First lesson WAS: Re: Marietta, was Slytherin's Reputation

[marionrosnl]

No: HPFGUIDX 185798

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "montavilla47" 
<montavilla47 at ...> wrote:

> 
> Also, let's face it.  If you are going to compare Lupin and Snape 
> as teachers, then Snape is always going to end up looking worse.  
> He's just not as good a teacher as Lupin. I think that goes 
without 
> saying.  


Marion

For a while I've been lurking again, because RL is very busy and I 
just don't have the time to get into these discussions like I used 
to, but I can't let this one slide - it's been said so many times 
before that Lupin is a good teacher and I utterly disagree with that.

Lupin is an awful teacher. Now, it might just be because I'm from an 
older generation, but unlike the kids who grew up in the nineties 
and the noughties, I *don't* think that bloating a kid's already big 
head by giving him praise and *sweeties* somehow constitutes 'being 
a good teacher'. In fact, my classmates and I would've taken Lupin's 
measure from the moment he deliberately uses the children to 
humiliate and belittle a fellow teacher during that boggart class. 
My god, but we were little bloodhounds. Kids have an instinct for 
powerlines and status. We would've interpreted that display for what 
it was; a pathetic attempt from an adult to ingratiate himself to 
his class by humiliating a fellow adult, one who is disliked by that 
class. We would've smelled the desperation and condemned him for a 
weakling. Oh, we would've laughed, for sure, but we would have 
smelled the vulnarability of Lupin. He is so desperate to be *liked* 
by the children, it paints a big bullseye on his back. We would've 
fallen on to him like a pack of rabid wolves. 

Now Snape exudes plenty of vulnarability as well.
>From the first book, when everybody was whining about how 'mean' 
Snape was, my overwhelming impression was how *lonely* the man was. 
He has *no* support from his Headmaster. He gets *no* support from 
his fellow teachers.
As I said, kids have a flawless instinct for power.
Harry is unto this from day one.

First Potions lesson, when Snape keeps a whole classroom mesmerized, 
Harry and Ron pull faces at eachother (they look at eachother and 
pull up their eyebrows, which, in British mime means 'who is this 
weirdo?'). When Snape, seeing this, turns unto unruly (he's not 
listening like the rest, does he think that being lauded as the Boy 
Who Lived exempts him from paying attention in class?) student like 
he is supposed to (because this is a *school* where children are 
*taught* important skills, not a kindergarten where the main purpose 
is to kiss booboos away and get the children to take a nap after 
lunch) Harry cheeks him. Snape takes away a point, and no 
consequenses follow. Harry gets the message clearly every time he 
breaks a rule, or cheeks Snape, messes up other children's potions 
or sneaks around, snooping; he is above the Law and especially, he 
is above Snape. Everybody is above Snape, apparantly.
In fact, everytime Snape exerts his authority as a teacher, he is 
shot down, humiliated, made seem ridiculous for even *wanting* to 
get recognition as a teacher and authority figure. The author makes 
sure of that.

And boy, does it work! The mainstream of the readers, indeed many on 
this list, seem to think Snape ridiculous for wanting to be 
called 'Sir', for instance. But he is an adult and Harry is a boy. 
It is common courtesy for a British child to call any adult 
male 'sir', and for a British schoolboy it is *mandatory* to call 
his teacher 'sir'. That Harry doesn't is a deliberate act of 
contempt. He isn't 'brave' or 'cool' for showing contempt to the 
teacher it is seemingly okay to hate because 'everybody does it'. It 
isn't 'childish' from Snape to fight for dominance in the classroom. 
He is *supposed* to have dominance in the classroom. He is the 
teacher! 

Snape is hanging in there by his teeth, though. It's what I like 
about him. He gets *no* support, he is all alone, the concences of 
Hogwarts seems to be that it is okay to hate and spit upon the weird 
man with the weird hair from the dungeons, but he keeps insisting 
upon his dignity. He keeps insisting that he is the teacher, and he 
keeps trying to teach the children, even if he has to ram the 
curriculum down their throats with sarcasm and wit.
He is like one of those cops from those movies or shows, where they 
are trying to uphold the law in areas where crime is so rife that 
other cops have given up. "No," they say, "I don't care if you have 
connections with the maffia, I don't care that you will be running 
around free again because our corrupted Judge, I will still arrest 
you because you Broke The Law and justice must be served otherwise 
all will descend into chaos."
I like Snape because he keeps on going. Everybody hates him, God 
knows he hates himself, but still he is going to save Lily's child, 
no matter what a rotten kid he is, and he is going to do his job to 
the best of his ability (and he is very able, seeing his results) 

But JKR, and most of the readers, seem to think otherwise. 
Apparantly it isn't important that children learn something. No, 
what is important is *that the teachers are nice to Harry*.
It isn't important that children grow up to be responsible, 
reliable, honest adults. No, it's important that Harry gets coddled, 
given choccies when he fails.

