several short replies on various things, followed by a long reply about Salazar

[Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)]

No: HPFGUIDX 183521

CJ wrote in <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183391>:

<< Which brings to mind the question: what happened to LV's wand? >>

Wormtail found it in the wreckage of the Potter house. I think he kept
it with him after that and brought it to Voldemort in Albania, but my
recollection is that Rowling said he hid it nearby, and retrieved it
when he brought Voldemort back to Britain. I think Wormtail used
Voldemort's wand after leaving his own in that gas-line explosion, but
the Priori Incantatem in GoF left out his day to day spells for
dramatic effect.

Montavilla wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183415>:

<< Percy really had nothing to apologize to his brothers for--the
argument wasn't with them but with his father. They were only involved
because they insisted on taking sides. >>

It seems that Rowling didn't agree with you. I don't know if she
thought he needed to apologize to his father at all, but it seems she
set up the Twins as the judges as well as enforcers of who is allowed
to associate with decent people, so they're the ones whose forgiveness
he needs.

Pippin wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183378>:

<< Do you think Snape would have been better off Sorted into another
House? Do you think he'd have been accepted there despite his
neediness and his grinding sense of inferiority? >>

He should have been in Ravenclaw, with his brains. His fellow
Ravenclaws would have admired his intelligence and knowledge, and all
wanted him as a study partner, and treated any pro-Dark Arts
statements he made as intellectual propositions to be discussed. 

Ravenclaws aren't saints, but they wouldn't have picked on him like
they picked on Luna, because he didn't drift around murmuring
idealistic nonsense. He would have been accepted *at least* as well in
Ravenclaw as in Slytherin. Some people from every House joined the
Death Eaters, so I can't say that being in Ravenclaw would have kept
him from making that particular big mistake. But there were Ravenclaws
he could have been friends with without having to choose between them
and Lily. 

Let's drift off on a digression about life in Ravenclaw House at that
time - of five Ravenclaw boys in one dorm, did they hate each other,
two versus three, about who was a Mudblood-lover and a goody-two-shoes
and who was not merely a criminal but a sadist? The Muggleborn boy
might have been afraid to go to sleep at night lest the boy who posted
newspaper clippings about Lord Voldemort might kill him in his sleep?

Pippin wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183452>:

<< If he didn't care about the students, why remain headmaster when
Voldemort was taking over? It would have been far easier to organize
resistance to Voldemort as Minister of Magic. >>

Maybe that's exactly what Dumbledore thought, and he really was trying
to become Minister, and Fudge was absolutely correct to suspect him in
OoP, which was not useful toward defeating LV.

Or maybe DD, having decided that he could not be trusted to be
Minister because of his power-abuse, never re-considered whether the
advantage to the war against LV of DD being Minister was worth that
risk. It is clear that he never considered whether he could CONTROL
his power-abuse enough to be a good Minister, just as he never
considered whether he was abusing his power as Headmaster and as
leader of the Order.

<< Yes, Dumbledore had a material as well as a moral reason for
planning to let Snape to kill him instead of Draco. But that plan was
spoiled when he lost the wand. At the moment on the tower when
Dumbledore decides to talk Draco out of killing him, the plan looks
completely trashed. >>

The part of the plan about making Snape into Voldemort's favorite,
most trusted, servant was not spoiled by loss of the Elder Wand.

Rlaw wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183458>:

<< Greyback hopes to gain a seat of power (so to speak) and go around
turning others into werewolves and raise his werewolf army to hate all
muggles and non-pure blood witches and wizard. >>

I can't think of any reason why Greyback would consider pure-blood
witches and wizards less tasty snacks than Muggleborn ones. I think he
hates ALL non-werewolves and, in the long run, would like to bite
Lucius, Narcissa, Bellatrix, and Lord Voldemort himself, and make them
his servants in the werewolf army.

Alla wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183464>:

<< And we have that famous quote by Sirius "Yes, but the world isn't
split into good people and death eaters" - p.302. Funnily, he is not
saying that the world is not split into good people and evil people. I
wonder. >>

I never wondered, I just assumed he was saying that just because
Umbridge is evil does not mean she is serving Lord Voldemort. Not in
the book, because there was no possiblity of allying with Umbridge
against LV, but here in discussion, it might raise the question of
allying with an evil Dark Wizard against LV (or with Stalin against
Hitler).

Zanooda wrore in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183468>:

<< back then I didn't know what to think - did DD meet with Sirius
behind the veil and used his mirror to look after Harry <bg>? >>

That's what I thought, at least the first time it happened, which made
me annoyed that it wasn't Sirius.

