Maraurders/he exists

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 168202

> Neri:
> Well, Sirius does explain in OotP that even when Lily was actually
> dating James, she didn't know all about his vendetta with Snape, and I
> don't see why would Sirius lie about this. But I suspect Lily knows
> enough about Severus's reputation in this scene and doesn't care.
> There's no indication that Snape interests her at all here. She just
> wants so much to pick an argument with James... 

Pippin:

But if everyone knew about Severus's badass reputation, the laughter
wouldn't be growing as it became clear that Sirius and James were
getting the upper hand. People would be worried, as Harry usually
is when he gets the worst of Snape, that Snape would be having
his revenge. But they're obviously not.


> Neri:
> Or she could blink because she expects him to have the brain of hold
> on the M word for once while she's helping him out of trouble. And
> that single blink is the only sign that Lily is surprised at all. In
> the next sentence she answers "coolly" and changes tack with ease.
> There's no surprised "I didn't think you're one of *those* Slytherins".

Pippin:
That would just make her look weak, besides gratuitously
insulting Slytherins in general. There's no indication in the scene
that Snape used the word because he's a Slytherin. Nobody's
ever even said that it's a word only Slytherins use, either.
Remember, in CoS Ron didn't even know that Slytherin had
started all this pureblood stuff.


> Neri:
> One problem with this argument: Snape never actually 
blames James of *stealing* his spell. He only blames him of 
"turning my inventions on me", which James could have easily 
done without any knowledge that the spell was originally Snape's 
invention. I can't remember a single clue in canon that James 
indeed stole the spell directly from Snape. 
> 

Pippin:
Except that Snape says, "Like your filthy father" and not, "Like all the
rest." Of course he could be wrongly blaming James, but that's different
than not blaming James particularly. Remember everyone was doing
levicorpus, not just James. And now a further word on that...

Considering the structure of the whole SWM plot line. When Harry first
approaches Lupin and Sirius  in OOP, Lupin says, "I wouldn't
like you to judge your father on what you saw there, Harry. He was
only fifteen--"

After indignantly dismissing this excuse, Harry hesitates but finally
blurts out that his father had acted that way just because Sirius had
said he was bored.

Sirius immediately says "I'm not proud of it" which earns a sideways
look from Lupin.  Lupin then says that James and his friends were
the height of cool and sometimes got carried away. Sirius interrupts 
to say that they were arrogant little  berks. 

Sirius and Lupin then reveal that in seventh year, James had stopped
hexing people for the fun of it, and only continued to hex Snape in
retaliation because Snape was always hexing *him*. 

Now this is  presumably Sirius's final word on the subject, being 
dead. But Lupin's not done yet. We hear from him again in HBP, and 
this time his argument is that levicorpus had a great vogue.

Now, why have I gone through all this? To show that there really
was no reversal between OOP and HBP. There's always been two
different opinions about why James shouldn't be judged harshly. 
Sirius judged that their fifteen year old conduct wasn't something 
to be proud of, but James grew out of it.   He stopped hexing 
Snape for fun, and only did it when he had a reason.

But Lupin's opinion was and remains that James shouldn't have
been judged harshly because everyone said it was cool and 
besides it was a vogue.

Everyone thought it was cool???? Everyone was doing it???  

Gimme a break!

Any kid of mine that offered those shabby excuses would have 
got himself grounded for an extra week. But it's a perfect example of 
Lupin cutting his friends too much slack, IMO.

Pippin