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lilytakeharryandgo · 4 years

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STOP ROMANTICISING SEVERUS SNAPE - A MANIFESTO

“Albus Severus Potter, you were named after two headmasters of Hogwarts. One of them was a great strategist, the other one was a racist, hateful, bitter, scary bastard. Voldemort must have damaged some brain cells when killing the Horcrux inside of me.”

Now that I have Snape fans raging and screaming for blood, here’s my show of evidence:

If the boring, same argument brought up by Marauders stans is Snape being a Death Eater, I know it’s basic, but it’s basic for a reason: it’s true. Supporting Voldemort doesn’t mean you support his ideas? I’m sorry, what did he support? The Dark Lord’s contouring skills? It is a truth universally acknowledged that joining a group of racists and following them in perpetrating crimes does make you a racist and a criminal.

JK Rowling herself said that Death Eaters are an analogy to Nazis, Marauders stans are not making this up. Are you questioning what JK ROWLING said? Because you know, she is JK ROWLING.

We know it was Snivellus that created the Levicorpus. He must have used it against the Marauders in order for them to learn it. And let’s just remember that “Snape’s worst memory” takes place after the Shrieking Shack’s incident, when dear, lovely Severus tried to unmask Remus so that he could be expelled for being a Werewolf. He went down to the Whomping Willow of his own free will, no one forced him, and he supposedly knew what was happening there: he risked his own life only to get Remus expelled. Yes, it was Sirius who thought it would have been funny to lure him to the Shrieking Shack where Lupin was due for his transformation, and that was wrong. However, why did he do that? Because Snape was constantly spying on them. Was it wrong? Definitely, no one is trying to get Sirius out of this one. Still, James saved Snape in time. Did James do that just because he wanted to protect Remus? Most likely: James gave them all a family and he loved his friends and would have done everything for them, and he did. But also, he wouldn’t have let an “innocent” (if we want to call him that) die. So James saved Snape’s life, which dear Half Blood Price seemed deeply ungrateful for later, and yet, Snape constantly tried to get the Marauders expelled from Hogwarts time and time again while using Dark Magic and creating his own dark spells (see the irony?). Stop saying that the Marauders’ actions pushed him to become a Death Eater. As if “Snape never missed an opportunity to curse James” was a lie. As if Snape wasn’t on his way to being a buddying Death Eater by his 5th year. As if Snape hadn’t came up with a curse that slices your body open by his 6th year. As if the Marauders had nothing to do but ruthlessly bully Snape all day and all night, when they actually are described as the brightest as some of the brightest students of their year despite being engaged in loads of other things like the creation of the Marauders Map, becoming Animagus, dealing with Remus’ monthly transformations (because those demonic guys didn’t leave him alone and didn’t report him to get him expelled as someone else was willing to do), James and Remus being responsible enough to be Head Boy and Prefect. Oh, and training for a war and joining the Order once they graduated. Minor things, right? Things they were busy doing in their personal lives such as surviving, living and being happy? Nah, that never happened, their entire life consisted of bullying innocent, poor service teenagers, that was their goal. Snape experienced one side of the Marauders (and we read that from his own pov, so it’s a little biased too): that is not a deciding factor of whether or not they (and especially James) are good people. He was so fascinated with the Dark Arts, even after Lily’s death and hence his presumed redemption, that Dumbledore did not appoint him as Defence Against the Dark Arts professor. Snape’s apologetics make it sound like the Marauders made Snape’s life hell every minute of everyday and he was the poor victim who was not capable of standing up to himself against those horrible demonic creatures, but he was the one inventing the Sectumsempra and using it against James, against George. Only a truly tormented person could have invented such a bloody spell.

So now let’s talk about Remus. Remus, a hero who fought against Voldemort and joined an anti-terrorist resistance organisation when he was just 18 years old, who fought alongside Frank and Alice Longbottom in the Order, is about to start his first class with the third years. Neville is there, of course, Remus knows his parents’ fate, how they were tortured into madness, and probably guessed that Neville’s biggest fear would be similar to what he guessed Harry’s would be. He’s probably planning on stepping in before Bellatrix Lestrange shows up, but then it’s not her, it’s Snape. Snape who insults him in front of his class, Snape who tries to shame him. Can you imagine how he must have felt? Yes, they bullied him, but his best friend James grew up, and what did he get in return? Death. Instead, Snape hasn’t gotten over himself a little and most importantly he does not realise that being a teacher also means being responsible for those children. Snape never changes: he is the same petty, angry, bitter child that he had been in school, except now he’s bullying children half his age instead of yelling racial slurs at his classmates. While Snape is one of his students’ greatest fear, Remus starts off the year by letting his pupils confront their biggest fears. Remus truly, deeply cared about his students, and wait… what did Snape do? He got him fired! But even most achingly than that, just imagine… it’s 1993, Remus is coming back after a rough full moon. He’s feeling down, he’s weak, both physically and emotionally, he’s one more time without his friends by his side, one more time alone as he was before the Marauders became Animaguses to be alongside him to support him during the roughest times (horrible people, isn’t it?). So Remus is coming back to his class of Defense Against the Dark Arts, and his best friend’s son is writing an essay on how to kill him. But Snape didn’t stop there, no, he told the whole Wizarding World that a man who had struggled to keep his condition secret all his life was a Werewolf. He had to withdraw from his position as a professor because of that, and straight after that the Ministry issued a law against Werewolves which made it impossible for Remus to have a job. So, to sum it up, not only he exposed him as a Werewolf, he also condemned him to live in poverty and be persecuted for that reason. Also, quoting, when Remus was trying to explain things in PoA he attacked him and said “I’ll drag the Werewolf, perhaps the Dementors will have a kiss for him too.” James and Sirius were the kind of persons, the kind of friends and brothers, who risked their own life every month for one of his best friends. Think about this: they found out about Remus’ situation when they were just boys in their first years of school, and they didn’t leave him, they decided to help him embarking in something much bigger than themselves. Whereas dear lovely 33 year old Necrophilus told everyone about Remus’ secret and basically had him fired. Sounds angelic, why haven’t I thought about doing something like that before? That would most certainly secure me a spot in heaven!