Pippin wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183513>:

<< No one had the primary motivation of wanting to harm others. Even
Voldemort wanted most to stay alive. >>

This is a forbidden "I disagree" post. I deeply believe that Voldemort
wanted to hurt all and sundry more than he wanted to avoid death. He
might have succeeded in avoiding death otherwise.

Potioncat wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183518>:

<< the spider-teddybear incident >>

If Ron was 3 at the time, then Fred was 5 and didn't even have a wand.
I am absolutely certain that turning Ron's teddy into a huge ugly
spider was spontaneous child magic, when the child's emotions are so
strong that some magic just *happens* with no intentional act by the
child. Like Harry turning his teacher's wig blue.

THE FOUNDERS

Betsy Hp wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183329>:

<< I still have *no idea* why Salazar was ever invited into the
original fold, >>

In the past I have suggested that the other Three thought Salazar was
less dangerous inside their group and school where they could keep
their eyes on him, than outside where none of them would know what he
was up to. I don't believe Godric and Salazar were the best of friends
despite the Hat having said so - at best, they ACTED friendly while
working together. 

Drifting toward fanfic (is that allowed now that canon is pretty much
closed?), I even theorized that Godric and Helga decided to start a
school as a way of preventing Salazar from collecting ignorant
Muggleborns and teaching them to be his vassals.

<< and I *certainly* don't understand why Slytherin House was allowed
to remain after he rubbed his true colors (never a big secret to begin
with, per the Sorting Hat) into everyone's face. >>

I think the four Founders made a magical contract that the School
would contain the four Houses, so when Salazar sulked away, the other
Three were UNABLE to close down his House without collapsing the school.

In MY Potterverse, Salazar, altho' evil, was not exceptionally racist.
(Like Steve bboyminn's
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183447>)

Professor Binns said: "They built this castle together, far from
prying Muggle eyes, for it was an age when magic was feared by common
people, and witches and wizards suffered much persecution. (snip)
Slytherin wished to be more selective about the students admitted to
Hogwarts. He believed that magical learning should be kept within
all-magic families. He disliked taking students of Muggle parentage,
believing them to be untrustworthy."

In a time when wizarding folk were hiding from Muggles because they
were (rightly) scared of Muggles, Salazar objected to taking students
of Muggle parentage because he believed them to be -- not dirty, not
less magically powerful, not less able to learn magic, not  less able
to fit into wizarding culture -- UNTRUSTWORTHY. 

In my mind, Salazar feared that students would tell their Muggle
parents and/or siblings either the location of Hogwarts, or
information about magic. Information which, if known to the larger
Muggle community, could be used to launch an attack on Hogwarts itself
or on wizarding households. To me, it was not their Muggle 'blood'
that made them untrustworthy, but their intimate relationship with one
or more Muggles.

To me, that's discrimination, but not racism. Racism would be like
'all Muggleborns are liars; they can't stop themselves'. I think there
is room to argue whether fearing that children might be loyal to their
parents is prejudice or not. The actual racism, such as the word
Mudblood, came along later, when the wizarding folk were feeling even
more besieged. 

(The more they were in danger from Muggles - scared of Muggles -
hiding from Muggles - inferior to Muggles in terms of power, the more
they talked up their alleged superiority to Muggles. They do have a
superiority, in terms of something they can do that we can't, i.e.
magic, but no reason to exclude Muggleborn wizards and witches from
that particular superiority.)

Zara wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183332>:

<< In Salazar's day, and even in Harry's, there was nothing illegal
about the notion that certain families were better and more important
than others. Nor about the suspicion that the best witches and wizards
were descended from those families, or that Muggleborns are naturally
less talented. And these notions were widespread within society, so a
wild-eyed reformer wishing to close Slytherin House and stigmatize
such views at a later date, would meet stiff resistance from a sizable
portion of the population and of the membership of Hogwarts' Board of
Governors. And all these reasonably popular and completely legal
political views, are only one of the things Slytherin House is for. >>

This is a forbidden 'I agree' reply.

Pippin wrote in
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HPforGrownups/message/183342>:

<< And I know of no parents who would want their children
indoctrinated against their beliefs. >>

This is a forbidden but deeply heart-felt 'I agree' reply. IIRC, years
ago listies were asking why Dumbledore (whom we thought, at that time,
cared about his students) didn't try to teach the Hogwarts students to
be less prejudiced, and I often replied that many of the parents are
in favor of prejudice and would object to the school teaching beliefs
with which the parents disagreed.