Hogwarts Legacy – these accusations aren’t new and have only been emboldened thanks to the game’s early access launch (Picture: Warner Bros.)
Ahead of its public launch, Hogwarts Legacy’s critics say they’ve found further evidence of the franchise’s use of Jewish stereotypes.
While a lot of discussions surrounding Hogwarts Legacy involve JK Rowling’s comments on transgender issues, and whether that makes the game transphobic by association, there is a second controversy that has surrounded the game since more story details were revealed.
Part of Hogwarts Legacy’s plot involves a goblin rebellion, with its leader serving as one of the main antagonists. Aside from the fact that many take umbrage with the idea of what is essentially a slave race championing for their rights being depicted as bad guys, others have long suggested that the goblins are based on harmful, if not outright antisemitic stereotypes of Jewish people.
This is partially based on how goblins are the ones who run Gringotts Bank and now players have discovered an in-game item that has only increased criticisms.
The item in question is simply referred to as a goblin artefact. It resembles a musical horn and it’s in-game description says it is used by goblin rebels to ‘rally troops and generally annoy witches and wizards.’
On it’s own, there doesn’t appear to be any problem with that. Except some argue that the item is essentially a stand-in for a shofar.
A shofar is a musical horn used for Jewish religious purposes, but also during war times to signify when a battle has started.
With the shofar and this goblin artefact sharing similarities, people see this as further evidence that the goblins are explicitly based on Jews.
Despite Warner Bros. being quick to stress that Rowling herself has had no direct involvement with Hogwarts Legacy’s development, intrinsic elements created by her, for the fictional universe, continue to attract controversy and create accusations of perpetuating stereotypes.
However, Dave Rich, the head of Jewish charity the Community Security Trust, has previously said that he doesn’t believe Rowling is responsible for creating antisemitic caricatures and that she has spoken out consistently against antisemitism: ‘Her goblins are just goblins.’
‘Now, we could have a fascinating discussion about whether the traditional depictions of goblins in European culture have been subliminally influenced by antisemitic depictions of Jews (you could do the same for vampires), but that doesn’t make every goblin an antisemitic caricature,’ he stated.
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Despite the widespread criticisms and efforts by some to boycott it, Hogwarts Legacy is on track to be a major success.
Aside from it receiving mostly positive reviews from critics, it’s already broken viewer records on Twitch thanks to its early access launch, although the standard version of the game is not released until Friday.
Metro.co.uk has contacted Warner Bros. for comment.
Hogwarts Legacy launches for Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, and PC on February 10.
The PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions launch on April 4, followed by a Nintendo Switch version on July 25.
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Ahead of its public launch, Hogwarts Legacy’s critics say they’ve found further evidence of the franchise’s use of Jewish stereotypes.
