Lily (was Complimenting a character WAS: Re: HBP CHAPTERS 7-9 POST DH LOOK

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 184438

Potioncat wrote:
> 
> I've never seen anything in canon that indicated Professor Snape
discriminated against Muggleborns. I don't mean I'm discounting a
character's comments because of PoV, but rather, I don't recall
anything. The only non-Pureblood I can remember discussing Snape was
Hagrid--and Hagrid seemed to view him with respect.
> 
Lynda replied:
> 
> Professor Snape treated everyone with pretty much the same disdain
and lack of respect. Blood status does not seem to have mattered.
> 
> When discussing Lily, however, the discussion needs to be kept to
his school days. Or prior to. And as a child, he showed supreme
disrespect for both muggles and muggleborns.

Carol responds:
Like Potioncat, I had the idea that you were referring to Professor
Snape rather than the boy Severus. (Maybe it's the use of the name
Snape to refer to a child of nine through sixteen, which I blame on
JKR, who. of course, is reflecting Harry's view of Severus Snape, boy
or man, as Snape. But it might help if we all made it clearer in our
posts which "Snape" we're referring to.) At any rate, I'm glad we
agree that blood status seems not to have mattered to the adult Snape.

I don't hink, however, that we can really say that the boy Severus
showed "supreme disrespect for both Muggles and Muggleborns." He
certainly showed disrespect toward Petunia, but it was mutual. She
treated him with disrespect because of his poverty and oddness. (He
was "that awful boy" to her; no doubt she was "Lily's awful sister" to
him.) We don't actually see him showing "supreme disrespect" for his
father. He only says that his father doesn't care about much of
anything and fights with his mother. But, clearly, his father shaped
the boy's attitude toward Muggles, probably including Petunia. The two
Muggles he's acquainted with are ugly and mean. It's not surprising
that a nine- or ten-year-old boy would extend that attitude to
incorporate all Muggles. (We don't see him interacting with Lily's
parents. If they had befriended the poor boy from the wrong side of
town, maybe he'd have felt differently.)

As for young Severus's "supreme disrespect for Muggleborns," it's not
shown. Far from rejecting Lily, he reaches out to her, teaching her
about magic and Hogwarts and even wizarding law as it relates to
children. Admittedly, he rejects *Petunia* as a Muggle, but if she'd
been nice to him, he might have treated her better in return despite
he inability to do magic (which would make her appear to be inferior
or even abnormal from his childish and unenlightened perspective).
Yes, he uses "Mudblood" when the girl he loves is flirting with his
tormentor, and, yes, Lily *says* that he refers to other Muggle-borns
using that term, but where's the evidence to support her accusation?
It isn't there. Lily may be assuming that he *must* use the term for
others if he applied it to her, but that isn't necessarily true. It's
also possible that he uses the term among his Slytherin friends to fit
in without necessarily sharing their views (certainly not any disdain
they showed for Half-bloods!), but we're not shown that, either.
Instead, he's guilty until proven innocent. And Lily, who has to
suppress her laughter at his predicament while she flirts with the
"toerag" who's humiliating him, is taken as the ultimate authority
with out a speck of ccrroborating evidence. I don't buy it.

Carol, noting again that he hopes Lily will be sorted into Slytherin,
indicating that he has not yet learned the extent of his House's blood
prejudice before he enters Hogwarts