Sorting Hat (was: muggle baiting...)

[houyhnhnm102]

No: HPFGUIDX 155894

Arwen:

> I just had to respond to some of these comments about 
> my house.  We are told that Gryffindors are courageous.  
> We are also told that they are noble and chivalrous.

houyhnhnm:

But they are not *better* than the other houses. The 
Gyffindor way of approaching life is one way of being 
a good person.  It is also one way of being a not so 
good person (impulsive, reckless, arrogant).  Being 
loyal and hardworking is another way of being a good 
person.  Creating new knowledge through intellectual 
endeavor is another. Likewise there are other ways of 
being a not so good person, such as being clannish and 
hidebound or cold, aloof, and disconnected from the 
problems of other people.

Some see the Potter books as a story of good guys versus 
bad guys.  I see them as being ultimately about harmony 
versus disharmony or balance versus imbalance.  I think 
this is what Rowling is trying to prepare her readers for 
by having the Sorting Hat call for unity of the four Houses, 
by showing us the flaws and mistakes of the heroes and 
their friends, and by telling us in interview that the 
four Houses represent the four elements (none of which 
is any better than another; all are necessary to life).

This how I think the story will end: Not with "good" 
Gryffindors beating "bad" Slytherins, but with Voldemort 
defeated by all four "personality types" of the WW working 
together in harmony.  Book 7 will tell.  Fancy a flutter?

BTW, you wrote "my house".  Was that a typo, a Freudian 
slip, or do you mean that you identify so strongly with 
Gryffindor House you feel as if you were in it?  See, 
not everybody does.  Because there are all types of people 
who read the books, just as there are all types of people 
in the RW. If I try to imagine myself into the Potterverse, 
I don't see myself being sorted into Gryffindor at all.  
So I like to look at the way the Gryffindors might appear 
to the other Houses. That makes the imaginative experience 
much richer for me than if I were to try and force myself 
into identifying with characters who are not like me just 
because they are the heroes. We're not all ESFPs.