A Textbook Case of Bullying

But Worse

Introduction

A lot of people, mostly Snape-haters and especially Marauder fans, want to pretend that what happened to Snape wasn’t serious. That it wasn’t bullying but a mere rivalry between him and the four of the Marauders. I understand: isn’t it Rowling who calls James Potter, Snape’s “arch-rival”?

Snape, whose obsession it had become to expose his arch-rival, James Potter, in wrongdoing.

https://www.harrypotter.com/fr/writing-by-jk-rowling/the-marauders-map

But she also says:

[Lupin] did not approve of their relentless bullying of Severus Snape, but he loved James and Sirius so much, and was so grateful for their acceptance, that he did not always stand up to them as much as he knew he should.

https://www.harrypotter.com/fr/writing-by-jk-rowling/remus-lupin

Clearly there’s a problem. Rivalry is not the same as bullying:

• A rivalry is the state of two people or groups engaging in a lasting competitive relationship. […] In order for the rivalry to persist, rather than resulting in perpetual dominance by one side, it must be « a competitive relationship among equals ». (Wikipedia)
• Bullying is the use of force, coercion, hurtful teasing, comments, or threats, in order to abuse, aggressively dominate, or intimidate one or more others. The behavior is often repeated and habitual. One essential prerequisite is the perception (by the bully or by others) that an imbalance of physical or social power exists or is currently present. (Wikipedia)

Otherwise said:

Bullying is a form of youth violence and an adverse childhood experience (ACE). CDC defines bullying as any unwanted aggressive behavior(s) by another youth or group of youths, who are not siblings or current dating partners, that involves an observed or perceived power imbalance, and is repeated multiple times or is highly likely to be repeated. Bullying may inflict harm or distress on the targeted youth including physical, psychological, social, or educational harm. Common types of bullying include:

• Physical such as hitting, kicking, and tripping
• Verbal including name-calling and teasing
• Relational/social such as spreading rumors and leaving out of the group
• Damage to property of the victim

https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/youthviolence/bullyingresearch/fastfact.html

Bullying also concerns bystanders. As said in Mean Girls:

“There are two kinds of evil people in this world. Those who do evil things and those who see evil things and don’t try to stop it.”

Looking at you, Prefect Lupin.

Rivalry implies a balance of powers, unlike bullying, and Snape confirms there wasn’t such balance:

“Coward, did you call me, Potter?” shouted Snape. “Your father would never attack me unless it was four on one, what would you call him, I wonder?” 

Given what we witness in Snape’s Worst Memory (SWM), where Snape was – to my regret, and unlike the fan video Severus Snape and the Marauders suggested – completely dominated and emasculated by James and Sirius, it’s impossible to say that Snape was, at the time at least, so strong that for balance of powers to exist, four people needed to gang up on him. 

Rivalry also implies there’s something to compete over, but those are not the reasons given by Sirius and Lupin:

“Yeah,” said Harry, “but he just attacked Snape for no good reason, just because — well, just because you said you were bored,” he finished with a slightly apologetic note in his voice.

“I’m not proud of it,” said Sirius quickly.

(As if.)

If there was something to compete over, it would be implied to be Lily, which is disgusting, but is also supported by Rowling who said that James bullied Snape out of sexual jealousy:

James always suspected Snape harboured deeper feelings for Lily, which was a factor in James’ behaviour to Snape.

If you want to explore the subject further, I can recommend you: Love, not desire! and James’ Desire.

In any case, despite the obvious, some people still refute that Severus was bullied by the Marauders in the first place. I understand: it was horrible, and the fact fans freaked out over how SWM will look in the HBO series is telling.

So this essay will explicitate each element that proves that bullying is the correct term to use as to what happened. That this was no Harry vs Draco dynamic. Reddit user pet_genius has already written an extensive analysis and has given me permission to use their essay. I will immortalize it on the Snape-defending Sneep Project website and add some notes on the right.

We present you: 

https://www.reddit.com/r/harrypotter/comments/eq77qs/the_marauders_vs_snape_was_bullying_not_a_rivalry/

The Marauders vs. Snape Was Bullying, Not a Rivalry

We have three Marauders-Snape interactions from their school days, and I argue that they, by themselves, with no need for more context, prove that at least until the end of their 5th year, the Marauders bullied Snape, and it was undeserved, one-sided, and extreme.

The Express Scene

This is the 1st interaction between Snape, James, and Sirius:

Snape enters a compartment containing Lily and a group of rowdy boys, including James and Sirius. This passage is followed by Snape and Lily’s brief argument, and then:

“But we’re going!” he said, unable to suppress the exhilaration in his voice. “This is it! We’re off to Hogwarts!”

She nodded, mopping her eyes, but in spite of herself, she half smiled. 

“You’d better be in Slytherin,” said Snape, encouraged that she had brightened a little.

“Slytherin?” One of the boys sharing the compartment, who had shown no interest at all in Lily or Snape until that point, looked around at the word, and Harry, whose attention had been focused entirely on the two beside the window, saw his father: slight, black-haired like Snape, but with that indefinable air of having been well-cared-for, even adored, that Snape so conspicuously lacked.

“Who wants to be in Slytherin? I think I’d leave, wouldn’t you?” James asked the boy lounging on the seats opposite him, and with a jolt, Harry realized that it was Sirius. Sirius did not smile.

“My whole family have been in Slytherin,” he said. 

“Blimey,” said James, “and I thought you seemed all right!” 

Sirius grinned.

Snape’s exhilaration lasts five minutes before James hears something he doesn’t like. The text hints at what kind of person 11 years old James is another way – he sounds like Draco:

“Imagine being in Hufflepuff, I think I’d leave, wouldn’t you?”

Back to James and Snape:

James picks a fight with Snape without provocation – Snape is talking to Lily.

[…] Where are you heading, if you’ve got the choice?” 

James lifted an invisible sword.

“‘Gryffindor, where dwell the brave at heart!’ Like my dad.” 

Snape made a small, disparaging noise. James turned on him. 

“Got a problem with that?”

“No,” said Snape, though his slight sneer said otherwise. “If you’d rather be brawny than brainy —”

“Brawny” is not even an insult, and a “slight sneer” is called for, given that James said he’d rather leave than be in Slytherin. Snape also doesn’t insult James – he rolls his eyes at the fact that James values physical courage over intelligence. James is the one who confronts Snape directly.

“Where’re you hoping to go, seeing as you’re neither?” interjected Sirius. 

James roared with laughter. Lily sat up, rather flushed, and looked from James to Sirius in dislike.

“Come on, Severus, let’s find another compartment.”

“Oooooo…” 

James and Sirius imitated her lofty voice; James tried to trip Snape as he passed.

“See ya, Snivellus!” a voice called, as the compartment door slammed.

James picks a fight and throws the first indirect insult. Sirius throws the first direct insult, calling Snape stupid and weak. James approves. Lily wants to get away, gets mocked, and James tries to trip Snape, meaning he is escalating to physical violence, as Snape and Lily were leaving, no less! Brawny indeed! Someone also throws the first rude nickname, Snivellus (incidentally, Snape never refers to James or Sirius by anything other than their actual name).

This is the first Snape+Lily and proto-Marauders interaction. Snape is uninteresting until he gives James a reason to hate him, and then James and Sirius seem to bond over their hatred of everything Slytherin, including Snape, and Lily, who is Slytherin-bound at this point. Sirius tries to make peace with Lily once she is Sorted, but she’s still hurt.

She took one look at him, seemed to recognize him from the train, folded her arms, and firmly turned her back on him.

The Prank

The « prank » takes place sometime in their fifth year. This is Lupin’s account of it:

”Snape had seen me crossing the grounds with Madam Pomfrey one evening as she led me toward the Whomping Willow to transform. Sirius thought it would be — er — amusing, to tell Snape all he had to do was prod the knot on the tree trunk with a long stick, and he’d be able to get in after me. Well, of course, Snape tried it — if he’d got as far as this house, he’d have met a fully grown werewolf — but your father, who’d heard what Sirius had done, went after Snape and pulled him back, at great risk to his life… Snape glimpsed me, though, at the end of the tunnel. He was forbidden by Dumbledore to tell anybody, but from that time on he knew what I was.”