Its ironic, isn't it? Apparantly, when Harry was a small boy, he 
went to a Muggle school, where he was singled out as the 'weird 
boy', the cootie kid with the glasses and the hair. The staff seems 
to be on the Dursley side. The kids went 'Harry hunting' with 
Dudley. Dudley, in the mean time, gets all he wants. His mommy 
kisses his booboos away. She calls him ickle pet names, she gives 
him attention. To the Dursleys, the world is made up into Good 
People and Bad People, and the division is made by measuring how 
nice people are to the Dursleys in general and Dudley in particular.
We are told that the Dursleys are Bad for glorifying Dudley, who is 
nothing special, after all. Only a dull, stupid, fat, spoilt little 
boy.
Then Harry enters Hogwarts, and suddenly the author decides that the 
Good People of the WW are separated and clearly defined by virtue of 
them being *nice* to *Harry*! Those who give Harry chocholate and 
sweets are Good, those who give discipline are Bad. Those who pet 
his swollen head are Good, those who try to deflate it are Bad. All 
the while we get stressed every book that Harry is *not* an ordinary 
boy at all. No, he's special. But at the mean time we are shown a 
boy who is mediocre at best at school (and getting dumber by the 
year, by Gum! does DH Harry even remember how to tie his shoelaces? 
He couldn't even remember where he saw a picture before after having 
seen it just the previous chapter!!) We get shown a boy who jumped 
onto the Slytherin-hating bandwagon even before ever meeting one 
*because everybody hates them*!
One would think that after showing Harry to have been the cootie kid 
versus Dudley the Golden Boy, the author would've taken pains to 
show that in the WW, where Harry is the Golden Boy, Harry would've 
handled things better than Dudley. But no, the message is apparantly 
that the Dursleys weren't exactly wrong for coddling a Special Boy, 
but that they are wrong for coddling the wrong Special Boy! They 
should've coddled Harry instead, since he is the True Special Boy TM!

So why exactly was Lupin such a good teacher again?
- Because he was Nice to Harry, by telling him how nice his dad was, 
and by giving him special treatment and giving him loads of 
chocolate.
- Because he dislikes Snape (which earns him points, apparantly)
- Because he 'was the best DADA teacher Harry ever had' (according 
to Harry, that is)
and finally, according to some
- Because he was Nice to Neville (but was he? Nice to Neville, I 
mean. As if Neville hasn't been made the laughing stock enough, he 
is called upon to expose his - childish, unfounded - fears, which 
get laughed at by the class, and is then used by the teacher to make 
a dig at another teacher)

I don't think this makes Lupin such a great teacher. In fact, I 
think his stunt with boggart-Snape is immensely petty and childish. 
Its also a nail in his own coffin, because teachers should form an 
united front, no matter how disliked another teacher is by students 
and staff alike. By his public attack on a fellow teacher he 
diminishes himself in his pupils eyes (well, he would in Real Life), 
and in Real Life he would've been severely reprimanded by the 
Headmaster for that stunt.
His singling out of Harry, giving him special lessons, as the child 
of his old schoolchum (who said something again about Slytherin 
nepotism?) doesn't give him browniepoints with me because I don't 
think that 'being nice to the kids of old friends' is a particular 
virtue in schoolmasters.
And really, being nice to Neville? Fake!Moody was Nice To Neville. 
As if that is a sign of a Good Teacher!

More damning, Lupin Wants To Be Liked. JKR even stated so in her 
interviews. Well, I've seen teachers like that, and they usually 
don't last long, and when they do they are disillusioned and all the 
more sarcastic for it. I've seen a teacher who Wanted To Be Liked 
chased from her classroom, being pelted by erasers, pens and wads of 
paper.

Sorry to get up people's noses, as I'm sure this post will do, but 
imo Lupin is a Bad Teacher. I'm afraid, though, that JKR thinks 
differently about this, but this is because I value different things 
that her.