Pressure and humiliation tends to bring your defences down, meaning you cannot controll yourself from saying things you normally wouldn't say. It doesn't MAKE you say things you don't think.
So? Consider the other swear word in HP-canon, the word 'bitch'. For a long time it was often used to specify a woman who didn't 'know her place' - whether by standing up for herself or rejecting a man who believed himself entitled to her attention or any other way. The word criticizes a woman for not being 'womanly enough'. But it became an all-around insult for a woman for whatever reason, whether said reason would also apply to a man or not. So people may intend it either as 'insufficiently submissive woman' or as 'evil person who is female' (even if they don't believe all women are inferior to men). In other 'net places I hang out at the more vocal posters are raising awareness for such behavior and are advocating the idea that gendered insults are uncool, regardless of the reason the word was chosen, because even if the speaker did not intend the word in a sexist way, its use promotes a culture of sexism. They tell people that if they want to insult someone call them an asshole because everyone has one. Or use random words as equal-opportunity insults (the most common one is 'cupcake' and believe me, it is pretty obvious when the word is being used to insult). Debate continues as to which other insults to add to the list of words to be discouraged. (Is 'douche' sexist? Homophobic?)
Back to Severus. He heard the word 'mudblood' a lot. I bet his mother referred to Lily as such. So when Lily behaved badly to him he called her the way others did when they disparaged her (and people like her) - and you can't know if it meant 'Muggle-borns shouldn't behave like that, but I would accept such behavior from someone who wasn't' or 'she is behaving unacceptably *and* Muggle-born, so I'll call her an insulting word for a Muggle-born'.
But up to that moment, Severus had been her friend and - as weird as it may seem - I think she might have owed him to respect his wish for her not to interfere on his behalf.
That moment was already too late. Lily should have done more, whether as a prefect or a friend before things got bad enough that he lashed out at her. No, I don't expect her to be a mind-reader, I'm saying her supposed 'defense' of Severus was not. She was standing there arguing with James instead of disarming him and undoing his hexes. If she was going to use Severus' humiliation to mentally bat her eyelashes at James then yes, he had no need for her 'help'.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2012-08-16 03:51 pm (UTC)So? Consider the other swear word in HP-canon, the word 'bitch'. For a long time it was often used to specify a woman who didn't 'know her place' - whether by standing up for herself or rejecting a man who believed himself entitled to her attention or any other way. The word criticizes a woman for not being 'womanly enough'. But it became an all-around insult for a woman for whatever reason, whether said reason would also apply to a man or not. So people may intend it either as 'insufficiently submissive woman' or as 'evil person who is female' (even if they don't believe all women are inferior to men). In other 'net places I hang out at the more vocal posters are raising awareness for such behavior and are advocating the idea that gendered insults are uncool, regardless of the reason the word was chosen, because even if the speaker did not intend the word in a sexist way, its use promotes a culture of sexism. They tell people that if they want to insult someone call them an asshole because everyone has one. Or use random words as equal-opportunity insults (the most common one is 'cupcake' and believe me, it is pretty obvious when the word is being used to insult). Debate continues as to which other insults to add to the list of words to be discouraged. (Is 'douche' sexist? Homophobic?)
Back to Severus. He heard the word 'mudblood' a lot. I bet his mother referred to Lily as such. So when Lily behaved badly to him he called her the way others did when they disparaged her (and people like her) - and you can't know if it meant 'Muggle-borns shouldn't behave like that, but I would accept such behavior from someone who wasn't' or 'she is behaving unacceptably *and* Muggle-born, so I'll call her an insulting word for a Muggle-born'.
But up to that moment, Severus had been her friend and - as weird as it may seem - I think she might have owed him to respect his wish for her not to interfere on his behalf.
That moment was already too late. Lily should have done more, whether as a prefect or a friend before things got bad enough that he lashed out at her. No, I don't expect her to be a mind-reader, I'm saying her supposed 'defense' of Severus was not. She was standing there arguing with James instead of disarming him and undoing his hexes. If she was going to use Severus' humiliation to mentally bat her eyelashes at James then yes, he had no need for her 'help'.