy would't feel exactly that same way? The teenage
boys of my acquaintance think that girls are weak, and any boy who
demonstrates weakness or cowardice resembles a girl in their view.
Call me sexist, but I don't know any boy who wouldn't be insulted to
be rescued by a girl because boys are supposed to be strong and brave
and girls are (they think) just silly and weak. (I can think of a
variety of terms, ranging from "effeminate" and "sissy" to derogatory
terms relating to female body parts, used to describe a boy or man who
resembles a woman, or the male view of women and girls, in any way. A
boy has to be "manly," and that means he has to stand up for himself,
not be protected by a girl like some mama's boy.)  I've never been a
boy, so I could be wrong, but I'd say that most boys would be
humiliated to be rescued by a girl (especially one who's flirting with
their tormentor). I'm not saying that it's right to think that way;
I'm just saying that it fits the pattern I've seen over and over again
in real life.
> 
Mike:
> As to being in humiliating positions; I wonder what you think of 
Snape's "I see no difference" remark? You suppose that might be a
little cold-hearted dig at Hermione's large front teeth? No need to
answer. :D 

Carol:
You know, or should know, that I consider that remark to be cruel and
unjustified. But it has nothing to do with prejudice against
Muggleborns. Had it happened to young Severus rather than Hermione,
he'd have fired off a retaliatory hex at the person who hit him rather
than hiding his teeth rather than given the teacher who insulted him a
cold stare before heading off to the hospital wing rather than
bursting into tears. But of course those words weren't nice; they were
wholly uncalled for. No one here, even the most adamant Snape
defender, is arguing that Snape is nice. But that has nothing to do
with whether he's prejudiced.
> 
MikeA:
> Now, I'd like to ask what you think of "And what difference does
that make?" Sounds awfully similar, doesn't it. That's the remark that
got under Hagrid's skin and caused his "Squib" outburst. To say Hagrid
was not under some duress is an unfair analysis imo. <snip>
> 
Carol:
Huh? He's not being hung upside down with his own spells, publicly
humiliated in front of the entire fifth-year class after having been
attacked off-guard two against one while he was minding his own
business. And he's not sixteen years old. Hagrid should know better.
Maybe Severus should, too, but James's words, "You're lucky Evans was
here, Snivellus" are the last straw. Sevvie's masculinity has been
insulted along with everything else. (IMO, "Snivellus" is crueler by
far than "Mudblood," which isn't even personal.)

Mike:
> Magpie put it best: as far as I remember, don't we have three
student characters who ever use the term? Snape, Draco and Tom Riddle.
I can't even remember any adults using the word--oh wait, Kreacher and
Mrs. Black. It seems unlikely the word could ever be dismissed in 
canon as not being serious.
> 
> Quite the company Snape is keeping here. 

Carol"

Are you forgetting that Snape is sixteen in this scene? If we saw the
adult Snape using the word, it would be different. But we don't.

Carol earlier:
> > calling someone a werewolf when that werewolf has endangered your 
> > life, <snip>
> 
Mike:
> PoA p. 357: "Snape glimpsed me, though, at the end of the tunnel."
> 
> Mike: Sounds like Snape barely found out that Lupin was a werewolf.
> 
> Had he gotten farther, "he *would* have met a fully grown werewolf",
*but* *he* *didn't*. 

Carol:
In which case, James didn't save his life. We have a problem with
contradictory canon here. Did Severus merely glimpse the werewolf, in
which case he could easily have run out of the shack on his own, or
did he need James to save him, resulting in lifelong resentment? We
can't have both. Either Lupin is, er, mistaken, or James didn't save
Severus's life, and Severus has no reason to resent being saved by his
worst enemy (and DD's explanation for Snape's year-long protection of
Harry in SS/PS, already only a partial explanation, IMO, loses any
validity whatever). 

