Took out these entries.
- Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: James would never stoop to killing his arch-enemy, and he even staged an Embarrassing Rescue after Sirius told him his idea of a prank. Despite this, he and his friends continued to pick on him For the Lulz, and the incident did not lead him to let go of their rivalry.
The werewolf incident is largely a Noodle Incident. We don't know a lot of the details. We don't know what since said to convince Snape to go into a haunted house at night. We don't know how James fount about about it. We do know that James was horrified by it and went to save Snape from Remus. It's very unlikely it was about covering his tracks. Furthermore, James did not pick on him For The Lutz. James hated dark magic and Snape was fascinated by it. This is not an excuse by any means, but for James, it was more about ego. Lastly, it takes two people to have a rivalry. Sirius stated that Snape gave as good as he got. Yes, James should have let it go, but that doesn't make it completely James' fault.
- Moral Myopia: James is described and shown as a firm opponent of the Dark Arts, Blood Purity and prejudice towards outsiders and supports his friend Remus Lupin who is otherwise persecuted by his condition. However, despite Snape's interest in the Dark Arts and friendship with future Death Eaters, he would attack him For the Lulz and envy of his friendship with the girl he loves.
There is a huge difference between someone who pracices dark magic of their own free will and someone who is afflicted with it. It doesn't make James myoptic. Again, James did not attack Snape For The Lutz.
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In the Pensieve scenes, both times we see James pick on Snape. Once on the Hogwarts train and the other in Worst Memory chapter. In both occassions, Snape is doing no dark arts within his sights. He is minding his own business while James sneaks in. He admits to Lily that "it's more the fact that he exists" and he's spurred because Sirius admitted to being bored. It's also implied(YMMV so I didn't put it) that he did it because he wanted and expected Lily to come save her friend, so he'd flirt with her. He looked to where Lily and the girls were standing by the lake as he marched to Snape.
This takes place after the werewolf incident. Which shows that it didn't change anything. So Jerk with a Heart of Jerk towards Snape is justified in my view. Sirius admitted that they never changed, "he was always a special case".
For the Lulz is clear in the scene itself, where until Snape calls Lily Mudblood, he doesn't do anything Dark Arts like, aside from checking over his question paper. Sirius and James attacked him because Sirius was bored. That is technically For the Lulz.Snape wasn't blameless but this is James Potter's character page, dealing with his treatment of Snape so featuring his characteristics, Warts and All. Snape's page will have his.
I didn't phrase Moral Myopia clearly, I think. So for that I am sorry.
I can see your point. My point is that what made Snape an acceptable target for James was Snape's interest in the Dark Arts. It's not not like James attacked Lily's other friends to try to flirt. To clarify, I'm not trying to justify James at all. I think that the rivalry between James and Snape was a combination of Snape's fascination in the Dark Arts and James' jealousy of Snape's friendship with Lily. I agree that the memory Harry saw was primary motivated by the latter and sheer boredom on James' part, though.
Snape's main fault was trying to get the Marauders expelled by sneaking and being nosy and being Too Dumb to Live by listening to Sirius' Schmuck Bait, which ended up backfiring on him by making Lily realize that James Potter has Hidden Depths when he saved his life. Him being into Dark Arts is true enough but it seemed to be mostly to make himself scary and impressive when he was otherwise the school laughing stock and punching bag. Word of God said that James' treatment of Snape had obvious consequences. So the main problem was James Potter being a Knight Templar Jerk Jock with Green-Eyed Monster.
I like James a lot, I am not pro-Snape at all, far from it. But true fans of James should own up his flaws so that his virtues get highlighted more. Otherwise other people will tell the story. I put in a lot more positive attributes on James than negative attributes if you look at History.
The real reason James won Lily was that he changed and listened to her. After shouting at him, he seemed to have toned down his other behavior while keeping Snape as a "special case". Snape did not listen to her. Even after calling her Mudblood and having a door slammed on his face, he could have cut off ties with his Death Eater friends, tried to be more social and show that he's genuine. Had he done that, Lily would have forgiven him. Instead he seemed to have decided Then Let Me Be Evil.
I seem to have phrased things badly; I am trying to own up to James' flaws. I am sorry if I offended you by implying that you weren't. That wasn't my intention at all. I'm just trying to say that James' rivalry with Snape was more complicated than just jealously and boredom. I needn't have worried, in any case, given that you stated everything I was trying to say. I think I just misinterpreted? Sorry for the confusion.
It's okay. At least we discussed this. I don't think boredom and jealousy are uncomplicated motivations at all. Or that shallow. The other thing with James and Lily is they were compatible in that they had very little psychological damage and scars, they were both normal, where Severus, Sirius, Remus and Peter weren't. Both come from Good Parents.
The other thing which might have impressed Lily was that James seemed to attract friends while people around her kept letting her down, first her sister then Severus. After Severus letting her down, it was natural for her to seek that closeness without that complication and James provided that for her and so she became a part of his world as that letter to Harry shows where she refers to Peter as Wormy and seems to be in on their secret.
Lord of the Blue Star
In Fluer's section, the introduction information states she married Bill. But in the trope index below that Happily Married is covered in spoiler. Is that just a mistake or to cover they were still married into the epilogue?
Regarding Word of God that Lily had convinced James to make amends with Snape and wanted to make him godfather: excuse me?! They had been hunted by Voldemort and just escaped with their lives on 3 occasions, and at the time Snape is a Death Eater whose only saving grace is that he warned Dumbledore that now Voldemort would be really out to get them. Okay, offer an olive branch and maybe get him to switch sides, but jumping immediately to making him your kid's godfather?
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I'm just as skeptical, the example was added by a single person who also added it to another Harry Potter page as well. Where's this Word of God proof, anyway?
Someone's gotta check the Moody section, there are bits that actually refer to Barty Crouch Jr - including the initial quote.