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The Social Realities of Slytherin
Trying to write down my bizarre little Alan Rickman dream last night, and I got completely sidetracked by thoughts of pro-Slytherin writers.
There's this tiny little contingent out there that has taken the idea of a very class-conscious House, and turned the Slytherins into something so very completely different from the other three houses. The example I'm thinking of was a saga set in Slytherin during Dumbledore's tenure as a student at Hogwarts, and his younger brother was sorted as Slytherin. I wish I could remember the URL, but it sort of fades in with all the other Fiction Alley stories I've read in the last couple of months. It's a rather extreme case, with the Head of House asking a student for a detailed analysis of the consequences of his actions in befriending Dumbledore's, younger, muggle-born brother. Other stories I've seen take the same sort of idea, where the Slytherins are regimented and disciplined so much more than the other houses.
And really. Good grief! They're just kids!
I'll grant Slytherins with a certain degree of awareness of rank and class, given the ambitious nature of the house, but regimented? Disciplined? These are seething balls of hormones between the ages of 11 and 18. The younger members of the house haven't completely gotten over the inherent selfishness of little children, and the older members are trying to out-do each other in the traditional high school mating dance. Add in a house that encourages ambition and you've got *less* of a chance of an organized status within the house.
You're more likely to see that sort of thing in Hufflepuff, which values (and likely, rewards) hard work.
I've got a friend who works in Washington DC for a Senator. She's not an ambitious person, and hearing all of the back-biting and in-fighting and juvenile status-conscious crap she deals with makes me think that Slytherin (and the Ministry) is going to be much the same way.
So. I'll read those sorts of stories with an amused suspension of disbelief, but lurking in my hindbrain is a little snicker at the unlikeliness of it all.
There's this tiny little contingent out there that has taken the idea of a very class-conscious House, and turned the Slytherins into something so very completely different from the other three houses. The example I'm thinking of was a saga set in Slytherin during Dumbledore's tenure as a student at Hogwarts, and his younger brother was sorted as Slytherin. I wish I could remember the URL, but it sort of fades in with all the other Fiction Alley stories I've read in the last couple of months. It's a rather extreme case, with the Head of House asking a student for a detailed analysis of the consequences of his actions in befriending Dumbledore's, younger, muggle-born brother. Other stories I've seen take the same sort of idea, where the Slytherins are regimented and disciplined so much more than the other houses.
And really. Good grief! They're just kids!
I'll grant Slytherins with a certain degree of awareness of rank and class, given the ambitious nature of the house, but regimented? Disciplined? These are seething balls of hormones between the ages of 11 and 18. The younger members of the house haven't completely gotten over the inherent selfishness of little children, and the older members are trying to out-do each other in the traditional high school mating dance. Add in a house that encourages ambition and you've got *less* of a chance of an organized status within the house.
You're more likely to see that sort of thing in Hufflepuff, which values (and likely, rewards) hard work.
I've got a friend who works in Washington DC for a Senator. She's not an ambitious person, and hearing all of the back-biting and in-fighting and juvenile status-conscious crap she deals with makes me think that Slytherin (and the Ministry) is going to be much the same way.
So. I'll read those sorts of stories with an amused suspension of disbelief, but lurking in my hindbrain is a little snicker at the unlikeliness of it all.