Do we want to talk about an abusive person? Well, Snape was not just abusive as a person, he abused and took advantage of his position as a teacher (and Head of House too, to reward extra points from the other Houses) to bully his own students (even after his presumed “redemption”). He told Neville he would have given his failed potion to his toad, Trevor, so that the fatal effects of the potion would teach him a lesson. He bullied Neville to the point that he was literally his greatest fear - Neville’s parents were tortured to the point of insanity by Bellatrix, yet Snape was his greatest fear. He also condoned and took part in bullying when Draco cursed Hermione’s teeth to grow. He said he didn’t see any difference, then watched as she ran off crying. From the very start he starts bullying Harry: he perfectly knew he was raised by muggles, he knew how Petunia was and still went on to ask questions that he wouldn’t be able to answer. And after calling Neville and idiot for a mistake that anyone could have made he took points from Gryffindor because Harry didn’t tell him how to do it right - great teaching strategy, let’s nominate him for Most Valuable Teacher. Harry had nothing to do with what went on during Snape’s school years, but he physically resembled James and he was his son, so let’s bully him from the very first second! And honestly, asking an 11 years old Muggle-raised kid the difference between monskshood and wolfsbane in front of everyone on the first day? There is no difference! They are colloquial terms for the same plant. He just wanted the intellectual upper hand over a goddamn little kid. But he didn’t stop there: that resentful git always tried to blame Harry for something even without proof (as most of the time), and he physically abused Harry because he was angry (“Snape threw Harry from him with all his might. Harry fell hard onto the dungeon floor.”). He knew how important it was for Harry to learn Occlumency and he stopped giving him classes and later ignored when Lupin asked him to start them again even when he knew how poorly Harry’s progressed. And he was cruel: he knew Harry was sad about Sirius’ death, and gave him a detention in which he was going to see his and his father’s names multiple times while copying out old detention records. Yes, Harry’s deeds should have called for expulsion, as McGonagall states, but Snape chose something more painful than that. Not only he punished Harry (don’t get me wrong, he almost killed Draco, he deserved detention if not expulsion), but he chose to inflict him more pain and at the same time tried to ruin the memory of Harry’s father figures. Ordinarily, copying out old detention records wouldn’t be worse than writing lines, but Snape vindictively tailored that detention to inflict pain. In addition to this, he could have been an awesome teacher if he wasn’t a disgusting waste of a human being. He knew from his teen years that the instructions that the textbooks were giving were not as goos as they could be so he improved the potions and recorded his own methods at 16. Harry himself states what an amazing teacher “the Prince” is. If Snape were not such a horrible person, he could have either written the entire textbooks himself, or taught his students his own alternate methods. Instead he spent his time bullying children. He could have been great and become everything a Slytherin should have been

Snape also saw his friends perform Dark Magic on Mary Macdonald and when confronted by Lily, literally didn’t see any problem with it and compared it with the Marauders’ pranks.

He called Lily, his supposed best friend, a Mudblood. Then he tried to get away with it by saying he didn’t mean it and that she (and only she) was different from the other Muggleborns. And Lily tried, she tried to tell him he was not on the right path, she tried, and she got called a racial slur from the person she trusted the most at the time. And, for the extremist Snape apologetics in the back, who even hate Lily (how can they hate on Lily I don’t know, but apparently these people exist too): Lily Evans did not owe anyone anything. She had the right to cut ties with her friends for any reason she pleased, whatever that’s because she was sick of them or because they were hanging out with a group of terrorists wannabe. She did not owe anyone her love, loyalty or energy. She tried to be Snape’s friend despite his other group of friends (“but Mulciber’s and Avery’s idea of humor is just evil. Evil, Sev. I don’t understand how you can be friends with them”), but there’s canon evidence that Snape chose his Death Eaters friends over Lily’s friendship and safety. It was her choice to cut ties with him after what he and his friends had done (and the racial slur of course, truly a touch of class), and it’s not like he was a good friend to begin with: he called all other Muggleborns “Mudblood” and was canon friends with the people who wanted Lily and other Muggleborns killed, and he even still wanted to be a Death Eater while being her friend. Like, wait here while I go out and slaughter your people, Lils! And if Snape stans are still arguing that he was suffering because he got dumped, that’s another no: he did not get dumped, she just didn’t have romantic feelings for him but was trying so hard to be his friend and he was just a whiny baby about it. Is that a crime? No, it isn’t. Is not getting over it and taking it out on countless kids who weren’t even born instead a crime? Yes, it is.

Also, from the get-go we see him drop a tree branch on Petunia. That shows that he didn’t see a problem in hurting the people Lily loved (seen later in a larger proportion, that’s his tag line). Lily loved her sister, but Petunia was an obstacle between her and Snape, hence, Snape hurt her. And no, that was not accidental underage magic, just as Lily performs magic on the flower, Snape uses magic to cause a tree branch to fall on Petunia. Even as a child he had no qualms about hurting someone Lily loved, this really serves to underscore the idea that Snape, with his so called love for Lily, was not invested in her happiness or wellbeing because he didn’t care about the people she loved. As a child he didn’t care about hurting her sister and at 20 he didn’t care about the imminent deaths of her husband and son. If he truly loved and cared for her, he would have wanted to see her happy. Not even considering how crushed she would have been if her husband and only child were dead, and she was left alone and pregnant in the middle of a war.

