crosspost: the Hogwarts Houses and loyalty (with a side of Star Wars)

[anghraine]

caripr94 on Tumblr asked:

Hey there! I'm a big Star Wars fan and I've seen how you sort the characters into Hogwarts houses, such as Anakin being in Gryffindor and Padmé being in Hufflepuff, but I also see other people do the opposite because of Anakin's loyalty and work ethic and Padmé's recklessness and idealism, and I'm like "I don't know". How would you respond to that?

I think the issue mostly comes down to loyalty—or rather, what an unfortunately broad term “loyalty” is, because it can reflect very different motivations and dynamics, but fandom lumps all forms into Hufflepuff.

Specifically, fandom has a fixation on the first Sorting song, far more than a) the other ones, or b) what people in the Houses actually do and say through the books. Loyalty isn’t even mentioned as a Hufflepuff quality in the other songs; it’s not the defining trait. And even in the original song, “true friends” comes up as a Slytherin trait, so loyalty definitely isn’t just a Hufflepuff thing.

[ETA: I … accidentally wrote an essay on this. Jump to “roughly summarize” to skip it.]

As implied by the song, we see intense, highly personalized loyalty among Slytherins. One of the most iconic Slytherin moments is Bellatrix at her trial, shouting that they alone were faithful. There’s Narcissa, betraying Voldemort after years of alliance on the off-chance that her son might be saved. There’s Draco risking himself for the friend who stayed loyal to him. There’s even Regulus’s weird sort of loyalty to Kreacher.

Some Slytherins prioritize self-preservation above loyalty, but for most of them, the two are intertwined; self-preservation is not just about them as individuals but them and the people they care about or find compelling. It’s self-centered, but it’s loyalty, and loyalty that many of them are willing to sacrifice everything for.

Loyalty also comes up with Gryffindor values. Hermione’s quintessential moment as a Gryffindor rather than a Ravenclaw is when she announces that friendship and bravery matter more than books and cleverness. Friendship is framed as a Gryffindor quality there, and it will be throughout. Sirius Black screaming that Peter should have died rather than betray his friends, as they would have done for him, isn’t a sudden detour into Hufflepuff priorities; it’s a perfectly typical Gryffindor one, treating friendship as a cause in itself. Molly Weasley’s attack on Bellatrix is also framed in terms of loyalty: not my daughter. And loyalty is a huge part of Harry’s psyche.

The Slytherins’ and Gryffindors’ tightly focused, personal loyalties form a sharp contrast to the loyalty we see from Hufflepuffs. It’s not that Hufflepuffs don’t have friends or that their friendships don’t matter, just that the narrative overwhelmingly frames the characteristic Hufflepuff loyalty, the one from that first song, in terms of collective loyalty. The entirety of Hufflepuff House turns against Harry when Justin Finch-Fletchley gets Petrified. The entirety of Hufflepuff turns against him again in GOF. A wrong to any Hufflepuff is a wrong to all Hufflepuffs.

And while there’s a certain level of partisanship in all the Houses, we don’t really see that kind of absolute solidarity as a group with the others, imo. And once Hufflepuffs do accept Harry, they also prove his staunchest allies as a group; in DH, they’re specifically pointed out as the most numerous after Gryffindor, where virtually everyone is loyal to Harry as individuals.

Hufflepuffs are the real team players, where Gryffindor and Slytherin teams tend to pull together out of loyalty to a charismatic leader like Voldemort or Dumbledore. In fact, I think Hufflepuffs are probably the least inclined to be followers or take orders. And their House was formed on the basis of acceptance into their group, unlike all the other Houses’ focus on the individual. So it makes sense for them to be the way they are.

In a weird way, I think the different Houses’ forms of loyalty are best understood in the places where they’re disloyal. That is, we can see the core motivations for loyalty where they break down.

The most prominent disloyalty from a Slytherin is Snape’s and Narcissa’s betrayal of Voldemort; both do it because they care more about someone else. The most prominent disloyalty from a Gryffindor is Neville—their firmest friend otherwise—standing up against Harry, Ron, and Hermione because he feels it’s right morally, and Peter Pettigrew, because he lacks ideological commitment to friendship and the fight against Voldemort.

The most prominent disloyalty from a Ravenclaw is Marietta Edgecomb, who IIRC is never fully persuaded of the DA’s purpose and swayed by other considerations, which her own friends consider understandable in the circumstances despite their differing loyalties. The most prominent from a Hufflepuff is Zacharias Smith, who doesn’t seem to have seriously integrated into any kind of relationship at all and lacks loyalty to anyone.

Taken altogether, I think we see loyalty as a characteristic quality cutting across all the Houses, with the possible exception of Ravenclaw (no slight against Ravenclaws like me; I suspect JKR mostly just doesn’t like them much). But it takes different forms. To roughly summarize how I see it:

Slytherin loyalty is self-oriented, and breaks when a Slytherin cares more for the welfare of someone else (which can include themselves).

Gryffindor loyalty is ideologically oriented, and breaks where a Gryffindor feels a higher moral imperative, or never attaches morality to loyalty in the first place.

Hufflepuff loyalty is communally oriented, and breaks where Hufflepuffs consider themselves under threat from an outsider.

Ravenclaw loyalty is uncertain (thanks JKR), but seems contextually oriented, breaking where a Ravenclaw is persuaded by opinions and circumstances.

Considering all that, Anakin’s loyalty seems very much more the Slytherin or Gryffindor type than the Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw type. From AOTC to ESB, his overriding motivation is his desire for a peaceful and orderly galaxy along with a strong commitment to individual people—and he turns on them when he perceives them as disloyal to him. He is not remotely a team player. So he’s pretty clearly a Slytherin or Gryffindor as far as that concerned.

And I don’t see him as particularly disciplined in the Hufflepuff work ethic way. He’ll do anything for what or who he believes in, but that’s not discipline at all. He’s markedly undisciplined, in fact—all wildfire. It’s Padmé who can spend months hammering away at a bill. It’s Padmé who talks about her people. It’s Padmé who smoothly operates within teams or wider organizations for the general welfare, where Anakin feels confined and restless within them. It’s Padmé who is driven by loyalty to Naboo, loyalty to the Republic as a body, who literally cannot live without it.

So: She certainly has Gryffindor qualities like rashness, but I think her sense of duty and of teamwork are much more important qualities to her overall personality, and that means Hufflepuff (she could choose Gryffindor if she wanted to, but I don’t think she’d want to). Anakin’s loyalty is of a perfectly typical Gryffindor or Slytherin kind, he persistently struggles with or gives up on communal loyalties, and he’s notoriously a loose cannon even as Vader. I see zero Hufflepuff in him and maybe a few scraps of Slytherin at most. He's a classic Gryffindor.

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original tags:

#honestly i think most major characters in these kinds of franchises are gryffindors or slytherins #simply because they tend to shine in these kinds of narratives #also - i didn't bring up my beloved 'rogue one' #but i think vader vs krennic is peak gryffindor villain vs slytherin villain