Good and bad expression of house traits (Was Nice vs. Good)

[houyhnhnm102]

No: HPFGUIDX 153083

a_svirn:

> I really wouldn't know *what* can be the other 
> side of fairmindedness.

houyhnhnm:

Now I am thinking of the old saw about not being "so open-minded that
your brains fall out".  So maybe lack of discrimination is a fault of
Hufflepuff.  And maybe that ties in with what Sarah is saying.

Sarah:
 
> Could it perhaps be "judgement?"  Fairness necessitates 
> certain judgement of whom to be fairest to, and when. The 
> Hufflepuffs are ready to judge Harry in CoS when they think 
> he is the Heir of Slytherin and has threatened and then 
> cursed Justin.  The Sorting Hat described them as "just" 
> which is reminiscent of justice, and judges.

houyhnhnm:

Judgementalism.  Yes.  The bad expression of a characteristic can be
an exaggeration of the trait as in courageous/reckless or
fairminded/indiscriminant, but it can also be the opposite as in
just/judgemental.  Or maybe being judgemental is really an
exaggeration, too, of being just, one that goes so far, it ends up as
an opposite.

Your example of the Hufflepuff's reaction to Harry in CoS is a good
one of Hufflepuff judgementalism.   Maybe Zacharius Smith is an
example of being "so open-minded that your brains fall out", at the
Hog's Head meeting, when he insists on hearing both sides in the
You-Know-Who-is-back-or-he-isn't debate even though the time has
clearly come for action. He is also judgemental when he is announcer
at the Quidditch match.

When lack of discrimination combines with judgementalism you get the
worst kind of Hufflepuff; you get Zacharias Smith. 

a_svirn:

> Maybe, certain detachment?  Lack of involvement? 
> Indifference? If you are always unfailingly fair, 
> you risk earning reputation of a "cold fish".

> As for Ravenclaw, I'd say eccentricity is the vice 
> of the intellectual. Usually eccentricity is a price 
> for living chiefly in one's own head. So Luna is a 
> "bad Ravenclaw" in a way, even though we all quite 
> like her. Eccentricity is a vice that is easy to absolve.

houyhnhnm:

Luna's character is a good argument for eccenticity being the vice of
Ravenclaw and so is Flitwick's.

Detachment and lack of involvement, I would think, would be
Ravenclaw's faults, too, more so that Hufflepuff's--the recluse in the
Ivory Tower who is unconcerned with the rest of humanity.  Cho Chang
might be a good example.  For all her weepiness in OotP, she strikes
me as kind of a cold fish.  The fate of her world is hanging in the
balance, but she doesn't seem to think it concerns her.

So, while Luna is a very good human being, she is a "bad" Ravenclaw,
and so, really, are Flitwick and Cho Chang.  What's missing is a
"good" Ravenclaw.  Maybe we will see one in book 7.  I would also like
to see a truly good Slytherin in book 7, not one who is merely not on
Voldemort's side, but one who uses the qualities that Slytherin
prized--ambition, will, resourcefulness, determination--for the
betterment of the WW instead of just for personal gain at the cost of
its destruction.