Sirius doesn’t correct Lupin, and neither does Snape, so we can take it at face value.

Why did Sirius do it? In his words:

”It served him right,” he sneered. “Sneaking around, trying to find out what we were up to… hoping he could get us expelled.”

In Sirius’s mind, at 16 (and at 33), sneaking around is punishable by death.

Maybe Sirius didn’t intend Snape to use the information? But then, why give it? Did he want to frighten Snape so he’ll leave them alone? Why would he do that in a way that hurts Lupin? The only explanation is that Sirius either wanted Snape dead, or did not think of the consequences (or of Lupin), only of his own amusement. Fortunately, James did. Since James’s life was endangered (despite James possibly already being an Animagus), Snape’s was, too.

Dumbledore agrees that this was attempted murder:

“Sirius Black showed he was capable of murder at the age of sixteen,” he breathed. “You haven’t forgotten that, Headmaster? You haven’t forgotten that he once tried to kill me?”

“My memory is as good as it ever was, Severus,” said Dumbledore quietly.

We know Dumbledore knows how to shut Snape down, and even dismiss his concerns. That he doesn’t do so here suggests that Snape’s feelings are more than justified.

Snape did not know what Lupin was. The only sign that he knew is Lily’s “I know your theory”. Here it is in context:

“It was Dark Magic, and if you think that’s funny —”

“What about the stuff Potter and his mates get up to?” demanded Snape. His color rose again as he said it, unable, it seemed, to hold in his resentment.

“What’s Potter got to do with anything?” said Lily.

“They sneak out at night. There’s something weird about that Lupin. Where does he keep going?”

“He’s ill,” said Lily. “They say he’s ill —”

“Every month at the full moon?” said Snape.

“I know your theory,” said Lily, and she sounded cold.

[…]

I heard what happened the other night. You went sneaking down that tunnel by the Whomping Willow, and James Potter saved you from whatever’s down there.”

This conversation is a little after the prank, because Lily refers to James saving Snape from something that’s down the tunnel by the Whomping Willow the other night.

Snape is provoked because Lily is lecturing him about Dark Magic, and Lupin is a textbook Dark creature who had been used to nearly kill him. He impulsively asks about Potter and his mates. Now knowing what Lupin is, he is trying to steer Lily to that conclusion.

The “theory” Lily knows can be literally anything. Assuming that the theory is “werewolf”, Lily’s response makes no sense – she is the one who says “he’s ill” as if refuting it. Most tellingly, “the other night” was a full moon night, and Lily does not wonder why Snape went down to the Whomping Willow if he had expected a werewolf.

Also, werewolves are 3rd year material – if he had been needlessly obsessing with the Marauders and keeping track of them at all times, he would have realized this in their third year, like Hermione, and he would have known how to deal with a werewolf before going into the tunnel. What happened was that he was completely unprepared for this and he froze (as one does when trapped in a confined space with a predator), and was pulled out by James.

If Snape knew, then why, rather then tell everyone and ruin the Marauders’ life, did he endanger himself? Why did Lupin say “but from that time on he knew what I was”? Why did Sirius say he was “trying to find out what we were up to?” Most importantly, who cares? Being stupid or curious is not a crime.

The “prank” was attempted murder and Sirius was an attempted murderer.

Meanwhile, the accusations leveled against teenage Snape are that he was “an oddball who was up to his eyeballs in the Dark Arts”, jealous of James, hung around with Slytherins who then became Death Eaters; found what Mulciber did to Mary funny, and that, per Lupin, “Sectumsempra was always a specialty of Snape’s”. Even Lily only accuses him of hanging around with (not of being one of the) people she finds creepy, who do “Dark Magic”, and of calling people Mudbloods. This, when lecturing Snape about his wrongdoings and ending the friendship, meaning these were her strongest complaints.

About Mary McDonald:

“We are, Sev, but I don’t like some of the people you’re hanging round with! I’m sorry, but I detest Avery and Mulciber! Mulciber! What do you see in him, Sev, he’s creepy! D’you know what he tried to do to Mary Macdonald the other day?”

Lily had reached a pillar and leaned against it, looking up into the thin, sallow face.

“That was nothing,” said Snape. “It was a laugh, that’s all —”

“It was Dark Magic, and if you think that’s funny —”

Some fans have claimed that Mary has been sexually assaulted or even raped, but we have no proof of it. Besides, why then is Lily’s preoccupation the fact that they used Dark Magic? If (attempted) sexual assault or rape were the crimes, then Lily is saying that it’s okay as long as it doesn’t involve what she calls “Dark Magic”. She repeats it: the crime was the use of Dark Magic on a student itself.

This is her defending the Marauders:

“I’m just trying to show you they’re not as wonderful as everyone seems to think they are.”

The intensity of his gaze made her blush.

“They don’t use Dark Magic, though.”

To be honest, considering she’ll later date James even though he’ll have sexually assaulted him at the time implies she’s okay with crime being committed as long as “Dark Magic” wasn’t used. It makes her dangerously naive and out-of-touch, or a plain abuse/crime-apologist. “Dark Magic” isn’t equated with evilness, and if it is, then the Marauders are guilty of it and she was okay with that enough to defend them in front of Severus. 

To get back to the point: it’s also unknown whether Snape truly thought that what happened to Mary McDonald was funny; he could be repeating what he heard. And even if he did find it genuinely funny… it doesn’t justify, in any way, what the Marauders did to him.

Sectumsempra was probably developed after the attempted murder – it is a clear escalation from the other spells Snape developed, which were more defensive, and I have good reason to believe it made its debut in Snape’s worst memory.

Conclusion: Sirius tried to kill Snape because Snape had inconvenienced him and his friends.

How did the school handle this?

Dumbledore forbade Snape from telling anyone about it. Sirius wasn’t expelled.

We also have this conversation […]:

“And you’re being really ungrateful. I heard what happened the other night. You went sneaking down that tunnel by the Whomping Willow, and James Potter saved you from whatever’s down there —”

Snape’s whole face contorted and he spluttered, “Saved? Saved? You think he was playing the hero? He was saving his neck and his friends’ too! You’re not going to — I won’t let you —”

This might be the first time Snape realizes that James hadn’t been silenced. James goes around bragging about saving Snape, making himself look like a hero who saved that idiot Snape – and Lily believes James over her supposed best friend.

James effectively uses rumors to bully Snape.

Since the thing adult Snape accuses James of the most is arrogance, I think this is the worst thing James did, in Snape’s view – ruining his credibility and reputation with his bragging. James took credit for saving Snape’s life, but astonishingly, this was not a wake-up call. The Marauders did not see the error of their ways, at all.

Even after graduation, Snape held on to Lupin’s secret for 20 years, until the end of POA. This hints at some sort of magical silencing, but whether or not you buy it, the way Dumbledore handled the attempted murder is appalling, and nowadays, the similarity to the systemic hushing-up and victim-blaming and discrediting that often follows rape should be obvious, even if the analogy was unintentional. James, conversely, looks the hero.

This level of bullying and enabling is extreme, and should be understood as such.

Tumblr user Deathdaydungeon has a short essay on the debut of Sectumsempra and its relation to the Shrieking Shack Incident:

Once we have the timeline straight between the werewolf incident and Snape’s Worst Memory, there’s one thing that jumps off the page:  the creation of Sectumsempra.

And boy, is it a nasty spell.  

Unlike the other creations littered through the Prince’s Potions book, this one is clearly labelled:  For enemies.  

