Snape / Albus section of Catlady's post

[julie]

No: HPFGUIDX 184337

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)" 
<catlady at ...> wrote:

> 
> I had a similar reaction to Pippin's
> <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/184292>:
> 
> << I think we are meant to look to Dumbledore for a clue to Snape's
> feelings: pity for Narcissa, mingled with disgust at her lack of
> concern for other innocent lives. >>
> 
> I question whether 'disgust' is the right word. To me, disgust is a
> visceral rather than intellectual emotion, so Snape would feel
> 'disgust' at Narcissa's lack of concern for other lives only if his
> concern for those lives was also visceral. I think even heroic Snape
> doesn't go in for compassion and empathy (words for feeling other
> people's pain as a visceral feeling). I know he saves people when he
> can in preference to standing there watching them die, but I think 
he
> does it out of a sense of duty, or because he decided intellectually
> that he will do it, not because standing there watching people die
> nauseates him or breaks his heart. (Which incidentally answers
> Scarah's question of why he bothered to save Lupin.)
> 
> For the same reasons, I question whether DD really felt disgust when
> he said 'You disgust me'. Whether he felt it or not, he said it to
> manipulate young Snape. This is the DD who sent trusting adults on
> what they didn't know were suicide missions all the time without
> feeling nauseated or grief-stricken and expected to do the same with
> little Harry as I mentioned in my above comment to Carol. Not a 
whole
> lot of visceral compassion and empathy.
>

Julie:
I agree. Carol felt betrayed by Dumbledore's lack of empathy
for Snape in the DH scene above, and Alla did not. Like Carol,
I did feel quite betrayed at first, and it was this scene,
where young Snape comes to Dumbledore intent on saving Lily,
that finally and irrevocably pried my fingers loose from 
my desperate grip on the "Dumbledore as kind, compassionate
all-around epitome of goodness and best Wizard ever to 
grace the WW" theory.

And it really has nothing to do with Snape or whether he 
*deserves* empathy or sympathy or compassion. What one 
deserves and what one gets is as much based on the person
doing the giving as the one receiving it. I have no doubt
McGonagall would have been just as severe and unforgiving
as Dumbledore, and her "You digust me!" would have been 
filled with genuine feeling. Moody would have simply hexed
Snape and tossed him in Azkaban after his desperate plea
to save Lily. But the Dumbledore I thought I knew, the one
who was apparently so desperate to save Draco's soul--him
I expected to show compassion for Snape. Not to ignore his
crimes, but to offer Snape a second chance and salvation
as much (more, even) for the fate of Snape's soul as for
anything Snape could do to help Dumbledore defeat Voldemort.
That Dumbledore showed not a single ounce of true sympathy
or concern for Snape's pain (again, whether Snape deserved
such or not), was the final nail in the coffin for me.

The real Dumbledore isn't about second chances at all that
I can see, not unless those second chances serve his own
goals. He's not interested in saving anyone's soul, unless
again it happens incidentally in accordance with achieving
his goals. He accepted Sirius's imprisonment in Azkaban
without any protest or any further investigation--and this
was a Gryffindor invited into his Order! Throughout his years
as Headmaster he did nothing at all to sway the Slytherin
children from following the paths set out by their Death
Eater parents (and, really, how much could Dumbledore give
a damn about Draco's soul if he never showed an ounce of
real concern about any of Draco's classmates, or any of the
Slytherin students of Snape's era, all so openly choosing
the wrong path straight to Voldemort?).

I don't believe Dumbledore *wanted* any of his students to
join Voldemort, Slytherins or otherwise, but he believed 
that a hands-off approach is not only acceptable but right--
even children are left to make their "own" choices. He ignored
the reality that no one, child or adult, makes choices in a 
vacuum. There are always societal and peer pressures, family
expectations, and a host of other influences that affect 
our choices. Dumbledore's *own* choice was to deliberately
exert no influence on Hogwarts students headed in the wrong
direction (nor apparently to request or require that the
teachers under him make any effort at all to do so). While
he may have had his own justifications for such an approach,
to me a deeply Good person would do everything he could
to help children under his/her care and guidance to make
the right decisions (my opinion, not everyone may agree).
Rather Dumbledore sat back and popped lemon drops while 
Rome--er, Hogwarts nearly destroyed itself from the inside.

I know others saw this colder and more calculating Dumbledore
coming, and there was plenty of evidence earlier in the books.
I think the misdirection of Dumbledore's apparent deep concern 
for Draco's soul in HBP was what led me to cling so tenaciously
to the concept of a good Dumbledore, i.e. a loving and empathetic
Dumbledore (Jesus-like if you will), rather than a manipulative
and emotionally distanced Dumbledore (more in the Old Testament
God role) who was on the side of Good but not particularly 
infused with any more goodness than the next person (and quite
a bit less than many). If saving Draco's soul hadn't been a
direct consequence of furthering Dumbledore's own plan (making
his imminent death more productive in defeating Voldemort), I
think Draco would have been left entirely on his own to decide
between saving his soul or his family. 

Julie