Sorting Hat (was: muggle baiting...)

[dungrollin]

No: HPFGUIDX 155456

> houyhnhnm:
> And when did Gryffindor morph into the House for those 
> who Do The Right Thing?  That is really being Gryffindor-centric.
>

Dung:
No, absolutely, I didn't mean to imply that (though looking back I 
realise I may have inadvertantly done so). Sydney was wondering why 
JKR didn't put the twins in Slytherin, and I suggested that if the 
sorting hat sort people according to what traits they *prize*, 
rather than which traits they *have*, it makes more sense. So you 
can have Gryffindors not always behaving with their stereotypical 
courage (Pettigrew) or Slytherins who appear to have zero guile 
(Crabbe & Goyle), but you can also have ambitious cunning people in 
Gryffindor, because they prize having the courage to actually *do* 
stupid things like feeding magic sweets to Muggles right under their 
campaigning father's nose.

Which makes me wonder whether Arthur might have got his point across 
to the twins better if he'd pointed out that using magic on Muggles 
is a bit *cowardly*, abusing an advantage like that, particularly 
with no provocation. The finer points of wizard-muggle relations 
were always going to go over their heads (because they, like many on 
this list, think that bad people should be punished, and don't see 
that it matters *who* does the punishing) but hit their Gryffindor 
pride by calling them cowardly, and they might begin to understand. 
Just a thought...

Dung.