SMW: A Political Reading or Why Defending the Marauders Means Supporting Humiliation, Power Dynamics, Symbolic Violence and Sexual Assault
A lot of people don't understand —regarding Severus and the SWM incident— that in many current legal and psychological frameworks, the concept of sexual violence has evolved to include not only explicit sexual contact, but also other forms of violating a person's sexual integrity. Forcing someone to be naked without their consent, exposing them to others, ridiculing their body or sexuality, these are expressions of such violence. In this sense, what the Marauders do can be considered a form of symbolic sexual violence or sexualized humiliation. And I don’t care if in someone’s country sexual violence is only considered to be rape, the spectrum of sexual violence and abuse is vast. Legal and psychiatric frameworks insist on the necessary expansion and redefinition of its causes precisely because there are many sexually aggressive actions that have been normalized by reducing everything to the apex of the pyramid, which is direct sexual violence. That reduction harms millions of people when trying to present their cases in legal terms and obtain justice. Therefore, that excuse is not only reductive but highly harmful, and it is a dangerous form of violence denial that, in fact, is constantly reproduced in this fandom and should be unacceptable.
Stripping someone of their clothing in front of others is profoundly violent, not just due to the physical exposure, but because of the extreme vulnerability it entails. Clothing is not just fabric: it's a symbolic barrier between intimacy and the outside world. Removing it publicly —and with the intent to ridicule— is an act of power, humiliation, and control. This is not a prank: it’s an act of domination rooted in mechanisms of sexualized violence. And even if the aggressor doesn’t have a sexual intent toward the victim, the act takes on a sexual nature inasmuch as cultural codes interpret forced nudity as a form of humiliation. It’s not necessary for there to be a sexual motive, as some defenders of this behavior claim, the very act of forcing someone to expose their body or be partially undressed in public is an aggression, and it carries a sexualized subtext.
Moreover, the presence of an audience that does not intervene turns it into a performance of power. The violence becomes a spectacle, and the crowd amplifies the humiliation. It is a ritualized scene of social exclusion. This not only traumatizes the victim but educates everyone else about who can be humiliated and who gets to do the humiliating.
Yet again, the defenders of the Marauders conveniently ignore this, which is ironic, considering they constantly brand themselves as champions of justice and equality.
Then there’s this widely repeated idea (which is honestly outrageous, especially coming from people who claim to be part of the LGBTQ community or feminists, when this very narrative has been historically used to violate women and queer people): that “Snape brought it on himself” because he was interested in the Dark Arts or because he was unpleasant. This argument is not only false, but it reproduces the same logic that blames victims of harassment and assault in real life: “she was dressed like that,” “she was provocative,” “he’s weird,” “he’s unlikable.” It’s the same mental structure that justifies abuse of power and systemic violence because the victim is “uncomfortable.” And that’s incredibly dangerous. It’s also a lie, because James explicitly says he’s attacking him “for existing.” It’s not ideological, there’s no provocation from Severus. It’s a raw display of power —the alpha male against a boy with nonconforming masculinity— a manifestation of patriarchal violence that glorifies the man who exerts dominance and aggression over a weaker man to punish his lack of strength and power. It’s an aggression rooted in patriarchal power dynamics, which further supports the interpretation of sexual aggression, since these are deeply tied to power and the imposition of hegemonic masculinity, embodied in James and, secondarily, Sirius. Not to mention the profoundly classist undertones, but that’s a topic for another meta.
What’s striking is that the people who defend or downplay James’s behavior use exactly the same rhetoric as those who excuse or minimize rape by men against women, or assaults by cishetero men against queer people or, more broadly, the violent behavior of cis men. These are people who pat themselves on the back for being feminists, socialists, or LGBTQ rights advocates, but who actively defend a character whose behavior embodies everything those communities are fighting against: toxic masculinity and patriarchal male stereotypes.
On top of that, when the fandom (or any community) justifies this type of behavior as “teenage things,” they’re whitewashing abusive conduct. That has real-world consequences: it fosters a culture where bullying, public humiliation, or symbolic aggression aren’t taken seriously, especially if the victim is “unpopular” or “unlikable.” This perpetuates systems of hierarchical violence: those with charisma, attractiveness, or symbolic power (like James or Sirius) can act cruelly without consequences. We see this all the time in real life when people who commit serious crimes get sentence reductions or are institutionally exonerated because they come from good families, have social capital, or financial support while others who commit minor crimes out of desperation are imprisoned and stigmatized. There’s a clear class element in how some people are whitewashed while others are ridiculed or blamed. In the case of Severus vs. the Marauders, the issue isn’t just that familiar social dynamics are being reproduced, it’s that the defenders of the abusers mask their victim-blaming with supposedly political rhetoric. It’s pure demagogy, where they not only blame the victim but completely ignore his social and economic context, stripping him of the material conditions that explain his odd behavior, his appearance, and his friendships. Yes, Severus has a bad temper, but that bad temper has a context, just like his worn-out clothes, his appearance, and his associations. And that context has a deep socio-economic subtext that his haters don’t want to acknowledge, because then their whole phony justice-warrior rhetoric falls apart. They’d have to take off the mask and admit that deep down, they’re just victims of established canons and stereotypes, and their identities aren’t as dissident or subversive as they claim. Because they hate what’s truly dissident and subversive. They admire, defend, and whitewash the abusive, the traditional, and the hegemonic through the characters they choose to uplift. They’re not political heroes; they’re sheep of the establishment.
In conclusion, minimizing or justifying what the Marauders did to Severus Snape isn’t just a matter of narrative interpretation or personal taste within a fandom: it’s a political stance, whether their defenders realize it or not. When someone defends a scene of public humiliation, non-consensual bodily exposure, and symbolic violence as merely “teen antics,” “boys being boys,” or “something from the times,” they are —perhaps unconsciously— participating in the same mechanisms that sustain rape culture, power impunity, and the marginalization of people who don’t fit the hegemonic molds of likability, class, gender, or behavior. Invalidating a victim’s experience because “he’s not nice” or “he also did bad things” is to replicate the very discourse that countless vulnerable people and communities have been denouncing for decades.
This kind of discourse and analysis doesn’t seek to sanctify Snapev—as snaters love to repeat, because they confuse critical analysis and social commentary with beatification, for some reason— but to point out that being a victim and being flawed are not mutually exclusive. Understanding aggression in context and denouncing the normalization of certain forms of violence is what allows society to move forward, both inside and outside of fiction. It is also a call for coherence: you cannot champion feminism, queer struggle, or critique of power structures, and simultaneously justify with enthusiasm scenes that represent the exact opposite. Critical analysis is not optional if you claim to be politically engaged, even within fandom. Because fiction doesn’t happen in a vacuum, and how we choose to read it, justify it, or challenge it says a lot more about our real-life ideologies than we’d like to admit.
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