Also note that Remus was quite literally not in his right mind at the
time of the so-called Prank, so his memory of the incident is not
reliable. In fact, he probably can't remember it at all. Snape and
Dumbledore believe that James saved Severus's life. Are they wrong, or
is Lupin wrong? You can't have it both ways.
> 
Carol earlier:
> > and then that werewolf has the nerve to think that Snape's
> > suspicions of him are based, not on his own sneaky conduct
> 
> Mike: Sneaky conduct? What sneaky conduct has Snape witnessed?

Carol:
Not turning in the Marauder's Map in to Dumbledore, for one. And
concealing information from DD. Snape may not *know* that Lupin is
doing so, but he suspects it. For example, he's right that Lupin knows
 how Black is getting into the school and is concealing that
information from Dumbledore. And he suspects that the Hump-backed
witch is a secret passageway that Lupin knows about but has concealed
from DD. Lupin also lies to Snape about not being a manufacturer of
the Marauder's Map that has just insulted Snape ("It's a Zonko's
product"--yeah, right, Lupin) and note that when Lupin says "I'll take
theis *back,* shall I?" Snape doesn't protest. He knows full well that
the parchment is no Zonko's product that merely insults anyone who
reads it. He knows that it belongs to Lupin and his fellow
manufacturers and he guesses rightly that it shows how to get into
Hogsmeade without being seen by the Dementors. Lupin's failure to hand
it in to Dumbledore (it's lying right on his desk when Snape brings
the potion on the night of the Shrieking Shack incident) is also
suspicious. 
> 
Carol earlier:
> > As for the pureblood superiority ethic, there's no evidence 
> > that he believes it (calling Lily a "Mudblood," which he does once,
> > is IMO no worse than the personal, and to me revolting, insult 
> > "Snivellus," which Sirius Black uses repeatedly, even as  an adult.
> > (It's not an insult to a group and therefore it's okay? I think 
> > not. It's as mean-spirited and snide and cruel as anything in 
> > the books.)
> 
> Mike:
> Huh? Mudblood is no worse than making fun with someone's name? Using 
> the WW equivalent of the "N" word is no worse than someone calling 
> me "crud"? <shakes head>

Carol responds:
First, I don't think that "Mudblood" is anywhere near the equivalent
of the "N" word. It's just taking the idea that Muggleborns are
inferior one step further with the (illogical) assumption that the
absence of magical blood is somehow dirty. But the reaction to the
word in the books is IMO as much of an overreaction as the reaction to
"Voldemort." 

"Snivellus," OTOH, is a personal insult devised to injure the feelings
of a particular person. It's not like calling a person "crud." It's a
personal insult, distorting Severus's name to sound like something
foul and contemptible, and Sirius, at least, seems to sneer when he
says it. I suppose it's a personal reaction, but that name makes my
blood boil in a way that "Mudblood" doesn't. (Also, I don't see
Muggleborns and purebloods as "races." It's more like having or not
having a gene for musical ability. It's surprising that so many
Muggleborns exist since they must be the result of a mutation and the
prejudice against them stems from the days when Muggles hunted
witches. It's not racial at all; it's a mutual misunderstanding rooted
in the idea that *Muggles* are inferior, "Other," and the enemy from
whom wizards and witches must hide.)
> 
> And, as said above, Snape's use of the term is in very rare and 
> bigotted company in canon. We only see Snape "once" as a student -
so he's one-for-one in his vile language batting average. And Snape 
> joined a terrorist organization that spouted pure-blood elitism.

Carol:
Right. We see him once as a student. But Lily's reaction shows that
Student!Severus is not in the habit of using that particular term
(though he does call himself the Half-Blood Prince, indicating that
he's conscious of his own supposed inferiority and, IMO, denying it).
But we see Adult!Snape over and over, and he never once uses the term,
or refers, as Slughorn does, to Muggleborns. 

