Danger in designating an "Other" / Bad magic (wasRe: Deathly Hallows Reactio...)

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 173956


> Betsy Hp:
> If that were true a few Slytherins would have stayed for the big 
> battle at the end of DH.  They didn't.  They are less worthy than
all  the other houses.


Pippin:
Whoa! JKR doesn't give us the reason none of them were in the fight.
Why assume that it's because they're unworthy? There are emotional
ties between the Slytherins and the DE's that Voldemort could have
used to great effect. Harry rejected using the children as hostages
against the parents, but Voldemort wasn't squeamish about using
parents as hostages against their kids. 


Betsy Hp:

  Souls just a tiny bit meaner, hearts just a tiny 
> bit smaller.  They probably don't even feel pain to the same extent 
> as other houses.  (Which is why dropping a Slytherin against a stone 
> floor is good times.  Any other house and it'd be horrifying.)

Pippin:
Huh? Hermione and McGonagall *were* horrified. We don't actually get a
sense from Harry that it's good times, we get that from Ron. But Ron's
reaction isn't about payback for being a Slytherin, it's about payback
for all the times that Draco  badmouthed him, and that started before
Draco was a Slytherin at all. It's personal, not political, or rather,
Ron doesn't have the maturity or the frame of reference to see it as
political. 


The story can be read on different levels. You could see the
Slytherins as a metaphor for the selfish side of humanity and the
Gryffindors as a metaphor for the good, and you can think about how
selfishness always defeats itself. We all have a selfish part that
needs to be reminded of this.

But I think JKR makes it very clear that a problem arises when this
kind of thinking escapes from storyland and you dehumanize real people
by seeing them as symbols or metaphors. That's what the golden
fountain was all about, IMO.

I don't doubt that Harry's vision of house unity has a touch of the
golden fountain in it. Arrogance is one of his faults. But it's a bit
of a leap, IMO,  to say that JKR herself doesn't see that, especially
since  Dumbledore says frankly that the fountain is a lie and the
wizards' attitude towards their fellow creatures is one of the causes
of the war.

Pippin