Literally same. Something about being shoved into a personality box at eleven years old and told that’s your fate forever always felt a bit fascist, even before I had the vocabulary to diagnose it properly. Deep down I think we all knew the Sorting Hat was just British classism in a funky little song.
I bend the knee to your courage. You are on the mountaintop because of your thoughtful, considered and flip the tables, wake the f up attitude. So good.
Honestly I am taking this and framing it above my non-existent fireplace. Thank you. If I am on the mountaintop it is only because I got lost on the way to the pub and decided to start yelling.
I was never really that big into Harry Potter. I read books 1-3 and I watched the movies 1-3 then I stopped. I didn't watch the rest of the movies until much later. You brought up a lot of good points. I always thought the idea of house elves being slaves was a bit weird.
JK Rowling really went off the deep end. She spews hateful rhetoric all the time, but when she experiences any kind of push back then her victim complex emerges. But it's fine for her to call for the restriction of trans peoples' rights to be themselves.
Yeah, exactly. The house elves thing always stuck out even as a kid, like... why is slavery being played off as quirky lore? And the worst part is she clearly thought she was being progressive by making Hermione care about it, without ever addressing why the system existed in the first place.
And you are so right about the victim complex. She frames any accountability as persecution, while actively fuelling the exact kind of rhetoric that puts real people in danger. It is wild how someone who built their career on the idea of fighting oppressive systems has decided to become the Ministry of Magic in real life.
It's a great piece, well done 👏 i wasn't that invested in Harry Potter so it's not a massive loss for me. I feel like destroying books in general isn't good, but I have the urge to buy up all the Rowling works in any charity shop I pass, to take them out of circulation but then what do I do with them? Paper mache protest art? Origami? 🤷♀️P
MJ being a raging abuser still hits me hard. Ruined many childhood memories for me and a song that got me through bouts of depression, but I can not seperate the two. Can not enjoy any of his music any more.
Thank you so much. I totally get the instinct, but personally I do not think removing the books is the answer either. For me the biggest thing is walking away with a full picture of the author, the messaging baked into the work, and moving forward with intention.
I will not be giving her another penny for anything new, but at this point the old work has already been fully absorbed into the giant machine of capitalism. The profits have been siphoned off into a thousand companies and licensing deals. It is less about individual boycotts now and more about how we choose to engage with the material, with clear eyes instead of nostalgia goggles.
I agree with your points — it’s hard to ignore these cultural behemoths and the effects their ideologies have on society. But I also think people can separate the art from the artist, to a degree. It’s messy, but it’s possible.
No matter what, a creator’s voice is going to be baked into the work. That’s just how art is — it’s a reflection of the mind that made it. But there’s a difference between engaging with that work critically and engaging with it ignorantly. You can still consume — even enjoy — work made by problematic people without inherently supporting them, financially or ideologically. Piracy exists. Private engagement exists. Contextual critique exists.
It all comes down to intentionality. You don’t have to wipe every trace of a once-meaningful story from your life just because the person behind it turned out to be awful. What matters is that you know. That you’re not pretending ignorance is innocence. That you don’t build altars to authors who actively harm people. You can grieve the loss of meaning while still holding them accountable.
Look — people read Mein Kampf. Not because they agree with it, but because understanding dangerous ideology matters. That doesn’t mean we slap it on a T-shirt and call it nostalgia. It means we recognize that sometimes consuming is about education, not endorsement.
So yeah, nostalgia isn’t a moral exemption. But neither is consuming with awareness a crime. If you’re thinking critically, if you’re not contributing to the creator’s platform, if you’re willing to unpack the ideology baked into the story — then maybe keeping that book on your shelf isn’t the sin people make it out to be.
It’s not about purging every problematic artifact. It’s about refusing to pretend they’re harmless just because they comfort you. You don’t have to burn the castle down. But you better stop calling it a sanctuary.
In fact, books like Harry Potter are excellent case studies because they’re beloved and feel harmless. That’s the trap. That’s why it works. Ideology doesn’t hit you over the head with a brick — it slips into your emotional bloodstream. When something is comforting, we stop questioning it. That’s why examining baked-in worldviews in popular media is so important. You want to understand how narratives reinforce classism, racism, fatphobia, transmisogyny, and eugenic ideas? Study Harry Potter. Study Star Wars. Study Friends. Study the stuff that shaped you when you weren’t old enough to filter it. That’s not “ruining your childhood.” That’s reclaiming your adulthood.
Thank you so much for this. Honestly, you have nailed what I was trying to claw at. It is not about pretending to exist in some perfect vacuum where every book we touch is ethically sterilised. It is about refusing to engage with media like we are toddlers eating crayons. If something shaped you, you owe it to yourself to actually look at how it shaped you, not just cling to it like a haunted security blanket. Nostalgia does not mean innocence. It just means the propaganda worked when you were young enough to swallow it whole.