Okay so now let’s talk about James. Yes, James was a spoiled brat, and Lily hated him for that, then guess what? He matured, he started protecting the weaker ones and joined the Order along with Sirius, Remus and Lily to fight for a better world. He didn’t hold it against her nor did he sulk for days, he grew up and matured because he was a well adjusted human, unlike some. James Potter was many things other than an “arrogant bullying toerag” (hey, also, well done for trying to destroy a 15-year-old orphan’s memory of his heroic father): he was a friend who risked his life every month for Remus’s safety and comfort. A brother who took Sirius in and was “the best friend he ever had.” An adored friend of half-giant Hagrid, in an age when all “half-breeds” were looked upon with suspicion during the war. An all time “favourite student” of Minerva McGonagall, so much that she waited all day at his son’s future home and wept at his death. A savior of his enemies even when they were trying to expose his friends’ secrets. An activist protecting the right of existence for Muggles, Muggleborns and hybrids right out of school. A soldier who faced Voldemort three times and lived to tell about it. A caring father who went into hiding to protect his son. A loving husband who sacrificed his life for his family. A faded trace of magic still trying to guide his son when the man that killed him returned to life. A young man that inspired so much loyalty in his friends that Remus Lupin, who so feared the idea of harming people because of his condition, was 100% willing to abandon those morals to avenge his death, and would have done so, had Harry not reminded him and Sirius that James would not have wanted them to murder anyone for him. A Patronus helping Harry through his darkest moments until the very end. James had a friend facing bigotry and he became an illegal animagus to help make that friend’s life better. Snape had a friend facing bigotry and he joined up with the bigots. No one is trying to pretend that James was an angel, but he got better and better until his last breath. And again, that spoiled brat and the love of his life joined the resistance and were martyrs. James, Lily, Sirius and Remus all died for Harry. Are you trying to blame James and Lily for sacrificing their own lives to save their infant son? What terrible parents they were! Their sacrifice was an act of love and wait… actually ended up saving the Wizarding World. The only thing James and Snape had in common was that they would have both sacrificed James’s life in order to save Lily’s. James was the hero, he was the one who faced Voldemort without his wand (pretty dumb thing but he was a Gryffindor, hence no surprise) in order to give his wife and son more time to flee. When he opened that door on Halloween, he thought he was sacrificing his life so that they could live. He literally died wandless perfectly knowing he wouldn’t survive, but facing death for those he loved, hoping he would be able to stall enough time so they could escape. He was never more dedicated in anything in his short life than he was to the loves of his life: he died for Lily and Harry, and would have happily died for Sirius, Remus and Peter. And this is absolutely canon, of course it is: we might not have some explicit description of him but all we know comes from the lives he touched, how they talked / not talked about him, the pain they felt - the seven books are a testament of James and Lily’s love. James Potter was the kind of person that would have been happy to die for love, he would have taken pride in that. How do we know that? Are we making this up? No, we are not: all we have are the words of people who knew him, from his best friends to McGonagall, and who remembered him as a hero. This, albeit indirectly, speaks volume about the kind of person he was. He might have been obnoxious and arrogant as a teenager, but at 21 he died a hero - wandless, alone, betrayed, hopeless, but also bravely and out of love - and nothing can change either of those. Yes, he bullied Snape (let’s be clear here even though I highly doubt Snape did not retaliate) and that is a disgusting attitude. But how can you forgive a 31 year old man for bullying his kids and not a 15 year old boy who bullied one of his definitely not innocent classmates? Who matured and who later died, at the young age of 21, for his wife and son? How can you hate James Potter when as soon as he graduated, he was ready to fight a war against the most powerful wizard of his age? Yes, he had a big head and I am fairly certain he did actually strut - and let’s just take a moment to remember why Harry doesn’t know anything about him… oh, right, Snape went to Voldemort and told him about the prophecy - but he was a caring person, who stood up to what he thought and stood up for his friends and his family. The spoilt boy Snape’s apologetics hate, who grew up to be a great man, who died fighting and protecting, not some emo with a crush and an ego the size of the Great Lake! Wait, I hear somebody trying to bring up the “we have no real evidence of him becoming a better person” thing. Let me get this straight: James was mentioned to have jinxed other students, not to have bullied them. He did not pick out targets, it was implied to be done at random as it is explicitly stated that he jinxed random people in the corridors. Fred and George pranked other students in the same way, and they would have often have more disastrous effects, but no one calls them bullies. We know that on one known occasion attacks Snape with Sirius at his side and almost pantsed him with a spell of Snape’s own invention. James and Snape had a rivalry, and it was two-sided. It wasn’t James relentlessly hexing poor, innocent Snape, so if you still want to call James Potter a bully, okay, do it, he was a bully bullying a bully. The evidence speaks for itself: he was Head Boy in 7th year (hence I don’t think Dumbledore despised him that much), he was unapologetically a blood traitor, he dated Lily Evans (who hated him for how he was and would have never fallen in love with such a brat, so it’s pretty evident he did actually change), he joined the Order of the Phoenix (an anti-terrorist organisation, at the peak of the war, as a teenager, whereas someone else joins a racist dark cult), he died protecting his wife and child! And if we really, really want to bring the ‘evidence’ thing up… well, we have no evidence he bullied Snape, except for one little incident - I’m fairly certain he did, but let’s play it literally now. And since we are there, we may not have been blessed with more about the Marauders, but Sirius and Remus both tell Harry Lily changed his mind about James because he became a better person, why don’t Snape stans consider that an evidence pro James but “Snape’s worst memory” is their pro Snape pamphlet? That chapter showed us an incident where both Sirius and James were assholes but everyone that was there supported it but Lily. All the other Students supported it because of what the fandom conveniently forgets that Snape loved Dark Arts, disparagingly called Lily a Muggle twice, tried to expose Remus and run around with a group of Death Eater wannabes tormenting Muggleborns all through his school years (he literally says that torturing Mary Macdonald was funny - “That was nothing, it was a laugh, that’s all”), to the point where Lily’s friends and herself questioned their friendship: “none of my friends can understand why I even talk to you. I’ve made excuses for you for years.” And eventually, when questioned by Lily if he wanted to join Voldemort, he couldn’t find any way to lie to her: “you and your precious little Death Eater friends— you see, you don’t even deny it! You don’t even deny that’s what you’re all aiming to be! You can’t wait to join You Know Who can you?”. He literally didn’t find anything wrong with Voldemort’s political position (only the fact that he wanted to kill his obsession, he only had that so called change of heart when it personally affected him as his beloved Dark Lord wanted to kill the object of his lust). So yes, he did join the Death Eaters because he wanted to and was everything he’d always desired. Does this make him a bad person? HELL YES.

