good and bad slytherins/Disappointment and Responsibility

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 175072

Magpie wrote:
<snip> Sirius was born into a Slytherin, Pureblood supremist family,
but by 11 was already showing by his choices he  was a different
person. <snip>

Carol responds:
Sirius chose to be in Gryffindor to be with his new friend, James, who
hated Slytherin. And both of them turned up their noses at Severus's
choice to be in the house that he thought stood for "brains, not
brawn," labeling him as "Snivelllus" for no other reason than that he
saw Slytherin as a place that would accept a Muggleborn and honor
intellect. (If James knew differently, perhaps he ought to have said
so. And Sirius, who doesn't even know Severus, accuses him of having
neither brains nor brawn, the pot calling the kettle Black.)  We're
looking at children's prejudices and mutural ignorance here, not a
choice based on principle or a rejection of pure-blood superiority or
the Dark Arts. Even James's choice is presumably based on his father's
having been in Gryffindor, just as Severus's choice of Slytherin seems
to be based on his mother's placement there.

Had Sirius not met the less than loveable James Potter and wanted
James to view him as "all right," he would probably have ended up in
Slytherin like the rest of his family. there's nothing to indicate
that he thinks it's a Dark or prejuciced House. And do we ever hear
Sirius expressing his views on Muggle-borns vs. pure-bloods? I don't
recall it. He certainly doesn't care about the rights of house-elves.

Carol, who sees nothing relating to principle in Sirius's choice of
Gryffindor and nothing to admire in the choice