You are so right about ideology slipping into the bloodstream. The cultural messaging that sticks is never the stuff screaming in your face. It is the comforting stuff, the stuff that says this is just how things are, no need to question it. And the most effective machine of all is the one that disguises ideology as personal memory. Harry Potter is not just a book anymore, it is part of a billion-pound cultural industry that sells identity as merchandise. You can buy your Hogwarts house, your Patronus, your moral compass in matching socks. And then they tell you that examining the roots of it is "ruining your childhood," as if your childhood is a protected UNESCO site rather than a collection of deeply manipulated emotional imprints.
Cancel culture arguments muddy this too, because the conversation always gets flattened. It becomes "you are either pure and burning all your old books" or "you are fine with funding bigotry," when in reality most of us are somewhere in the miserable, complicated middle. Critical engagement is not cancellation. Piracy is not endorsement. Grieving something you once loved is not weakness. People who think it is are usually the ones most invested in never questioning anything that makes them feel good.
At the end of the day, the story was never really "ours." We just lived in it for a while. Now we know better. You can still love the memories. You can still laugh about your Draco Malfoy phase. But you also owe it to yourself to stop acting like childhood nostalgia is a moral alibi. It is not. Hogwarts is not a sanctuary. It is a case study. You can keep the book. Just stop pretending it was ever magic in a vacuum.
I agree-- this is a messy, difficult topic. I think in JK Rowling's case, since she is very actively causing harm right now, I wouldn't support any work that she currently puts out, but I also think it's unrealistic to expect Harry Potter to be forgotten, particularly when the books and movies were finished long before any of this current insanity. (Though I wouldn't personally buy the books now.)
And I think the line gets even more blurry when we're talking about artists from a very long time ago, who can no longer profit from their work. It's difficult. But if we completely purged the work of every author, every artist, from 100, 200 years ago who did terrible things or who held views that today we find deeply harmful-- I genuinely don't think we would have many works left. Like you say, I think it's important to engage critically, to notice how these views may have shaped their work and not be naive to possible propaganda. But erasing them is not the answer either.
But yes, I completely agree that in JK Rowling's and Kanye West's cases (both people who are very much profiting today from people supporting their work) it's not helpful for people to turn a blind eye and continue to support them financially.
I always found the essentialism of the sorting hat problematic, even before I knew what essentialism was.
Literally same. Something about being shoved into a personality box at eleven years old and told that’s your fate forever always felt a bit fascist, even before I had the vocabulary to diagnose it properly. Deep down I think we all knew the Sorting Hat was just British classism in a funky little song.
I bend the knee to your courage. You are on the mountaintop because of your thoughtful, considered and flip the tables, wake the f up attitude. So good.
Honestly I am taking this and framing it above my non-existent fireplace. Thank you. If I am on the mountaintop it is only because I got lost on the way to the pub and decided to start yelling.
Toothpaste just sprayed the counter
I was never really that big into Harry Potter. I read books 1-3 and I watched the movies 1-3 then I stopped. I didn't watch the rest of the movies until much later. You brought up a lot of good points. I always thought the idea of house elves being slaves was a bit weird.
JK Rowling really went off the deep end. She spews hateful rhetoric all the time, but when she experiences any kind of push back then her victim complex emerges. But it's fine for her to call for the restriction of trans peoples' rights to be themselves.
Yeah, exactly. The house elves thing always stuck out even as a kid, like... why is slavery being played off as quirky lore? And the worst part is she clearly thought she was being progressive by making Hermione care about it, without ever addressing why the system existed in the first place.
And you are so right about the victim complex. She frames any accountability as persecution, while actively fuelling the exact kind of rhetoric that puts real people in danger. It is wild how someone who built their career on the idea of fighting oppressive systems has decided to become the Ministry of Magic in real life.
It's a great piece, well done 👏 i wasn't that invested in Harry Potter so it's not a massive loss for me. I feel like destroying books in general isn't good, but I have the urge to buy up all the Rowling works in any charity shop I pass, to take them out of circulation but then what do I do with them? Paper mache protest art? Origami? 🤷♀️P
MJ being a raging abuser still hits me hard. Ruined many childhood memories for me and a song that got me through bouts of depression, but I can not seperate the two. Can not enjoy any of his music any more.
Thank you so much. I totally get the instinct, but personally I do not think removing the books is the answer either. For me the biggest thing is walking away with a full picture of the author, the messaging baked into the work, and moving forward with intention.
I will not be giving her another penny for anything new, but at this point the old work has already been fully absorbed into the giant machine of capitalism. The profits have been siphoned off into a thousand companies and licensing deals. It is less about individual boycotts now and more about how we choose to engage with the material, with clear eyes instead of nostalgia goggles.