And wait, can somebody remind me why the Potters were forced to hide? Wow, it must have been because Snivellus dearest spilled the tea to his master. So basically it went like this: “Hey Dark Lord! Our adorable group of racists kills Mudbloods for fun, but there’s this filthy Muggle born I fancy, can you please kill her husband and baby so that I can have her?” How the hell could he think Lily could have ever forgiven him? He was totally fine with Dumbledore saving Lily but not her husband and infant son (see how deeply he cared about Lily’s happiness?) and only cared for him being the rebound. James and Harry were totally expendable but hey, bravest man ever known!

So yes, he protected Harry (in his very own and questionable way, he did), but I’m sorry, that’s not enough. However, before someone says “in the end he cared about Harry” let me say a big, important fact: NAH HE DIDN’T. And not only he didn’t, but he also openly states that: in the Deathly Hallows chapter with the Pensieve, Snape describes Harry as selfish, self-important and arrogant - does it matter than all the other teachers like him and see none of those things? Of course not. And he’s not talking about sassy 4th-6th year Harry (who I really thank for that “there's no need to call me "sir" Professor” gem): Snape is tasing about an 11 year old who was picked on his whole life, who never had a family of his own and who lived in a cupboard under the stairs. He’s a child, an orphan (now tell me what’s that heroic about tormenting an orphan). However, Snape had decided that Harry must be bad news from the start, so he reasonably spends six years making his life as difficult as possible. That’s a great way to honour Lily’s memory, right? Do Snape stans remember what their hero answered when Dumbledore asked if he had grown to care for the boy, after all? He literally shouted “for him?” before casting a Patronus (a little over obsessive too). He felt he owed it to Lily to make sure Harry survives, and for Merlin’s sake, he did! He went to Voldemort and basically condemned the Potters. I’m not saying he is THE reason why they died, that honour goes to the lurid latrine rat, but he is one of them. Protecting Harry was the least he could do. Switching allegiances doesn’t cancel the awful actions before Lily’s death, as much as taking advantage of his position can’t be justified by his loyalty to Dumbledore. And most importantly, he cannot be redeemed by his stalkerish obsession for Lily (or by the creepy ‘look at me I want to die looking into your mother’s eyes,’ ew). All he did was made out of selfishness, even in his quest to redeem himself. Snape had a chance to honour Lily's memory, and disregarded it every single day. He claimed to regret his past, yet his cruelty to Harry was persistent and immature. Plus, loving someone doesn’t redeem terrible deeds. He aligned himself with a terrorist organisation who murdered for sport entirely of his own volition, endorsed the torture of Muggleborns, but of course, what a hero! I will never understand how people continue to use Snape’s obsession with Lily and ‘protecting’ Harry thing as an excuse for all the pain and terror that he inflicted upon small children. Does that mean you’ll excuse a father who continuously hit and emotionally abused his child and made their life a living hell if his excuse was “well I was still protecting them they had their dead mother’s eyes”? This is SICK.

And if you can still argue that “he had a terrible childhood,” that is inarguable, however, it just cannot justify him. Remus was bitten when he was 4, he had no friends until he was 11, lived in constant fear that he was going to be outed as a Werewolf, was forced to turn into a monster every month, lost everyone he loved and lived in poverty for 14 years and still managed to be a decent person. Luna watched her mother die, was picked on by almost everyone, was treated as a freak and only had one friend until she was 14 and still managed to be a decent person. Ginny was literally possessed by Voldemort himself for almost a year, guess what? Decent person too. Neville was constantly told how worthless he was, lived knowing his parents were tortured to insanity and was bullied and belittled by everyone. Decent person? Yes, right again. And do we want to talk about THE lonely kid who was abused his entire life? Sirius was raised and abused by blood supremacists, was disowned by his family, framed for murder (of his best friends, for Merlin’s sake!) and literally lost almost everyone he loved and still managed to be a decent person. He couldn't help the way he was? The environment around him conditioned him to be that way? If I remember correctly, Harry was raised by neglectful relatives, wore ill-fitting clothes, felt inadequate among his peers… Harry is proof that a terrible childhood doesn’t excuse despicable behaviour.