As for joining the DEs, do you really think that his reasons for doing
so had anything to do with their ostensible pureblood agenda?
*Regulus* would join it for that reason, but Snape's reasons, based on
what we've seen, probably had more to do with a desire for recognition
(which he would have received from his former Slytherin gang, who must
have recognized him as a prodigy), revenge against his tormentors,
and/or a chance to learn more about the Dark Arts. At any rate, while
we don't yet know his motive(s) for joining, some combination of the
factors I've listed (along with pressure or encouragement from the
likes of Lucius Malfoy) seems to me more likely than the pureblood
agenda being supported by a half-blood. Note that even Draco, who
overtly supports the Pureblood superiority ethic and spouts the term
"Mudblood" with or without provocation in practically every book, only
joins the DEs when his father is arrested and he wants revenge (at
which point he's wearing his heart on his sleeve and is very easy for
Voldemort to manipulate).
 
> > Carol:
> > But I still don't think that "werewolf" is a bigoted term.
> > It's a fact. Lupin, as both he and Hermione state, *is* a werewolf.
> 
> Mike:
> Filch is a Squib. That's a fact. Was Hagrid using a bigotted term 
> when Hagrid called him such? I seem to remember you arguing that it 
> was a bigotted term, even if Hagrid is not truly bigotted.

Carol:
The difference is that a werewolf is dangerous and a Squib is not.
Lupin's being a werewolf is extremely important at the moment because
he's about to transform and endanger everyone present (Snape doesn't
know that Black is an Animagus who can partially control Lupin, though
even he is injured after Lupin transforms without Prongs there to back
him up). Filch's Squib status is wholly irrelevant and is simply used
as an insult (rather like Trelawney's calling Firenze "the nag" only
Hagrid is insulting him to his face). Snape really does need to "drag
the werewolf" to the castle so he won't endanger anybody. Had he done
so, Peter Pettigrew would not have escaped. (Lupin would no doubt have
lost his job, but his innocence with regard to Black would have been
established by DD's cover story and the Time-turner subplot would
still have rescued black and Buckbeak.)
> 
> 
> > Carol:
> > 
> > Where's the canon that shows he is? 
> 
> Mike: 
> I've presented the evidence that Snape was a bigot, even if he has
changed his ways, since. You gave me a litany of Draco's uses of the
term, thanks, but I didn't need convincing that Draco or Mrs. Black 
or Tom Riddle were bigots. Now add Severus Snape as the only other 
humans in canon to call another human a "Mudblood" and you have the 
> complete list.

Carol:
As a boy of sixteen, under duress. We don't see him use it as an
adult. The contrast with Draco and his family is very marked, IMO. (If
Lucius Malfoy, who levitates Muggles for entertainment and sneers at
Hermione as "a girl of no wizarding family" doesn't use the term at
home, I'll be very surprised. And Draco uses it in speaking to his
mother, who seems to share his views.) But we never see Snape doing
that. He is, after all, a Half-blood, and it's unlikely that he really
views purebloods as superior to himself.
<snip>
> > Carol:
> > It makes sense for Snape to suspect Lupin of trying to help 
> > Sirius Black, but *Snape* isn't going to do it.
> 
> Mike:
> Why? Wasn't Sirius suppose to have switched sides? Wasn't Sirius 
supposed to have at least been a Voldemort supporter if not a DE? So
why should Snape suspect that Lupin had also switched sides? Snape 
should suspect that Lupin was also a Voldemort supporter and 
Dumbledore hired him anyway? Or should Snape be the only former DE
that Dumbledore could trust? 
> 
> Face it, Snape *suspects* Lupin because Lupin was friends with those
two boys that tormented him, while they were in school. Snape 
suspects Lupin because of that "schoolboy grudge" and makes all his
evidence fit his theory. And Snape lobbied against Lupin before the 
school term even started. What evidence did he have for his pre-term>
conviction besides that *Prank*?