Sectumsempra is akin to an invisible sword.  Wielded correctly, it’s a hex that can slice, dice and ultimately, kill.  Lupin commented years later that it was Snape’s specialty, so he clearly practiced and honed his skill.  

Sectumsempra is a huge departure from the other created spells found in the Prince’s Potions book, which are either useful (Langlock; Muffliato) or arguably jocular in intent (toe-nail growing hex; Levicorpus).  In contrast, there’s no jokey element to Sectumsempra; the intent is to cause great harm.

Langlock is the first spell that really intrigues me; it has a very deliberate outcome – and why would you want to stop someone from talking?  Well, in your early years at Hogwarts, it’s how you prevent someone from spell casting, because younger students aren’t skilled in non-verbal casting.  

So I think that points to Snape trying to defend himself when being attacked four-on-one; but it’s curious that none of his early spells are particularly nasty or vicious, and that Sectumsempra is such an elevation in horror.  

So what changes?

Enter:  the werewolf incident.  

I think this broke Snape.  

I think he’d handled the four-on-one bullying for as long as he could, and Sirius had unwittingly changed the rules of the game.  It wasn’t “just” bullying; it wasn’t just harassing and irritating and picking on him.  It wasn’t just calling him names, and flicking some hexes down the corridor.

This time, they tried to kill him.

And when we look at the timeline, we can see that they didn’t have the decency to leave him alone after that…which implies that they can’t have been severely punished for their actions, because they show little remorse.

That in turn suggests that Snape probably felt isolated.  We already know that Lily had sided with James Potter’s version of events, and if the Marauders weren’t punished harshly by the teachers, then he probably felt as if they wouldn’t defend him in the future.  

So Snape created Sectumsempra.  It’s the magical equivalent of a bullied kid taking a penknife to school to defend himself.  He created a knife, and having learnt his lesson from Levicorpus, he unleashed it nonverbally, ensuring that nobody would be able to use it against him in retaliation.

Snape’s Worst Memory

Here’s adult Lupin trying to comfort Harry about not being made a prefect:

“I think Dumbledore might have hoped that I would be able to exercise some control over my best friends,” said Lupin. “I need scarcely say that I failed dismally.”

This is foreshadowing, even if Lupin makes it sound cute.

The pretext for Harry viewing SWM is that Snape rushes out of class to help Montague, who finally resurfaced after being shoved in the Vanishing Cabinet by the twins.

Here’s what Harry sees:

Snape-the-teenager had a stringy, pallid look about him, like a plant kept in the dark.

This is the boy who was barely able to contain his exhilaration at going to Hogwarts. This place has really done a number on him.

James yawned hugely and rumpled up his hair, making it even messier than it had been. Then, with a glance toward Professor Flitwick, he turned in his seat and grinned at a boy sitting four seats behind him.

James doesn’t look like he’s been having a hard time. Whatever Snape did to them didn’t make them change their demeanor. Here’s Sirius:

Harry saw Sirius give James the thumbs-up. Sirius was lounging in his chair at his ease, tilting it back on two legs. He was very good-looking […] and a girl sitting behind him was eyeing him hopefully, though he didn’t seem to have noticed. […] Harry looked down at his father, who had hastily crossed out the L. E. he had been embellishing, jumped to his feet, stuffed his quill and the exam question paper into his bag, which he slung over his back, and stood waiting for Sirius to join him.

Harry looked around and glimpsed Snape a short way away, moving between the tables toward the doors into the entrance hall, still absorbed in his own examination paper. Round-shouldered yet angular, he walked in a twitchy manner that recalled a spider, his oily hair swinging about his face.

A gang of chattering girls separated Snape from James and Sirius […]

Snape and Lily have been drifting apart: James and Sirius wait for each other after their exam, Snape and Lily don’t. The gang includes Lily. Later, we also learn why Sirius doesn’t notice the girl. Snape walks with a hunch, he’s twitchy, he’s looking from side to side (his hair is swinging). His body language is screaming: he is scared.

[…]

Snape remained close by, still buried in his examination questions; but this was Snape’s memory, and Harry was sure that if Snape chose to wander off in a different direction once outside in the grounds, he, Harry, would not be able to follow James any farther. To his intense relief, however, when James and his three friends strode off down the lawn toward the lake, Snape followed, still poring over the paper and apparently with no fixed idea of where he was going.

How hard must it have been for Snape to answer questions about werewolves while in the same room as Sirius and Lupin? I think he had to dissociate heavily to get through the exam, and this is why he is wandering aimlessly and appears unaware of his surroundings. He’s definitely not trying to bother the Marauders. Moving on.

He started playing with the Snitch, allowing it to fly as much as a foot away and seizing it again; his reflexes were excellent. Wormtail watched him in awe. They stopped in the shade of the very same beech tree on the edge of the lake […].

[…] Snape had settled himself on the grass in the dense shadows of a clump of bushes. He was as deeply immersed in the O.W.L. paper as ever, which left Harry free to sit down on the grass between the beech and the bushes and watch the foursome under the tree.

The sunlight was dazzling on the smooth surface of the lake, on the bank of which the group of laughing girls who had just left the Great Hall were sitting with shoes and socks off, cooling their feet in the water.

[…] James was still playing with the Snitch, letting it zoom farther and farther away, almost escaping but always grabbed at the last second. Wormtail was watching him with his mouth open. Every time James made a particularly difficult catch, Wormtail gasped and applauded. After five minutes of this, Harry wondered why James didn’t tell Wormtail to get a grip on himself, but James seemed to be enjoying the attention. Harry noticed his father had a habit of rumpling up his hair as though to make sure it did not get too tidy, and also that he kept looking over at the girls by the water’s edge.

“Put that away, will you?” said Sirius finally, as James made a fine catch and Wormtail let out a cheer. “Before Wormtail wets himself from excitement.”

Wormtail turned slightly pink but James grinned.

“If it bothers you,” he said, stuffing the Snitch back in his pocket. Harry had the distinct impression that Sirius was the only one for whom James would have stopped showing off.

This establishes that: 1. Snape is minding his own business. 2. James is so attention-seeking, it’s making Harry uncomfortable. 3. Lily is nearby and James wants her to notice him. 4. Sirius is the only one who can put James in his place. 5. James’s reflexes are excellent.

The horror show begins:

“I’m bored,” said Sirius. “Wish it was full moon.”

[…]

“This’ll liven you up, Padfoot,” said James quietly. “Look who it is…”

Sirius’s head turned. He had become very still, like a dog that has scented a rabbit. “Excellent,” he said softly. “Snivellus.”

Sirius and James’s motivation is boredom. There is no sign that they are scared of Snape, on the contrary, this is fun for them. Sirius and Snape are literally compared to a dog and a rabbit – predator and prey.

Later, in HBP, we read:

He felt stunned; it was as though a beloved pet had turned suddenly savage; what had the Prince been thinking to copy such a spell [Sectumsempra] into his book?

Snape was a prey that lashed out, for which he was punished, in-universe and in the narrative.

Harry turned to see what Sirius was looking at. Snape was on his feet again, and was stowing the O.W.L. paper in his bag. As he emerged from the shadows of the bushes and set off across the grass, Sirius and James stood up. Lupin and Wormtail remained sitting: Lupin was still staring down at his book, though his eyes were not moving and a faint frown line had appeared between his eyebrows. Wormtail was looking from Sirius and James to Snape with a look of avid anticipation on his face.

“All right, Snivellus?” said James loudly.

Snape reacted so fast it was as though he had been expecting an attack: Dropping his bag, he plunged his hand inside his robes, and his wand was halfway into the air when James shouted, “Expelliarmus!”

Snape’s wand flew twelve feet into the air and fell with a little thud in the grass behind him.

This behavior is nothing unusual: otherwise, what is Lupin worried about? What is Peter avidly anticipating? Why does Snape react as though he had been expecting this? Why does it appear like they never retired the nickname from the Express scene?

Snape had now been disarmed. Everything that follows is an attack against someone helpless.

