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naraburns  nihil supernum  2d ago (text post)   Edited 2d ago   1891 thread views

Quality Contributions Report for October 2026

This is the Quality Contributions Roundup. It showcases interesting and well-written comments and posts from the period covered. If you want to get an idea of what this community is about or how we want you to participate, look no further (except the rules maybe--those might be important too).

As a reminder, you can nominate Quality Contributions by hitting the report button and selecting the "Actually A Quality Contribution!" option. Additionally, links to all of the roundups can be found in the wiki of /r/theThread which can be found here. For a list of other great community content, see here.

These are mostly chronologically ordered, but I have in some cases tried to cluster comments by topic so if there is something you are looking for (or trying to avoid), this might be helpful.

Quality Contributions to the Main Motte

@FiveHourMarathon:

Contributions for the week of September 28, 2026

@100ProofTollBooth:

Contributions for the week of October 5, 2026

@kky:

@YE_GUILTY:

@ThenElection:

@FtttG:

@roystgnr:

@YoungAchamian:

@KingOfTheBailey:

@Shakes:

@hanikrummihundursvin:

@OliveTapenade:

Contributions for the week of October 12, 2026

@4bpp:

@Rov_Scam:

@coffee_enjoyer:

@FCfromSSC:

@rockbier1218:

Contributions for the week of October 19, 2026

@Shakes:

@Iconochasm:

@Dean:

@Primaprimaprima:

@naraburns:

@satirizedoor:

Contributions for the week of October 26, 2026

@Shrike:

@hanikrummihundursvin:

@FCfromSSC:

@SecureSignals:

@Nerd:

@Goodguy:

@Shakes:

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JKR is notoriously bad about internal consistency in her world building, and the bloodlines = magic bit is one of them. If you’re writing to make the point that everyone should be included, maybe don’t make genetics a component of your magic system.

The books are quite explicit that while many of the pureblood wizards believe that keeping their blood “pure” is important to retain their powers, they are in fact not correct. There is never any actual indication that being more pure makes you stronger. Of the main characters: the Potter family were a pureblood lineage but Harry’s mother was muggle-born, and he is a strong wizard; Ron is a pureblood and is a moderate-to-strong wizard; Hermione is a muggle-born and is “the finest witch of her generation”; Malfoy is a pureblood and is a mediocre wizard; even Voldemort, one of the strongest wizards ever (and leader of the wizard-supremacy movement) is himself a half-blood.

Some wizards are naturally stronger than others, it’s not only about practice, but that natural talent is not correlated to “blood purity” at all. Hermione is the obvious example for this, and it’s why Malfoy hates her so much, this is not subtle in the text.

This is true, but something that I think fandom has had a very hard time accepting? Textually, it is extremely obvious in the Potter series that there is absolutely zero relationship between blood status and magical ability. Being pureblood, halfblood, or Muggleborn has nothing to do with your magical talent whatsoever, and the believe that it does is indicated to be irrational bigotry. Most of the most powerful wizards in the series are actually not pureblood (both Dumbledore and Voldemort are half-blood, for instance), after all.

Despite an American tendency to interpret it as a metaphor for race, in its original context I think blood status is a metaphor for class. Hogwarts is an exclusive British boarding school - purebloods are aristocratic families who've been going to Harrow Hogwarts for centuries, and muggleborns are lowborn or common people who aced their admissions tests and made it in, and are now rubbing shoulders with people who considered themselves their betters. Hermione, the most prominent Muggle-born character in the books, is a picture of an aspirational lower or middle-class student who has earned her way into an elite school through sheer swottery. Just watch her cringe when asked what her family does!

Anyway, that said, I think there was a fandom tendency to assume that pureblood status means something practical, and I don't think it was just far-right people. Back in the 2000s there was a noticeable trend of stories where Hermione discovers she's secretly pureblood, for instance. My guess would be that because Potter is already a series where firstly magic runs in families, and secondly people discover that they were secretly special and important all along, it's pretty intuitive to apply that same system within wizards themselves. The start of the very first book, after all, is Harry discovering that he's really a foundling prince, a special person revered in this secret world because of who his parents were. If you want to use that trope again, and the character is already a wizard, well, she-was-a-pureblood-all-along is the easiest way to do it.

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