[HPforGrownups] Re: Pride and Prejudice (regarding Hogwarts Houses)

[Janelle Lile]

No: HPFGUIDX 22559

>
> --- In HPforGrownups at y..., anna_l_milton at h... wrote:
>
>  >Let's face facts here: what are the
> > typical Slytherin personality traits? Ambition, cunning, wilfulness,
> > self-determination, a certain disrespect for established authority.
> > Now, are these traits *intrinsecally* bad? Not at all.>
>
> You made some really excellent points here!  I snipped this because it
> made me think about something.  Why are Crabbe and Goyle in Slytherin?
> What little I know of them tells me they are, overall, exceedingly
> loyal to Draco.  Wouldn't that make them Hufflepuffian?
>
>
>

I hope I'm not dredging up something people are tired of hearing...
If memory serves, we've only heard the Sorting Hat sorting Harry.  We don't
know exactly what it's saying to the other students when they put it on.  As
we all know, the hat didn't say "Gryffindor" until it had determined he
didn't want to be in Slytherin.  I've been thinking that maybe it doesn't
matter which qualities one has quite so much as which house they would
rather be in.  (Someone with CoS at hand can insert the relevant quote from
Dumbledore here)
Hermione seems like the perfect Ravenclaw (to me at least) but if she
decided to be in Gryffindor, that's where the hat put her.  Slytherin has a
reputation for a certain kind of student.  If that's where the person feels
they'd be at home (regardless of potential or abilities) that's what the hat
will do.  Maybe it's more about what's most important to a particular
person.  That would take care of the problem I think most of us have with
the "Slytherin qualities" being automatically bad.  I mean, Percy without
ambition wouldn't be Percy, would he?
The obvious flaw with this theory is what, then, is the use of the Sorting
Hat?  Why don't the students just write their names and what house they
want?

Janelle
The preceding has been a shameless bit of wishful thinking, as Janelle is
neither especially brave nor especially smart but wants to be in Gryffindor
or Ravenclaw anyway