Scapegoating Slytherin - The Moral Majority

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 144078

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "a_svirn" <a_svirn at y...> wrote:
>
> 
> > bboyminn:
> > 
> > Sorry, this might have already been covered in the discussion;
> > I haven't been following it that close. But Slytherin IS NOT 
> > resticted to PUREBLOOD. Snape is mixed blood, Voldemort himself
> > is mixed blood. ... So, I don't think Slytherin himself made 
> > pure-blood an absolutecriteria of admitance into Slytherin 
> > House. 

> a_svirn:
> 
> Well, you might not think so, but that what's the Hat says. Either 
> it's lying, or you must be mistaken. We do know that not everyone in 
> Slytherin is pureblood, but then we do know that not everyone in 
> Gryffindor is brave. Snape and Voldemort would have made the best 
> Slytherins ever, but most lamentably fall short of the ideal where 
> their ancestry is concerned. 
> a_svirn
>


bboyminn:

I assume this is what you are refering to-

OotP Pg 203 - The Sorting Hat Song - 
"Said Slytherin, "We'll teach just those whose ancestry is purest."

"For instance Slytherin took only pure-blood wizards of great cunning,
just like him..."

First, we must understand that it is not likely that the Sorting Hat
is speaking in absolute truths. I believe that in the specific context
of a song, and for the purpose of illustrating the completely
different point of unity, the Sorting Hat was speaking in /general/
truths.

In general, Slytherin preferred his students to have a strong
connection to the wizard world because HE FELT that made them less of
a security risk. So, pureblood wizards with generations in the wizard
world would be the least security risk. The greatest security risk
would come, as I previously pointed out, from /freshly-minted/
muggle-born wizards.

Freshly-minted muggle-borns don't have long historical ties to the
wizard world and its culture. They don't fully understand, by way of
wizard-objective history, the potential dangers nor have the proper
perspective. So, to some extent, Salazar's fears were justified, or at
least they had a valid foundation.

Yet, if the Sorting Hat /IS/ making an absolute statement of
indisputable fact, then how can we explain the presents of half-bloods
and mixed-bloods in Slytherin House? Snape himself is a perfect
example, he is a first generation mixed-blood; mother a witch, father
a muggle. How can we explain his presents in Slytherin House if we are
going to insist on the absolute purity of blood? 

I explain it like this, while it may be true that Snape's father was a
muggle, I speculated his mother was from a magical family. That is,
her family, which may or may not be pureblood, at least had a
significant history in the wizard world. That history and long time
presences in the wizard world is the connection that allowed a
mixed-blood like Snape and/or Tom Riddle to be placed in Slytherin
House. Not the purity of blood, but the historical connection to the
wizard world. 

This further re-enforces my belief that Salazar was not a pureblood
racist. First let us consider the Sorting Hat's statement that
Gryffindor and Slytherin were the best of friends. Would Gryffindor
likely be friends with a pureblood racist? Well, we can only speculate
but I don't think so. However, if Salazar merely had a justifiable
distrust of muggles, muggle-borns, and those who were new to the
wizard world, that is not so much a prejudice, as a fearful practical
consideration. There was indeed a great deal at risk, as I clearly
pointed out in my previous post, should the location of Hogwarts be
revealed to fanatic over-zealous muggles. 

So we are left with believing that the Sorting Hat is a liar that is
not doing it job, or is at least compromising its mandate, or that
Salazar is not the pureblood racist he is made out to be.

Note that we have seen mixed-bloods in Slytherin House, but we have
never seen a muggle-born. Of course, the books haven't flat out said
there are no muggle-born in Slytherin, but I don't think we have any
evidence that they ARE there.

Further, on the nature of the Sorting Hat, perhaps it doesn't not pick
the House in which a student is absolutely and ideally suited, a
somewhat impossible task, but instead picks the House in which a
student is /best/ suited. 

That is, you don't have to match the criteria of a House to
perfection, you only have to be more /that/ House than any other. In
Harry's case, he seemed suitable to more than one House, but in the
end, the Sorting Hat decided his best fit was Gryffindor. The same is
true of Hermione, she could have been Ravenclaw or Gryffindor, but in
the end, the Sorting Hat decided that Gryffindor was the best fit. In
either Harry or Hermione's case, the choice wasn't a perfect fit, but
merely better than the rest. That could also explain the presence of
non-purebloods in Slytherin House.

Regardless of whether that is true is somewhat irrelavant, because we
are discussing the nature of Slytherin House, and not the nature of
the Sorting Hat. My main point was that it is rediculous to believe
that all Slytherins are evil pureblood racist, when we have NOT indeed
seen all Slytherins nor have we seen a majority of Slytherins. We have
seen a very select group though Harry's eyes. 

Slytherins may be proud, cunning, nasty, ambitious, greedy and many
other things, but that doesn't automatically make them evil pureblood
racists.

Just passing it along.

Steve/bboyminn