deadcatwithaflamethrower:

Spiteful entertainment: Reading about whiny ignorant fuckheads writing about how since Harry Potter is set in Britain, OBVIOUSLY it’s gonna be all white people because Britain is totally mostly white people!

Uh. No.

This would be Britain’s census data for 1991, tracing the population changes from 1981-1991. I found it in about three seconds of Google Searching, and it would have been available as public material that could be requested at libraries after its publication. There would also have been the 1971-1981 census data, already available.

“Over the fourteen years from 1966 to 1980, the minority ethnic group population more than doubled in size, rising from 886 thousand to reach 2.1 million.”

&

“Further evidence of underestimation of the minority ethnic group population by the LFS in the 1980s is provided by the Quarterly Labour Force Survey introduced from April 1992  (using an improved sampling methodology), which estimated that minority ethnic groups formed 5.9 percent of the population in 1992.”

Okay. So the racist shitstains are gonna wail that 5.9 percent means that obviously they are TOTALLY RIGHT.

No.

See, based on JKR’s own statements and a lot of math I did last year based on actual reported IRL population numbers, the population density of magical people in Britain should be about 210,000 as of 1991, and an underage population density of 2,940, or the Hogwarts population of 2,058–a reasonable estimate reduction of 30% to allow for Squibs, homeschooling, and those under age 11.

Of course, we don’t see 2,058 students. We’re told Hogwarts supports
about 400 students. JKR only writes a population of less than 100 based on dorm
counts in Harry’s year, which is frankly ludicrous. (EDIT: And that’s the migraine showing. 280, not 100.)

The first conclusion to be drawn from
this: JKR is not capable of basic maths or basic research, and no, she
doesn’t have an excuse for this lapse. She lived near libraries, she
could have put in a bit of effort, and after she got famous she had
these wonderful things called EDITORS, who were off somewhere not doing
their fucking jobs.

So, instead, let’s be population-realistic and say Hogwarts was fully
populated per the actual population numbers the magical community in
Britain would have had in this fictional universe. 2,058 students.

At 5.9% for a miniority population in Britain, this means that 12,390 of the magical population would be composed of people who are not white, placing 174 of them as non-white school-age children. If everyone who was of age was attending Hogwarts, using that same 30% figure, there would be 142 non-white students at Hogwarts.

Set against the rest of the population? No, those numbers aren’t huge…

BUT THAT IS A NOTICABLE POPULATION. Only having a couple of students who are acknowledged not to be white is racist, it is Imperialist, and it is the writing of someone with their fucking blinders on who has no real clue about the diversity they’re living in the middle of. The woman lived/lives in London while writing quite a bit of HP. She was/is surrounded by diversity and still didn’t write it. She set Diagon Alley in London and ignored London’s blatantly obvious diverse population, which has been diverse for a very long time.

JKR has no excuse, and neither do you racist assholes who keep screaming excuses for her.

(I won’t excuse Stephen King, either, who really is from a region with a pathetic diversity ratio that just broke 5% non-white in 2010. I love The Stand, it’s a great book, but it’s racist as all fucking shit because he writes a United States that is 99.99999% white, and it’s complete bullshit. Stories he writes set in Maine with that lack of diversity? Sure, because we really don’t fucking have it. Our local schools make JKR’s Hogwarts look extremely diverse. But stories set outside of Maine? Nope, he should have known better, and he should spend his retirement editing his old books to reflect the diversity that existed in the time period those stories are set in. Yes, he really fucking should.)