Slytherin House - LONG

[JP Smith]

No: HPFGUIDX 177536

I don't think we should be so harsh on the Slytherins. I think 
what the overall idea of the house is that they have the potential 
to be bad people, more so than the others.  

In Sorcerer's Stone, The Sorting Hat says:

"Or perhaps in Slytherin
You'll make your real friends,
Those cunning folk use any means
To achieve their ends"

Right there in the first book we know right off the bat what each 
house admires as good traits for their members. It's very obvious 
that above the others there are going to be more lecherous folk 
in Slytherin than the others, simply by the traits they admire, 
ambitious people always have the proclivity towards "evil". Maybe 
that was the idea of having the house, to sort of wrangle in just 
how to use these dark thoughts and ideas into something more 
productive. Or maybe the idea was, if you take the psychological 
approach, that inside each of us we all have the potential for 
dark deeds, and we must accept that fact.

Additionally, JKR never comes outright and says all Death Eaters 
were in Slytherin. Correct me if I am wrong.

Also, Slughorn wasn't such a bad guy, was he? Granted, not much 
of a hero in the end. Let us not forget Snape, as well.

Something else to think about is that we, the readers, really 
only see a microcosm of the students in the books. Draco and 
his cronies weren't the only Slytherins just like Harry and the 
gang weren't the only Gryffindor. We barely even look at the 
other houses. So it's kind of like the bad apples of the bunch, 
I think. I think the idea of the houses and their competitiveness 
is an interesting one as well. It's almost as if it's designed to 
create the in-fighting. Wouldn't it have been great if Harry's 
true love had been a Slytherin? Magical Romeo and Juliet!

I also might be the only person that actually like DH. I really 
did and I thought it wrapped the storyline up nicely.

johnsmithatx