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harrypotterandthefandomaccount · 1 year

Text

worthy of trust

pairing: sebastian sallow x fem!reader

warnings: sebastian being a jerk & calling you ignorant, angst, feeling like you lost a friend but he makes it up to you with a lil kiss

note: i've been obsessed with hogwarts legacy and the gameplay itself is just phenomenal. 39 hours into the game lol and still so much to do, so enjoy this sebastian oneshot. based on his questline, in the shadow of the mine i think?

important note: i do NOT support hate towards the transgender or LGBTQ+ community. JKR has made her stance very clear and i could not disagree and be disgusted with her more. this fic and future ones merely pertain to the character(s) in hogwarts legacy and to my knowledge, JKR had no part in the game. if you are still mad i play the game/write fics for hogwarts legacy, you can scroll past this. thank you!

you had no qualms about trusting lodgok since sirona ryan had known him for years, along with miriam. while the both of you had been albeit hesitant at first towards one another, he had proven his loyalty to stopping ranrok and was actively trying to be one step ahead of him - which is exactly what you, sebastian, and the others wanted.

however, when the opportunity arose to tell sebastian about lodgok, it all came flooding back to you - anne.

you and sebastian had just finished clearing out a cavern of arachnids, which quite honestly, was pretty exciting. you had even reminded him that well, spiders aren't insects.

"don't you start," he had responded, a small smirk on his face.

after finding the last piece to the tryptich and hoping to solve the mystery concerning isidora morganach, returning to the undercroft was the last step. you both were eager to see if the portrait piece would fit, and once it had been placed, you were able to breathe.

"please tell me you recognize the location in this bit of canvas," you said, turning around to face your slytherin partner in crime.

he sighed, "the good news is, i do, in fact."

your shoulders dropped, "and the bad news?"

sebastian turned to look at you, "we're in for more trouble."

you groaned, leaning your head back as Sebastian's eyes seemed to darken; gluing your attention back to your slytherin friend, he continued, "i know that coast. Ranrok has taken over a huge mine and the surrounding area. Marunweem has suffered for it. It's as bad as Feldcroft's become."

with a sigh, your eyebrows knitted together and you looked at the triptych once more. sebastian glanced towards you, "should we head there now?

you shook your head, "no, we should wait."

sebastian immediately questioned you, "why?

you gave a grimanced look, "all this time, we've been a step behind ranrok. I may know someone who could help us get head."

sebastian raised an eyebrow, "who is that?"

before you could even think about formulating your answer a different way, the words slipped out, "a friendly goblin named lodgok. he wants no part in ranrok's fight."

sebastian immediately became disgusted, angry, even. "a friendly goblin?" he started, "you know goblins cursed my sister to shut her up! said she should 'be seen and not heard.'"

you took a step towards sebastian as he stepped back. taking a breath, you nodded, " i do, but not all goblins-"

he glared towards you, "not all goblins what? have you forgotten feldcroft? have you forgotten the mine we just went through?"

you sympathized with him, no doubt. you knew how close the twins were, how much Sebastian loved anne and cared for her - but this fight against ranrok was against all wizardkind, not just anne. and you knew she would understand.

shaking your head, you tried to reason with Sebastian, "no, sebastian, i haven't. you're not listening to me."

sebastian scoffed, "why would i listen to someone so ignorant?"

ouch.

you knew sebastian could be mean, cruel, but throughout these months of knowing him, he has only been so kind, sweet and soft with you. there was never any malice towards you, no anger or disgust. towards the goblins and ranrok in conversations with you, but it was never directed. it was understandable that what happened to anne was hurting Sebastian as well, but this anger was now at you, and he was changing.

you already had reservations working with lodgok before sirona ryan said you could trust him, but there was something he wasn't telling you. but it wasn't a secret that jeopardized your working relationship with him, no. if it had been, you would have turned your back and not worked with him another day.

it wasn't ignorant at all, you knew that. a bit sketchy at first, sure, but not ignorant. lodgok had proven himself trustworthy and has helped you in being one step ahead.

you stepped back in surprise, "that was cruel. perhaps your uncle was right about you - you don't know when to stop."

sebastian glowered over you, stepping forward as his words were laced with venom, "oh, i do know when to stop. unbelievable."

taking a deep breath, you turned and walked out of the undercroft, ready to scream. you understood where Sebastian was coming from but the way he talked to you was so...angering. maybe you should have lied about who it was, about what lodgok was.

but calling you ignorant? okay, yes, this was your first year learning about magic and catching up to the rest of your peers, but you earned respect and knew - for the most part - what you were doing. you would never intentionally put Sebastian, anne, ominis, whoever in danger if you were not confident.

with a sniffle, you made your way through the dark arts tower to your common room, ready to just cry about how upset and angry Sebastian was. but before you could, ominis's voice stopped you, "coming from the undercroft, are we?"

you turned around, eyes glassy with unshed tears - albeit glad that ominis couldn't see them. you gave a small smile, "oh, yes. we were just discussing a painting we found."

ominis hummed, not entirely satisfied with your answer, "your voice is shaky. what happened?"

you let out a breath, "i - we can't talk about it here, ominis. too open."

he sighed, and with his free hand, he grabbed your arm, pulling you towards an owl statue inside a small window, before it turned around and you found yourself...well, inside a wall at hogwarts.

before you had time to question ominis of where you were, he asked once more, "what happened?"

you explained everything, just leaving out the parts where Sebastian was intent on not stopping to find a cure for anne, but moreso focused on the triptych. when you revealed who lodgok was, ominis cringed.

"oh, that's not the worst part," you said, wiping a stray tear, "he asked why he should listen to someone so ignorant."

ominis winced once more, "yikes."

you grumbled, "tell me about it. i want to cry because, well, i understand why he is upset but lodgok is a lead to stopping ranrok, to being one step ahead."

your blind friend nodded, "agreed, and if sirona trusts him, that's saying something."

you both stood in silence, the occasional sniffle from your nose giving ominis hints of how much this bothered you.

"give him time to cool off," he began. "anne is a sore spot for him, but he needs to understand that she won't be the only one cursed without your goblin friend's help. you made your way into his heart, those that he cares about. you'll be fine."

you nodded, trying to formulate your words, "thank you, ominis. i apologize for putting you in the middle of this, but it was nice to have someone listen."

ominis smiled softly, "of course, y/n. meet you at dinner?"

with a quiet, "yeah," you watched ominis make his way out of the secret room, and once again, you were left with screaming thoughts. sobs immediately racked your body, regret aching from your tears and sore throat. there was nothing left by the time you were done, face dried with tears as you composed yourself.

taking a breath, you left the room and immediately looked down, seeing a letter by the 'door.' on the top left was ominis's handwriting, but the letter itself was unopened: told you he's gone soft for you.

with a pained sigh, you picked up the letter and opened it, reading the words:

we need to talk. undercroft after dinner?

"merlin's beard."

dinner was not something you could stomach at the moment, and to be honest with yourself, you were sure it could come right back up as you made your way to the undercroft. with a wave of your wand, you opened up the clock-looking door and headed inside, anxiety eating you up like a full-course meal.

sebastian had his back to you, staring intently at the triptych until he heard the door open. his eyes met yours immediately, and he softened.

"hi," he said, biting his lip nervously as you made your way over to him.