Carol:
I'm not following your argument. I asked why Lupin should suspect
Snape, whom he doesn't know to have been a DE. A supposed interest in
the Dark Arts as a kid and his association with a Slytherin gang isn't
enough to make even Sirius Black (in GoF) think that Snape had been a
DE. And Lupin knows that Black can get into the castle in ways that
Snape doesn't know about. There's no reason for Lupin to suspect
Snape, whom he knows to hate Sirius Black, of helping him get into the
castle, and no indication whatever that he holds any such suspicions.
He does know that Snape is suspicious of *him.* But Snape, who thought
that Lupin was part of the conspiracy to kill him and who sees that
someone is letting Black into the castle has every reason to suspect
that it's Black's former friend Lupin and none at all to suspect
Crookshanks as Black's accomplice.

BTW, I agree that snape makes the evidence of his theory, but he has
reason to do so. And he's far from the only one who does the same
thing. So do Fudge and Hagrid and McGonagall regarding Sirius Black.
And look at Lupin's own theory: Black must have learned Dark Magic
from Voldemort. He couldn't possibly be using those secret passages
and his Animagus form to be getting inside the castle and slashing up
portraits and bedcurtains. Lupin as a schoolboy Prefect sat by and let
 his friends torment Snape as a schoolboy. And now he's standing by
and doing nothing to prevent Black from entering the school. Snape is
absolutely right in that regard, at least. <snip>

> Mike:
> I also think Snape is suppressing information. I find it very hard
to believe that Snape wouldn't know that Black was never a Death
Eater. As many have pointed out, the enmity between the two was
unsurpassed in their generation. The idea that Black could have snuck
into the Death Eaters and Snape not know about it...?

Carol:
that may or may not be a plot hole. But Voldemort would have every
reason to keep the identity of his spy secret, and we know that he
walks by some of the DEs without addressing him. I believe Karkaroff,
who gives all the names he can think of other than people like Malfoy
who have already been cleared, that the DEs didn't all know each
other. And it would be particularly important to conceal the identity
of his Order member spy. So Snape not only didn't know that the spy
was Pettigrew, he had every reason, especially after Black's arrest
for murdering Pettigrew and the Muggles "proved" him right, to think
that Black, a member of a Dark Wizard family with a strong tradition
of pureblood supremacy, a boy who had attempted murder (in Snape's
view) as a teenager had become a Death Eater. (Besides, as you point
out, he *wants* to believe the worst of Black. The apparent facts
match perfectly with his view of Sirius Black, who tried to murder him
as sixteen.)  

Mike: 
> And I also find it highly dubious that Lupin would believe that
Black had turned DE and Snape had not. What in their past would hint
that that is the likely way things would fall out? From everything we
know of their early years, which isn't much, it seems that an ordinary
observer would guess that Snape would be far more likely to have
become a DE. (And they would be right). So why would Lupin, a friend 
of Sirius Black and an antagonist of Severus Snape, pick Black as the
one more likely to become a DE? <snip>

Carol:
Doubtful or not, it's what canon suggests. Maybe Lupin is lying to
himself about Sirius Black (and he surely is doing so, with that bit
about LV teaching him Dark Arts to get into Hogwarts and escape from
Azkaban). But like Snape and Dumbledore and everyone else, he has
"proof" that Black turned DE--he was (supposedly) the Potters' Secret
Keeper, and he "murdered" Peter Pettigrew. What else is Lupin, who
already thought, as he confesses, that Sirius was the spy (just as
Black thought that Lupin was the spy). What else is he supposed to
think when no one tells him that the SK plan was changed? (What I
don't understand is why they would tell him about it in the first
place when the Potters, Black, and supposedly Pettigrew all thought
that he was the spy, but, oh, well. Logic isn't JKR's strong suit.) As
for Snape's having become a DE, even Sirius black doubts it, if only
because everyone suspected of being a DE has already been either
arrested, killed, or let off on an Imperius charge, except for Snape,
whose role as spy the Wizengamot apparently thought worth protecting
since not even Rita Skeeter knows that he was ever a DE. Anyway, as of
PoA, it's Black, not Snape, who's out there trying to kill somebody in
Gryffindor, slashing paintings and bedcurtains with twelve-inch
knives. Neither the Fat Lady nor Ron is screaming, "snape tried to
kill me!" Both of them name black as the wielder of the knife.
("Sirius has not behaved like an innocent man.") And Black *is* out to
murder somebody. It just happens to be Pettigrew, not Harry.

