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

[montavilla47]

No: HPFGUIDX 179071

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Zara" <zgirnius at ...> wrote:
>
> > Betsy Hp:
> > Honestly, I think you're straining at details here.  We know Crabbe 
> > and Goyle (and Draco as well) were doing something *for* 
> Voldemort.  
> 
> zgirnius:
> Honestly, I think you are ignoring the text here. 

<snip>

> Thus, if Rowling wants me to believe from this that Slytherins fought 
> (rather than some fraction of them maybe sitting in the Forest 
> waiting for their mommies and daddies), she *really* needs to show 
> me, or at least have someone tell me. Voldemort does not, since the 
> statement under discussion is made before the final battle. And noone 
> else does later. No named or unnamed dead bodies in Slytherin school 
> uniform appear, no named or unnamed Slytherin students are seen 
> battling their classmates, nothing.

Montavilla47:

I'm beginning to wonder what the heck we're fighting about here.

Perhaps if would help if we look at a few options?

Voldemort declares that Draco did not join him, "like the rest of the 
Slytherins."  I'm going to assume that "Slytherins" in this context refers
to current students at Hogwarts (as of that morning) and not to all 
those who ever attended Hogwarts (i.e., Voldemort is not using 
"Slytherins" as a synonym for his adult Death Eaters.)

So, by the "rest of the Slytherins," Voldemort could conceivably be
talking about:

a. All the current Slytherin students from 1-7th years.
b. All the "of age" Slytherin students.
c. All the "of age" Slytherin students with a family connection to
the Death Eaters.
d. An indeterminate number of Slytherins, probably between 
5-20, who formed enough of a group that Voldemort preferred
the term "the rest" rather than "that sorry lot of three or four
Slytherins who showed up.  Stinkin' cowards."
e. The Professor and Mary Ann.

Looking at that array of options, it seems to me that it's quite
possible that not all the Slytherins who left Hogwarts joined up
with Voldemort.  It seems obvious that the first years wouldn't.

Not that Voldemort wouldn't use them if he could, but they'd
be pretty useless on a battlefield....

Heh.  No, they wouldn't.  I just realized that historically, 
children have been used on battlefields (not just by those
cruel militias we hear about who kidnap children and force
them to fight).  Children have been used to play drums and
to perform various tasks around an army.  I'm remembering 
that in Henry V (Branagh's version), there are a number of 
boys helping out--until they're slaughtered by the French.

But Voldemort doesn't need to be *lying* in order to use
the term "the rest of the Slytherins" to refer to a group that
is smaller than the entire Slytherin House body.

Moreover, it really doesn't matter, did it?  The point is that
NONE of the Slytherins cares enough about the Anti-
Voldemort cause (or Pro-Harry, take your pick) to join the
other students who rebel against the school authorities.

Thus, no flags in the RoR.

It is a Slytherin student who proposes turning over Harry
Potter--the one person who can possibly defeat Voldemort
according to the rumors--in order to save their skins.  It
is the entire Slytherin Student Body that McGonagall throws
out of the school as untrustworthy--and not one of them
even hesitates to leave (except the three who stay behind
for nefarious purposes).

And the strong implication is that SOME Slytherin students
join Voldemort's forces.  

I'll admit that Voldemort is a liar, and so we cannot take his
words as face value.  I would counter that with Harry's 
disability in terms of recognizing students who are not in
his House or his year.  It's just as possible that Harry
simply didn't recognize any Slytherin students who were
fighting Voldemort as being different from the other
"unmasked" Death Eaters as it is that Voldemort was 
deliberately lying to Lucius about the presence of Slyterin
students in his army.

Montavilla47