The Overarching message (of the HP books)

[nikkalmati]

No: HPFGUIDX 191677



 
> Alla:
> 
> Depending on what kind of wrong the person does it surely can make him evil in my mind. And Snape surely makes the definition of every day evil as far as I am concerned. He makes that definition despite agreeing to spy for Dumbledore and yes, despite agreeing to protect Harry's life.
> 
> I wish he would never agreed to protect Harry's life, because doing that while trying to make that life a constant misery, humiliation and yes, mind rape (because I did not stress in the previous post that on that aspect I completely agree with me - unsuspect Legilimencing is almost a perfect analogy to mind rape for me), is an every day evil IMO. He is no Lord Voldemort for sure, but he in my opinion needs to be fought every day and no less than Grand evil that Lord Voldemort is. His intent was to make Harry's life a misery IMO and the fact that Dumbledore forced him to take upon an additional task of protecting Harry's life does not make me despise him any less.
>

Nikkalmati

I would not attempt to argue that any evil Snape does is offset by the good. I would argue that the good he does indicates that speculation about what bad things he may have done is misplaced.It is an antidote to the circular reasoning that -- Snape must have done these bad things, because we already know that is the kind of person he is.

  I appreciate that you understand the difference between canon and canon based speculation.  I consider the use of the hints you have spoken of as the source of your canon based speculation to be completely unreliable.  They fall into the same category as the incident at the Welcoming Feast when Harry (and the reader) were misled by JKR (or the unreliable narrator) to believe Harry's scar hurt because Snape was looking at him.  In fact, it is canon that it was LV in Quirrel's turban. JKR repeatedly uses the same technique to conceal what is actually happening from us.  Much like a Muggle magician, she focuses the audience's attention away from the action.

 Unlike others on the list, I don't believe  Snape or DD ever used Legitimacy secretly.  In fact, to answer Steve, the fact that Harry is not aware of being Legitimized is proof that it doeesn't happen.  Consider the examples of Legitimacy we know about.  In every case the victim was aware of what was happening and even what the other person was seeing.  Harry knows what Snape sees in the lessons because he sees exactly the same visions. When Snape attempts to enter Draco's mind, in HBP, Draco knows exactly what Snape is doing and intentionally uses Occlumancy to stop him.  When Snape enters Harry's mind after Draco is injured in the bathroom, Harry again knows exactly what Snape is seeing.  BTW you could argue this invasion was not consented to, but Harry did not actually object, he had nearly killed Draco (and Snape too, of course), he had lied when questioned about it, and Snape looks only for the memory of the Potions book. 

 I think DD used Legitimacy on Snape on the hilltop when Snape asked him to protect Lily, but we can't see into Snape's mind, so we don't know what Snape perceived or if it was consentual.  We also do not ever see Snape acting on information he received from invading Harry's mind secretly, as far as I know.  If you have any examples, let me know. Mostly, it seems it would be a waste of Snape's time and effort.

The only person who clearly invades another person's mind without permission is Harry.  He does it to Snape - twice. He saw into Snape's mind as a result of the backlash from the Occlumancy lessons (agreed that this was unintended).  He also invades Snape's mind when he looks into the Pensieve without permission and views the memories stored there. 

Nikkalmati