Of Sorting and Snape

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 175879

> Pippin:
> The Blacks aren't all dead, just extinct in the male line, as canon
> makes clear by  giving us the terminology. Teddy and Scorpius 
> survive. Harry came by the house lawfully, not by forcing out its
> original owners, so I don't see how an ethnic cleansing metaphor
> applies. Presumably some day Teddy's and Scorpius's descendants
> will occupy the house, all wizard families being interrelated.
> 
> The transformation of the GP shows that the transformation of
> Slytherin *could* happen, IMO. 

Magpie:
I don't think when the person brought up ethnic cleansing they meant 
to imply Harry killed anyone, it just pointed out that Harry's 
living in the house after the original owners and that's when the 
house is nice. Many people benefit from situations like that without 
killing the person themselves. (I consider myself to be doing this, 
certainly, as an American.)

Anything could happen in the future if we write it ourselves. It 
doesn't happen in canon.

> > Pippin:
> > What I meant is that when the House is restored to what its 
Slytherin
> > founders intended it to be, it's not creepy, gloomy and full of 
> > traps. It's warm, gracious and welcoming. 
> > 
> > Magpie:
> > Gloomy and creepy was more a factor of nobody living there for 
years. 
> 
> Pippin:
> Ahem. Kreacher was living there. He could have restored it,  if he 
had
> not been distraught over his inability to fulfill Regulus's 
command and
> Mrs. Black's deterioration. He restores it according to his 
understanding
> of what it is supposed to be like, which had to come from the 
Blacks.

Magpie:
But so what? We know the house presumably was comfortable when the 
Black lives there and that Kreacher is inspired to act like a good 
House Elf again when he's got kind owners. I accept it for what it 
is, it just seems like it's being made into more than it is, namely 
a profound, positive point about Slytherin.

Pippin:
> 
> I accept your correction about the traps, they are intrinsic and 
in fact
> the Order adds traps of their own. But Kreacher was able to change 
his 
> mind about who the wrong sort are, so  presumably Slytherins can 
too. 

Magpie:
There's a lot of things I would presume that Slytherins could do, 
independently of Kreacher. The happy ending is not about them doing 
it, though. This was obviously presented as something the story 
could tackle, but since the story doesn't go this way, I can't say 
that it will happen. 

 
> Pippin:
> By the end of the story Harry knows that parseltongue is not the
> mark of a Dark Wizard, and by extension neither is membership in
> Slytherin House.  Nonetheless I'm sure there are still people who
> get the shivers when they hear about parseltongue, have a gut
> level distrust of Slytherins and are okay with it. The question 
is, 
> does Harry still feel that way?

Magpie:
It still seems like again reaching for symbolic things about Harry 
that aren't about change in Slytherin's status because the status of 
Slytherin isn't a big change in the story. They're not all Dark 
Wizards. Harry's not terrified of them or out to kill them. He never 
was. But they are what they are and they stay what they are/were at 
the end of the story. 

Pippin: 
> Harry's introspection is not missing from the story. On the night
> of the celebration, though all he wants to do is sleep, he takes
> Ron and Hermione to Dumbledore's office, and there, in the 
> presence of the headmaster portraits, he tells them "slowly and
> painstakingly" IIRC, everything he saw in the pensieve and 
everything
> that happened in the forest. He can't be doing that for himself. He
> only wants to sleep. It's not like Ron and Hermione
> are begging him to know. He does it without magic, even though 
> the pensieve is right there, even though one of those memories
> is one he can hardly bear to think about. 

Magpie:
He tells them the new information he's learned, which is a lot of 
new information about Snape and Dumbledore. Iirc, Dumbledore's 
information about Harry was that he was awesome.

Pippin:
> 
> I've got to see that as Harry feeling that Hermione and Ron need to
> know, ASAP, the truth of what Snape  and Narcissa did. The
> chorus of headmasters needs to know too, though they know part
> of the story already. > 
> In my tradition, the honor you give to the dead is supposed to be
> the most selfless and purest act of goodness because the dead can't
> give you anything back. It's really hard for me to see Harry 
wanting
> Snape's story to be told, or naming his son after Snape, as a 
cheap 
> gesture. 
>   
> 


Magpie:
Yes, he does let people know what they did. I wasn't implying he 
didn't. This information isn't connected to a huge difference in 
Harry. 

Narcissa lied to save her son, we know. That's no big change. The 
information about Snape is more important for Harry. It explains the 
very question Harry couldn't figure out earlier--why would Snape be 
protecting him? Harry was never obsessed with proving Snape a DE 
exactly--that was just one expression of the larger problem, which 
was that he couldn't trust Snape to really be on his side when Snape 
so obviously hated him. He could accept the concept--he did back in 
PS when Quirrel tells him Snape hated him (and DD verifies that yes, 
Harry is right that Snape has reason to hate him because of his 
father) but didn't want him dead. But as Harry says in HBP, why 
would Snape regret getting his father killed? The Pensieve explains 
Snape so that he makes sense by giving him the information Harry 
lacked: No, Snape didn't care about getting James killed. But he was 
in love with Lily and vowed to protect Harry because of that 
relationship. Snape makes sense now. He really was mean to Harry but 
always loyal to Dumbledore and protected Harry from Voldemort, just 
as he was supposed to be. The effect on Harry is...well, there's not 
much specific written about it. He undertands Snape now, it does not 
seem to shake Harry's ideas about himself--understandably.