"sebastian, i-" you began, but he shook his head. with a small smile, he grabbed your hands and held them against his chest, "it's ok."

your eyes welled up with tears, "but it's not, seb. i should've been honest with you and i wasn't. I'm sorry, you have every right to hate me."

sebastian was silent as the tears fell down your cheeks until he wiped them away with his thumb. you sniffled, looking up at him. he grasped onto your hands once more, "you were hesitant to tell me because you know how much i care for anne, for my sister. you listen to me and want what is best - that has always been you. I'm not mad at you, dove. I'm mad at merlin for making that our last option."

you gave a sad excuse for a chuckle as he smiled at you. he continued, "dove, listen to me. I'm sorry for what i said. i know you aren't ignorant; i reacted harshly about your goblin friend, but you understand why?"

you immediately nodded, squeezing his hands, "of course, seb. i know how important it is for you to find a cure for anne, and i would never jeopardize that if there was a chance lodgok could betray us. but he's good, honest."

sebastian grinned, and you continued, "i'm not mad at you either, y'know. you're good to me, seb, and i was just scared i lost you."

he held your face between his hands, thumbs softly rubbing over your cheeks as he adored you, "you could never lose me, dove. you are one of the few good things left in my life and i'd be an idiot to let you go."

you swallowed a sob as tears clouded your vision, but Sebastian hushed you, "it's okay, sweetheart. we're okay - i trust you. promise."

you nodded and gave a small smile, "i trust you too, seb. promise."

leaning forward, sebastian nudged his nose with yours, and you giggled as he mumbled, "there's my pretty dove." and with that, Sebastian sealed your lips in a kiss, your hands wrapping around his neck as he grounded himself on your hips.

maybe you should send lodgok a thank you card.

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thecarnivorousmuffinmeta · 18 days

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Unless I missed something, it seems you don't have anything about Rita Skeeter in your HP masterposts (other than "what if JKR was Rita").

I'm wondering what you think of her? I feel like I barely even remember her in canon, but fanfic uses her for everything under the sun.

You know, I think you're right anon.

Generally, she's unscrupulous as hell and will do nearly anything to chase down a story regardless of the devastation it may cause an individual (see her roasting a 14-year-old girl in a national paper to people who otherwise would never have heard of Hermione Granger but then only knew her as WHORE, including Mrs. Weasley who for a year thought Hermione was a gold digger), incredibly hard working and ambitious, very thorough with her sources, and has an unfortunate tendency to be... not wrong a lot of the time.

Say what?

Yes, I know, I know, she uses the quotes quill which is clearly intended to exaggerate a person's reactions to whatever she's saying (and infuriate them so they'll say more things to her face while they're flustered) but the woman is meticulous with her sources.

The Dumbledore book was extensively researched, with letter evidence, interviews with everyone Dumbledore had pretty much ever known in his life, and it turns out it's... pretty much... entirely... correct...

We learn that the reason Rita knows all this information she shouldn't is that she's been wiretapping (well, being a bug in a room). And that's the thing, she doesn't make things up, she does put them in the worst/most scandalous way possible (e.g. misconstruing Hermione and Harry's friendship into being romantic and theorizing what Hermione gets out of this relationship) but it's not wholesale made up.

So, I actually like Rita as a character. The woman will ruin you for a story, and is absolutely vicious and manipulative as hell, but she's just so interesting.

(And JKR clearly despises her, to a hilarious degree, Rita represents all of JKR's hatred of the British tabloids in one human form that she calls ugly.)

#harry potter #harry potter meta #harry potter headcanon #rita skeeter #meta #headcanon #opinion

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gayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy · 2 years

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Scorpius should have been a Hufflepuff I have so many reasons:

- The WHOLE point of the play is that Albus and Scorpius are NOT like there dad's witch is why Albus is in Slytherin so why is Scorpius in the same house as his dad when the whole point is that he's the exact opposite of him?

- Scorpius doesn't have any of the Slytherin traits He's not ambitious or cunning and he sucks at being a leader ( sorry Scorpius it had to be said)

- What traits dose he have? Loyalty- he sticks my Albus's side no matter what. Trough think and thin Albus's can always count on Scorpius to help him. Honest- Scorpius in the play only lied ONCE about the time Turner. Tell me how this isn't Hufflepuff traits Plus Scorpius is open and willing to call out Albus's on his toxic behavior- this is good friendship!

- The play took away the ONLY Hufflepuff character they never even brought teddy up! Not once! And the only other important Hufflepuff died! So why not have a Hufflepuff and a Slytherin be the main character 's?

- It whould be a great way to show off Draco's amazing parenting skills and how much he grew as a person and as a character. Because he made it clear in the first book that he didn't like Hufflepuff and that anyone who went there should be disappointed in themselves. So imagine his own son being in Hufflepuff. And him not only being okay with that him because proud and how Scorpius in redefining the Malfoy name and not giving a damn about pure blood tradition.

- It whould have made it easier for timeline #2 ( Gryffindor Albus and asshole Harry timeline) to be different for Scorpius and not just different for Albus. Because what if a MALFOY being in Hufflepuff is what gave Albus the courage he needed to allow himself to be sorted into Slytherin? So in the alternate timeline Scorpius is put in Slytherin and Albus goes in Griffindor.

- " But how whould this affect Albus and Scorpius's friend ship?" I think it whould bring them closer together. They both already are different from there family's and what everyone expected from them if course they would be friends even if they weren't in the same house! Plus it's very popular in the fandom where the 'Angry snarky Slytherin' And the 'Kind supportive Hufflepuff' are best friends/Lovers try and tell me that ISN'T Albus and Scorpius! Also HUFFLEBUDDY SCORPIUS'

- I'd feel like Scorpius whould do AMAZING in Hufflepuff - because Hufflepuff's are known for being accepting of everyone. So he whould'nt be an outcast. Hell he and Albus might be able to make some other friends besides each other now that there in different houses - I'd love to see the boys make friends that share the same interests as them! Plus if your not a big fan if the time travel plot this a great plot idea. Have the boys make friends have Albus and Scorpius help with inter house unity!

Anyway here's my rant and my ideas for Hufflepuff Scorpius thank you and Good night.

( Also Scorpius is Trans and Draco is 100% supportive fuck you JKR)

#harry potter #harry potter next generation #scorpius malfoy #albus severus potter #cursed child #scorbus #draco malfoy #fuck jkr #trans rights

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twinkle-light-me-on-fire · 11 months

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Ominis x Reader

This is all about their friendship starting. Or how I imagine it would.

Disclaimer: I do not agree or support JKR or her comments. I don’t own the characters except my own.

Trigger-warning: light swearing, mentions of torture, spoilers for the game

Mostly this is just angsty and fluffy friendship building.

Your shoulders shook in time with your strangled sobs. The hard stone of the Undercroft against your bottom and back as you sat, curled up against a far pillar. Your head was pounding and you couldn’t tell if it was because of the cruciartis curse you had endured or because of how long you had been crying for.

The voices in your head were relentless.

He had to do it.

You’re being dramatic.

“You have to mean it”

He wanted to hurt you..

The pain of the curse was still tingling within your skeleton and with each sob you bones ached. There was only one truth. Sebastian meant to cause you pain and even with the best of intentions that meant he was capable of hurting you in a way you never wanted to feel again.