So, Snape hated Neville because he could have been the Chosen One instead of Harry (but it’s definitely on him for going to Voldemort and condemning the Potters), he hated Harry because he was James’s copy and he hated Hermione because she was a Mudblood and brilliant as Lily was. Makes sense, again, and again, it stresses how much of a beautiful person and teacher he was, don’t you think so? Also, had Voldemort picked Neville to kill instead of Harry, Snape would still be a Death Eater. It’s not like he thought being part of a group of supremacists and terrorists was wrong. It wasn’t until something directly affected him that he turned his back to his master - so brave, right? Snape may have done some good for the Wizarding World when he joined the Order, but while he was alive, he was horrible. He wasn't fighting the good fight because he couldn't possibly imagine a world where Voldemort was in charge (honestly, he couldn't have cared less), he was doing it to spare Lily’s life and get her for himself. James and Lily fought for the light because they believed in the light. Snape fought against the dark because the dark had offended him. Had Voldemort gone after the Longbottoms instead, Snape would have lived and died as the most loyal Death Eater in history.

Wait, I hear a “there’s no evidence that Snape voluntarily murdered anyone in his entire life” over there! He joined a group whose aim was genocide and was actually one of the few members which were part of the inner circle of Death Eaters, he didn’t get there by throwing kisses and rose petals around. It is explicitly said that not all Death Eaters actually bore the mark. Only selected wizards can be part of Voldemort’s circle, and not only Snape was part of that circle during the First Wizarding War, but it is also heavily implied that he passed messages from Voldemort more than once. Plus, he was also able to speak directly to Voldemort and even ask him to spare Lily’s life. Voldemort actually told Lily to move over three times before killing her, and he didn’t do that because he had such a kind heart and wanted to spare a Muggleborn’s life, he did that because Snape begged him. And maybe we haven’t read the same books, but it’s not like Voldemort strolled along Diagon Alley offering favours to random people. In addition to this, Snape did most certainly kill someone since Dumbledore compares Draco’s soul to his, meaning he has done remorseless acts of great evil before, hence his soul was already damaged, unlike Draco’s. So please, stop saying Snape was somehow influenced into joining the Death Eaters and never committed any crime: he fully believed in what they pledged and actually longed about being one of them for years (according to Lily). No one manipulated him into joining said group nor into perpetrating crimes. And no one manipulated him into being a horrible person even after he “switched sides.” He’s the one who willingly decides to be a terrorist, he’s the one who willingly decides to abuse children half his age, and he’s the one having the nerve to be awful to Harry when he’s the reason why Harry doesn’t have any parents.

And he was so childish and cruel! He threw a tantrum after discovered he was getting an Order of Merlin and wasn’t going to see Remus and Sirius in jail (even though he knew they were innocent).

There we go: HE KNEW SIRIUS WAS INNOCENT (don’t try to deny it, he was part of the inner circle of Death Eaters, he perfectly knew Sirius was not the one selling the Potters to Voldemort)! Did this matter for him? Of course not! And was Snape cruel and abusive to Harry because he blamed himself for Lily’s death and Harry was a constant reminder of his guilt? Yes, he was. But you know who else blamed himself for the Potters’ deaths and also was constantly reminded of them by Harry, and yet, did not abuse him because of his guilt? That’s right, Sirius. Sirius whose death was indirectly caused by Snape who kept making fun of him for being locked in Grimmauld Place. Sirius who had no problems breaking out of Azkaban, all he had to do was turn into a dog and leave. He could have left anytime he wanted to over those twelve years but he didn’t. You know why? Because he thought he deserved to be there. It was his fault his friends were dead. Everyone could blame him all they wanted with false accusations and it didn’t matter, since to him, changing Peter to the Secret Keeper, he was guilty for his friends’ death and deserved to be in Azkaban. He only broke out when he knew Harry was in danger after seeing that filthy rat on the newspaper. And when he broke into Hogwarts? Do people remember those lines: Hermione said “It’s very lucky he picked tonight, you know,” to which Ron responded “I reckon he’s lost track of time, being on the run. Didn’t realise it was Halloween.” Please, of course he realised it was Halloween, he perfectly knew that. He went after Peter on the anniversary of James and Lily’s death to revenge them and to save his godson. Sirius might have strut as much as James during his teens but again, he turned out to be a decent person.

And think about Harry, a 17-year-old grown up in an abused “family” (and still managed to be a decent person too): he has no memories of his parents, the only thing remained is a photograph. A photograph of a happy little family, showing James and Lily in love with the fruit of their love. Snape found it and ripped off and stole the half with Lily smiling so he could pretend her happiness and love were directed at him and not at her husband and son (yes, people, that disgusting moment actually existed, and it was so creepy Yates couldn’t put it in the movies). He stole Lily’s picture and Lily’s last words from Sirius, a friend she loved, the Potters’ best man, James’ brother. How nasty. What can I say, at least he waited until after Sirius’ death to go to Grimmauld Place and raid his bedroom?

Lovely Snivellus, such a cupcake, also laughed and mocked Tonks when her Patronus changed when she fell in love with Remus (let’s also remember that Tonks’s one was not the same as Remus’s, as stated by Rowling, before Snape stans can accuse me of applying double standards: Remus’s Patronus was a regular wolf, and okay Harry is oblivious at times, but he would have recognised a regular wolf) despite the fact that his own changed to match Lily’s - let’s just remember that THIS is obsessive behaviour, whilst James and Lily’s Patroni represent them being soulmates. Snape’s Patronus does not honour Lily, stop considering this the greatest romantic moment of all times, it does not show virtue nor morality, it’s just the representation of his creepy fascination with necrophilia. It’s disgusting, not noble. His so called love for Lily is creepy. She found happiness with another man, yet Snape was possessive, manipulative, and inarguably obsessive. And let’s remember that J.K. Rowling said that “he thought Lily would find him impressive if he became a real Death Eater”… was he really her best friend or was he just completely blinded by his attraction to the dark side? This is not a redemptive love, this is problematic, toxic, abusive, emotionally-stunted, obsessive.