Sirius let out a bark of laughter.

“Impedimenta!” he said, pointing his wand at Snape, who was knocked off his feet, halfway through a dive toward his own fallen wand.

Students all around had turned to watch. Some of them had gotten to their feet and were edging nearer to watch. Some looked apprehensive, others entertained.

Snape lay panting on the ground. James and Sirius advanced on him, wands up, James glancing over his shoulder at the girls at the water’s edge as he went.

James publicly attacks Snape in two out of two scenes he appears in. If the text wanted to establish a rivalry, it failed.

James and Sirius are advancing on a guy who is laying panting on the ground without his wand. James is trying to get Lily’s attention with this behavior.

Wormtail was on his feet now, watching hungrily, edging around Lupin to get a clearer view.

“How’d the exam go, Snivelly?” said James.

“I was watching him, his nose was touching the parchment,” said Sirius viciously. “There’ll be great grease marks all over it, they won’t be able to read a word.”

That’s why Sirius didn’t notice the girl. He was preoccupied with Snape, he hates him this much. He never grew out of it.

From POA:

“Snape?” said Black harshly, taking his eyes off Scabbers for the first time in minutes and looking up at Lupin. “What’s Snape got to do with it?”

Sirius, 33, hates Snape so much, it makes him take his eyes off Pettigrew, who betrayed the Potters, killed 12 people, and framed him. Why? How could this possibly be rational?

It’s worth noting, in this context, that the Marauders’ Map insults Snape’s looks too. It appears that they were very preoccupied with it, much more than with his interest in the Dark Arts.

Moving on:

Several people watching laughed; Snape was clearly unpopular. Wormtail sniggered shrilly. Snape was trying to get up, but the jinx was still operating on him; he was struggling, as though bound by invisible ropes.

“You — wait,” he panted, staring up at James with an expression of purest loathing. “You — wait…”

“Wait for what?” said Sirius coolly. “What’re you going to do, Snivelly, wipe your nose on us?”

When Snape is openly threatening James, Sirius does not believe him capable of worse than wiping his nose on them.

Here’s Sirius to an opponent he respects (20 years later, but still):

“Come on, you [Bellatrix] can do better than that!”

Indeed, she can. Moving on:

Snape let out a stream of mixed swearwords and hexes, but his wand being ten feet away, nothing happened.

“Wash out your mouth,” said James coldly. “Scourgify!”

Pink soap bubbles streamed from Snape’s mouth at once; the froth was covering his lips, making him gag, choking him —

“Leave him ALONE!”

James and Sirius looked around. James’s free hand jumped to his hair again.

It was one of the girls from the lake edge. She had thick, dark red hair that fell to her shoulders and startlingly green almond-shaped eyes — Harry’s eyes. Harry’s mother.

Note the use of adverbs such as “coolly” and “coldly”. James and Sirius are attacking Severus calmly, methodically, and with a total disregard for the feelings of their victim. That’s psychopathic behavior.

James is telling Snape: You’re nothing. You’re so low, you’ll be punished (by choking) for attempting to defend yourself. Snape is supposed to be the one who is all about the scary Dark Arts, but it seems that Scourgify can certainly do enough damage when applied to a human mouth, no? Anyway, James accomplished his goal – Lily is finally paying attention to him.

Scourgifying someone to the point they choke has been compared to waterboarding, a form of torture. 

“All right, Evans?” said James, and the tone of his voice was suddenly pleasant, deeper, more mature.

“Leave him alone,” Lily repeated. She was looking at James with every sign of great dislike. “What’s he done to you?”

“Well,” said James, appearing to deliberate the point, “it’s more the fact that he exists, if you know what I mean…”

Many of the surrounding watchers laughed, Sirius and Wormtail included, but Lupin, still apparently intent on his book, didn’t, and neither did Lily.

“You think you’re funny,” she said coldly. “But you’re just an arrogant, bullying toerag, Potter. Leave him alone.”

If Snape deserves this, why does Lily ask James why he is attacking him? Why does James make a point of explaining how low Snape is, instead of producing a reason Lily would approve of? Why is Lupin staying out of it and not defending his friends? Why is Lily calling James a bully? My guess about the “he exists” line is that James is teasing Snape because Snape owes him his life. Imagine being teased about being nearly killed.

This line can also be interpreted as suicide-baiting: James will keep bullying Severus until he dies; suicide being one of the only escapes.

It’s also worth noting that Snape thinks the four of the Marauders tried to kill him:

your saintly father and his friends played a highly amusing joke on me that would have resulted in my death if your father hadn’t got cold feet at the last moment. There was nothing brave about what he did. He was saving his own skin as much as mine. Had their joke succeeded, he would have been expelled from Hogwarts.”

So James’ line could be interpreted as a threat that they’ll try again to kill Severus, directly, or indirectly (pushing for suicide). 

What James said is monstrous. His friends’ and the crowd’s reaction, even more. And James expected Lily to laugh at this “joke”?

This is two Gryffindor Prefects on the scene now, who are obligated not only to protest what is going on, but to stop it and report it. Lupin is failing miserably, and Lily is failing only slightly less miserably (or maybe more, because she and Snape are ostensibly friends, still.)

“I will if you go out with me, Evans,” said James quickly. “Go on… Go out with me, and I’ll never lay a wand on old Snivelly again.”

Behind him, the Impediment Jinx was wearing off. Snape was beginning to inch toward his fallen wand, spitting out soapsuds as he crawled.

“I wouldn’t go out with you if it was a choice between you and the giant squid,” said Lily.

Snape is still on the floor, coughing up soap, wandless, crawling.

James is not doing this because Snape deserves it. A pro-Marauders fanfic I read attempted to make James look good in this scene by having Snape torture Peter in the same manner first. Let’s say this happened. Proof by elimination: James isn’t giving Lily the real reason for the sake of Pete’s dignity. This also explains Pete’s anticipation. But why is Lupin disapproving? How come James promises to end the hostility for a date, if he’s retaliating for something? More generally, If James is being moral, why target Snape, and not Avery and Mulciber, who actually do bad things? What did Bertram Aubrey do?

For context:

“‘James Potter and Sirius Black. Apprehended using an illegal hex upon Bertram Aubrey. Aubrey’ s head twice normal size. Double detention.’”

Conclusion: Snape did nothing to deserve this.

Moving on:

“Bad luck, Prongs,” said Sirius briskly, turning back to Snape. “OY!”

But too late; Snape had directed his wand straight at James; there was a flash of light and a gash appeared on the side of James’s face, spattering his robes with blood.

James whirled about; a second flash of light later, Snape was hanging upside down in the air, his robes falling over his head to reveal skinny, pallid legs and a pair of graying underpants.

Many people in the small crowd watching cheered. Sirius, James, and Wormtail roared with laughter. Lily, whose furious expression had twitched for an instant as though she was going to smile, said, “Let him down!”

“Certainly,” said James and he jerked his wand upward. Snape fell into a crumpled heap on the ground.

James is using Levicorpus against Snape. Snape invented that spell:

Mustering all his powers of concentration, Harry thought, Levi —

“No, Potter!” screamed Snape. There was a loud BANG and Harry was soaring backward, hitting the ground hard again, and this time his wand flew out of his hand. He could hear Hagrid yelling and Fang howling as Snape closed in and looked down on him where he lay, wandless and defenseless as Dumbledore had been. Snape’s pale face, illuminated by the flaming cabin, was suffused with hatred just as it had been before he had cursed Dumbledore.

“You dare use my own spells against me, Potter? It was I who invented them — I, the Half-Blood Prince! And you’d turn my inventions on me, like your filthy father, would you? I don’t think so . . . no!” 

Snape-haters have tried to justify James turning Levicorpus against its inventor on the account that Snape must have used it on other students. There’s no evidence of that. Then they have argued that sexual assault was the intent of the spell – plainly admitting that James SA’ed Severus – but that isn’t the case either. “Levicorpus” seems to mean “to levitate a body”; it could have been an attempt from Snape to learn how to fly unsupported; something he admired in Lily and something he will achieve in his adulthood.

