Choices of life - Abilities or other qualities/Snape-a werewolf bigot? Say it is

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 170232

> > Magpie:
> > I don't know whether they're all that different. Harry's friends 
> > with all Gryffindors, the Marauders were friends with 
Gryffindors, 
> > the Slytherins are friends with Slytherins. I don't think JKR is 
> > saying that the Marauders weren't true friends--on the contrary. 
> > They certainly made a mistake with Peter, but I still think 
> they're 
> > friends. 

sridharj_ap:
> 
> Umm, while group loyalty is a strong bond of friendship as we see 
in 
> the school history, I am not sure why the marauders made the group 
> among themselves. It could easily have been another group.
> 
> However, I am most concerned about the marauders not knowing each 
> other completely. I mean, why would Lupin feel that Sirius was the 
> traitor even though Sirius became an illegal animagus to help 
Lupin 
> face his curse easily? The other way also holds true.
> 
> I think that the marauders were held together only by James, to 
whom 
> Sirius and Lupin had true loyalty. I may be wrong, though


Magpie:
I don't quite understand what you mean about how it could have been 
another group--couldn't we say that about all friendships? They may 
have just had fun together, which they discovered upon being put in 
a dorm together. The Marauders do seem to know each other to me. 
Their suspecting each other could have been due to things they did 
know about each other and the paranoia of the times--Ron suspects 
Harry of putting his own name in the Goblet in GoF and Harry doesn't 
understand why he can believe this, but I think they still know each 
other. Harry himself thinks that friends sometimes aren't as close 
as they get older. Their friendship wasn't forged under the kind of 
circumstances the Trio's was.

Sirius and James seemed to have been the closest two of the group, 
but I don't think we can say that James was the focus for Lupin. 
We've only ever heard Lupin talk about James as an adult when James 
has been dead for years, so what he says is naturally going to be 
tinged with nostalgia and sentimentality about the dead. But Lupin 
seems to have a handle on Sirius as an adult, and Sirius actually 
does have Peter's number as an adult as well. Once he knew he was a 
traitor he was able to fit that into his personality--being a 
traitor didn't have to mean the person had actually decided 
Voldemort was right. It was just a case of folding to pressure or 
getting themselves into something. Lupin had shown a weakness of 
will as a kid, Sirius' anger and recklessness may have been thought 
to have been used to trick him into Voldemort's clutches, or perhaps 
it was thought he was being pressured via his family or something. 
The main reason Peter was thought to be safe seemed to be that 
nobody thought Voldemort would be interested in him, not that he was 
a great guy.

As someone else said, their own personalities may have lent them to 
wonder about each other in those times. They had a history of 
bullying, being reckless, lying and secrets. Sirius had also pulled 
the Prank, and while I don't think we know this sewed mistrust, it 
could have come up in their thinking as well.

Dana:
Lupin risked exposing himself to others when he was
young BECAUSE he believed in the safety precautions that his friends
provided and the near misses proved to a young kid that indeed the
safety precautions were sufficient. In retrospect it was a dumb thing
to do but fortunately nothing seriously came of it.We use airplanes 
because we believe the safety precautions taken are
sufficient to travel by these means but they never are fail proof at
all times and neither are the safety precautions that a werewolf can
take. 

Magpie:
I think it's a little much to say they were "sufficient." Lupin says 
they had some close calls, and luck played a part. MWPP's idea of 
what was sufficient was clearly different than what the school 
thought was sufficient.

The real precautions patently didn't work--those precautions being 
that Lupin was supposed to be locked away from people *while he was 
dangerous* in the Shrieking Shack. Those precautions were dismantled 
by his friends with his blessing--and at least once one of them 
intentually attempted to bring someone into close contact with 
transformed!Lupin which had an even better chance of serious 
consequences if James hadn't acted. 

I don't think this means all werewolves should be locked up, of 
course, any more than people with TB and Typhoid should have been 
locked up because that guy on the plane and Typhoid Mary as 
individuals were not responsible enough for some peoples' liking. 
But one can easily imagine the parent of a child at the school 
looking at Lupin's decisions about his precautions and not feeling 
like their child is safe. They might think the kid is perfectly safe 
around Lupin himself, but still feel uncomfortable having them that 
close to his disease which, as you correctly said, does not 
discriminate.

An important thing to remember, too, about the situation as it is, 
is that nobody is agreeing to the safety precautions like they do on 
a plane. Lupin's condition is a secret--nobody's agreed to these 
precautions for their kids. Of course it's only secret because of 
unfair discrimination to begin with, so he's between a rock and a 
hard place, but still all these things are keeping it from being the 
ideal situation. 