Obviously Harry does think Snape needs to be honored for that, and 
if you think it's a pure act of goodness to name his child after him 
that's fine with me. Pure acts of goodness aren't new for Harry, as 
characters often remind us. I didn't say it was a cheap gesture, I 
just disagreed with the type of change in the world at large that 
you feel is there. (I do think it's a weird gesture, but that's me.)


> Magpie:
> > Slytherins and Slytherin did not transform like the 
> > Black House under Kreacher's renewed cleaning and it was never 
> > intended to be warm, gracious or inviting to Mudbloods. 
> 
> Pippin:
> But that's not true, is it? The House was not enchanted so that it 
could
> only be owned by a pureblood, although it could have been. It
> isn't enchanted to exclude mudbloods, it's enchanted to exclude
> whoever the householder decides are enemies. The basilisk is the
> same -- it hat nothing personal against mudbloods. 

Magpie:
The Blacks had something against mudbloods and cut off family 
members who didn't share that view (and Mrs. Black put a sticking 
charm on her portrait that screamed about them all the time). You're 
still left defending the neutrality of a house and a reptile when 
they've never been the ones who are at issue here. Nobody thinks the 
basilisk is evil for killing Muggle-borns--it's Tom Riddle who's 
killing them. The basilisk is just a weapon. The house is just 
architecture. It's welcoming to Muggle-borns when the Order is 
there, because the Order is welcoming to Muggle-borns. (Similarly, 
arguments that Harry acts Slytherin-ish himself also avoid 
Slytherins.)
 
> Magpie:
> >Not one of  them rises to even the level of someone you'd really 
want to be 
> > friends with.
> 
> Pippin:
> Okay, I think I see what you're getting at here. But transforming 
the
> culture of Slytherin, like transforming the culture of the House 
Elves,
> is something only the Slytherins and the House Elves can do. What
> Harry did is win them some space and freedom in which they can
> attempt it should they choose to do so. He can cajole and persuade
> and use his considerable influence, but in the end they're going to
> have to march to the arena themselves. 

Magpie:
Exactly! Slytherins suck and they still suck the way they always 
sucked. They don't march into the arena themselves, and Harry knows 
that. They end the series the way they began it.

Pippin:
> 
> I  wouldn't be comfortable if JKR showed Harry
>  trying to make the Slytherins change, just like I wasn't
> comfortable with Hermione's efforts to pressure the House Elves
> into seeking their freedom. 

Magpie:
Well, I wouldn't want Harry pressuring them. I don't think a little 
encouragement or reaching out would be a problem, one person to 
another. But my whole view on that is obviously very different from 
the author's so not relevent. What we get are the Slytherins on 
their own showing who they are, and it's not too great.

Pippin: 
> I'm really unhappy  with the comparison of the House Elves to pets.
> Some Slytherins believe, mistakenly IMO, that the natural order of 
> things is that some should be slaves and some should be masters. 
> Some House Elves, mistakenly, believe the same thing. I don't 
> think it should make either group subhuman in our eyes. 

Magpie:
I don't think we can blame just Slytherins for believing this is the 
natural order of things. Harry ultimately learns to be a good master 
of a slave--he's the only person we see by the end of canon who 
actually owns one. Which I think is partly why people go with the 
pet analogy. It maybe makes them more happy than Harry comfortably 
owning a human being. But either way he certainly is the master of a 
slave and it does seem like the natural order of things to him too. 
I think the books are actually full of confirmations about the 
natural order of things with some higher than others, myself. 
 
> > Magpie:
> > He saves the lives of people he doesn't care for. I don't see 
him 
> > treating them with particular kindness or respect or feeling 
that he 
> > needs to; maybe I'm forgetting what you're referring to.
> 
> Pippin:
> I'm thinking about Dobby in CoS and GoF, when he thought Dobby was 
just
> plain weird. He didn't want to socialize with Dobby, he couldn't be
> comfortable with him, he certainly didn't expect that Dobby would 
ever
> be of any use,  but he still was kind and respectful. 

Magpie:
Yes, Harry is often this kind of kind and respectful and is praised 
for it. It's the same thing with the Goblin, iirc. I don't consider 
what he's doing to be all that out of the ordinary from my 
perspective--I mean, would you have treated Dobby cruelly just 
because he was odd? Especially when he's worshipful of you? I was 
thinking more about the way Harry treats people he really doesn't 
like meaning people who don't like him and treat him badly, not 
Harry not openly insulting people like Neville and Luna when he 
thinks they're weird. 

-m