Another thing to note: Severus reacts explosively when Harry tries Levicorpus on him, in contrast to Harry attempting Crucio:

“Cruc —” yelled Harry for the second time, aiming for the figure ahead illuminated in the dancing firelight, but Snape blocked the spell again. Harry could see him sneering.

“No Unforgivable Curses from you, Potter!” he shouted over the rushing of the flames, Hagrid’s yells, and the wild yelping of the trapped Fang. “You haven’t got the nerve or the ability —”

It parallels his reaction after he caught Harry looking into his Pensieve, and his reaction when he learns about Sirius’ escape in PoA (for which he is mocked).

Snape has c-PTSD from Levicorpus, from what happened in his Worst Memory. Because of James, Sirius, Remus and Peter – who by the way never said they bullied Snape because of that spell, which they themselves used.

Inventing Levicorpus is no reason to bully Severus.

This is Sectumsempra’s debut. If Snape had used it before, Sirius would have had more to worry about than Snape’s boogers. He was certainly not famous for attacking people with it, as some claim. This hypothesis is based on Lupin saying Sectum was a specialty of Snape’s – but of course it was, he invented it, and Lupin is one of the enemies for whom it was intended. Hell, the inscription “for enemies” proves teen Snape knew you don’t use this spell on just anyone. The fact that it takes Snape using it again (in the 7 Potters battle, ironically, in an attempt to protect Lupin) for Lupin to remember that he ever used it shows that he didn’t use it indiscriminately. James had it coming.

James is also the type of person who would leverage the safety of a girl’s friend to score a date with her. Appalling.

Moving on:

Disentangling himself from his robes, he got quickly to his feet, wand up, but Sirius said, “Petrificus Totalus!” and Snape keeled over again at once, rigid as a board.

“LEAVE HIM ALONE!” Lily shouted. She had her own wand out now. James and Sirius eyed it warily.

“Ah, Evans, don’t make me hex you,” said James earnestly.

“Take the curse off him, then!”

James sighed deeply, then turned to Snape and muttered the countercurse.

“There you go,” he said, as Snape struggled to his feet again, “you’re lucky Evans was here, Snivellus —”

Thanks for remembering you have a wand, Lily. No wonder Snape had to seek out friends who might be more enthusiastic about protecting him (although, where are they? How tight was he with his Slytherin gang at this point?)

James earnestly threatens Lily, whom he likes. He is displeased at having to release Snape, he threatens him with what could have been. This is clearly intended to humiliate Snape, and it works. When Harry views this scene for the second time, in The Prince’s Tale, this moment is described like this:

“Distantly he heard Snape shout at her in his humiliation and his fury, the unforgivable word: “Mudblood.”

Snape tried to reclaim some dignity, some of his masculinity, even. Sadly, it backfired horrendously.

“I don’t need help from filthy little Mudbloods like her!”

Lily blinked.

“Fine,” she said coolly. “I won’t bother in future. And I’d wash your pants if I were you, Snivellus.”

“Apologize to Evans!” James roared at Snape, his wand pointed threateningly at him.

“I don’t want you to make him apologize,” Lily shouted, rounding on James. “You’re as bad as he is.”

“What?” yelped James. “I’d NEVER call you a — you-know-what!”

“[…], walking down corridors and hexing anyone who annoys you just because you can — I’m surprised your broomstick can get off the ground with that fat head on it. You make me SICK.”

She turned on her heel and hurried away.

“Evans!” James shouted after her, “Hey, EVANS!” But she didn’t look back.

“What is it with her?” said James, trying and failing to look as though this was a throwaway question of no real importance to him.

“Reading between the lines, I’d say she thinks you’re a bit conceited, mate,” said Sirius.

“Right,” said James, who looked furious now, “right —”

There was another flash of light, and Snape was once again hanging upside down in the air.

“Who wants to see me take off Snivelly’s pants?”

And scene.

Some say that James was attacking Snape for having called Lily a Mudblood – but if that were the case, he’d go against her wishes, again posing himself as a massive jerk. Besides, who’s he to talk? Snape is a Half-blood, technically Muggle-born, and James is pureblood – he should look himself in the glass.

The key words were “I don’t need help”, not “Mudbloods”. This is not saying slurs are OK. However, this was in 1970s UK, and Wizarding society is behind Muggle society in every way. Unfortunately, slurs were more common then, meaning it was not just the raging racists who used them. In universe, we know Snape used that word on others (which is worse than doing it at a moment of rage and hurt, by the way) and James doesn’t say that’s why he’s attacking Snape. Even when Draco uses it, nobody starts a campaign against slurs. Harry, Lily’s son, barely even remembers that Snape used that word – he correctly identifies what’s the bigger transgression in this scene, even though he hates Snape.

I’d argue that whether Lily said the truth or not about Snape calling people Mudbloods left and right is unsure as it could be a rumor, and we know she’s gullible: see The Death Eater Days 1. 

Why is the use of a slur scrutinized so heavily when, in universe, it is clearly not downplayed and is in fact a major plot point? Why are the abuse and public degradation that are the context for using it downplayed and whitewashed? People insist that things must have happened, off-page, that justify what James and Sirius did, but ignore the on-page explanation for what Snape did. Even Lily, the “Mudblood” in question, who is clearly hurt, says James is as bad as Snape, and accuses James of hexing people because he can. Lily’s “I won’t bother in the future” is further proof that she knows there will be a next time – this was not a one time thing, she’s had to defend Snape before. James is a menace.

And the menace is furious. He was not furious before, mind you, just bored. It’s because he had no reason to be furious with Snape. James is furious now because Lily rejected him. It is a near-certainty that James then exposed Snape’s genitals in front of a crowd (in UK English, pants means underpants): The scene ends there, with the literary equivalent of a fade to black. James seems intent on delivering on his threat. Lupin and Sirius don’t say it didn’t happen. Snape has now been sexually assaulted at least once.

To put this in perspective, something similar is done to someone else, by a bad group of people, and it is referred to as torture. From GOF:

One of the marchers below flipped Mrs. Roberts upside down with his wand; her nightdress fell down to reveal voluminous drawers and she struggled to cover herself up as the crowd below her screeched and hooted with glee.

Voldemort’s heard of this:

You are still ready to take the lead in a spot of Muggle-torture, I believe?

Except what Snape endured is worse in some respects, because his underpants were removed, he was a minor, his assailants were not strangers and he continued to see them every day, and all of this is going on the charitable assumption that the assault at the end of SWM was the only one. Mrs. Roberts is a victim of a hate crime (although she doesn’t know it), and she is experiencing a horror she cannot comprehend, true; and yet – within the moral landscape of HP, this is extreme behavior.

To note: Exposing one’s underwear is already sexual assault, so to debate on whether James did remove Severus’ underwear is useless to defend him from that accusation. For anyone who wonders if it really is sexual assault, just imagine James hanging a girl upside down to show her knickers to everybody and then forcing her knickers off so he can expose her sex and her arse in public. The first is already eligible in schools to be labeled as sexual assault, the second, all the more so. Both boys and girls can be victims of sexual assaults, and what applies to a girl applies to a boy. 

Reminds me of the fact that TERF-y Rowling emulated James when she exposed a trans woman’s underwear in public.

James perfectly emulates the Death Eaters in Goblet of Fire as they lift Muggles into the air in some sort of sick torture, as we saw:

One of the marchers below flipped Mrs. Roberts upside down with his wand; her nightdress fell down to reveal voluminous drawers and she struggled to cover herself up as the crowd below her screeched and hooted with glee. 