You had been avoiding them. Even thinking about facing either of them was embarrassing. They had heard your screams and seen your body crumple to the floor next to Noctua’s corpse. Then they moved onto the next most pressing issue. Ominis pleading with Sebastian to leave and Sebastian babbling like a schoolboy in a candy store about Salazars Spellbook. All of this while you caught your breath and tried to regain something within yourself that felt further and further away as time stretched on.

Eventually you realized that no one was coming to your aid and if you wanted some comfort you needed to look elsewhere. When your thoughts cleared, you realized that nobody could know about this experience and therefor comfort was an unreasonable expectation. You let that go as well.

Until now, you had been pretending that everything was normal aside from avoiding Sebastian and Ominis. Since you were so new, nobody noticed. Nobody even batted an eye at your new behavior because you hadn’t even had time to establish a known normal. So instead of feeling ignored and used to fix other people’s problems, you made your way to the Undercroft. You needed to release yourself.

Eventually, the tears slowed and you sat in the silence until you heard footsteps.

“Hello?” you squeaked. The question caught in your throat.

“I’m so sorry, I came down to check on you and upon hearing your - well hearing what state you were in- I didn’t know what to do,” Ominis spoke and stepped into the light of the many flames in the Undercroft.

Shame, fucking endless shame exuded from you.

“This is my issue, Ominis. Don’t be sorry. I apologize for not realizing your presence sooner.” you spoke stiffly. It had been almost 3 weeks since you last spoke.

“Why are you doing this?” he asked abruptly. Did he sound angry? “Why won’t you talk to us- to me?” He was scolding you. Speaking as though you were a petulant child. You hadn’t just had a childlike squabble. For Merlin’s sake you had been tortured by people you thought were your friends. This enraged you further and all of the anger at their betrayal bubbled up.

“Why would I, Ominis? Sebastian made it abundantly clear that in his search for Anne’s cure I am an object to be used. ‘Solve this puzzle, Please talk to Ominis for me, either cast Crucio on me or i’ll do it to you’” you mimicked.

Ominis flinched at the darkness in your voice as you called out their friend.

“And fine- I can handle that, Sebastian is single mindedly focused on his goal but you… I thought we were starting to become friends. And after he did what he did your concern was on him. I lay breathless next to your ‘favorite aunts’ bones and your worry was on him.”

“You said- you consented..” he started as you yelled at him,

“What was I meant to do? I couldn’t have cast it, that is for sure.”

“I-I don’t know what to say.” he all but whispered. Then you noticed the tears on his face and all the anger, all the rage disappeared.

“Ominis, I am sorry. I have so much on my plate and I took it out on you. You’re right. I agreed. This is not your burden to bear.” you stood up and moved closer. “Please don’t cry,” you whispered.

“He is my dearest friend. I had no idea he was capable of something so cruel.” he explained. You took his hand. He lifted his head to your direction; his unseeing eyes searched your face for an answer to an unspoken question that you didn’t have the answer to.

Gingerly, you pulled him to the floor where you sat side-by-side in your grief. You both decided to forgive Sebastian because of the obvious reason- you both cared for him and for each other.

“Ominis?” you broke the silence first.

“Yes?”

“Does this mean we’re friends now?” you asked motioning to your still joined hands. He laughed softly and squeezed your hand tighter.

“We’re in this together now” He answered with a sigh, “So I suppose we are friends.”

“Fucking finally.” You nudged him as he rolled his eyes, laughing all the while.

#ominis x reader #hogwarts legacy #hogwarts legacy sebastian #sebastian sallow #ominis gaunt #the undercroft

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livebloggingmydescentintomadness · 2 years

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Hi Momdad, I'm not entirely sure how to word this, so I'm sorry if I ramble. (Honestly feel free to ignore this if you don't have time/spoons, it's not pressing.) I've been struggling recently with questions concerning purity culture ish and critical thinking skills in regards to reading and media consumption. I have friends that tend to "vet" their authors, looking up on Twitter or Google if an author has had any scandals or has been known to have homophobic, transphobic, etc. views—(1/4)

or write -phobic portrayals into their work, and if they find stuff like that, they'll tend to decide against reading the book. And I tend not to pay attention so much to what authors do or discourse on Twitter. I just read books that interest me. But it makes me question like... is it wrong to consume works written by people who are known to be [insert]-phobic here or having poor takes, or have portrayed certain demographics poorly in their writing? (2/4)

I don't have great critical thinking skills (which makes me feel dumb because I feel like I just... never learned it well in school—live in US and mid-20s, for reference) but would it not be okay to... to read things, keeping in mind potentially poor takes the author has, or has written into their work, and see how it affects the work itself? Is it bad to still enjoy a work knowing the author's a not great person (either in views or just like, bad behavior online or to fans or whatever)? (3/4)

Like I stopped having anything to do with Harry Potter outside of fanfic due to JKR, but most authors... don't have her level of reach and power and sway, I feel? I don't know. I feel silly for struggling with these questions but they always come to mind whenever my friends share the latest ish with authors and whatnot. I'm sorry for such a long ask. x_x; I hope you're doing all right, and thank you for always being such a comforting presence online here. (4/4)

hello, dear! i think this is an issue that a lot of people are questioning right now, and i'd like to compliment you on, in fact, having the critical thinking skills to question whether this is the right thing to do and ask someone else their opinion instead of mindlessly following everyone else. the fact that you want to consider this topic carefully reflects well on you, i think.

so, i have strong feelings about purity culture, largely because i was raised as a homeschooled conservative in texas, and i spent my adolescence in the baptist church. i signed a purity pledge and wore a purity ring, the whole nine yards. having broken out of that mind-prison, i have absolutely no patience for anyone trying to talk me back into it.

BUT, i think this topic does, in fact, have nuance, as almost everything does, and there is no one-size-fits-all answer to every piece of media, so we need to keep considering this from multiple angles.

i know i'm going to have a lot to say here and this post is already long, so i'm going to break them down into separate chunks for ease of my writing and your reading.

EDIT: i tried to put this as bullets with spaces between them, but posting removed the spaces, making it harder to read. i’m going to replace the bullets with an emoji symbol.

🔸 first off, we have to understand and accept that there is no such thing as "moral purity" or "unproblematic media", much less unproblematic humans. humans are inherently flawed. humans make mistakes. humans commit selfish acts. humans fuck up and do the wrong thing, even if they don't mean to. most people have bad opinions about something, if you ask long enough. i'm certainly not morally pure, and you should NEVER trust someone who claims that THEY are.

🔸 part of the issue with purity culture, in this context, is the way it flattens everything to issues of black and white, so that everything Bad becomes equally bad by virtue of being ~problematic~. thereby, an active nazi can be on the same list as someone who said something homophobic ten years ago. these things are not the fucking same.

🔸 the true difference, in my opinion, is someone who means active harm and someone who commits harm unintentionally. jk rowling means active harm to trans people, and she uses the revenue from her media to fund her campaign against trans people. THAT'S why you boycott her, not simply because she has bad opinions. if you were to come across another author who portrayed trans people negatively in their work, look them up online and find that they've realized they were wrong and have apologized for it, that's perfectly fine. we all have to learn and grow, and unfortunately sometimes your old Bad Opinions exist out in the world where you can't change them.

