It’s funny because crows are black, I guess. Disney never says ‘these are Black people,’ but it’s very clear that’s what the crows represent. They’re like the crows in Dumbo, one of whom is actually called Jim Crow. Caricatures of Jewish people also typically depict them as money-grubbing, secretive, manipulative, and the true keepers of power in the world - you know, literally everything the hook-nosed goblins are. ‘Bu-bu-bu-bu-but wait, aren’t you the racist here? JK Rowling never said they were Jews, that’s you!’ Nice try, but hooked noses and beady eyes are very well-known racist depictions of Jewish people, popularised by the Nazis but dating back much further. Why can’t we just fight a Munglebunglefunglebeak in the forest? Why does it have to be the obviously racist goblins? Instead, we’re seeing cartoonishly Jewish antagonists that we will need to mercilessly slay as they stage an uprising. The goblin bankers are a wildly antisemitic caricature, and while I suppose the house elves are a somewhat avoidable inclusion - and at the very least are beloved characters by everyone who will overlook the fact they’re slaves - the goblins could have been left out completely. Don’t worry though, they like being slaves. Good looks are frequently associated with beauty, while ugliness of evil characters is repeatedly overemphasised, several women (and zero men) are constantly negatively defined by their emotions, and then there’s the literal slaves in the form of house elves. A Black female wizard’s skin tone changes dramatically across the movies as she’s recast with very little regard for authenticity, and the weird views on gender are clear to see with the fact the magic stairs stop boys from going to the girls’ dorm but do not stop girls from going into the boys’. Even white characters aren’t spared this - just ask background characters Anthony Goldstein and Seamus Finnigan, the latter of whom is very stupid and likes to blow things up. There are very few people of colour in the books, and those who do exist are often relegated to the background and given ridiculously stereotypical names: for example Cho Chang, whose major qualities are being good at school and… oh that’s it.
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