“That’s sick,” Ron muttered, watching the smallest Muggle child, who had begun to spin like a top, sixty feet above the ground, his head flopping limply from side to side. “That is really sick…” 

You’re right Ron. And even more sickening is that, yet again, James parallels Draco:

“Granger, they’re after Muggles,” said Malfoy. “D’you want to be showing off your knickers in midair? Because if you do, hang around… they’re moving this way, and it would give us all a laugh.” 

Being hanged upside-down is not only humiliating, it also hurts:

“You insulted her, Harry! You said it was a joke!” shouted Ron, who was slowly turning purple in the face as all the blood rushed to his head.

John Jones would know a thing or two about it.

Harry views this scene and he is horrified, the thought of his father makes him ashamed. He never tells anyone he’s seen it, except Sirius and Lupin.

For nearly five years the thought of his father had been a source of comfort, of inspiration. Whenever someone had told him he was like‘ James he had glowed with pride inside. And now… now he felt cold and miserable at the thought of him.

From the same chapter:

Directly ahead of him, Harry could see the towering beech tree below which his father had once tormented Snape. He was not sure what Sirius could possibly say to him that would make up for what he had seen in the Pensieve, but he was desperate to hear Sirius’s own account of what had happened, to know of any mitigating factors there might have been, any excuse at all for his father’s behavior…

He gets none.

If Snape and the Marauders had been rivals, then the people who knew Snape would have had something worse to say about him than vague accusations of being into Dark Arts. Even when Snape kills Dumbledore, and it is “proven” that he was never good, nobody has anything concrete to say to make any sense of it. On the contrary: they are all shocked.

Here’s Sirius’s analysis of the kind of company Wormtail sought out, in a startlingly rare display of self-awareness:

You’d want to be quite sure he was the biggest bully in the playground before you went back to him, wouldn’t you?

James has multiple advantages over Snape: He has 3 sidekicks, including a prefect. He’s a rich, popular pureblood. McGonagall, who’s in charge of disciplining him, is known to bend rules when it comes to Quidditch stars. His Quidditch skills make him hard to evade and beat. Dumbledore has already shown that he will let them get away with murder, quite literally. He has an infallible surveillance system of the school and a perfect invisibility cloak.

The infallible surveillance system being the Marauder’s Map. Rowling’s notes on it:

The Marauder’s Map subsequently became something of a bane to its true originator (me), because it allowed Harry a little too much freedom of information. I never showed Harry taking the map back from the empty office of (the supposed) Mad-Eye Moody, and I sometimes regretted that I had not capitalised on this mistake to leave it there. However, I like the moment when Harry watches Ginny’s dot moving around the school in Deathly Hallows, so on balance I am glad I let Harry reclaim his rightful property.

This Map is a creep’s wet dream. And it’s not something that the Marauders found; they purposefully invented it.

Snape was no match to all of that. Rather than prove that he had “changed”, the fact that James was made Head Boy proves that James set the terms for any encounter between Snape and himself, no matter how many times Lupin says Snape was a special case. The only thing about Snape that was special was that he was an especially easy target, and also, he was friends with Lily, which James really didn’t like.

James apparently managed to keep his fights with Snape a secret from Lily in seventh year, which would be quite hard to do unless they were all in places and times of James’ choosing – unless, in other words, they were started by James.

It would be quite easy to do this, given that James had access to the Marauders’ Map, allowing him to get Snape when he was alone, the Invisibility Cloak, allowing him to sneak up on Snape, and a whole gang of friends with years of training in coordinating sneak-up assaults on people, particularly on Snape, who was a friendless, isolated kid.

There’s something that’s so telling of Severus Snape in HBP. This is what he tells Draco:

“You were certainly alone tonight, which was foolish in the extreme, wandering the corridors without lookouts or backup, these are elementary mistakes —” 

I repeat: For Severus, wandering the corridors alone, without lookouts or backup, is an elementary mistake.

This heavily suggests a scenario where Severus maneuvered through the corridors based on the knowledge he must always be on his guard; where during his school years, he’s revolved his life around the imperative of never being caught alone where James and his mates would ambush him and then pretend they “got better” in the daylight. It would be a fine reason for Severus to “hang out” with his Slytherin dorm mates; as far as we know, the Marauders, cowards as they were, always took the easy target but never bullied the most dangerous future Death Eaters. Nevermind if they weren’t true friends (why didn’t any of them help Severus in SWM?), those Slytherins represented a necessary protection for Severus.

Sirius and Lupin admit that their behavior was unacceptable:

“I’m not proud of it,” said Sirius quickly. […]

“Did I ever tell you to lay off Snape?” he [Lupin] said. “Did I ever have the guts to tell you I thought you were out of order?”

“Yeah, well,” said Sirius, “you made us feel ashamed of ourselves sometimes… That was something… »

Why would Lupin think his friends were out of order, why would he make them feel ashamed of themselves sometimes, if they had been a mutual rivalry, or if they had been defending the school against a deranged psycho, as some like to portray it?

Harry is so disgusted by his father’s behavior, he does not understand what Lily saw in him:

“She started going out with him in seventh year,” said Lupin.

“Once James had deflated his head a bit,” said Sirius.

“And stopped hexing people just for the fun of it,” said Lupin.

“Even Snape?” said Harry.

“Well,” said Lupin slowly, “Snape was a special case. I mean, he never lost an opportunity to curse James, so you couldn’t really expect James to take that lying down, could you?”

“And my mum was okay with that?”

“She didn’t know too much about it, to tell you the truth,” said Sirius. “I mean, James didn’t take Snape on dates with her and jinx him in front of her, did he?”

Lupin speaks slowly because he’s lying. It’s James who never missed an opportunity, and Snape was expected to take it lying down. James knew he was in the wrong, otherwise, why lie? Since James managed to hide his stunts from Lily, why not from the staff? Given his bragging that he “saved Snape’s life,” lying to look good to Lily is a pattern. Lupin is a known liar, as proven by the entire plot of POA.

Snape was expected to take it lying down just like in SWM.

Besides, Snape not losing an opportunity to curse James – which we have no proof of – doesn’t mean the curses had to be the magical kind. They could refer to mere insults. In any case, this is no excuse for a Head Boy to hex a student he’d chosen as an easy target for six years already. As a Head Boy, he should use at best the Disarming Spell and the Shield Charm. 

That makes seven years – the whole of Snape’s scholarity – of living hell.

There’s a reason Harry wonders if James forced Lily into a relationship.

James’s two best friends have nothing concrete to say in his defense, except that he “stopped hexing people for fun.” This is damning with faint praise.

The defenses they offer are laughable:

“I wouldn’t like you to judge your father on what you saw there, Harry. He was only fifteen —”

“I’m fifteen!” said Harry heatedly.

Harry knows 15 is old enough to know better. So do the Centaurs:

“They brought her here, Ronan,” replied the centaur who had such a firm grip on Harry. “And they are not so young… He is nearing manhood, this one.”

James was in fact 16 year-old, one year short of reaching adulthood, sexually mature by Muggle standards. We know that the OWLs exams happened at the end of the 1975-1976 school year; from DH:

JAMES POTTER

BORN 27 MARCH 1960

DIED 31 OCTOBER 1981

Lupin either misremembers or he purposefully reduces James’ age for his argument that he shouldn’t be judged because he was young – another tactic borrowed from rape culture. (Snape-haters funnily don’t apply the age excuse to Severus as he called Lily a Mudblood – so why should we for the Marauders?)

Moving on:

“Look, Harry,” said Sirius placatingly, “James and Snape hated each other from the moment they set eyes on each other, it was just one of those things, you can understand that, can’t you? I think James was everything Snape wanted to be — he was popular, he was good at Quidditch, good at pretty much everything. And Snape was just this little oddball who was up to his eyes in the Dark Arts and James — whatever else he may have appeared to you, Harry — always hated the Dark Arts.”

“Yeah,” said Harry, “but he just attacked Snape for no good reason, just because — well, just because you said you were bored.”