🔸 now you might go online and look up the author who wrote something transphobic and find that they haven't said anything one way or another about trans people. they've neither apologized nor gone all in on trans hate. (or any other form of bigotry.) at that point, it's your call. it's 100% up to you whether you enjoy the media enough that you want to keep going anyway, or if the content makes you too uncomfortable to continue.

🔸 since nothing is 100% pure and unproblematic, it's about what we personally can tolerate and what makes us most uncomfortable. some people have thick skins, some people don't. that's okay.

🔸 now, even though i say that, i think it's also a mistake to surround ourselves entirely with media that makes us comfortable 100% of the time. art doesn't exist just to be Good and Pure, it also exists to express dark emotions, give catharsis, push us, make us think, make us grow, open our minds to new experiences and new truths. a piece of media can contain absolute heinous depictions of bigotry for many purposes other than to say that bigotry is good. bigotry exists, trauma induced by bigotry exists, and we can't just bury it under pretty and nice stories and act like it doesn't.

🔸 part of learning to think critically is exposing yourself to things you don't agree with and coming to understand why you don't agree with them. if you support trans people but don't know WHY you support trans people, do you even support trans people? you shouldn't believe what you believe just because people tell you it's the right thing to believe. you need to understand why it's right, or else you're in serious danger of someone skilled at manipulation convincing you to believe whatever they want you to believe.

🔸 we have to relearn that consuming media doesn't inherently mean endorsing all of its messages. reading a book does not mean you approve of everything it says or everything the author has ever done, even if you enjoy the book. you do not somehow become responsible for the author's flaws just because you took enjoyment from a story they told. that is a simply preposterous concept. no art in the world could be consumed if we were all held accountable for anything the artist had ever done wrong, because we have ALL done things wrong.

🔸 there are a lot of "problematic" things that are problematic only in some people's opinions. some people might look at shows like our flag means death, what we do in the shadows, hannibal, and interview with a vampire and say that it's homophobic to represent queer people as murderers who kill without remorse. some people say "queer people can have a little murder, as a treat." one person's problematic is another person's playground.

🔸 don't trust people who tell you that you aren't allowed to read certain books. seriously.

🔸 now, on the other hand, there are some pieces of media that are made as deliberate propaganda. brooklyn nine-nine is a great example, because it's a hilarious show with fantastic characters, but it's also police propaganda. it's made to make young people - the sort who don't watch law and order or blue bloods - believe that there are good cops fighting against discrimination from the inside. it teaches you that a gay black cop is a good cop, that a bisexual latina cop is a good cop. they're not. there are no good cops. so while it's not that you shouldn't be "allowed" to watch b99, i think that you should only watch it if you're capable of watching it fully aware that its goal is to feed you propaganda. you definitely should not recommend it to people like it's a harmless sitcom.

🔸 i don't think it can ever be morally wrong to simply read a book or enjoy a story, and at the same time, you can never assure yourself that what you're consuming is 100% free from any form of bigotry. i'm not saying you need to write an essay deconstructing every piece of media you ever consume, but you also can't do a quick google, find no dirt on an author, and assure yourself that everything you're about to read is good and correct. there's nothing wrong with wanting to just turn your brain off for a while and read a damn story, but you still need to have enough wits about you think, "hold on, describing a fat person as a slob and a pig and a mean, selfish bully with many degrading descriptions of their fatness used to emphasize how they're a bad person isn't okay." (which is, you know, another problem with the harry potter books.) you can relax and read a story but also keep watch for bullshit.

🔸 in my opinion, most of this stuff about obsessing over which authors and artists and other creators are Bad has absolutely nothing to do with morality and everything with wanting to feel superior. it's like a godless religion, as there are many religious people out there who only go to church so they can be seen going to church, so they can assure themselves they're better than people who don't go to church. since most of the youth aren't religious, they're finding new ways to feel morally superior to others, and instead of righteous vs sinful, it's pure vs problematic. and just the same, they find ways to justify the things they like as righteous, while always maintaining superiority over people who enjoy the sinful things they don't like.

🔸 bottom line: read whatever the hell you want, but keep your eyes open.

if you'd like to read more, check out my purity culture tag.

#purity culture #fiction #long post for ts #anonymous #ask

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transmasc-wizard · 2 years

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do you want to Rant about harry potter worldbuilding?

Yes. Yes, I do.

Preface

I love two things. Those things are any opportunity to dunk on JKR & everything she's made, and good worldbuilding.

There is only one thing that I love in this discussion, and it is not #2.

This will be split up into sections; hogwarts & its houses, magic, bigotry/things that make me go hmmmmm, and things that just generally don't make sense.

And just a note: Harry Potter fans? Get Off My (Blog's) Lawn.

With that out of the way:

Hogwarts & its Houses

I cannot stress enough that even when I was in my HP phase, I thought the houses were fucking stupid. You're telling me the four types of people are brave, smart, nice, and ambitious and there are no mixes or other options? You're gonna say that with a straight face? At 10 years old I was mapping out percentages of how I thought I and my friends/family members would fall, and none of them would fit concretely into just one house.

Like. If you know me moderately well, you know I have gripes with V. Roth's Divergent, due to the premise being "most people only have one personality trait and the protagonist is special because she has three". But at least Divergent showed people who broke out of that restriction. In Harry Potter, no one questions why people are sorted into groups that represent their core personality & values when they're ELEVEN YEARS OLD. (The closest thing to "mixing" houses would be the fact that the Hat had trouble sorting Harry, but like... in the end, it decided based off of his 11-year-old mind that bravery was his defining character trait.)

They can never even change, and they are expected to base their personalities around it enough that the Hogwarts house of grown adults who haven't been to school in 40 years is still relevant.

I hope I don't have to explain why even if people were built in a way that they all had the defining trait of brave, smart, nice, or ambitious, it would be extremely unlikely for that trait to stay the same from age 11 until the day they die. I really, really hope I don't have to explain how that's ridiculous.

Like. IIRC, the whole reason the Houses are like that in the first place is because four people founded it and based the houses on their own personalities. You cannot??? Categorize all of humanity based on one friend group??? Hufflepuff is extraordinarily unbalanced/messy because of this, imo; Rowling realized "hey, not everyone fits into these 4 categories" and so she made anyone who wasn't brave, smart, ambitious, or the typical Hufflepuff nice into Hufflepuff anyway.

Magic

there is no magic system in Harry Potter lol. Calling it that is way too generous. Magic works because it needs to for the plot. It is almost never inconvenient for the characters--it's just exactly what they need. (There's barely even any boundaries to what it can do except for... summon food? I think? idk.)

There's no information given on how spells are made, why they work, why you need a wand, why some people can do magic without wands, why you need to use potions for some things and spells for others, whatever the fuck is going on with Divination, how new spells get known/popular, literally how the fucking planets are involved (Harry takes astronomy and it's supposed to be relevant), how the magic of magical creatures is different or similar to the magic of humans, how people can do magic accidentally & without wands as children, how magic is viewed in different cultural contexts, how ALL OF THE TIME TRAVEL MAGIC was stored in one fucking place, where magic comes from, or even how magic itself works beyond "wave wand, say magic word, bam! spell".

For fuck's sake, you don't even learn why magic is colourful.

This isn't inherently a bad thing. There are well-done fantasy stories with super vague magic systems. But if you are going to have a story about a magic school where magic people learn how to do magic tricks, YOU HAVE TO TALK ABOUT THE MAGIC BEYOND JUST LISTING SOME SPELLS AND POTIONS.

