Quidditch World Cup: Why Harry Potter Fans Need To Let Go

They creep from the depths of basements where they once played D&D. They lurk in every convention center that touts Magic the Gathering tournaments. Now they are taking over large patches of grassy land to hold a huge Quidditch tournament. They are nerds, and they should be ashamed of themselves. 

Before I begin, let me state straight out that I am a card-carrying nerd, a dork, and outcast. My peculiar indulgences allow me to discuss various subjects that would be shunned at most parties.

Among those are: Captain Picard being the preeminent bad ass in the universe, Han shot first and there will never be another cartoon like Voltron. 

You see, I can dork out with my nerd out with the best of them. However, you will never catch me wearing a full costume to a premier of a blockbuster movie. 

Sure, I may think about wearing a Star Trek t-shirt on my way to a J.J. Abrams opening, but I think better before I lock the door to my house and leave. 

There is something lost on some of the sadder dregs of our nerd collective, and that is these worlds are fake. We tip-toe dangerously close to Crazyland when we play dress up. 

This brings me to the Quidditch World Cup. The last installment of Harry Potter had me sad that the tale was over. I will not give any spoilers, but I will say that it was a great ride with a fantastic ending. 

There are those that just can't let go, though. Some of us out of control nerds very proudly ride around on brooms that don't fly, chasing a snitch that is not actually enhanced by magic. 

Last year, 60 different teams from high schools and universities across the country gathered at De Witt Clinton Park in New York City for the fourth annual Quidditch World Cup.

They wore capes and ran with brooms all the while playing a fictional game invented by a fiction writer who was trying to create something like soccer, or lacrosse. 

An NPR report from 2010 shows the dream of some Quidditch players to have the fictional game become a real-life NCAA sanctioned sport. 

This is where I draw the line. It is fine to have your nerdy indulgences with friends, but playing dress up is not a sport. 

Just because you found hundreds of other people to buy into the Quidditch dream does not mean this is a valid form of entertainment. It just means dating sites are not doing their jobs. 

I am okay with Quidditch as a joke. In this CBS news item, International Quidditch Association Commissioner, Alex Benepe, goes a long way to keep this lifestyle as light and surreal as possible.

Benepe knows this is all fake. It is the reason he mandates the brooms. They make the sight of dozens of people running around a field look ridiculous, because it is. 

The IQA will never be NCAA sanctioned, because the NCAA does not oversea the wonderful world of imagination.

Look, I love Harry Potter. I want the hallowed halls of Gryffindor to be real as much as the next nerd. But there is a reason that I leave the dreams in the theater. It is the same reason I keep my shirt on when I go to the beach, the alternative scares people. 

This in not Revenge of the Nerds, and I am not Stan Gable advocating a call to arms. Like I said, I am one of you. Please, put down your beaters, capes and brooms.

You are starting to scare us all.