Good and Bad Slytherins

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 175063

bboyminn wrote:
<snip>
> How can anyone possibly think that Slytherins don't
> leave Hogwarts and live perfectly normal lives. They
> get jobs, they build careers, they establish 
> relationships, just like anyone else. They are just
> cunning and ambitious about how they accomplish it.
> 
> There is no reason to think that Slytherins don't 
> interact with other citizens of the wizard world 
> in a perfectly normal way. 
<snip>
> 
> Take Lucius Malfoy, ignoring for the moment that he
> became a New Death Eater; he seems a respected 
> citizen. He gives to worthy causes. To maintain his
> fortune, he must conduct business as usual, and in the
> process, he must interact normally with other citizens.
> He must be able to function in the world. I'm sure he 
> is ruthless, cunning, and arrogant in how he does it, 
> but none the less, he functions in the normal wizard 
> world. 
<snip>
> I do think there is probably a higher percentage of
> Slytherins who are willing to skirt the boundaries
> of ethics, morals, and laws to achieve their ends, but
> only a /higher/ percentage. 
> 
> I have no logical reason to believe that there isn't 
> also some percentage of Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, and
> Ravenclaws that are also willing to skirt the edges.
> 
> Again, that's not based on canon, that's based on
> common sense, something that shouldn't be abandon
> simply because we are in the wizard world.

Carol responds:

Okay, we're skating on thin ice here because there's so little canon
to back us up, but I'm going to tentatively agree with you. If there
had been no Voldemort, or if he had not returned, the WW would have
seen occasional Muggle-baiting and continuing pureblood prejudice
against Muggle-borns (the WW as we see it in early GoF), but nothing
worse. (I think the WW of the epilogue is meant to contrast with this
previously condition of "normalcy.")

If it weren't for Tom Riddle, Slytherin could hardly have earned its
reputation as the House that produced most of the Death Eaters because
there would have been no Death Eaters. Lucius Malfoy might or might
not have kept poisons and Dark artifacts in that room hidden beneath
his drawing room  (which finally shows up as the room where Ollivander
and Luna are imprisoned--I knew that hint in CoS was there for a
reason!), but he would have been a "respectable" citizen, manipulating
people and using his money and influence for his own agenda exactly as
he does in CoS and PoA.

Slughorn, a pre-Riddle Slytherin, uses his influence to get his
friends and protegees into suitable careers in return for favors.
Imagine what he might have done for Severus Snape if there had been no
Death Eaters to ruin Severus's life. And Snape himself, if he had not
become a Death Eater, might never have become estranged from Lily or
developed into the embittered, sarcastic (but brave) man he became. 

Even Mulciber and Avery might have gone in some less dangerous
direction had they not been incipient Death Eaters. Maybe Dark magic
would not have seemed so appealing to them if there had not been, so
to speak, a market for it. Macnair, of course, would have kept on
"executing" dangerous beasts for the MoM.

Draco would have been a nasty little snob, but he would never have
become a would-be murderer if it hadn't been for Voldemort (or
received the nasty shocks to his worldview that he receives in the
last two books). All we need to do is contrast the pre-HBP Draco with
the Draco we see in HBP and DH to see what he would have been like,
minus the statements of support for Voldemort which are based on his
father's DE status and his absolute ignorance (paralleling Regulus
Black's) of what being a DE really means. And Regulus Black, keeping a
scrapbook of Voldemort's press clippings, might have had some worthier
hero. 

I have a feeling that Barty Crouch Jr., whose father was so proud of
his twelve OWLs, was a Slytherin. What might he have become, with all
that intellect (shown again in his ability to  sustain the personality
of Mad-Eye Moody for ten months--I'm no Barty fan, BTW) if he hadn't
rebelled against his father and joined the Death Eaters? All that
talent gone to waste, worse by far than what happened to Severus
Snape, who was at least able to redeem himself and do some good,
however unrecognized until too late.

Rita Skeeter is a Slytherin personality type and possibly one of
Slughorn's protegees. Certainly, she uses the slytherins to find
information about Harry. Unprincipled as she is and not above using
Veritaserum on her interviewees, at least never became a Death Eater,
and she notes the use of Dark Magic with disapproval.

I've already stated my views on the "good Slytherin," Andromeda Tonks
Black (and, yes, I know, I messed up that post!) and on Severus Snape
and Regulus Black. (I also like Phineas Nigellus, a product of his
era, who accepts Snape's correction after he calls Hermione a
"Mudblood," but I realize that not everyone finds him entertaining.)

On a sidenote, I always thought of Delores Umbridge as a Slytherin
wannabe rather than a true Slytherin, just as she never becomes an
actual Death Eater despite her prejudices, preferring to exercise
power through legislation and pamphlets. (A real-world anaolgy for the
DH version of Umbridge would be a Jewish or half-Jewish supporter of
the Nazis, a turncoat who falsifies her family tree because she
doesn't want her origins known.) Her cardigan and hair bows and Alice
bands strike me as Muggle-ish. Maybe she's a Half-Blood who got into
Slytherin based on cunning and ambition, or maybe she's a Muggle-born
who altered her family tree and is lying about her connection with the
Selwyns. Still, we twice see a Death Eater named Selwyn (prresumably a
pure-blood or she wouldn't brag about the connection), so maybe she
really is related to him. Maybe he procured Mad-Eye's magical eye for
her at her request. Just tossing out thoughts and impressions here.
Please don't flame me.

Carol, who thinks that eliminating the DEs is the first step toward
Slytherin's reformation, along with giving it some heroes on the
"good" side, and rooting out the pure-blood supremacy ethic is the
second step, already begun as of the epilogue but not complete