Other people have said this more eloquently, but like. It's why Harry sucks so much. (See the joke of "no one's favourite HP character is Harry" that used to be vaguely (?) popular, at least where I was hanging around in my HP fan days.)

Harry is passive and does not notice or do anything even remotely related to the actual premise of a magic school where you learn magic, because then JKR would have had to actually think about how her magic works. He just cheats off of people or learns things in lessons she never describes because he was, like, staring out the window or talking to his friends or whatever.

Bigotry/Things That Make Me Go Hmmmmm

the race of slaves who like being slaves and whose rights are a joke that only one character genuinely cares about

the whole shit with "Native American wizards were so primitive and weird with their magic until European wizards came along and taught them to do better" (this is in companion material, not the OG series, btw)

similarly: using creatures from Native American legends as backdrops for her History of Magic in North America thingy, but not actually... talking to Natives or having Natives star in the story. (see: using the Pukwudgie as a Ilvermorny house name but not talking about the Wampanoag tribe, which it's from.)

the goblins, who are hooked-nosed greedy creatures that control all the money and hate the Wizards, and who also literally have a Star of David on their bank floor in one of the movies

the date rape potion that gets frequently mentioned that no one says is a date rape drug (makes the person think they're in love with whoever brewed it, or smth like that. when it wears off, they realize what happened. may i say: what the fuck?)

Unicorns only approaching girls because they're "safer" and "purer"; this is r*dfem rhetoric and gender essentialism. (No I am not saying misandry is real or that she's being sexist against men, I am saying this is the same foundation T3RFs use to hate trans women & TIRFs use to hate trans men)

Things That Just Don't Make Sense

Truth potions exist. They work 100% of the time. No one thought to use this in Sirius Black's trial, or any other criminal trials in the wizarding world, because JKR doesn't think about things.

luck potions exist. They work 100% of the time. No one thought to use this to shoot Voldemort in the face, because JKR doesn't think about things.

Time travel magic literally all being destroyed in one go. You're saying you cannot make more time turners??? They're just gone?? And you're saying every single one was in the Ministry basement?? yeah ok sure.

How that "taboo" thing works. Yeah that falls in magic in general but I hate this one specifically so it gets its own spot

The logistics of skill level in magic. Again, this falls under magic, but it deserves a special note. I have no idea what is easier or harder to do when it comes to magic, and it is never explained in a sensible way.

the logistics of having a fucking giant squid in a lake. what does it eat. does it eat the mermaids

how come humans can make babies w/some magical creatures (see: Fleur being quarter Veela) but not others, e.g. goblins?? (or,,, can they also have babies with goblins....? Never mind i don't want this one answered)

SERIOUSLY WHAT THE FUCK DO THE PLANETS HAVE TO DO WITH MAGIC AND HOW IT WORKS. FUCKING TELL ME PLEASE

In Conclusion

JK Rowling's Harry Potter series has weak as shit worldbuilding and a 12-year-old with a hyperfixation on unicorns or something could do better than she ever will. thank you and goodnight

#harry potter tw #fuck jkr #worldbuilding #asks #will/lee #nico rants

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prettyboysdontlookatexplosions · 1 year

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speaking of superhero movies sucking. this thing happened to me when i read the raven cycle where i was like, "huh it turns out that there are certain fundamental skills of writing a novel that are like so fundamental i have never thought to notice or give credit for them because even bad novels do that but there's something on a different plane from bad novels and it's whatever the fuck is going on here." and like this was the case even before the raven king came out and decimated my ability to derive enjoyment from those books at all, when i was still like, well these books are dumb but fun and have some neat stuff going on occasionally. there is something just so deeply weirdly wonky about their plotting or pacing or structure or all three or whatever that they don't entirely feel like books the way other things feel like books. i was like, really hate to feel like in any way i have to hand it to her [this was i think before any political stuff when i was just bitter about JKR because the casual vacancy was one of the worst and most unpleasant novels i had read in my life to a degree that completely soured my childhood memories of her other books] but the harry potter books, whatever you say of them, they feel like books. you can argue they feel like bad books, but you read them and you're like, "i'm reading a book" and maybe "this book is good" or "this book sucks" or "this book is ok it could have used an editor why is she so weird about some things." the raven cycle does not offer that experience. it offers other experiences, some of which are actually kind of nice. adam parrish is great. ronan lynch could be so awesome if he were being written by any other half-competent YA hack on the planet. but it did not give me the experience i had for almost my entire life known to categorize as "reading a book."

anyway. that's how i increasingly feel about marvel movies, which i tapped out on after far from home because far from home made me so angry, to the extent that while i would not call it the worst marvel movie i think it is the one i hate the most, but which i have been catching up on because i have a lot of mindless work tasks to do and they make stimulating but undemanding background viewing (i am open to recommendations of things that are also stimulating but undemanding background viewing that are maybe, like, 15% less dumb). there's a weird smushiness to them that i can't quite put my finger on that makes them not feel like movies. and like some people have been calling marvel movies not movies forever and i respect those people but that's not the kind of not-movies i'm talking about. i'm not saying marvel movies aren't art, or cinema. i mean that watching them doesn't feel like watching a movie. even a bad one. some of the older marvel movies were pretty bad. i did not enjoy thor, for example. i thought it was very boring and laggy and the tone was weird and it was unbalanced and idk what else because i did not retain a strong impression of it because i thought it sucked in uninteresting ways. but it was a movie. even the avengers, i have been an avengers hater since seeing it in the theaters, i did not need the suckage of ultron to convince me that joss whedon is an idiot hack who writes terrible dialogue and makes stupid movies, i mean i fucking hate the avengers. i do. i'm like a total unfun killjoy about it, that movie has zero redeeming qualities to me except casting mark ruffalo as the hulk and even that i now feel weird about because it's like you see Smart Hulk showing up in she-hulk and it's like, is this what you thought your career was going to be when you were making kenneth lonergan movies with laura linney, mark? is this what you dreamed of? whatever. it doesn't matter. it's his life. anyway. i hate the avengers. but it's a movie. a shitty, stupid, hatefully dumb, terribly shot, offensively written movie. a movie that does not respect itself or the art of filmmaking or the canon of comic books it's drawing on or the dumb forever-commercial extended universe it's operating in or the audience, my god, least of all the audience. but it's a movie. compare to shit like, the eternals, which... like what the fuck was that? that was not a movie. that was shapes and sounds. and then different shapes and new sounds. and then shapes and sounds again. shang chi? had a secret movie hidden inside it if you squint, but itself not a movie. i feel bad picking on wakanda forever in this regard because its production was so troubled so they sort of have an excuse, but also, wakanda forever: not a movie. even the imaginary cut of wakanda forever that erases all the commercials for thunderbolts they put into the movie, still not a movie. people doing stuff. that's not a movie. and i'd rather sit through wakanda forever again than sit through thor the dark world again, but thor the dark world was a movie (a terrible, terrible movie). i liked love and thunder more than as far as i can tell anyone on the internet but i must concede it too was not a movie. like. what is going on here.

idk. as always i'm a Film Idiot and don't know anything about anything so i don't really know what it is that i am reacting to here that makes these movies feel so unmovielike to me. i'm not quite ready to say they're at j j abrams star wars levels of not a movie (the force awakens is the least movie of any movie i've ever seen in my life. less than rise of skywalker even, because the sheer unrelenting badness of rise of skywalker gives it some kind of semblance of movie-ness, although i would stop short of calling it a movie. the force awakens... a gifset with a score. period. a naked emperor inexplicably accepted by the masses as being properly clothed. one of those dreams where everything makes sense inside it but the second you try to describe it to someone you can't explain any of it any more. all this and other heinous things, but: not a movie). but we're getting there!