This is because there was never a love triangle and that’s why there is simply NO Team Snape! Not winning at the genetic lottery doesn’t justify being such an awful person! Also, THIS is why the tag line should be changed from “always” to “Lily, take Harry and go! It's him! I'll hold him off!” or to “until the very end” because a father’s eternal love for his son is much more important than a racist’s obsession of a dead woman (dead because he contributed to her death, to be precise). His always and doe patrons can’t get him out of this one. Eventually, let’s remember J.K. Rowling’s dedication in Deathly Hallows: “[…] to you, if you have stuck with Harry until the very end.” Not “always” nor creepy moaning, just the pure words of a hero, of a loving father who died protecting the ones he loved most.

Now, I don’t get why we should celebrate Snivellus as the hero of Slytherin and an example of the “not all Slytherins are evil” when Regulus Black died in a cave, drowned by reanimated corpses to bring about the downfall of Voldemort, and Narcissa Black straight up lied to Voldemort because she’s first and foremost a mother, ruthless in doing whatever it took to save her beloved son. Regulus and Narcissa were brave: despite their flaws they knew what mattered the most and they were two big key factor in Harry’s survival and Voldemort’s demise. Sure, Snape was among the three that deceived the Dark Lord, but whilst Regulus did it because he realised what was right and what wasn’t, and Narcissa did it because of love, putting her family first (plus, she wasn’t even a Death Eater, and this tells a lot about her, as her loyalties solely lie with her family), Snape did it because resentfulness. Sure, Regulus joined the Dark Eaters of his own free will and Narcissa did what she did only after having her family threatened, but since one of Snape stans’ major point in his defence is his family being abused, let’s take their family into consideration too. The Blacks were pureblood supremacist, they grew up within that establishment and yes, some members of the family rejected those arguable ‘values’ but not everyone has the courage to do that (also, every Black family member is indisputably a badass, don’t get me started on that). On the contrary, Snape was a half-blood, and still, ended up hating muggleborns - yes, don’t try to say he didn’t, he joined the Death Eaters because he believed in Voldemort’s cause. He disparages mud bloods, he joins in on their massacre as a Death Eater after having idolised them for years in school before actually joining them. Read this again: he idolised a group of pureblood supremacist, he actively helps orchestrate genocide against the muggleborns. And what is his Freudian excuse? He believed that, in so far as Halfblood, he had to ‘prove’ that he was magical and capable enough (does this remind you of somebody else who hated muggles albeit being a half-blood and eradicates his whole Muggle family?), you can see that in how he strived to highlight his maternal Prince lineage in his stupid nickname. And no, now don’t try to blame the Marauders’ behaviour for this: Severus Snape, the man you glorify, hated muggleborns and went out of his way to commit genocide against them. So, in the end, if you still deny that, despite it being clear in the books, you are being dishonest. If, on the contrary, you fully realise it and still glamorise Snape despite how horrible of a person he was, well Snape stans, you have sunk to a new low. I’m not trying to justify anyone who supported said supremacist beliefs, but at least Regulus and Narcissa were born and bred within one of the Sacred 28, those beliefs were instilled in them from the very beginning, Snape reached them all on his own (well done for embracing your nazi self Snivellus). Regulus turned his back on Voldemort as soon as he realised how wrong he had been: at age 18, he literally sacrificed himself to try and stop his master. Narcissa, on the other hand, never sworn loyalty to Voldemort: she was a pureblood elitist, yes, she was guided by pride, but she was also calm, rational and restrained where her sister was crazed and her husband was reckless. So… Regulus faced death in the hope that when when the time had come, Voldemort would have met his match and would have been mortal once more, and Cissy only wanted best for her family and did everything she could to protect her son. She perfectly knew that Voldemort could have easily killed her in a second, but she wanted to find Draco, kept a straight face as the strong woman she was and fooled the Dark Lord. And why did Snape deceive Voldemort? Oh, right, he told him the prophecy that eventually led to the killing of the woman he was obsessed with (and no, again, he did not care at all about her husband and baby), this, of course after asking him to spare her life so that he could have had her (so this is, once again, classic Snivellus holding grudges). Regulus and Narcissa are pretty much the epitome of Slytherin, and still, let’s celebrate Snape! As a Slytherin myself, I am utterly disgusted by Snape’s behaviour. He could have been an amazing teacher, he had the talent to be one of the greatest Potions masters ever, and he willingly chose to throw it away in favour of being awful for the sake of bullying his own pupils. If we have to pick characters who proved that not all Slytherins are evil, let’s look at Regulus, let’s look at Narcissa, let’s look at Slughorn and Andromeda. Slughorn fought against Voldemort during the Battle of Hogwarts and refused to become a Death Eater, Andromeda married a Muggleborn. And guess what? None of them bullied children for 15 years.