First: here is Lupin’s count of why James and Sirius bullied Snape:

And I understand; with James as your father, with Sirius as your godfather, you [Harry] have inherited an old prejudice.

Second: Defending a sexual assaulter / rapist / pedophile / etc on the account they are popular and/or a genius is typical rape-apologia that, to this day, still harms victims of such crimes. A Youtuber, Korbin Miles, has compared James Potter to Brock Turner on it: Why James Potter is the WORST!

Sirius should look himself in the glass after saying such a thing.

Sirius is either lying or misremembering: we know James and Snape didn’t hate each other from the first moment for no reason, but because James and Sirius antagonized Snape. Also, why would Snape’s supposed jealousy of James contribute to James feeling so inferior compared to Snape, that he’d treat him like that? According to JKR, it was James who was jealous of Snape, over Lily. Given that Sirius is blatantly wrong, there is no reason to believe the Dark Arts had anything to do with it. It reads like an attempt to move the conversation to more comfortable territory, and is extremely hypocritical: James didn’t pretend he was being righteous in real time and neither did Sirius. They set a werewolf loose on Hogsmeade and used an illegal hex (i.e., Dark Magic) on Bertram Aubrey, so James didn’t hate the Dark Arts this much; the dichotomy between Dark and legitimate magic reads as arbitrary nonsense at best and self-serving at worst, and I’ll forever maintain that using Scourgify on a person is extremely violent, « Dark » or not. If James had a problem with Snape’s brand of magic, why did he use a spell Snape invented? Harry recognizes that this is irrelevant.

See the essays: 

Misconceptions on the Dark Arts

Opinion: The Dark Magic/Light Magic Dichotomy is Nonsense

Sectumsempra and the nature of curses

Also, note how Lupin uses time and again a humiliating  and discrediting tactic by calling Severus jealous of James, like he does in PoA and, as we see, in OotP:

“We were in the same year, you know, and we — er — didn’t like each other very much. He especially disliked James. Jealous, I think, of James’s talent on the Quidditch field…

We know that wasn’t mere dislike, and we know that’s not the reason Severus loathed James. Lupin is a pathological liar and the “soft” but ever so vicious kind of bully.

The defense campaign ends with:

“Look,” he said, “your father was the best friend I [Sirius] ever had, and he was a good person. A lot of people are idiots at the age of fifteen. He grew out of it.”

“Yeah, okay,” said Harry heavily. “I just never thought I’d feel sorry for Snape.”

To me, this reads like:

“Look,” he said, “I am extremely biased and I miss your father and this conversation is making me uncomfortable. Your father was an idiot and eventually he stopped, that’s all I actually have to say in his defense.”

“Yeah, okay,” said Harry heavily. “I just never thought I’d feel sorry for the person I hate, who treats me like total shit, my dad was really bad!”

Also, Sirius never grew out of it, and he was OK with it in the first place, so his opinion doesn’t count. At 15, Harry is more mature than him, and he is unconvinced.

Some would say that James is better than Snape because he “grew out of it” while Snape never did. It is so disingenuous, so insensitive, it makes me think of that tweet:

abusers be like “I don’t remember that happening” no shit, sherlock! for me it was a formative memory that forever changed the way my brain processes information and for you it was a FUCKING TUESDAY

Some also say that James is better than Severus because he was part of the “good guys”. The comparison cannot be made but even if it were, Snape wins it. Snape became an Order member and saved countless people. Who did James save?

Belonging to the Order is not a reason to sweep all that he did under the rug, and Snape joining the Death Eaters at some point in his life does not retroactively justify the bullying he had to endure.

In fact, Rowling once said:

“James could certainly have been kinder to this boy who was a bit of an outcast. And he wasn’t. And these actions have consequences. And we know what they were.”

Hinting that James is the reason Snape became a Death Eater (see: A Textbook Case of Radicalization).

James will never prove he was a truly good person; he will prove the contrary. He’s a failed character.

In one of the last interactions between Snape and Sirius (OOTP:24), Sirius still calls him Snivellus, by calling him “Lucius’s lapdog”, he’s possibly suggesting something very unsavory, he’s the first to raise his wand. Harry is the one who tries to defuse the situation. Snape’s behavior is cringe-worthy too, but he is giving Sirius life-saving information: His dog cover’s been blown. He is being protective, in his trademark snarky way. Note that Sirius has yet to apologize for the attempted murder, or for anything else.

For context:

“I’ve warned you, Snivellus,” said Sirius, his face barely a foot from Snape’s, “I don’t care if Dumbledore thinks you’ve reformed, I know better –”

[…]

“Tell me, how is Lucius Malfoy these days? I expect he’s delighted his lapdog’s working at Hogwarts, isn’t he?”

“Speaking of dogs,” said Snape softly, “did you know that Lucius Malfoy recognized you last time you risked a little jaunt outside? Clever idea, Black, getting yourself seen on a safe station platform . . . gave you a cast-iron excuse not to leave your hidey-hole in future, didn’t it?”

This isn’t somebody who knows anything about growing up, so his opinion can be dismissed. The same goes for Lupin, who has a lifelong pattern of letting his desire to be accepted get the better of him.

Lupin is seen making Snape the laughing-stock of the entire school on the very first day of tenure in a sexist and queerphobic way that insulted Neville’s grandmother: Remus Lupin: The Facade of Niceness

He also forces Snape to bring his own medication to his office, leading to the events of Pettigrew’s escape: Was Lupin truly a great professor?

Lupin doesn’t bully Severus after his professorship because Severus is out of reach again. Lupin, by his own words, never changed.

As for Peter, we know what kind of person he became.

Moreover: Harry draws a clear parallel between Snape’s situation against James and his own against Dudley:

What was making Harry feel so horrified and unhappy was not being shouted at or having jars thrown at him; it was that he knew how it felt to be humiliated in the middle of a circle of onlookers, knew exactly how Snape had felt as his father had taunted him, and that judging from what he had just seen, his father had been every bit as arrogant as Snape had always told him. 

What the Marauders have done is so horrible that Harry is reminded of his trauma. The difference being that Dudley, according to Rowling, saw his worst memories under the Dementor as those of being a spoiled-rotten bully, implying that he regrets it:

Superhans: What was duldeys worst memory?

J.K. Rowling: I think that when Dudley was attacked by the Dementors he saw himself, for the first time, as he really was. This was an extremely painful, but ultimately salutory lesson, and began the transformation in him.

https://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/2007/7/30/j-k-rowling-web-chat-transcript/

By seventh year, the « slow » and « obese » ex-bully makes peace with his cousin.

“Er — no, they don’t,” said Harry. « They think I’m a waste of space, actually, but I’m used to — »
“I don’t think you’re a waste of space.”

[…] It now dawned on Harry, however, that the cup of cold tea on which he had trodden that morning might not have been a booby trap at all. […]

“But he hasn’t said thank you at all!” said Hestia indignantly. « He only said he didn’t think Harry was a waste of space!”
“Yeah, but coming from Dudley that’s like ‘I love you,’” said Harry, torn between annoyance and a desire to laugh as Aunt Petunia continued to clutch at Dudley as if he had just saved Harry from a burning building.

You know you’ve failed as a character when even Dudley gets a redemption arc but you and your friends don’t make a serious effort at redemption.

Snape’s Worst Memory still haunts Harry months later:

“My dad used it [Levicorpus],” said Harry. “I saw him in the Pensieve, he used it on Snape.”

He tried to sound casual, as though this was a throwaway comment of no real importance, but he was not sure he had achieved the right effect; Lupin’s smile was a little too understanding.

It’s disgusting how Lupin smiles when remembered of what they did to Snape.

