Slytherin as villains / Ender vs. Harry SPOILERS for Ender's Game

[pippin_999]

No: HPFGUIDX 179064

potioncat:
> My real point has nothing to do with whether LV is telling a lie; but 
> rather whether there's hope that some Cough**Theo**cough didn't join 
> LV.
> 
> Pretty much, Slytherin House appears as the villain after DH. I'm not 
> sure if JKR intended that, or if the bigger picture became blurry 
> while she worked on the smaller details. In an interview she had 
> stated that not all Slytherins had DE ties, and that some students 
> from other houses did have DE ties. If she really intended that, she 
> didn't show it.
>

Pippin:
She made it easy to assume that Slytherin House is the villain. But did
she make it *right*? Only in so much as it's fair to divide the world into
good people and Slytherins. I think I can show that we're not supposed 
to think it's wise to do that.

The assumption that the Slytherins left to join Voldemort has more
canon than we've been considering.

"There are kids of Death Eaters you've just sent to safety." says Aberforth,
(DH 31) 

The first to assume that means they joined Voldemort is Harry.

"So how come you three aren't with Voldemort?" asked Harry (DH 31)

Crabbe explains that they didn't join the evacuation.
"We 'ung back, Potter. We decided not to go. Decided to bring you to
'im." (DH 31)

Harry has his vision of Voldemort tormenting Lucius,
and here we hear him apparently confirm Harry's assumption,
"He did not come and join me like the rest of the Slytherins." ch 32

But canon offers us no proof. 

Harry sees  DE's fighting in the castle. ch 32
"while Death Eaters both masked and unmasked duelled students and
teachers." 

We see Draco pleading with (not trying to join) a masked DE. Harry
recognizes Yaxley and Fenrir among the attackers, but not as far as
we know, any Slytherin students.

After viewing Snape's memories, he passes by Ginny comforting an
injured girl.

"It's all right," Ginny was saying. "It's OK. We're going to get you
inside."
"But I want to go *home* (italics in the orginal)," whispered the 
girl. "I don't want to fight anymore!"
"I know," said Ginny, and her voice broke. "It's going to be all
right."

Here at last we are given an honorable reason to withdraw 
from the battle -- Hogwarts is not home to everyone and
not everyone has the nerve or the ability to fight a losing battle. 
And this is "all right" -- it's not cowardice or treachery.  

But Harry realizes that "he *was* home. Hogwarts was the first
and best home had known. He and Voldemort and Snape had
all found home here..." DH 33

This is the explanation for why Harry and Snape continued to
follow Dumbledore's plan even after they found out it didn't
(apparently) allow for Harry's survival. Harry and Snape were
fighting for the same thing, to save the best home they had 
ever known, and like Frodo Baggins, they fought knowing
it would not be saved for them.

Harry finds no Slytherin students in Voldemort's encampment.
And in King's Cross, he hears the following:

"That which Voldemort does not value, he takes no trouble to
comprehend. Of house-elves and children's tales, of love,
loyalty and innocence, Voldemort knows and understands
nothing. *Nothing*" (emphasis original).  

The emphasis on what Voldemort does not know turns the
reader towards what we know of these things that Voldemort
does not. House-elves remind us of Dobby, but also
of Kreacher and Regulus. "Children's tales" refers to the
Tales of Beedle the Bard, but also The Prince's Tale of the
children Lily and Severus. Regulus's  is a story of love, Snape's
story is of loyalty to Dumbledore, and Draco's "innocence" was
stressed in HBP and maintained in DH, where Draco still
refused to kill and saved the unconscious Goyle from the
fire.  

 It is of Regulus, Snape and Draco, these three Slytherins,
 that Voldemort knows and understands nothing. And if he
does not understand these three that were in his service,
it hardly seems likely that he understands the others better.
We are shown that he, unlike Harry, unwisely assumes that
Narcissa can be trusted to tell him the truth.

Harry understands that Narcissa wishes to rejoin her son, and
no longer cares whether Voldemort wins. It seems likely that
the other Slytherins, wherever they went, went only to rejoin
their families, DE or otherwise,  like the rest of the evacuees. 
Surely the Order did not leave them milling around Aberforth's 
tiny pub! 

Harry also discovers that Slughorn has joined with 
Order member Charlie Weasley to lead back to Hogwarts the
residents of Hogsmeade and the family and friends of those
who stayed to fight. Slughorn then joins Kingsley and McGonagall
in duelling Voldemort. 

Harry's understanding of Narcissa  is confirmed when he sees the 
wandless Malfoys running through the battle not even trying to fight, 
searching for their son. 

Voldemort continues to understand nothing. He scarcely seems
to believe what Harry is telling him about the Elder Wand, and that
of course is his undoing. So, IMO,  only by ignoring what canon 
tells us of loyalty, love and innocence is the reader able to think that 
the Slytherins deserve Voldemort's opinion of them.

Pippin