Heroes in the Harry Potter Series/Back to Slytherin House

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 176138

> Alla:
> 
> I actually agree with almost everything you said in this post - as 
in 
> how people in general decide whether fictional character is a hero 
or 
> not, meaning that this is my approach.
> 
> But does anyone complaining that these guys aren't heroes because 
> they are not perfect?
> 
> Eh, sure people do complain about that IMO. The argument that good 
> guys stoop to the level of bad guys because they used 
unforgiveables, 
> I think was made quite often in the unforgivables thread.
> 
> I really do not want to get into unforgivables discussion again, I 
am 
> just saying that I saw plenty of arguments that when good guys do 
bad 
> things that means they are not perfect, not **good** enough.

Magpie:
I don't think that's quite the same as wanting them to be perfect, 
though. Like I personally don't have a real problem with Harry 
casting Crucio, but most of my involvement in those threads has been 
because I understand the case other people are making about it, 
which isn't really about Harry being perfect but in Harry (and 
others) living up to either the things they feel other people say 
they are in canon or just somebody they like.

Like with the Unforgivables, as I understand the problems with it, 
it's that they feel that *canon* set up these curses as something 
heroes didn't use, so that's why it brought them up short when Harry 
did. I didn't see them that way--I felt by HBP they'd been 
established as something that wasn't that big of a deal no matter 
how it seemed in GoF. But if somebody had considered that a part of 
what was supposed to make Harry a hero, it was a loss when he used 
one.

I think two things happening in arguing, because there's just nobody 
who wants their heroes to be perfect. I haven't heard anybody say 
they want to read a book where the main character just demonstrates 
good conduct throughout. But first if you don't like a character and 
his actions bug you, their little actions probably are going to bug 
you more. Sometimes people might lose sight of what's emotional and 
what's objective, so little problems get blown up into big moral 
issues. But second, some issues do mean more to some readers. Like, 
somebody who can't accept Harry throwing a Crucio might have had no 
problem with him using Imperius, even if they considered both 
Unforgivables a mistake. 

Or with Lancelot, you're saying you don't consider Lancelot a hero 
because he slept with Guinevere, which proved he didn't love Arthur 
etc. But someone could just as easily reply to that by saying that 
*you* want heroes to be perfect. Is that really what you're saying, 
though? Because reading that it doesn't sound to me like you want 
your heroes to be perfect, it reads like you just think Lancelot's a 
jerk and don't find him impressive. I wouldn't even be so sure that 
sleeping with one's best friend's wife was a deal breaker for every 
hero. Perhaps in a different story you might find it less despicable 
because of the way it happened or way it was written. So for me your 
saying "I don't think Lancelot's a hero--he slept with his best 
friend whom he supposedly loved's wife and caused all these problems 
for his own cause!" doesn't translate into "He can't be a hero 
because he isn't perfect!" Arthur's imperfect too--probably every 
hero you like is imperfect, so I don't think the problem is that 
he's failed to live up to perfection. I think it's often more like: 
I hate this hero, and here are all the ways he's an idiot. 

> 
> Alla:
> 
> Oh, but again the person does say which actions of Harry bug them, 
do 
> they not?
> 
> Probably because they know that if they just say that they find 
the 
> character to be dim witted something, their post has a chance to 
be 
> be well, ignored in the discussion as argument with no support, 
> unless person is doing an opinion piece obviously. 
> 
> So, again, how is it mutually exclusive from what Bart said. 
People 
> do complain which actions of the characters make them less heroic, 
> while probably basing their complaints on what you said **general 
> dislike of the character**.

Magpie:
For me it's that I don't think saying which actions of Harry's bug a 
person does not mean you want him to be perfect. It just means those 
actions of Harry's bug you. These actions of Harry's do make him 
seem less heroic to them, but that doesn't necessarily mean they 
can't stand flaws in the character. They don't like these flaws of 
Harry's (possibly at least partly because of the way they're 
presented more than just what he does), or don't like these actions 
of Harry's. But maybe they love, say, Snape and think he's a hero 
and when confronted with his flaws think they're fine. So they do 
like flawed heroes--they just like flawed heroes they don't think 
are wastes of space.:-)

Steve:
As an extension of this last aspect, I don't think
Mr. Slytherin was quite as racist as he is made out to
be. Yes, Slytherin favored pure-blood. He felt it was
safer to keep magic within magical families. But, he
was justified in feeling this way. This was a time
of persecution, and by switching from many remote
Apprentice Schools to a single central universal school,
the wizard world was placing itself at great risk. It
is not by accident that Hogwarts is a walled fortress.

Magpie:
Mr. Slytherin put a basilisk in the school to kill Muggle-borns and 
cleanse the school of them. While I would have liked to have found 
out there was some mistake in the real idea behind Slytherin and the 
split amongst the founders, this really does seem to be in line with 
what was originally intended. We did not find out that Tom Riddle 
was wrong about Slytherin's "noble work" and that the basilisk was 
not what it seemed or perverted by Tom Riddle.

I do agree that being Pureblood obviously doesn't mean you're 
bigoted. However, we should remember you're not Sorted for your 
bloodline. All the Weasleys are in Gryffindor, despite their Pure-
blood. They don't view it the same way it's viewed by some others. 
Snape and Riddle were Half-bloods, and while they probably weren't 
Sorted for being bigots I think canon does point to their 
personalities having something seriously bad in them. It might not 
always manifest as Pure-blood mania, but perhaps Pure-blood mania is 
a natural expression of it. 

-m (who would not be surprised at another civil war once Slytherin 
is no longer "diluted" in the author's words--this is why it's so 
hard not to read Shadow imagery into this stuff!)