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NancyLebovitz comments on Love and Rationality: Less Wrongers on OKCupid - Less Wrong
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It's very odd that a lot of women find Snape attractive. Where does he fit into the theory?
Masculinity + authority + sarcasm + disagreeableness is an attractive combination for a reasonable subset of women. Alan Rickman's looks and voice may help.
See also House, M.D. for another attractive character close by in the same region of guyspace.
I would go with villain-type + played by Alan Rickman in the movies
The thing is, he's a medium-status villain. He's a teacher and not in charge of more than his classroom. He's not good-looking or well-dressed.
I believe he was the subject of a lot of fan fiction before the movies came out.
Harry treated him as though he was a major villain though. He and Ron spend pretty much the whole series blaming him every time anything goes wrong. I'm guessing that simultaneously raised his villain-status and his misunderstood-guy-in-need-of-love status.
He is a lot higher status in the movies, purely due to the way he is acted. He exuded power.
I'll also note that Snape is in charge of a house and could reasonably be considered the third most powerful in Hogwarts. Given the role Hogwarts has in Magical Britain his status would seem to be rather high.
And he looks and talks like Alan Rickman!
Also, the theory of female attraction to status is not so much about global status, but about local status in interactional contexts. That's part of why members of small-time crappy bands can do so well with women (that, plus good genes from being a musician). Global status in men is great, but local status is good enough, and it's more attainable.
I'll agree here. I didn't like him at all in the books, but after the movies...
Oddly, after reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone for the first time, long before any of the movies came out, I too found Snape to be oddly charismatic... sure, he seemed to hate Harry for no apparent reason and go out of his way to be mean to him, but he seemed interesting in a way that many of the other characters weren't. A hero who is consistently heroic is often a Flat Character and therefore boring.
For me, bullies children = utterly revolting.
I'm surprised this isn't widely shared, but I seem to be an odd person in many respects.
Your perspective is that of an adult, of course; but the Harry Potter books are children's literature, and thus (I presume) take a child's point of view on the world. Children often perceive adult authority figures as "mean" even when they are well within the bounds of what (adult) society considers to be acceptable behavior. Such "meanness", while unpleasant, is not something children are necessarily shocked by; they expect it in more or less the same way that adults expect "outrageous" actions from the government .
Snape doesn't even beat the children does he? That puts him ahead of what has often been considered acceptable behaviour to direct towards children.
He mentally beats them - between the implied Legilimency and verbal humiliation, I think a lot of his students would have preferred the occasional physical slap or kick.
Is your point that Harry isn't shocked by Snape's behavior, so that a good many readers aren't, either? I don't remember if Harry had a general opinion about Snape's viciousness.
The women who find Snape attractive aren't children themselves-- I don't know what the typical lower age limit for liking Snape is.
IIRC, Rowling hated the way Snape taught. She could have presented his nastiness as part of a useful toughening process, but she didn't.
Of course, as the books went on, not only did he eventually redeem himself, but (earlier) Umbridge made him look like a relatively less awful teacher.
I agree; Snape ought to have been revolting. I don't know why he wasn't.