#i can't decide if no way home was a movie or if i just think it was because of how alfred molina Ate #i have to rewatch spider-man 2 i think as a teen i was not ready for molina molina-ing #the TV shows are also for the most part not TV shows but that feels so obviously true as to not be worth mentioning

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metvmorqhoses · 1 year

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We have been mutuals for years but I’m going to step away now because I cannot in good conscience follow someone who supports the work of a dangerous bigot like JKR over the human rights of a marginalised group. Wish you the best.

In wishing you a warm farewell right back, I feel compelled to use the occasion to clarify, and for the last time, a thing or two - even if, to be quite honest, I absolutely don't consider this ask worth a response.

I do believe in certain principles though, and I think it important to state them from time to time, so I'll make this one exception in indulging underwhelming attempts at self-righteousness for the greater good.

You know, there's really nothing wrong in stopping interacting/following/liking a person for whatever intimate reason, you have every right to and you owe no one an explanation. It's quite telling though that you felt compelled to inform me, and anonymously.

This tells me you weren't actually seeking a constructive discussion, nor an explanation (you would have DMed me, or at least told me off anon, since "we have been mutuals for years"), but rather you were after that little high that small people reap from believing to have obtained, however briefly, the moral high ground over another, the effective shielded reward of the online moral policing that coincidentally always comes without consequences, since you are not even putting your face behind your egregious "good conscience".

You feel entitled to judge me for the art that I supposedly enjoy (already a ridiculous argument in itself and one that reaped real victims throughout history), after years of being my mutual, and don't even have the courage to actually face my reaction (and my unfollowing).

The fact that you cannot even appreciate how sad this all is for you as a person already frames the matter perfectly in itself. But still.

Premising that I don't need to justify the reasons I like what I like and that you should intrinsically have known you have no right whatsoever to send people messages like this, morally speaking, and also premising that I find genuinely embarrassing even having to explain such banalities to another rational being, the fact that I coherently keep liking a work of fiction that I have liked since I was six years old (specifically finding fascinating two villains and a dynamic that I explore in my own hyper-realistic way and that it's probably the farthest from any of the author's preferences as one can get), without suddenly and hypocritically finding all sorts of terrible crimes against humanity in it to reassure myself of my inner internet-approved wokeness, does not absolutely mean I share or second JKR's ideas or behaviours.

As a normally intelligent person, I'm fully able to separate the art from the artist. If people had truly used throughout history your narrow reasoning, art would have literally gone extinct thousands of years ago. We couldn't even safely read the Bible. You cannot expect to only like the artistic product of "morally"-approved people (by whose standards, moreover? What makes your opinion more important than anyone else's? Or you are an oppressor too?). You cannot quality-check artists, people, not even really committing yourself to the task, because you could never really know what's truly in a person's heart. This reasoning is simply childish and nonsensical.

I do not share JKR's views only because I like some of her characters from 25 years ago. I do not support her only because I enjoy psychoanalyzing her villains from time to time. I actually never liked JKR even while everyone else idolized her. But that never prevented me from genuinely liking what I like without pretending or idiotically forcing myself not to in the name of being TikTok-approved.

And finally, as much as I find some of her ideas disgraceful and baffling, as much as I absolutely do not support those ideas, at this point I find it much more important to support her right to think, believe and state whatever she likes without constantly risking harassment (or way worse), thanks to people like you, after all not that different from her and in some aspect even worse, who believe to have the right to "cancel" fellow human beings because of their ideas.

No one has more right to speak their mind than another, people. Freedom of thought is the backbone of culture and humanity. The fact that she is able to speak her mind disgracefully, is also the reason you are able to speak your mind against it.

The culture you are validating is dangerous and disgusting. Think about it.

#anon #this btw is a topic i had already touched years ago #it's sad i had to repeat such obviousness but here we are #bellamort #hp #jkr discourse #lord voldermort #asks/replies #one and one thousand stories lis told

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ashandflower · 7 months

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confessions of a pissed-off wannabe marauder

I once was a Harry Potter fan.

I was given the first book as a gift from a relative and refused to read it for a while. Then I read it and fell in love with it. I was maybe seven or eight at the time. I refused to read the next books for a while but eventually got around to the Chamber of Secrets, then Prisoner of Azkaban, and so forth.

I remember the deep and abiding HATRED little ten-year-old me felt for Umbridge. I remember feeling like I’d been punched in the stomach upon Sirius’s death. By the time I got to Deathly Hallows I was just sort of numb. Although I did feel excess shock upon Fred Weasley’s death.

I never much liked arguments. Or romance. Half-Blood Prince and Goblet of Fire were a bit of a drag that way. I don’t really give a fuck about who snogged who, you know? I just want my magic and friendship and mystery. And it was amazing when that came.

Then the transphobia came.

For a while I was still a Harry Potter fan. Desperately clinging onto a fading specter of escapism I no longer had, and I knew it. I refused to accept it though. Crying over why did JK have to do this, why won’t she apologize, why why why. Then everyone else starts pointing out things wrong with the series and I start shutting down.

Eventually I left the Harry Potter fandom. For my own good. The reassurances that ‘the books are yours now’ didn’t help. I tried to replace it with The Owl House, but it didn’t work for… convoluted reasons. I don’t feel comfortable explaining the whole story here.

I somewhat enjoy HP fanfiction now, because really the entire fandom hates JK at this point and if another fan is writing the characters I have the comfort of knowing they aren’t the same as canon. I don’t have to live with the worry that they carry the same prejudices as that bitch and goodness knows what else besides.

I have three very close friends in a group with me. Sometimes I mentally aliken us to the Marauders, it’s fun. But then I look at us and I feel guilty. We all grew up with Harry Potter and I may enjoy fanfiction, but my friends and to an extent me are people JKR actively hates and looks to destroy. And yes, before you ask, two of us are trans.

Oscar. Half-asian and brown. Funniest kid I’ve ever known, absolutely full of life, can perfectly contrast between serious and funny. Get yourself a friend like Oscar. But even so, he is half-asian, and I can’t help but feel JKR would dismiss him or use him to pat herself on the back. Harry Potter is undeniably a very white story, and also he’s a trans ally. Unforgivable I know.

Aaron. A trans boy who came out last year. Has the most sanity out of all of us. If there was ever a voice of reason he is it. Acts the least crazy, is the least crazy. But in JKR’s eyes, he is crazy. A ‘poor lost lesbian being groomed into being a boy’. How cute, she’s pretending she cares about lesbians. But she remains insistent that trans boys- that Aaron – are being exposed to ‘conversion therapy’. She pities Aaron for problems he does not have. She views Aaron as a ‘problem’. She likes to think she’s ‘saving Alice’ instead of destroying Aaron. (Alice is not Aaron’s actual deadname. But I do not think I have the right to reveal it in a public place.)