Then, for the “I sometimes think we Sort too soon” thing… no, just no. Before you can start yelling at me, I am not, I repeat, I am absolutely not saying this because I endorse the whole Gryffindor being saints thing. I am a Slytherin, and a proud one. I just don’t agree that Snape was brave. Is being a resentful, childish and abusive man being brave? Wow, I’ll have to refresh my vocabulary! It is not brave to bully your pupils for years because you lost your loved one, it is not brave to refuse to accept a woman loves somebody else and moves on, it is not brave to keep a childhood grudge against that someone because they ‘stole’ the so called love of your life, it is not brave to try to destroy an orphan’s image of their heroic father. Snape was burned Lily had chosen James over him, so burned that, fuelled by jealousy and envy (and by his pretty questionable ideals too, because it’s too convenient to forget he is 100% a Death Eater and hence a supporter of Voldemort’s lovely view for the Wizarding World), he struck out and ended up getting Lily killed. I don’t consider playing the martyr by “teaching” (if we really want to call that teaching instead of child abuse) and being an occasional spy being brave. I call it feeling guilty, I call it ‘I deserve to suffer for hurting Lily but I still choose to bully her own son instead of honouring her,’ I call it ‘I keep on tormenting an orphan because I hated his father and he looks too much like him, plus, he has his mother’s eyes so I’m constantly remembered of 1) Lily choosing James over me and 2) Lily dying because of me telling my beloved Dark Lord the prophecy.’ Any protection Snape offered Harry, he did it because of his penance, not because protecting him (and hence stopping Voldemort) was the right choice. Wow, how brave of him. I don’t think Snape could have been a Gryffindor at all, and I hated how David Yates (again, very conveniently for his martyr business) placed the Gryffindor scarf hanging up in the background in Snape’s death scene as a nod to his supposed bravery. Like, really?! Even if you really want to call him brave, he’s still an awful person who shouldn’t have been allowed to teach because of how abusive he was, an awful person who was a member and supporter of a supremacist, racist and violent sect, an awful person who caused the death of innocent people - and I could go on and on. You can’t let a few good deeds outweigh all the bad! It’s not like some potion or Imperius Curse made him join the Death Eaters, spill the tea about the prophecy and terrorise those children. He willingly chooses to do that because he was an awful person until the very end. And still, Snape apologists be like “the conclusion of his arc is that abusing your position of power over children is forgivable if you stalked one of their parents when you were a teen.” Again, sick.

Snape’s portrayal in the movies is entirely fan-service throughout the whole series of films, but especially in DH part 2: they never showed Sirius arriving at the Potters the night Lily and James died, they never showed the moment his whole world collapsed when he saw the corpses of his best friends, the moment he blamed himself for what had happened. No, we got an entirely made-up (and creepy) scene of Snape getting there, holding Lily’s body and crying when that never happened! We also never got a scene with Sirius and Remus evidently struggling to hold it together while they tell Harry about James, how he changed and how Lily fell in love with him. Their pain would have shown how much James had an impact on their lives, for the better, but of course, we only got a partial rendition of Snape’s worst memory, with careful cuts of course, they couldn’t say he didn’t find anything wrong with the torture of Muggleborns, right?

You can like Snape, sure, he’s a flawed character with an interesting past, but he’s not a hero, stop portraying him as such instead of what he really was: an abusive, creepy, racist man. You are allowed to like villains (who doesn’t?) but stop praising him! You don’t have to justify his actions because you like him: he was awful, recognise it.

Do we (still) need to talk about double standards? Well, there we go: people hate Lavender Brown and Cho Chang. Fair enough, pretty annoying girls if you want to hear me, but why do they get hate? They get hate for how they handle their feelings: Lavender gets hate for how she handles her unrequited romantic feelings, and Cho gets hate for crying and grieving over the death of her boyfriend. Does this sound like a thread to you? With the sole difference that they get more hate than Snape and this is disturbing and honestly just sick. He is a terrorist, he literally moans the entire series and abuses and terrorises children because he couldn’t have Lily but hey, misunderstood hero!

Stop romanticising Snape: the only reason why people love him is Alan Rickman, and all of this hatred is just a pathetic way of trying to cover up that James grew up while Snape didn’t. How can people glorify and stand up for a man who canonically is a vindictive bully? To be honest, I’m genuinely concerned for people who over romanticise such a man. Correct me if I’m wrong: do you see anyone sticking up for the Dursley’s or Umbridge, when they do basically the same stuff to Harry as Snape? How is Necrophilus any different? I will never regard him as a hero for as long as I am alive, however, the movies conveniently cut those parts where Snivellus was the half princey of baddies, right? Also, I really wish Sirius could have found out about this lovely nickname Snape gave himself as a teenager, that alone would have cured his depression, post traumatic stress disorder and alcoholism, this is a real tragedy.

Severus Snape did not die for love. He died because Voldemort thought hew was the true Elder Wand owner. I repeat: he did not die for love. Period.

He raised a wand to McGonagall!

Avada

Kedavra

#jamespotter #marauders #lilypotter #severussnape #snivellus #hp #hogwarts #harry potter #jily

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thiswasthebadplaceallalong-blog · 6 years

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Harry Potter and the Horrible World We Live In

What a horrible world we live in. What a terrible, evil, awful place- the space we occupy.

How did we get here? How did centuries of living lead to a world just as barbaric as the old one? How are we so hateful? How are we so vile? How can we continue this way? How can it get better? How can it get solved? We have had evil and hate throughout modern history. Always resolved. Evil loses. Good wins.

We circle back to the present and we are back at square one. Another war. Another fight. Another evil. Evil will always rise up. Star Wars knows this. Harry Potter knows this. The Star Wars original trilogy ended with evil being defeated. The new Star Wars trilogy begins in a world where a new evil has risen to take its place.

The Harry Potter novels and movies were about an evil that was eventually defeated. How did Harry’s life go on without any disturbances from the world? Another evil to take Voldemort’s place. The play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child which many fans do not adopt as canon despite author JK Rowling saying that it is, does not really have an evil power replacing Voldemort. Instead it is an intimate story about Harry and his son who had the spotlight in the final book and movie’s epilogue scenes, Albus Severus (For a protagonist, he has quite the unfortunate name). Albus Severus lives in his father’s shadow. The story of Harry’s adventure to defeat Voldemort is probably something every single adult and child knows about - just like us Muggles do in the real world.

