Slytherins (was Re: /Hurt/comfort/Elkins post about Draco)

justcarol67 justcarol67 at yahoo.com
Thu Aug 3 23:00:30 UTC 2006


No: HPFGUIDX 156455

Pippin wrote:
> Harry is forgetting that there were some Slytherins who defied
> Draco and stood for him at the leaving feast in GoF. They may
> be as fond of  ruthless ways and bigotted ideology as
> Draco is. But the war is not about whether ruthless
> bigots will rule the wizarding world (Umbridge is proof of that)
> but whether Voldemort will.
> 
> On that issue they stood for Harry and against Voldemort, knowing
> probably better than any other children in the Great Hall except
> Harry himself what price they and their families might pay. Those
> are allies whose bravery Harry cannot afford to ignore, IMO,
> whatever wrongheaded ideas they might have.
> 
> What Harry has to learn is tolerance, IMO. He can go on believing
> that the Slytherin philosophy is dead wrong, as long as he'll
> concede that he could be wrong about Gryffindor. Not that he
> has any doubts, just that he could be wrong without having them.

Carol responds:
At any rate, *one* of the lessons Harry needs to learn is tolerance!
Another (IMO) is that the pursuit of vengeance is evil in itself.

That aside, I agree with your post, except that I'm not quite sure
that I understand the last two sentences. Wrong about Gryffindor in
what respect? And I don't understand what you mean about being wrong
without having doubts.

BTW, not only did some of the Slytherins stand for Harry, and
presumably raise their goblets to him, everyone in the room, which
includes everyone in Slytherin and their HOH, Snape, stood up to honor
Cedric Diggory and raised their goblets to his memory. So even the
Death Eaters' children have performed one honorable and compassionate
act in Harry's sight. 

Regarding the real Slytherin, the one that JKR says we don't see
because we see Slytherin from the vantage point of the DE's children
(not to mention Harry's pov, which JKR doesn't mention), I'm wondering
if the Slytherin traits that Dumbledore attributes to Harry in CoS can
be taken to mean that Slytherin isn't all bad and Harry really would
have done well in Slytherin (if Draco and Hagrid together hadn't
prejudiced him against it from Day One): "resourcefulness,
determination, and a cetain disregard for rules" (CoS Am. ed. 333).
According to DD, Salazar Slytherin valued those traits in his students
(though, oddly, the Sorting Hat doesn't mention the first two--I can
see why DD wouldn't want it to mention the third).

It seems to me that, in HBP particularly, but even by giving Harry his
father's Invisibility Cloak in the first place, DD has been trying all
along to encourage those particular Slytherin traits in Harry, along
with cunning, a trait attributed to the House by the Sorting Hat. Why
else have Harry trick Slughorn into giving him the unaltered memory?

Carol, who agrees with Magpie that what we've seen of Slytherin so far
is unfavorable in most respects but wondering if this scene, like the
glimpses of Slytherin humanity we saw in HBP in Draco, Snape,
Narcissa, and even Bellatrix, was intended to prepare the reader for
another side of the Slytherins, one that would enable at least some of
them to work with Harry even if they can never like him or he them.
(And, no, I don't include Bellatrix in the list of possible helpers
despite her rather surprising affection for her sister.)

Carol, wondering how Dumbledore could be so objective about Slytherin
in that scene yet still imply Harry's choice of Gryffindor *in itself*
indicates that he's better than the young Tom Riddle











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