Revenge on Rita was First lesson

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 185790

Magpie wrote:
> <snip> Harry is annoyed at stories about him that are annoying and
angry when Snape publically humilates them with them. I don't see how
this is proving that Snape's picking on Harry in class has caused
Harry to be less sensitive about public humiliation. Fear of public
humiliation is very common for Harry throughout the books--it's far 
more associated with him as a character than Hermione. (Granted he
also deals with it more, but that's just yet another reason he hardly
needs Snape's help to get used to it.) <snip>

Carol responds:

I don't want to talk about Hermione at the moment, so I'm snipping the
discussion of her. I think, however, that Harry's ability to deal with
both fame and notoriety, public adoration and public humiliation, is
one of the important motifs in the books.

We start with Dumbledore placing him away from the WW so that (among
other reasons) he won't grow up a "pampered prince," praised and
adored for something he had no control over, surviving an AK and
(supposedly) vanquishing a Dark Wizard. I don't see how that sort of
fame could *not* go to his head, and the fact that his parents died
while he survived might add survivor's guilt to the equation.

Be that as it may, has plenty of experience with *private* humiliation
with the Dursleys, who are trying to stifle the magic in him without
telling him what it's all about, at the same time treating him like a
fairytale stepchild, a male Cinderella. He experiences *public*
humiliation at school, with the bullying of Dudley and his friends and
being generally laughed at for his clothes and being picked last for
sports teams, etc.

All of this experience makes him better prepared for public
humiliation than, say, Ron, who (IIRC) has trouble dealing with
unpopularity after he bungles a Quidditch game. He doesn't *fear*
Snape any more than he fears Vernon or Dudley. He responds to the
first Potions lesson with cheek and to the deduction of a point with
resentment. The experience temporarily spares him from undeserved
public adulation, but Quidditch turns the tables and he quickly
becomes a hero to the Gryffindors and a rival to everyone else,
especially Slytherin. Then he loses all those points for Gryffindor,
and his whole House turns against him. And then he and his friends win
them back, making them heroes again to Gryffindor and intensifying the
Gryffindor-Slytherin rivalry into enmity.

I'm oversimplifying, I realize, but even by the end of first year,
Harry has more experience dealing with extremes of popularity and
unpopularity than anyone else in the school. (To some degree, Hermione
and Ron share his experience, but they don't have Quidditch-hero
status or Harry's history.)

Lockhart in second year capitalizes on Harry's celebrity and, IMO,
makes Harry very uncomfortable with it. Colin Creevey with his camera
is no help, either. Then Harry reveals himself as a Parselmouth and
finds himself feared by half the school. Even the usually friendly
Hufflepuffs think that he loosed Draco's conjured snake on Justin
Finch-Fletchley, and he's widely suspected of being the Heir of
Slytherin. Matters get worse as more Muggle-borns are Petrified (until
Hermione's Petrification makes it clear that Harry is not guilty). 

In PoA, Harry's battle with fame is obscured by the idea that a
murderer is after him, but in GoF, it comes to the fore again. Harry
has to deal with personal unpopularity based on the idae that he put
his own name in the Goblet of Fire, with even his best friend
believing that he did so and lied about it. The tables turn yet again
when he battles the Hungarian Horntail, with even the Hufflepuffs who
had resented him for snatching Cedric's glory now supporting both
their champions. (The Slytherins still support Cedric as the real
Hogwarts champion.) The spotlight remains on Harry thanks in part to
Rita Skeeter and her articles, some favorable and some not. Harry's
"gone off me a bit, hasn't she?" shows that he doesn't mind the
articles that deal with him. He's used to fluctuations in popularity
and to public praise and/or ridicule and even aversion by now. It's
only when Hagrid or Hermione is involved that he becomes upset.

In OoP, of course, he's become a publicity-seeking liar who falsely
claims that Voldemort is back. Bad publicity for himself (and
Dumbledore) is the least of his problems. He's battling anger and the
fear that he's being possessed and Umbridge and glimpses into
Voldemort's mind and Umbridge's takeover, none of which helps or is
helped by Occlumency lessons with Snape. The public humiliation of
being called a liar by Umbridge is no humiliation at all. He stands up
to her and gets a series of cruel detentions that don't deter him or
cow him one iota. He's reluctant to teach the DA at first, sure that
they're only there to find out about Cedric, but eventually gets over
it and does what they need him to do (which, in most cases, is teach
what Umbridge isn't teaching).

By HBP, when no one can deny that Voldemort is back, he's become the
Prophecy Boy who fought LV in the MoM. The graveyard story has also
come out and is republished in the Prophet. By this time, fluctuations
in fame and popularity, public adulation and public attacks, have no
effect on Harry whatever. (He does, however, take advantage of being
Slughorn's little Potions Prince, as Hermione calls him somewhere.)
Otherwise, he's obsessed with finding out what Draco Malfoy is up to
and indifferent to what people think of him. He resists Scrimgeour's
efforts to make him into a mascot.

In DH, of course, he's dealing with fame only indirectly, hearing
about himself as--guess what--a mascot after all through the Wizarding
Wireless and about himself as inspiration for the reinstated DA later
in the book. And, of course, at the end he has to battle Voldemort,
all of which intensifies his fame.

But the epilogue shows that Harry, who is still stared at because of
his (no longer active) scar, is completely indifferent to what anyone
other than his friends and family thinks of him. And even Ron, who has
battled jealousy or envy for seven books, can now joke about his being
the famous one.

That whole concept of Harry as "our new celebrity" and his learning to
deal with the vicissitudes of fame and infamy is developed throughout
the book, beginning not with Snape but with his placement on the
Dursleys' doorstep and culminating in JustHarry, who happens to be
famous but lives a normal life, anyway, at the end of the book.

Carol, writing from memory and probably getting some details wrong but
trying to point out a thematic pattern or motif in the series as a whole