Slytherin House - LONG

[lizzyben04]

No: HPFGUIDX 177512

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Katie" <anigrrrl2 at ...> wrote:
<snip>
> Now that I see the deliberateness of making them evil...I don't 
> understand why Hogwarts just didn't get rid of Slytherin House 
after 
> Salazar Slytherin split. 
> 
> Some canon on what I mean about the deliberateness:
> 
> SS, Collector's Edition, page 77, Draco: "...but I know I'll be in 
> Slytherin, all our family have been..." THEN on page 110, "I've 
heard 
> of his family," said Ron darkly. "They were some of the first to 
come 
> back to our side after You-Know-Who disappeared...Malfoy's father 
> didn't need an excuse to go over to the Dark Side."
> 
> Linking Malfoys with generations of Slytherins and they're 
> all "Dark." Pretty obvious.


lizzyben:

Yep. And it's not just that individual people are evil, but entire 
families are evil ("all our family have been in Slytherin"), and 
entire generations of family are evil (generations of "Dark" 
Malfoys.) So... Hagrid was right! "Malfoys are bad blood, no good 
can come of them." There's actually evil *bloodlines*. Slytherins 
are bad blood, and no good can come of them.

Oh sure, occasionally a random genetic mutation produces a good 
person from a bad family (Sirius); just like occasionally a genetic 
mutation produces a magical person in a Muggle family. But blood is 
destiny, and Gryffindors & Slytherins are essentially sorted at 
birth.


Katie:
 "A rift began to grow 
> between Slytherin and the others. Slytherin wanted to be more 
> *selective* about the students admitted to Hogwarts. He believed 
that 
> magical learning should be kept within all-magic 
families...Slytheri, 
> according to the legend, sealed the Chamber of Secrets so that 
none 
> would be able to open it until his own true heir arrived at the 
> school. The heir alone would be able to unseal the Chamber of 
> Secrets, unleash the horror within, and use it to purge the school 
of 
> all who were unworthy to study magic."

lizzyben:

And at the end of DH, the same situation happens, in the reverse. 
the Chosen One re-enters the school, the Chamber of Secrets is re-
opened, and the school is purged of all who were unworthy to study 
magic (the Slytherins). YAY! Ethnic cleansing!

Katie:
> I was surprised to find such strong language and history against 
> Slytherin House...I hadn't really noticed it before. I know that 
> sounds ridiculous, but in my own mind, there was an ambiguity 
about 
> Slytherin House that allowed me to see these events in a more 
> sympathetic light. Now, I see that any ambiguity was really only 
in 
> my own mind, and JKR meant for the Slytherins to be evil from day 
> one. 
<snip> I also have to 
> reiterate that I find it strange for Slytherin House to even be a 
> part of the school at all, seeing them in the light of DH and the 
new 
> slant I have on them. Why not get rid of the House after Slytherin 
> departed?

lizzyben:

Exactly, they have no right to exist. The House should be purged 
from the school because they are unworthy to become wizards. They 
have "bad blood", which makes them evil since birth, and they are 
inferior to the superior worthy Houses. Howarts should be more 
*selective* in who it allows to enter - the unworthy should be 
excluded. All this is bad enough, but then DH invokes the heavy Nazi 
imagery to make it even worse. It's downright evil.