> Mike:
> Could've and would've but didn't and wasn't. Conjecture versus hard 
> fact. Lupin made a mistake and came close. Sirius Black was thought 
> to be after Harry but wasn't. Severus Snape made a *choice* to join 
> the Death Eaters and purposely brought word of the prophesy to 
> Voldemort. No amount of regret over those choices will bring Lily and 
> James back to life.

Carol:

Lupin's choice to rush out without his potion not only endangered HRH
but led to Peter Pettigrew's escape. Have we seen a single hint of
remorse about that? No, he only talks about how the parents won't want
someone like him teaching their kids; no indication that he's at fault
in any way.

> Mike:
><snip> And where in canon can you show that Snape did anything to
prevent the Potter's death? We must *assume* that Snape was the one to
tell Dumbledore of Voldemort's interpretation, leaving aside the
notion that Dumbledore would know how Voldemort would interpret it.
Dumbledore knew what the prophesy said and Dumbledore can count the
months. There also seems to be an assumption that Snape tried to
convince the Potters not to use either Black or Pettigrew, whichever.
I can't think of what else Snape *might* have done, but I don't see
any actual canon the backs up any of these assumptions. Can anyone
point me to some? <snip>

Carol:
What we have at the moment is Dumbledore's statement of Snape's
remorse when he found out how LV interpreted the Prophecy, which
obviously comes before the Potters' deaths and leads to his spying "at
great personal risk"; Fudge's statement that "one of {DD's] useful
spies (who could it be but Snape?) warned DD that the Potters were in
danger, which led to DD's suggestion of the Fidelius Charm; Snape's
own statement that James Potter was too "arrogant" to believe that
Black would betray him, which indicates that he tried to warn the
Potters in some way (probably through Dumbledore) that Black was the
spy and ties in with his obvious belief in PoA that Black (as opposed
to the "dead" Pettigrew) was both the spy and the traitor. We also
have Dumbledore's "complete" trust in Snape, which is inexplicable
unless Snape really is the one who revealed the Potters' danger to
Dumbledore. I certainly am not suggesting that Snape personally tried
to convince James Potter to do anything, certainly not to use Lupin
rather than Pettigrew (whom Snape had no reason to suspect) or Black
(whom I think he did suspect) as Secret Keeper. But I do think that he
went to Dumbledore telling him that the Potters were in danger and
asking him to provide them some protection. DD then suggested the
Fidelius Charm to the Potters but was refused the opportunity to be
their Secret Keeper in favor of Sirius Black, a decision which Snape
(who may have found out about it from DD or from the Daily Prophet
after black's arrest) regarded as "arrogant" and foolish in the
extreme. (I think he liked the idea that Potter's trust in Black was
partially responsible for his own death--it assuaged his own guilt as
blaming Snape for Black's death assuaged Harry's; it must have been a
bitter disappointment to find out that the traitor/murderer was only
the contemptible Pettigrew.)

At any rate, of course it's all conjecture. It's a way of fitting the
pieces of canon that we do have together (without having Snape at
Godric's Hollow or anything else noncanonical). Otherwise, we need
some other reason for Dumbledore to trust Snape; some other reason for
Snape's remark about James Potter's arrogance in trusting Sirius
Black; some other "useful spy" reporting that the Potters' danger had
intensified to the point that they needed a Fidelius Charm or some
other seemingly foolproof protection.

No doubt you can find some other way to fit the pieces together
involving manipulative Dumbledore, but, for me, they fit together best
if Snape really did try to protect the Potters (and resents James for
dying, leaving him with an unpaid life debt, as one but by no means
all of his reasons for protecting Harry).

Carol, typing while holding a conversation and not at all sure this
post is coherent