Dana:
It was
a response to an urgent and extremely confusing circumstance and he
took responsibility for that slip up and Sirius prevented that slip
up to cause any permanent consequences. The what if's are irrelevant
because you cannot change the outcome and the outcome therefore is
the only thing that stands. The safety precautions DD put in place
(the potion) were sufficient under normal circumstances but you can't
prevent all things all the time any time, not even Lupin and he never
bit or killed another human being in his life, actually not even you
could.

Magpie:
You seem to be wanting it both ways here, though. The "what ifs" are 
irrelevent when it's "what if Lupin had attacked someone when he was 
running around loose as a werewolf?" but important when it's "what 
if he hadn't seen Peter on the map and had not run out without 
taking his Potion?" The "what ifs" are the whole point of the 
precautions--and unfortunately in a situation where people would 
probably demand very tight security, Lupin's record is relatively 
bad. It turned out the whole precautionary system failed because 
there was a surprising incident.

Dana:
DD put safety precautions on the stone and still it was not
sufficient enough to keep Harry out because of Hagrid slipped up.
Should Hagrid therefore be shunted from society because he has
trouble keeping his mouth shut?

Magpie:
Bad analogy. Like it or not, with Lupin we're talking about an 
actual danger to others which is embodied (at times) in Lupin 
himself. It's not about punishing Lupin (which is what it would be 
with Hagrid--the proper precaution in that case is just to not rely 
on Hagrid to keep important information if it's important it not get 
out) but keeping other people safe. In trying to strike a balance 
between Lupin's right to live a full life and other peoples' rights 
to not be in danger from a werewolf, compromises are going to need 
to be made--so far they haven't found the right one. There were far 
more security measures around the stone than there ever were around 
Lupin, and the thing that broke through them was an even remoter 
possibility.

Dana:
Most kids in one way or the other encounter stupid and dangerous
things at one point in their lives. To still hold Lupin accountable
for his actions when he was young while they actually never led to
anything that is suggested that could have happened is saying that
kids can never be forgiven for the mistakes they make and should
still be condemned for it even if they wised up as adults.

Magpie:
Of course, the neat thing about Lupin and many in his generation is: 
How much did he wise up? He understood the danger enough to be 
guilty and worry about it when he was a kid, but covered his doubts 
to be with his friends. When he returns he's kind of doing the same 
thing. He's no longer running around as a werewolf so shouldn't be 
blamed for doing so, but stressing how much it "never led to 
anything" makes me feel *less* confident about Lupin and not more. 

I agree with you that Lupin deserves to be part of society. I think 
his disease should be able to be dealt with openly as a disease that 
is not his fault and that the secrecy has contributed to the very 
danger people are trying to avoid. More education about the real 
risks (as opposed to imagined ones) from werewolves would be a good 
thing. But I think part of being honest about it means accepting the 
real risks and taking protecting others seriously, not brushing off 
consistent slip-ups and breaches in security as if they don't matter 
because in the past they were lucky. 

Dana:
Precisely Snape uses the insult because it implies that that
mudbloods are inferior while he himself is a half-blood with one
muggle parent and if it was then known that he was a half-blood
either James, Sirius or even Lily herself would have made a notion of
his own background but they don't because they do not know. James
specifically states that he would never use the word even though he
is a pure-blood himself making the contrast that blood-status does
not mean anything to him (well obviously or else he would not have a
crush on Lily)


Magpie:
But come on, Sirius doesn't know who the Pure-bloods are? Of course 
he does. I think James, Sirius and Lily all know perfectly well that 
Snape is a Half-blood. Or at least that he isn't a Pure-blood like 
James and Sirius. The reason they don't bring it up to him as you 
yourself said is because *they* aren't making blood an issue. For 
any of them to respond with, "Yeah, well you're only a Half-blood!" 
would be validating Snape's insult in the first place, and fighting 
the argument on his terms. Most people would know not to do that.

As well, the idea that Half-bloods are insulted the same way Muggle-
borns is not canon. Fans assume that logically this is how it works, 
but we've never seen it. (Also, just as an aside, one can certainly 
have a crush on a member of a group one finds inferior. There are 
many male readers, young and old, who think Draco's behavior 
indicates he's got a crush on Hermione.) 

Regardless, we have not seen any indication that Snape is "passing" 
for a Pure-blood and many indications that his blood status was 
known at least as well as Seamus Finnegan's is. Especially since we 
know that the Pure-bloods themselves are highly aware of this sort 
of thing. None of them ever suggest Snape is one of them on those 
terms. When asked about Snape's blood status pre-HBP Rowling even 
replied: "Snape's ancestry is hinted at. He was a Death Eater, so 
clearly he is no Muggle born, because Muggle borns are not allowed 
to be Death Eaters, except in rare circumstances. You have some 
information about his ancestry there." So knowing he's a DE means 
that he's not Muggle-born, not that he'd be expected to be Pure-
blood. I see no indication of any story where Snape's passing for 
Pure or being outed as a Half-Blood and many indications that he 
simply has his own place based on who he is.

-m