[HPforGrownups] Gryffindor & Slytherin roles (was Villain!Dumbledore)

[Lenore]

No: HPFGUIDX 177707


Adam wrote:
>Griffindor is not white and Slytherin is not black.  These groups
>cannot be compared to race, or even religion or political affiliation.

Lenore:
In the Gryffindor perception, they ARE white/good and Slytherin
is black/evil.  It is a very simplistic and unreflective viewpoint.  It
really says less about Slytherin than it does about the Gryffindor
attitude, which is more about unexamined assumptions than anything
else.

Adam:
>Slytherin actually IS worse than Griffindor.  It is not a view that
>some characters have.  In the world JKR has created, Slytherin
>represents what is wrong with humanity.  It represents intolerance and
>selfishness and a proclivity for evil.

Lenore:
That is a view which makes it awfully convenient for the other
three-fourths of humanity!  They will never have to look at their
own misthoughts, misperceptions, attitudes, beliefs, assumptions,
etc. because they have such a convenient and willing scapegoat
upon which they can project all of their own selfishness and
proclivities for evil, and intolerance.  As is typical of such dynamics,
they have no idea that this is what they are doing.

The Gryffindors are, in a word, enablers who make sure that
the Slytherins stay in their place and continue to carry out
their role as scapegoats-- as Objects upon which evil is projected,
in order that the three-fourths can carry on their lives in the comfort
of a delusional "goodness".  Of course, anyone can be "good", as
long as they are heaping their own errors onto someone else and
letting them carry the load (the cross?).  I suspect that this is how
we crucify one another....

It takes more courage than Gryffindor has, to look within and to
face with total honestly what one finds there.  (It takes a different
kind of courage than Gryffs have, I mean.)  And, no, I am not
saying that all humanity is evil; I'm saying that all humanity has
a share in responsibility for whatever is experienced in this world...

(snip)

Adam:
>To say that Slytherin vs Griffindor is the same as
>two races is to deny the fundamental differences JKR assigns to these
>houses.  Every evil deed we see is done by a Slytherin, and every
>slytherin we see is a jerk.  It's not a productive of a backwards
>society thinking Slytherin is responsible for all its ills.  In the
>evidence we've been shown, Slytherin is responsible for every act of
>evil that can be attributed to an individual.

Yes, that is the lie which we are expected to believe, it seems.
It was because it is such a blatant lie that I really expected and
hoped in the final book that it would be exposed as the lie it is.

Lenore