# Why is Slytherin allowed to exist? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 6, 2018, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717 "2018-12-06T22:45:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/41 "2018-12-09T13:38:27Z")
Ties aren’t a big problem (most games can have them, after all); it’s just that, if they could have so easily avoided them, they should have. All of the other objections really aren’t any worse than muggle sports. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/42 "2018-12-09T19:04:14Z")
> [@Yookeroo](#): > > Quidditch and the pure evilness of Slytherin are the two biggest problems in the Harry Potter universe. I would argue that throwing time travel into the series was a bigger problem than Quidditch. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/43 "2018-12-09T20:40:44Z")
Eh, time travel is not something to be used lightly, because it’s really easy to screw it up. Rowling did a good job with it, though. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/44 "2018-12-09T20:41:17Z")
> [@AlsoNamedBort](#): > > “…he also tormented 11 year olds because he was bullied in high school, but that’s beside the point.” He was bullied in high school by supposedly “heroic” Gryffindors. The Marauders were assholes. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2018, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/45 "2018-12-09T20:48:10Z")
The books were written for children. That’s not a shot; it’s a tribute to the general strength of the storytelling that they resonate with adults anyway. However, one thing kids aren’t super good at is subtlety. Children tend to have an inflexible view of good and evil, right and wrong. A realistic depiction of the four houses might impress an advanced adult reader, but it would be either boring, confusing, or both to an eleven-year-old. Kids LOVE Slytherin just being a bunch of jerks. It works for them. > [@Chronos](#): > > The only thing insane about quidditch is that the Golden Snitch should be worth 145 or 155 points, not 150. Everything else about it is no crazier than muggle sports. I cannot think of any real life sport that makes as little sense as Quidditch. No really popular sport has a scoring system so fundamentally broken. I can think of at least a few things obviously silly about baseball, hockey, football, soccer, and most any sport, but nothing so mind-bendingly idiotic as Quidditch. ---
**Author:** ![Yookeroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yookeroo/32/323_2.png) [@Yookeroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yookeroo)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/46 "2018-12-10T01:21:48Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Ties aren’t a big problem (most games can have them, after all); it’s just that, if they could have so easily avoided them, they should have. > > All of the other objections really aren’t any worse than muggle sports. Which muggle sports have a scoring system as stupid as quidditch? If quidditch were a real sport, the rules as they are wouldn’t last a decade. Maybe not a year. The people playing it would change them quickly. A sport where the main action is practically worthless wouldn’t last. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/47 "2018-12-10T02:30:03Z")
So as not to further hijack this thread, [I’ve made a new one for quidditch](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=21369191#post21369191). ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 11:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/48 "2018-12-10T11:32:00Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > What am I missing here? That the isolationist, blood-purity, elf-slave-owning faction of wizards might not be in such a minority overall? ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/49 "2018-12-10T13:18:18Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Because the Wizarding World is fucked up. You have Slytherin racists, government-employed Dementors walking around assaulting innocent civilians, and as we’ve seen in the books, give them a little nudge and they go full-one fascist within a couple of months. And that’s just the Brits - the Americans are even worse, what with their summary executions and all. > > These are not good people. And the wizarding justice system is thoroughly corrupt as well; folks with powerful friends get off lightly, while the half-giant guy gets framed. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/50 "2018-12-10T14:08:57Z")
Rick Kitchen: > [@](#): > > He was bullied in high school by supposedly “heroic” Gryffindors. The Marauders were assholes. Brave. Not everyone brave is heroic. One can be brave for a bad cause. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/51 "2018-12-10T14:39:58Z")
I would add some more to my point about Rowling’s intended audience being children; children have a very different perspective from adults on institutions and power. As has been pointed out, quite correctly and obviously, Hogwart’s is ridiculous. The place is absurdly dangerous and run by idiots who see nothing, except arguably for Dumbledore, who, when he IS aware of what’s going on, is negligent. If a real life school was in any way like this, within three days there would be no children there. The police would be called., Government inquiries would take place. Parents would be parading around the grounds with the heads of the staff on pikes. So why does Rowling, an adult who has three children and would not in a zillion years accept 1/100th of this, write it? Well, because KIDS totally believe it. Children are largely unaware of the interplay between adults. To them., school authorities are authorities to be either obeyed or, if obedience is not desirable, lied to and avoided. The idea that parents would shut a school down because it is not well run just isn’t in the universe of consideration to a 10-year-old. A school is a place where adults make all the rules, create all the structure, and there is nothing that can be done about it. To kids, the dangers of school, like bullies, are things adults simply don’t perceive, don’t care about, and about which nothing can be done. To extend that to monsters and evil wizards is fantastical, but it’s logical; in a magical world, adults would be just as oblivious and uncaring to evil wizards and dangerous beasts in a school as they are to bullies and cruel teachers in a school. The idea that one of the “houses” is more or less a bunch of Nazis is, to a kid, quite logical, and a perfect extension of their experiences in the real world. EVERY kid feels like Harry Potter, to some extent; even the ones you thought were super popular in school feel like they are outsiders, without a place in the world, perpetually fearful of rejection. Every kid sees a bunch of unfriendly other kids in their school as a monolithic clique of malevolent baddies. What the kid can’t understand, because they just are not emotionally developed enough to understand it, is that all the other kids in school feel the same way to one extent or another, and that the world is in fact a jillion times more nuanced and complex than they can even begin to imagine. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/52 "2018-12-10T15:20:34Z")