Thanks! Yes maybe I could slip some house elf rights propaganda into book 4 or wherever they pop up instead. ☺️
I agree with your points — it’s hard to ignore these cultural behemoths and the effects their ideologies have on society. But I also think people can separate the art from the artist, to a degree. It’s messy, but it’s possible.
No matter what, a creator’s voice is going to be baked into the work. That’s just how art is — it’s a reflection of the mind that made it. But there’s a difference between engaging with that work critically and engaging with it ignorantly. You can still consume — even enjoy — work made by problematic people without inherently supporting them, financially or ideologically. Piracy exists. Private engagement exists. Contextual critique exists.
It all comes down to intentionality. You don’t have to wipe every trace of a once-meaningful story from your life just because the person behind it turned out to be awful. What matters is that you know. That you’re not pretending ignorance is innocence. That you don’t build altars to authors who actively harm people. You can grieve the loss of meaning while still holding them accountable.
Look — people read Mein Kampf. Not because they agree with it, but because understanding dangerous ideology matters. That doesn’t mean we slap it on a T-shirt and call it nostalgia. It means we recognize that sometimes consuming is about education, not endorsement.
So yeah, nostalgia isn’t a moral exemption. But neither is consuming with awareness a crime. If you’re thinking critically, if you’re not contributing to the creator’s platform, if you’re willing to unpack the ideology baked into the story — then maybe keeping that book on your shelf isn’t the sin people make it out to be.
It’s not about purging every problematic artifact. It’s about refusing to pretend they’re harmless just because they comfort you. You don’t have to burn the castle down. But you better stop calling it a sanctuary.
In fact, books like Harry Potter are excellent case studies because they’re beloved and feel harmless. That’s the trap. That’s why it works. Ideology doesn’t hit you over the head with a brick — it slips into your emotional bloodstream. When something is comforting, we stop questioning it. That’s why examining baked-in worldviews in popular media is so important. You want to understand how narratives reinforce classism, racism, fatphobia, transmisogyny, and eugenic ideas? Study Harry Potter. Study Star Wars. Study Friends. Study the stuff that shaped you when you weren’t old enough to filter it. That’s not “ruining your childhood.” That’s reclaiming your adulthood.
Thank you so much for this. Honestly, you have nailed what I was trying to claw at. It is not about pretending to exist in some perfect vacuum where every book we touch is ethically sterilised. It is about refusing to engage with media like we are toddlers eating crayons. If something shaped you, you owe it to yourself to actually look at how it shaped you, not just cling to it like a haunted security blanket. Nostalgia does not mean innocence. It just means the propaganda worked when you were young enough to swallow it whole.
You are so right about ideology slipping into the bloodstream. The cultural messaging that sticks is never the stuff screaming in your face. It is the comforting stuff, the stuff that says this is just how things are, no need to question it. And the most effective machine of all is the one that disguises ideology as personal memory. Harry Potter is not just a book anymore, it is part of a billion-pound cultural industry that sells identity as merchandise. You can buy your Hogwarts house, your Patronus, your moral compass in matching socks. And then they tell you that examining the roots of it is "ruining your childhood," as if your childhood is a protected UNESCO site rather than a collection of deeply manipulated emotional imprints.
Cancel culture arguments muddy this too, because the conversation always gets flattened. It becomes "you are either pure and burning all your old books" or "you are fine with funding bigotry," when in reality most of us are somewhere in the miserable, complicated middle. Critical engagement is not cancellation. Piracy is not endorsement. Grieving something you once loved is not weakness. People who think it is are usually the ones most invested in never questioning anything that makes them feel good.
At the end of the day, the story was never really "ours." We just lived in it for a while. Now we know better. You can still love the memories. You can still laugh about your Draco Malfoy phase. But you also owe it to yourself to stop acting like childhood nostalgia is a moral alibi. It is not. Hogwarts is not a sanctuary. It is a case study. You can keep the book. Just stop pretending it was ever magic in a vacuum.
I agree-- this is a messy, difficult topic. I think in JK Rowling's case, since she is very actively causing harm right now, I wouldn't support any work that she currently puts out, but I also think it's unrealistic to expect Harry Potter to be forgotten, particularly when the books and movies were finished long before any of this current insanity. (Though I wouldn't personally buy the books now.)
And I think the line gets even more blurry when we're talking about artists from a very long time ago, who can no longer profit from their work. It's difficult. But if we completely purged the work of every author, every artist, from 100, 200 years ago who did terrible things or who held views that today we find deeply harmful-- I genuinely don't think we would have many works left. Like you say, I think it's important to engage critically, to notice how these views may have shaped their work and not be naive to possible propaganda. But erasing them is not the answer either.
But yes, I completely agree that in JK Rowling's and Kanye West's cases (both people who are very much profiting today from people supporting their work) it's not helpful for people to turn a blind eye and continue to support them financially.
Happy Sunday morning and thanks for sharing this with us all