Ashley. Oh GOD Ashley. Loud, popular, liked by pretty much everyone, absolute best friends with Aaron. JKR hates her guts. In her eyes she is not Ashley but a ‘penised individual’. ‘A fox pretending to be a hen to get into the henhouse’. She sees her and girls like her as dangerous. She actively wants her GONE. I feel like she’d kill her if she could. She is nothing short of a threat to the existence of Ashley and girls like her.

And me. Since I’ve revealed everyone else’s real names I may as well reveal mine.

Rose. I prefer Rose Helen because Helen is my middle name and I think Rose Helen sounds cooler. I try to find somewhere to escape, I hang with my friends, sometimes we do stuff together. I think of myself as perfectly normal (Thank you very much. Haha.). I do lean into the oracle-card herbal-charm parts of witchcraft and enjoy it. I also happen to be a trans ally and someone hurt over JKR’s comments, or at least I have hurt feelings.

She’s also rather misogynistic, I’ve noticed. The treatment of Lavender and Parvati, calling Fleur a cow and mocking her accent in the text when she did NOTHING wrong, and there’s the fact that she praised Matt Walsh for ‘What is a Woman?’. I’ll say it now. If you ally with Matt Walsh, take the word ‘feminist’ out of any part of your identity.

Someone once asked her what she did knowing she’d lost so many fans over her transphobia. She replied ‘I dry my tears with my checks’ or something along those lines. Seeing that, I think, was the moment that really solidified it for me.

JKR doesn’t care about me. Who knows if she ever cared? I’m a pound note in her eyes. A piece of insignificant, lost money. And who cares about losing a pound when you’re a millionaire? An awful, dangerous, bigoted millionaire.

My friends she hates. Me she hates. And who knows if she cared before? She’s nothing but a transphobic, sexist prick who doesn’t know how minorities work.

I’m into the fanfiction Marauders. But I look at us – a collection of people JKR actively hates – and I can’t help but wonder if I’m hurting my friends too.

Imagining us as creations of a bigot. A bigot who wants us gone.

Fuck Joanne.

#harry potter #marauders #this sucks #fuck jkr

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tempestgnostic · 8 months

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Thus Spoke the Half-Serpent

I can’t recall the first time I laid down next to the water’s edge and yearned for a home I’d never known. I must have been very young; it wasn’t until much later that I learned shame. In those halcyon days, in the peace between the trauma of birth and adolescence, I dreamed of swimming with nixies—the ones I’d read about in my copy of Arthur Spiderwick’s Field Guide to the Fantastical World Around You. It would be years before I gave up waiting for a soulmate to appear beneath the surface of our neighborhood lake.

I joined the swim team just before the curse of puberty began to take hold. (I didn’t transition until my early twenties.) It was the closest approximation I had—yet, kicking around a pair of human legs felt just as wrong as the way my chest began to jut out beneath my swimsuit. I went to competitions across the state and did quite well, until dysphoria caught up with me and strangled my ambition.

My daydreams shifted as part of my identity once again rose to the surface. I was nearly always human from the waist up, but at times had the body of a massive serpent below. Other times, it was replaced with the digitigrade legs of a wolf, or even the body of a giant spider or scorpion. The serpent’s tail was always the most euphoric, though—the rest felt like using active imagination to cope with the ostracization I felt, being misunderstood and bullied relentlessly by peers. (To be a queer, autistic kid in Kansas is a kind of torture that should be reserved for the lowest circles of Dante’s Hell.)

I could write for hours about how snakes and their habits continued to pop up in the most interesting places—how I was once a ‘proud Slytherin,’ back when I was still ignorant of JKR’s legacy of hate; how euphoric I felt when I realized that getting a forked tongue is not uncommon in the body mod community; how the gods and spirits I encountered on my pagan journey kept pointing me to the serpent in increasingly obvious ways; how even my personal philosophy began to reflect my ophidian nature. “I slough off truths like snakeskin. The world is always changing—why should I remain the same?”

This—and so much more—rapidly coalesced into an awakening that truly began right after I allowed myself to accept my werewolf identity. I had ‘broken the seal,’ so to speak, and the kaleidoscope of my personal mythology erupted from that pinprick of light. Suddenly, it made sense why I sometimes expect to feel scales instead of skin beneath my waist, or why I find myself to be clumsy and awkward when I try to dance, unless my movement is serpentine and centered in my hips. It explained why I sometimes feel the swift forward extension of a viper’s fangs from the roof of my mouth when I open it just so.

When I get in bed, I wait until my legs fall asleep first, overlaid in such a way that they seem to melt into each other under the blankets. When my knees aren’t acting up, I allow the rhythm in my hips to carry me across the room as I dance to the music in my head. I dream of sunning myself beside a calm river, enjoying the feeling of warm rocks beneath my scales before slipping back under the surface. In my mind, I see silvery moonlight reflecting off of the water after nightfall.

There’s a beautiful young femme sitting by the water’s edge, enjoying the cool breeze. Something keeps her there, even as she sees me skim the surface of the water, striped scales suggesting half of my species. Cottonmouth. She speaks to me like a soulmate, our love a foregone conclusion, and I offer my hand with a gentle smile. I’ll teach her how to swim, and I promise not to bite—hard. She laughs, and my butch heart swells.

#alterhuman essays #alterhuman community #alt/non essays #alt/non community #nagakin #nagaposting #idk if this could fall under therian #probably not but i’ll look into it more #otherkin #otherkin essays

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iamanathemadevice · 1 year

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So someone saw my post on Troubled Blood and decided to reblog it with this comment

I watched Troubled Blood because, as my Tumblr profile proclaims, I am “an elderly Tom Burke tragic”, not because I had a hankering to consume JKR while condemning her as a person. The series is very much more than JKR’s books, and is a sum of the work of dozens of people, not JKR herself. Indeed, I approached the series with some nervousness because the books are known to be transphobic. However, the scriptwriters have not only managed to remove the transphobia, they have made them sympathetic to LGB people, if not specifically trans people.

There are still problems, like Burke playing a disabled actor when he is not himself disabled. (He was unable to make much of a defence of that when challenged about it, either.) As far as I know, he’s never spoken out against JKR’s opinions on trans people, though he’s not known for giving his opinions on such matters. The only time he expressed an opinion on something political*, he made a completely balls up of it, so I’m not surprised he keeps his mouth shut. Other actors have more courage, of course.

I haven’t bought any of the series - I watch them on BBC iPlayer - and I won’t be buying them. Or the books. JKR makes not a penny from me. I absolutely and unreservedly condemn JKR’s stance on trans people.

Am I a hypocrite? I certainly have refused to watch any more movies or TV with certain actors who have turned out to be racist, abusive, anti-Semitic etc, or by certain directors, ditto. I don’t buy books by authors who I deem problematic for various reasons.

But to me, there is an important separation between an author with horrible views which may or may not be expressed in a book which becomes the basis for a film or TV series, and that final product which has been cleaned of those horrible views and the story presented in a way which is not objectionable.

Will a lot of people look up the books after seeing the series? Yes. Do I control that? No. JKR’s opinions are now very well known - she makes no attempt to hide them and is very proud of them. So, if people still want to put money in her pocket after knowing about what she thinks of other human beings who don’t conform to her precise definitions of gender, then that’s on them. I would be confident that anyone following me would be well aware of what she is, and wouldn’t be persuaded to act against their conscience because I wrote up my reaction to the TV show.