Everyone knows Harry’s story. How can you not? And children born today and in years to come will all know about Harry Potter, and one day it will be a distant classic that one just knows about but hasn’t necessarily experienced because of all the other popular media that has taken over since Harry Potter existed. In the same way, Albus Severus experiences his father’s story. He then goes on to literally experience events from his father’s story by using an extremely powerful Time Turner to go back to moments in Harry’s life and interfering, creating different and terrifying alternate timelines. Some are downright insane to even comprehend as coming from JK Rowling or even from her approval. Albus is actually on this journey with his father’s school bully’s son (what an unlikely and fan servicey pairing, bordering on a romantic slash fiction story you would only find on the internet). He is also on this journey with a girl who becomes their “Hermione.” Now we have a classic trio of Albus’ friends matching his father’s adventure companions and friends to this day, Ron and Hermione.

The twist comes when we learn that the girl, Delphi, is in fact Lord Voldemort’s daughter. The daughter he had with none other than Bellatrix Lestrange. This reveal is the deepest you can possibly go down the well of fan fiction. Voldemort’s daughter with Bellatrix Lestrange? What the actual fuck? How did JK Rowling think this was remotely okay? How cliché! How awfully thought out. So the entire time Deathly Hallows was unfolding, you’re telling me that Voldemort and Bellatrix were parents? That there was a baby at Malfoy Manor being looked after. If this is really true, we would have had a hint of it in the final book. Imagine if the trio had discovered a baby born of Voldemort and Bellatrix while at Malfoy Manor. What would they have done? Even if the plot played out the exact same way but they just knew there was a child, the world would know about the child after the battle ended.

The child would be living in complete public view of the world as the offspring of Voldemort. Just like Harry lived his life as the most famous wizard in the world for surviving Voldemort’s killing curse, Voldemort’s kid would probably make a very interesting 7 book series itself. How do you live in a world where you are the evillest being in the world’s child? I think that would be a better story to explore. Instead we get the child of Voldemort being the traitor who was trying to change the timeline to have their father live? I don’t even remember if that was the ultimate motivation and I’m too lazy to look it up. But I believe Delphi was just trying to recreate the legend of her father’s death to have him survive? That’s no First Order. Harry even gets to experience the night of his parents’ murder and has the choice to intervene and save them, thus altering every single damn thing in the Harry Potter universe. Nothing we would have seen before would have happened.

The night Voldemort killed Harry’s parents and Harry survived defined the wizarding world for the rest of time. A world where Harry and his parents survived and just went on would never have involved Harry stepping up to defeat Voldemort. Maybe this world would have Neville as the one taking Harry’s place which in itself would make such a great alternate universe story, which I bet has been done a million times already. But imagine this as written by JK Rowling?

This all leads me to believe that the entirety of the plot of Cursed Child takes place in Albus Severus’ imagination. He imagines what it would be like to go back in time and experience some of the most significant events in his father’s life and altering some of them to create such different possibilities. He imagines that this would be orchestrated by Voldemort’s child and it comes together all too neatly and everything goes back to normal. Albus just now has a new appreciation for his dad.

Albus and Harry realized their relationship is not working, Albus imagines an entire adventure to mirror and exist with his father’s real adventure. He comes to realize that his father really is an amazing hero, but at the end of the day is still his father and he loves him. What a beautiful story. It is much better if this is how you see the story play out instead of as a complete literal sequel. That way, I accept it as canon as an intimate study of the effects an epic story like Harry Potter’s has on the psychology of him and his children.

Back to my analogy of a new evil taking over. The Fantastic Beasts series takes place before the events of Harry Potter. In fact, it begins just before the actual birth of the Harry Potter villain and while all this is happening, an evil has risen to ultimate power in the current 20’s story. JK Rowling will take us up to 1945 when the current villain, Grindelwald was defeated. It’s interesting that out of all the possible plots JK Rowling could have chosen to write about as a follow up to Harry Potter, despite the millions of pleads for a Marauders series, she chooses to take the character that the movie studio wanted to make a film about and insert him into the ultimate good vs evil plot occurring during the time he was alive.

She manages to insert the most unlikely of heroes into the events of the backstory of Harry Potter that has to do with an evil power before Voldemort. I bet that if Warner Bros never wanted to make Fantastic Beasts into a movie (Originally as a documentary-style film about the creatures in the wizarding world, what a terrible unimaginative idea), JK Rowling would still have maybe one day written the story about the rise of Grindelwald, but it never would have included Newt Scamander and his companions. JK Rowling had to create a whole storyline for Newt and his companions as they get involved in the rise and defeat of Grindelwald. Now we are going to have relationship drama with Newt, Tina, Theseus, Leta Lestrange and even between Jacob and Queenie. All this soap opera-style stuff along the epic story of good vs evil. And this time everyone is an adult and not a child in school growing up throughout the films and books. That’s why Fantastic Beasts is really just for the die-hard fans who were kids and grew up with Harry Potter and are now adults.

Back to my first thoughts – the world is an evil place. It always will be. What will happen after we have defeated Donald Trump and his supporters? The Nazis, the racists, the white supremacists, the homophobes, all the evil ones. How will that fallout affect those that still are all those things? How will it affect those who are actually the good people in the world? If we don’t defeat them, the world will end. No doubt. Something will happen to bring on the apocalypse. Whatever it is. Society will break, and we will be done. We cannot continue on this path. We can’t keep letting all these atrocities keep happening. When will something be done? What is the damn tipping point? What is the fucking final straw? This? This week? With the bombs, the shootings, the EVIL. Will you finally wake up and do something? You. The person reading this. The random citizen of whatever country you are in the world. What will you do? Will you act? Will you do something about it? Vote? Protest? Argue? Fight? Make a difference? BE HEARD? When will this end? When we decide to finally fucking do something. When will we finally fucking do something? The armchair activism can only go so far. Something needs to be done.

If we lose, the world ends. If we win, we win for now until the next fight. But the next fight is not for us to worry about right now. What will we do to defeat the evil in the world? What will happen next? We are not far from finding out. So let’s do something.

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