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

[Carol]

No: HPFGUIDX 179119

> Betsy Hp:
> Hah!  Okay, *this* is a reason I can buy for deciding Slytherins 
didn't actually *fight* for Voldemort.  I suppose they just gave him 
the Slytherin version of a thumbs up and then scampered off to hide 
under their beds (at their homes, not Hogwarts, obviously).  More than
likely pushing little firsties out of their way. <bg>

Carol responds:
Are you picturing a whole horde of Slytherins leaving the Hog's Head
to fight in the battle? Why would they do that, when the whole point
of evacuating everybody to the Hog's Head (including underage students
from all houses, none of whom are being labeled as cowards) was to
allow them to go to safety? If they wanted to go home to their beds
(and they probably did), it would be counterproductive to go onto the
battlefield, which would mean leaving the Hog's Head and going all the
way to the gates and from there to the school--a long walk, as we know
from all the Hogsmeade visits. It would be much easier and much more
sensible just to Apparate home from the Hog's Head like the students
from the other Houses. (Exactly what arrangements were made for
underage students, I don't know. I imagine they side-Apparated with
older students considerate enough to help them or with Slughorn.)
Anyway, if your intention is to stay safe, the stupidest thing to do
after being evacuated to safety is to return to the battlefield.

Betsy Hp:
> <snip> Also, JKR was positioning the house to remain
at Hogwarts (for some odd reason). If all of Slytherin came haring
over the ramparts, that Hogwarts did *not* forever remove them from
the school would make no sense. Instead Slytherin remains bad, but
tolerable. Which gives our heroes a group to be tolerant of, but
also a group to smack around when the mood so moves them.

Carol:
JKR was *not* "stationing the house to remain at Hogwarts." They were
supposed to follow Filch to the RoR and go from there along the
passage to the Hog's Head, where Aberforth was waiting. Aberforth does
not return to Hogwarts until every last student has left his pub, not
to return to Hogwarts, but to go home, including the children of Death
Eaters he says were "sent to safety" (DH Am. ed. 622). (Potioncat,
does this mean that Theo Nott got sent home, along with all the other
Slytherins except Draco and Co.? I think it does.)

Obviously, no Slytherin students came "haring over the ramparts." They
evacuated to safety and stayed there, just like the majority of
students from the other three Houses, not one of whom (with the
possible exception of the less-than-brave Zacharias Smith) is being
referred to as "bad." They do what McGonagall orders them to do, and
you're condemning them for it? Why? It would have been sheer idiocy to
return to fight for either side once they'd been evacuated. The whole
*point* was to get to safety. And that means getting *out* of
Hogwarts, taking the invisible passageway to the Hog's Head, where
Voldemort could not possibly have seen them.

Carol, who thought she was done with this subject but could not ignore
such a glaring error