In fact, the memory still haunts Harry YEARS later. It was so horrible that as a seventeen year-old man who has spent the year hunting Horcruxes, fighting Death Eaters, not yet left known that Snape was a good guy all along, and is about to kill Voldemort off… simply cannot bear to watch Snape’s Worst Memory one more time. He stays physically far away from the scene. The message is clear: he finds himself unable to accept the horrible; he tries to live in denial:

But Harry kept his distance this time, because he knew what happened after James had hoisted Severus into the air and taunted him; he knew what had been done and said, and it gave him no pleasure to hear it again…

The Marauders will never apologize for what they did.

To quote JKR, this was relentless bullying. Downplaying, whitewashing, excusing, and blaming the victim for it, is sickening.

Lack of empathy

The following is written by me, not pet_genius.

To understand the mindset of someone who commits all of those, you have to put yourself in the shoes of someone who’s worse than a cruel man: someone who lacks empathy. An inability to identify with or understand another’s situation or feelings. Yes, just like Voldemort and plenty of his followers. All of this is the pure manifestation of what a lack of empathy does. If you have empathy, there’s no way you could do any of that. 

To this day, the way James has been characterized makes him an example of Conduct Disorder, then Antisocial Personality Disorder and, I’d argue, psychopathy. Let’s see the DSM-V criteria for Conduct Disorder and how James answers those. In bold, all of the criteria that James checks:

A. A repetitive and persistent pattern of behavior in which the basic rights of others or major age-appropriate societal norms or rules are violated, as manifested by the presence of at least three of the following criteria in the past 12 months, with at least one criterion present in the past 6 months:

1. Aggression to people and animals

a. Often bullies, threatens, or intimidates others.

b. Often initiates physical fights.

c. Has used a weapon that can cause serious physical harm to others (e.g., a bat, brick, broken bottle, knife, gun).

d. Has been physically cruel to people.

e. Has been physically cruel to animals.

f. Has stolen while confronting a victim (e.g., mugging, purse snatching, extortion, armed robbery).

g. Has forced someone into sexual activity. [Lily / Snape]

2. Destruction of property

a. Has deliberately engaged in fire setting with the intention of causing serious damage.

b. Has deliberately destroyed others’ property (other than by fire setting).

3. Deceitfulness or theft

a. Has broken into someone else’s house, building, or car.

b. Often lies to obtain goods or favors or to avoid obligations (i.e., “cons” others).

c. Has stolen items of nontrivial value without confronting a victim (e.g., shoplifting, but without breaking and entering; forgery). [has “nicked” the snitch]

4. Serious violations of rules

a. Often stays out at night despite parental prohibitions, beginning before age 13 years.

b. Has run away from home overnight at least twice while living in the parental or parental surrogate home, or once without returning for a lengthy period.

c. Is often truant from school, beginning before age 13 years.

B. The disturbance in behavior causes clinically significant impairment in social, academic, or occupational functioning.

As for ASPD:

A. Disregard for and violation of others rights since age 15, as indicated by one of the seven sub features:

1. Failure to obey laws and norms by engaging in behavior which results in criminal arrest, or would warrant criminal arrest
2. Lying, deception, and manipulation, for profit or self-amusement,
3. Impulsive behavior
4. Irritability and aggression, manifested as frequently assaults others, or engages in fighting
5. Blatantly disregards safety of self and others,
6. A pattern of irresponsibility and
7. Lack of remorse for actions (American Psychiatric Association, 2013)

B. The person is at least age 18,

C. Conduct disorder was present by history before age 15

D. and the antisocial behavior does not occur in the context of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder (American Psychiatric Association, 2013)

See also: The semi-official HP prequel featuring James and Sirius playing thugs in Muggle streets.

Psychopathy has disappeared from the DSM, being renamed ASPD, but some professionals make a difference between the two. From the book “Psychologie des Comportements Criminels” by Catherine Blatier, the PCL-R from Hare was used to identify psychopaths, and a version exists for minors, called the PCL-YV, but I wasn’t able to find its criteria, so we’ll use those for the PCL-R and see which ones James checks:

Item 1: Glibness/superficial charm [tries to charm Lily]

Item 2: Grandiose sense of self-worth [Sirius calls James conceited]

Item 3: Need for stimulation/proneness to boredom

Item 4: Pathological lying

Item 5: Conning/manipulative

Item 6: Lack of remorse or guilt

Item 7: Shallow affect

Item 8: Callous/lack of empathy

Item 9: Parasitic lifestyle

Item 10: Poor behavioral controls

Item 11: Promiscuous sexual behavior

Item 12: Early behavior problems

Item 13: Lack of realistic, long-term goals

Item 14: Impulsivity

Item 15: Irresponsibility

Item 16: Failure to accept responsibility for own actions

Item 17: Many short-term marital relationships

Item 18: Juvenile delinquency

Item 19: Revocation of conditional release

Item 20: Criminal versatility

Other tests exist; I am merely giving you an idea. 

You see all the criteria that James demonstrates? Taken together, they are pathological. You cannot pretend this is common child behavior, let alone normal adult behavior, or that it is justifiable in any way. It is Rowling’s fault for writing James like that and making Lily get wet on it. I’m sorry for the fans. But this does not change the facts. If James existed, he would be a very suitable case of Conduct Disorder (later, Antisocial Personality Disorder) and even psychopathy (whether or not this term can be used in professional settings). If James and Sirius existed, they would need to serve time and benefit from intensive psychotherapy for their issues.

Finally, there’s this, from « CPTSD: From Surviving to Thriving »; a good summary of who James and Sirius were:

The Charming Bully

Especially devolved fight types can become sociopathic. Sociopathy can range along a continuum that stretches from corrupt politician to vicious criminal. A particularly nasty sociopath, who I call the charming bully, probably falls somewhere around the middle of this continuum. The charming bully behaves in a friendly manner some of the time. He can even occasionally listen and be helpful in small amounts, but he still uses his contempt to overpower and control others.
This type typically relies on scapegoats for the dumping of his vitriol. These unfortunate scapegoats are typically weaker than him. They may be members of a disenfranchised group: the « ethnic » employees, the gays, women, his « problem » child or wife, etc. He generally spares his favorites from this behavior, unless they get out of line.
If the charming bully is charismatic enough, those close to him will often fail to register the unconscionable meanness of his scapegoating. The bully’s favorites often slip into denial, relieved that they are not the target. Especially charismatic bullies may even be admired and seen as great. Being the scapegoated child or spouse of such a bully is especially problematic because it is so difficult to get anyone to validate that you were or are being abused by them.

What was Severus trying to do, again? Making people understand that the Marauders were not as great as they thought. But no one listened, no one validated his feelings… not even Lily. And she, later, may have paid the price.

Whether inherent or learned, whether generalized or reserved for certain people, the Marauders’ treatment of others and especially Snape was one that proved a lack of empathy (see also: Breaking the Facade of Niceness for Lupin’s case). As Sirius so ironically said:

If you want to know what a man’s like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals.

If love is a force of good in HP, a lack of empathy is a cause of evil. It’s no wonder Harry felt sick after he saw Snape’s Worst Memory. He had a greater heart than Lily, who almost smiled; he had empathy for his personal enemy and knew who was in the wrong. Let’s try to do the same, shall we? 

Conclusion

I’ll admit – writing this essay – reading Snape’s Worst Memory again and again to study it – is very triggering. It has not been easy. 

Some of us have been bullied, and I can assure you the consequences were ugly. But I can fairly say that it was nothing compared to what Snape has lived. Snape is an abuse survivor and his case is one of torture. I’d rather be called a slur than get what Severus got.

“I trust Severus Snape,” said Dumbledore simply. “But I forgot — another old man’s mistake — that some wounds run too deep for the healing. I thought Professor Snape could overcome his feelings about your father — I was wrong.”

No shit Sherlock.

So sometimes I think about how Harry called Severus the bravest man he’s ever known. And sometimes, I wonder if he’s saying Severus is the bravest for keeping on living after what his father and his friends have inflicted on him. 

Additional Resources:

• James Potter Was a HORRIBLE Person (Let’s Be Honest) : 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKX2khqwtW0