Did you LIKE Snape?

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 183527

Mike wrote:
> Hanging around with future Death Eaters, in fact, fancying himself
as the same. If he had been a dullert or a bully I could forgive him
for being seduced to the dark side. I think that's what happened to 
> Regulus. <snip>

Carol responds:
First, I'm snipping portions of this post that I vehemently disagree
with but which are simply a matter of personal taste and feelings. I
have a similar feeling of revulsion for MWPP which I can't be argued
out of because it's exactly that, a feeling.

That aside, are you saying that you consider Regulus a dullard or a
bully? I think he was merely a boy who rather unthinkingly adopted his
parents' values and who saw himself as the good and dutiful son, in
contrast to his rebellious and ungrateful brother. (He would have
agreed with Kreacher, I think, that Sirius was "an ungrateful little
swine who broke his mother's heart"). Regulus's collection of
Voldemort press cuttings resemble a Muggle teenager's press clippings
of a favorite rock star or actor. Clearly, he didn't fully understand
what his hero represented until it affected him personally (and the
same can be said for Severus Snape).
 

> Mike:
> All part of my reason to despise the Snape at the end of PoA, from 
the Shack onward to the end. When he bound and gagged Lupin, refusing
to listen to the other side, that was it for me. Harry showed more
maturity in that situation than Snape did.

Carol responds:

Now, granted, he was too incensed and too convinced that Sirius Black
had betrayed Lily (and intended to kill Harry) to listen to reason,
but that's not the reason he bound and gagged Lupin. He did that as a
safety precaustion because it was a full-moon night and Lupin, who had
forgotten or neglected to take his potion, was about to transform into
a werewolf.

Mike: 
> Some people have pointed out that Snape conjured a stretcher for 
Sirius too. That he was saving him from the Dementors. That's not 
what all his ensuing conversations showed. The Dementors were gone 
when he conjured those stretchers, of course he wasn't going to leave
Sirius out there where he might come to and make his escape. He 
brought him up to the castle with the others, saw him locked up with
the intent of bringing a Dementor up to him to have his soul sucked.
He even asked Fudge if it was going to happen right away. So why 
shouldn't I believe that was his intent in the Shack, to have Sirius 
soul sucked?
> 
> I repeat, I DON'T CARE if he thought Sirius was guilty and that
Remus was helping him. He was aiding and abetting a miscarriage of
justice that would result in a man becoming "worse than dead" based
mostly on a boyhood grudge. That's the way I read it.

Carol responds:

But as we now know, the boyhood grudge, however lingering, was a red
herring. DH makes it clear that he loved Lily, and in PoA, he would
have believed, with Dumbledore, that Sirius Black had been the Secret
Keeper who betrayed Lily to her death. Moreover, he took Sirius Black
to the proper authority, Fudge, who would administer "justice."

Meanwhile, he took the three unconscious children to the hospital wing
where they could be tended. Had he not done so, they would have been
prey to any Dementors who thought it safe to return and/or to the
werewolf who was roaming the grounds. And (though he didn't know it,
of course) had he not taken HRH to the hospital wing, Harry and
Hermione could not have used the Time Turner to return and save
Buskbeak, Sirius, and themselves.

Carol, who sees the matter very differently but is merely presenting
her own view, not arguing with Mike's feelings on the matter