Snape as infidel was Re: Kant and Snape and Ethics and Everything

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 150386

> Pippin:
> I think it's dangerous to confuse Harry's inner Slytherin with 
> Slytherin House (though Harry himself does this all the time.)
> Harry's inner Slytherin needs to be assimilated. But the Slytherins
> themselves have just as much right to be psychologically complex
> as Harry -- they can't be reduced to the qualities Harry sees
> as Slytherin in himself. 
> <snip>
> I see the attractiveness of assimilating the Slytherins, but I 
> wonder if this isn't how the rift began, with each of the Founders
> seeking power in order to make theirs the dominant
> culture, fearing that otherwise what they regarded as unique
> and valuable would be cast aside.
> I think the answer is not in assimilation,  in the houses becoming
> more alike. I think it's in seeing that what unites them is  more 
> important than what divides them. And part of that will be        
> admitting that they have scapegoated Slytherin, and that some     
> Slytherins have embraced the part.

Betsy Hp:
Ah!  Now I think I understand what you're saying, and I agree.  I 
don't want to see the Hogwarts house system come to an end.  There 
is a beauty and healthiness in allowing for the different 
philosophies and appreciating each house's strength even if it's not 
your particular thing.

I think I got hung up on the religion thing (which does bring a lot 
of extra stuff to the table, IMO).  If I think about it as different 
philosophies it jells better for me.  It's like on Star Trek you've 
got the three philosophies of Spock, Kirk and McCoy and the three 
together can take on the universe in a way they never could apart.  
Trying to mush them together into one single philosophy would never 
work, but there is a need for each man to recognize and appreciate 
the strength of the other.

So you've got Hogwarts, with its four houses.  (Let's throw in 
Scotty to make it all equal. <g>)  Kirk = Gryffindor, Spock = 
Ravenclaw, Scotty = Hufflepuff, and McCoy = Slytherin.  And 
Slytherin's been pushed out into the cold (or walked out).  But, 
just as the Enterprise isn't going to do so well without McCoy, 
Hogwarts isn't going to do so well without Slytherin.

And you know, I don't know that JKR really does see Gyffindor as 
better.  *She* prefers Gryffindor and feels she'd probably be Sorted 
there, and the Gyffindor type lends itself better to this sort of 
tale.  But it doesn't mean she doesn't get that other folks would 
feel more at home in, say, Hufflepuff.  And it doesn't mean that she 
can't see how important Hufflepuff is to Hogwarts.

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > Oh, yeah, I'm pretty much talking about DDM!Snape whenever I talk
> > about Snape.  Rather than interesting the other flavors are too
> > illogical, leading to the same dead-end.

> >>Nora:
> But note that your holding fast to DDM! generates some interesting
> problems, such as you mentioned--that not being a very nice thing 
> for Dumbledore to do.  Now, that could be actually what's going    
> on, and what is problematic is real and will probably generate    
> some further textual exegesis; but if you find it hard enough to   
> reconcile, it could also be a signal that you're running into     
> difficulties which are trying to tell you something.

Betsy Hp:
But that's the thing, it's not hard to reconcile at all.  Dumbledore 
isn't all that nice.  Sticking Sirius into his childhood home, 
sending Lupin to hang with the werewolf who turned him, returning 
Harry to the Dursleys year after year, none of those things are 
nice.  At all.  So a sudden dependence on Dumbledore not doing 
something merely because it isn't nice seems to be a deviation from 
the text.  IMO, anyway.

Betsy Hp, kinda proud of her Star Trek analogy <g>