“Clearly, there are only four kinds of student: brave but not smart, smart but not evil, evil but not brave, and chubby.”
“Well yes, obviously.”
“And the way to teach these students is to have a talking leather hat decide which one they are and then make them fight each other.”
In hindsight Rowling’s self-loathing and hatred of any idea of self-selected identity is obvious from the text. None of her characters choose for themselves who or what they want to be.
@mhoye I’m in the minority here, but I just don’t buy the “it was always clear from the text” argument.
To your particular point: in “here’s the moral of the book” scene at the end of the first book, Harry expresses to Dumbledore his doubts about whether he was placed in the correct house, and Dumbledore tells him that the hat placed him where it did because he chose it, and that is the strongest and best reason to be placed on a particular path. In other words, the book’s Voice of Moral Authority directly refutes your reading.
I don’t think it was always there. I think she betrayed the moral fiber of her books — wrote down caricatures of the kinds of people she knew she ought to be, then got filthy rich and stopped trying to be that person.
Money and fame do seem to have a serious corrosive effect on any conscience or perspective a human being might have once possessed.
@katrinakatrinka @violetmadder @inthehands
Yes. #Billionaires should be taxed into -extinction.
I am reminded by this thread that #WaltDisney was sort of a horrible person as well.
No point really, just that pop culture likes what it likes, sugar, cocaine, violence, titillation, porn, and entertainment created by monsters sometimes...
mhoye
Paul Cantrell
Violet Madder
Katrina Katrinka 
oldguycrusty