Yeah, I have some real problems with Dumbledore's speech to Harry there.
2) It's hard to read this and come up with anything but "Slytherin is bad", which is just... sigh. Possibly "personal ambition is bad", which goes along with Lockhart's severe punishment, but ambition is Slytherin's symbolic trait, so there you are again. Is Harry virtuous not because he fought to save Ginny, but because he chose to wear red and gold?
This, more than the point incident at the end of SS, makes me believe that Dumbledore genuinely does not like Slytherin house, but probably doesn't realize that. I think he believes he's a terribly fair headmaster, and the majority of his actions may even reveal that, but he does not like one of the houses, and they can almost certainly tell.
On point three, there's also the little problem that nearly every character we've ever met has had their position determined by their family. Sirius and Percy (and probably Snape) are the *only* exceptions to this, right down to Marietta Edgecombe. Various characters dislike or are deeply wary of Draco because Lucius was a Death Eater, and they rarely consider the possibility that he might do something else; this is extended to all other Death Eaters' children, just as it's assumed that the kids of Dumbledore supporters will do the same.
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Date: 2004-11-10 06:13 am (UTC)2) It's hard to read this and come up with anything but "Slytherin is bad", which is just... sigh. Possibly "personal ambition is bad", which goes along with Lockhart's severe punishment, but ambition is Slytherin's symbolic trait, so there you are again. Is Harry virtuous not because he fought to save Ginny, but because he chose to wear red and gold?
This, more than the point incident at the end of SS, makes me believe that Dumbledore genuinely does not like Slytherin house, but probably doesn't realize that. I think he believes he's a terribly fair headmaster, and the majority of his actions may even reveal that, but he does not like one of the houses, and they can almost certainly tell.
On point three, there's also the little problem that nearly every character we've ever met has had their position determined by their family. Sirius and Percy (and probably Snape) are the *only* exceptions to this, right down to Marietta Edgecombe. Various characters dislike or are deeply wary of Draco because Lucius was a Death Eater, and they rarely consider the possibility that he might do something else; this is extended to all other Death Eaters' children, just as it's assumed that the kids of Dumbledore supporters will do the same.