Houses / Sorting "too soon"

[Matt]

No: HPFGUIDX 173368

I wrote: 
> > I think that Dumbledore blames Voldemort much more 
> > than the house system for creating and exploiting
> > divisions.  (Indeed, it would be a bit strange to look 
> > at Snape, the Slytherin in love with a Gryffindor, and 
> > conclude that it was the house system driving students 
> > apart.)

---"littleleahstill" <leahstill at ...> replied:
> But Snape was love with Lily long before the Sorting Hat 
> got to work.  It was in part the malign influence of his 
> house companions that led to their separation.  From the 
> moment they sit at different tables Snape and Lily are 
> severed.

I disagree on the last point.  At least based on Snape's
recollections, they remained close for almost five years after that,
until the post-O.W.L. incident in which Snape called her a "mudblood."  

And Snape didn't pick up that anti-Muggle prejudice at Hogwarts -- he
was just as quick to dismiss Petunia as worthless for her lack of
magical talent in the memories we see from when they were little kids.
  He fell in with the proto-DE group not just because of where the
Sorting Hat placed him but because that was where his political views
fit most naturally.

-- Matt