5 Important Things In The Harry Potter Universe That Quickly Stopped Mattering

3. The House Cup

The Moment It Stopped Mattering: After Gryffindor wins the House Cup that first time. "10 points from Gryffindor" was basically Snape's catchphrase in the first book. All Harry had to do was sneeze or look at him funny for the mean old Potions master to dock the House Godric Built some precious House Cup points. Early on, this was an easy way to establish that Snape was a bad guy - that was basically the biggest possible crime he could have committed. You can only have him say to Harry "I hated your dad and I hate that you're famous" so many times before it starts to get weird. Then on the flip side you've got Professor McGonagall who throws points at Gryffindor every time Hermione answers a question correctly, which is every question all the time always. What exactly are the criteria for awarding and/or docking points? Teacher's discretion? Do they have to do paperwork every time they give or take points or does a scoreboard somewhere magically change? Crucially, none of this actually matters, because after Dumbledore gives them the W basically by saying "I don't care, Gryffindor wins, because I say so" at the end of The Philosopher's Stone, nobody cares about winning the House Cup anymore. Which naturally brings me to...