There is the question of what all these kids are doing when they’re not in class. Sure, homework takes up some time. But only 28 kids play quidditch, and that’s a sport with massive gaps between games, because it’s single round-robin. So what is everyone else doing? There’s no other interhouse sports, no group music, no journalism, no apparent groups of any kind you’d take for granted in an American middle school or high school. The entire system is set up to “other” the houses that you’re not a part of. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/53 "2018-12-10T15:54:39Z")
There are definitely other organized student activities. I definitely recall a “Gobstones club”. I’m sure no small number of students play Wizard Chess and have probably organized to some degree. There were others as well that don’t immediately come to mind. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/54 "2018-12-10T16:02:18Z")
> [@asterion](#): > > So what is everyone else doing? There’s no other interhouse sports, no group music, no journalism, no apparent groups of any kind you’d take for granted in an American middle school or high school. I believe that other stuff (or something analogous to it) is there, but Rowling just doesn’t show it to us, because can you imagine how long the books would have been if she did? ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/55 "2018-12-10T17:39:23Z")
> [@asterion](#): > > no journalism I may have been jumping to conclusions, but i thought Colin Creevey was always taking pictures for some publication. ---
**Author:** ![MarvinKitFox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ba0ec/32.png) [@MarvinKitFox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MarvinKitFox)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/56 "2018-12-10T17:42:46Z")
Well, they are in a school run by the ultimate Dark Lord of the century… Just think about it… Dumbledore murdered his sister. His gay lover, Grindlewaldt, was the prime moving force behind Hitler & WW2. His motto was “For the Greater Good”. Which philosophy he learned from Dumbledore. Dumbledore located, trained and Groomed tom riddle into becoming Voldemort. Don’t believe that tosh that they were enemies, why Dumbledore STILL has voldemort,erm, tom riddle’s award for special services to the school in the Hogwarts Trophy Room. Which voldie got for killing myrtle, and blaming Hagrid for it! Surely the “Leader Of The Light” would not keep a false trophy of voldemort on display in a place of pride for all to see?? . Dumbledore wanted to control Harry too, but that pesky Sirius Black was in the way. So Dumbledore KIDNAPPED Harry from his parents’ house, _before_ Sirius was arrested, and put him with the Dursleys. Correction… put Harry in a basket with a note, outside their door, on a cold november night!! And then failed to check up on Harry for the next 9 years? Although he later does admit that he knew Harry has gone through “dark and terrible times” with the Dursleys. And shall we mention just HOW MANY times Dumbledore hired Voldemort or one of his Death Eaters to be a teacher in the school? When he wasn’t hiring werewolves, or phychopathic pink toadwomen, that is. And just how many times did he forgive Draco Malfoy for such trivial things as… casting the cruciatus? attempting to murder a professor, but getting Katie Bell? Imperiusing Rosmerta to achieve this? How evil must the Headmaster of the school AND Head of the Wizangamot be to condone the casting of two of the Unforgivaeables by a student, with ZERO punishment? All of these clearly show that DumbleDore is the most evil wizard to grace the Harry Potter universe, So is it ANY WONDER that he lovingly supports the den of iniquity that Slytherin house has been made, even appointing hir Pet Death Eater double? triple? agent as the Head Of House for Slytherin. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/57 "2018-12-10T18:24:09Z")
> [@Sailboat](#): > > I may have been jumping to conclusions, but i thought Colin Creevey was always taking pictures for some publication. I thought that was a hobby. There’s apparently no “Hogwarts Happenings” or whatever you’d want to call it. The entire journalistic output in magical Britain, for that matter, appears to consist entirely of the equivalent of the Daily Mail (or maybe the Sun) and what most people would consider the equivalent of the Weekly World News. No magical equivalent of the BBC, even on radio. (Was television ever confirmed to exist?) No other print publications of any type: Equivalents to The Times, Telegraph, Guardian, and such are all missing, as are publications such as Private Eye, Spy, the Economist and so on. For that matter, how are new developments in magic distributed? Are there journals for publication of the latest developments in various branches of magic? ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/58 "2018-12-10T18:33:07Z")
> [@asterion](#): > > I thought that was a hobby. There’s apparently no “Hogwarts Happenings” or whatever you’d want to call it. The entire journalistic output in magical Britain, for that matter, appears to consist entirely of the equivalent of the Daily Mail (or maybe the Sun) and what most people would consider the equivalent of the Weekly World News. No magical equivalent of the BBC, even on radio. (Was television ever confirmed to exist?) No other print publications of any type: Equivalents to The Times, Telegraph, Guardian, and such are all missing, as are publications such as Private Eye, Spy, the Economist and so on. > > For that matter, how are new developments in magic distributed? Are there journals for publication of the latest developments in various branches of magic? To be fair, the Wizarding World seems to have a tiny population; there are only dozens of students in each year at the only school in Britain, and some of those students are muggle-born. The wizards probably read muggle news, and simply **pretend** to be ignorant of the simplest Muggle-devices because knowledge of “those people” is declasse’. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/59 "2018-12-10T18:55:19Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > …ambition is the defining characteristic of Slytherin, and ambition can be a virtue. He discusses the Aristotelian point of view on virtue, where a virtue is a mean between two extremes, or between an excess and a deficiency of some quality… “…You have confidence in yourself, which is a valuable, if not an indispensable quality. You are ambitious, which, within reasonable bounds, does good rather than harm. But I think that during Gen. Burnside’s command of the Army, you have taken counsel of your ambition, and thwarted him as much as you could, in which you did a great wrong to the country, and to a most meritorious and honorable brother officer…” President Abraham Lincoln to Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker, Jan. 26, 1863 ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2018, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717/60 "2018-12-10T19:06:14Z")
asterion: > [@](#): > > No magical equivalent of the BBC, even on radio. There is a radio equivalent, it’s called the Wizard Wireless Network. It’s been in the books a few times. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-slytherin-allowed-to-exist/825717.md?page=4)