this post was submitted on 22 Feb 2025
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Love her or hate her (and my opinions are mixed), I must confess, JK Rowling was a huge influence on why I didn't become a regular author. No shade on people who get what they paid for, but the young reader crowd is just so gimmicky, and not in a good way, and you see that with a lot of works like Percy Jackson and Twilight (but also predominantly with Rowling's work). How do you compete in such a no-rules game?

So then let's talk about one of the cores of the issue. People often have an epiphany when divulging into Harry Potter, and they think "huh, what's the deal with this if that thing is how it is". While noting that conflicts in literary analysis don't always reflect something that doesn't add up and that it could be a hiccup in details/semantics, the questions themselves don't go away. And there's nothing that matches the amount of those having to do with Harry Potter. What example of which strikes you as the most overlooked?

If Rowling herself ever notices that I'm bringing this up, let it be known I do think of her work as a reskinned Brothers Grimm in the universe of The Worst Witch and that I'm collaborating with another author (Samantha Rinne) whose work I would argue deserves Rowling's prestige if Rowling's work deserves it. Thanks (and here is where I run for the hills).

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

Ron didn’t need to wear Great Aunt Tessie’s dress garments. He could have magicked something snazzier. He wanted to wear Great Aunt Tessie’s wardrobe.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

JK Rowling just kind of improvised vis a vis the price of things over the series. Ie. in one book a galleon is a fortune where you can afford the entire snack cart and Ron has never seen that kind of money before with his own eyes, but then the next book the school books cost 5 galleons.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago (1 children)

To be fair, I have bought textbooks that cost twice what I spend on my weekly grocery bill lol.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Yes but how could Ron never have seen a Galleon in his life and in the next book he has to buy textbooks worth like 40 galleon at the beginning.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

You aren't wrong there. Almost every book had some form of continuity error like that.

[–] [email protected] 41 points 2 months ago (1 children)

There is zero reason for the wizarding world to have social classes. Allow me to explain.

Although food can't be created with magic, any graduate of Hogwarts can cast the Herbivicus Charm (I think it's called) or the Greenhouse Charm to grow plants in moments. There's also a spell that produces fresh, clean water. They have spells that make the insides of things larger than the outside. Spells that clean dishes. Spells that levitate objects and automatically perform rote tasks.

Every wizard or witch is maybe a month or two of moderate work (at the absolute outside) away from having a private pocket kingdom with crops, furniture, fireplace, teleport pad, beds, clothing, swimming pool, pets, cattle, enchanted kitchen, self cleaning floors, and fucking golf course if they want it.

If they can't create, craft, grow, or summon something, they can buy it with money taken from an entire world of gullible muggles. Sure, dollars and yen are worthless in Diagon Alley, but you can still buy food and an enormous range of physical comforts with it. And if you absolutely have to spend money in a magical store- muggles still have gold. Even at the extortionate exchange rates that I assume the goblins would charge, the process of turning essentially free cash (in exchange for magic tricks or conjured trinkets) into gold and then into goblin coin is basically nothing but profit. A lot of it.

Which brings me back to social stratification. Why are the Malfoys considered a powerful family? Why do people differ to government functionaries and Dumbledore? Why do witches and wizards run businesses or work at all? Social hierarchy is a result of power imbalances, and other than direct, physical force, there are no power imbalances in the wizarding world. They can take your job, but who cares? You don't actually need one. They can take your home, but who cares? You can make another in a few weeks (and this time the hot tub will go on the balcony instead of in the backyard).

A wizard does not need anything from society or from other wizards.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I feel like this is explained by the really unclear ideas of the "power level" of wizards. What makes Dumbledore "the most powerful wizard" isn't ever actually given context.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Oh yeah. Fair.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

Yeah, I vaguely remember some sentences mentioning how incompetent some wizards and witches can be.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Biggest "plot hole" is that anyone still likes it. Especially now that Joanne is publicly a piece of shit. I was extremely surprised to see so many trans people and allies rush to give a person that hates them money at every opportunity.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

She’s terribly ableist too. She made an entire book disparaging people with invisible disabilities.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Cool, maybe don't ruin a perfectly good thread though.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Sorry I ruined TERF book club for you.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I think hating on Rowling is much better for the thread than talking about some silly misogynistic books.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

Then start a different thread.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Dedicated magic government doesn't have a standing army or even an official police force branch to ensure public safety, and relies on essentially a band of mercenaries to take down Voldemort.

Twice

Also:

For me it’s always the unexplained power nerfing that authors do just to advance the plot.

Harry Potter in the first 3 books was fearless, he literally took on voldemort with his bare hands.

Then when the dumbass plan with the port key cup happens, he just stands there like an idiot as the rat dude kills Cedric and revives Voldemort as if both he and Cedric don’t have wands that allow them to cast spells.

I mean they could have maybe had like 20 wizards camping the graveyard to make escaping impossible, but nah they really tried to make the coward rat guy seem like he was now somehow more capable than all of voldemort’s previously defeated plans combined.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

What do you mean by mercenaries? The magical government has its aurors, which is kind of a police force working against the dark arts. And they caught many deatheaters, though were beaten from within the ministry.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Dumbledore is quite sure the Defense Against the Dark Arts job is cursed, at least by the time of HBP. Sooo... why didn't he figure out how to break the curse?

Being able to retain a skilled teacher would be pretty compelling. Is Dumbledore really so inferior to Voldemort in regard to curses that he couldn't remove it? Or, if not, couldn't he have created a new position with a new name, and new classes to go along with it? Call it Protection From the Dark Arts or Magical Defense or something.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I don't think he meant that kind of cursed.

Probably more important is why Dumbledoor wasn't able to get even ONE fitting DADA teacher, meaning without something making him unfit for the job, seemingly or inreality, after Quirrel (and we don't know if Quirrel was a good teacher before he got Voldy in his brain).

Lockhard was an obvious fraud, Lupin was a great teacher but unfortunatly a werewolf, Mad Eye was mad/a disguised deatheater and Snape was a bad teacher all along. (Umbridge was bot chosen by Dumbledor, so she doesn't count).

Hell, what is he even doing all day? Couldn't he just do the DADA classes himself, if he didn't find anyone fitting for the job?!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

That's easily explained. All of the qualified candidates had already been tried and cycled out by the curse by book 1.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 months ago

Well this kind of got answered in the game of Hogwarts legacy.

I always was curious how they Imbued physical objects with magical properties.

Let's say, the evanescent cupboards

So these are created as a pair and connected to each other in the sense that whatever you put in one, shows up in the other

It's basically an actual functional teleporter.

Leaving aside the specific instructions for use, this thing is a massive hack.

So in the games they do sort of explain that you can add magical properties to your clothes by using magical beasts resources.

So maybe the evanescent cupboards are made of one of those beasts that teleport a short distance

Same as the paintings and such

[–] [email protected] 30 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Why are there socioeconomic classes on a society that can literally create or at least multiply any resources at will?

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago

They clearly state in the books that they cannot create resources at will. The resources need to exist first

Clearly you have not been studying for your OWLS. Focus on Gamp's transfiguration laws

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

Life, uhh, finds a way.

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