I guess I’m saying that I was aware that I could justly be accused of hypocrisy, but I also weighed up the harm that might follow from that hypocritical acts, and judged it small. If I got that wrong, I’m sorry

*”He lives in London with a girlfriend he doesn’t speak about, confessing a “soft spot” for Boris Johnson when the prime minister stressed after his row with Carrie Symonds that his private life was his business. “I feel like this glass confessional box culture we’ve suddenly found ourselves in is so insidious.””

#troubled blood #problematic creators #JK Rowling

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essayofthoughts · 2 years

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7, 13, 35, 39? :D

7. Any worldbuilding you’re particularly proud of?

So back in the days before everyone decided the entirety of Harry Potter was as shit as it's creator* I actually used to run a HP headcanon blog, specifically one where I noodled out ideas about the flora and fauna of the magical world. I had a lot of fun with @themonsterblogofmonsters and while I probably won't be going back to it for some time - Hello CritRole pit! - I do still enjoy the sheer amount of sandbox space available in it.

Consequently some of my favourite worldbuilding I've done in fic form is probably The Banker or the Ban? Goblin Professions in Magical Europe, done for the Worldbuilding Exchange 2021. I wanted to try to dig into the racism and xenophobia of the magical world and to use some of the analogues and allegories of canon to further expand on it, to show how such things might occur in the world, sometimes mirroring known historical events, and to criticise such behaviour.

* I will be clear: JKR is a piece of shit. HP itself is flawed but worth criticising on its own merits, not being lumped in with its radicalised, shitty creator. I have seen a great deal of criticism that comes solely from a basis of wanting to believe it was always bad and that JKR was always bad and I dislike things that pretend that radicalisation isn't something that can happen to anyone - even you, reading this.

13. Are there any tropes you used to like but don’t anymore?

To write? Not that I can think of. To read? I definitely gained an ever-increasing dislike for slash fandom and went from tolerant of A/B/O to often quite skeeved out by some of it. There's a lot of misogyny and even racism often built into the way people who preferentially ship non-canon (usually white) gay ships and it often results in the villainising or fridging of existing canon female or POC love interests - this was especially bad in the Sherlock fandom; I recall reading one fic, absolutely excellent characterisation, beautifully written... but which introduced the character of Mary Morstan before her debut in the BBC Sherlock canon solely to make her a deceptive serial cheater so that John would be morally justified in getting with Sherlock.

After that I found that I just couldn't enjoy slashfic anymore - so often it ends up being at best dismissive of canon love interests and at worse actively malicious towards them, often drastically mischaracterising them.

I am someone who cannot stand purposefully, knowingly deceptive or dishonest presentations of things - and I consider the purposeful, malicious mischaracterisation of a character to be a similar brand of dishonesty.

Also just... the insistence of shipping your two (again, usually white) male faves together, often using the excuse of "But the female characters aren't as fleshed out!" - my dude, nor is that one guy mentioned in a throwaway comment by another character and yet fandom's so willing to give one-off male characters rich backstories and inner lives and just refuses to do that for the female ones. For the trans ones. For the characters of colour. It hacks me off and it's just fucking lazy.

And that's why I generally don't read slash anymore.

35. What aspects of your writing are completely unlike your real life?

I mean, I ran monsterblog for... several years, but my niche interest is Archaeology not Biology. As for actual fic... while I have codependent tendencies I'm pretty strict about managing those these days and I've certainly never been as codependent as certain characters I've written. And unlike Percy in Ghost Cass, I do not have the disembodied voice of one of my siblings in my head. I don't go adventuring like VM, and I am someone who Does Not Like travelling, especially long distances or overseas - I'm terrified of getting lost or running out of funds somewhere I don't speak the language.

Otherwise... I don't know? I often use things I've noted in my own life to help flesh out the world - the way that a valley can spread out down below you, golden fields split by green hedgerows, the way the cold wind can bite at your face, the soft cut of salt in the air when you're near the coast, the way birdsong can trill through the air. And with characters - quirks of eyebrows, the way a mouth twists, certain aspects of posture and movement.

I like using these little things I note day to day to help ground a story in a sense of reality, like the way a grounding touch can draw you out of your own thoughts. The point is to take something fantastical and bring it back to something the reader can easily understand and grasp - can relate to. That way, no matter how outlandish a thing one writes about - facing the bright, burning fireball of a dragon's breath, lets say - can be given a sense of reality by a reminder of the acrid scent of burning hair, the way the fire fills one's whole vision, the raw sting that lingers on the skin like lasting sunburn.

It makes the fantastical real.

39. Is any aspect of your writing process inspired by other writers or people? If so, who?

So back when I was in the MCU fandom, I used to write a lot of Maximoff twins fics. Like a lot. Like over 200 lots.

And most of these were oneshots. Some of these were way-overlong oneshots (looking at you, Crimson Peak AU) but still - they were oneshots. And I got in the habit of writing these in a vignette style, small snippet scenes, capsule moments that gave an idea of the overall story while still being only a few thousand words, if that. Each of the sections was marked by a lower-case numeral and there could be as few as five and as many as... I think I got up to 100 in the Crimson Peak AU.

I stole this way of doing vignette fics wholecloth from the wonderful @cosmonauthill. They used it as a way of doing simple fics for a prompt game and I found it so helpful for actually finishing fics, because I could just organise snapshot scenes into rough order and not write the dull in-betweens. I'm also very envious of Niamh's ability to very deftly create an atmosphere or a visual image of a written scene and emulating what they've managed to do in some of their fics has definitely pushed me to improve.

I also attribute a lot of my... I don't know... particular way of thinking about things, and how I try to empathise with and even write characters I don't like and struggle with to @tobermoriansass, who taught me to more carefully think about alternate perspectives and where they originate from, even if I don't agree with them, and a lot of my specific thoughts about Campaign 1 and certain notes I'll repeatedly bring up in fics are absolutely due to discussions I had with @chamerionwrites as I was watching the Campaign. Chamerion has a very measured way of explaining their thoughts that really helps to understand how they got there and why they think they make sense and I generally find that more compelling than other arguments.

And also, through all of these, it's pushed me to want to make sure that even when you disagree with a character's choice you still understand where they're coming from. Niamh's ability to deftly set the atmosphere and Mike's to present the perspective and Chamerion's to put it all together coherently - knowing all three of them has pushed me to improve in these ways due to these things I admire deeply about all of them.

#ask game #blorbologist #fic things #ask

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smilingformoney · 2 years

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Hi! Do you think I Book 3, when Snape is raging mad that Sirius escaped and lets it slip that Lupin is a werewolf, this was really about the recognition and Order of Merlin? Dumbledore and Lupin seem to think so, Lupin actually tells Harry this as the reason for Snape revealing what he was. On Wizarding World, this recognition and award also seems to be Severus's motivation.

I always headcanoned that Severus knew of Sirius's supposed role in Lily's death and that this, even more than their school day animosity and the bullying he experienced at his and James's hands, contributed to Severus considering the Dementor's Kiss a fitting punishment. His mania in the shrieking shack also makes more sense this way, as he's never this close to losing his mind out of rage later in Book 5 whenever he finds himself face to face with Sirius, as perhaps Dumbledore has told him what has truly transpired between Pettigrew and the Potters by then.

On the other hand, Severus was a Death Eater at the time and Sirius says many of them were after Pettigrew for thinking he had betrayed them -- how could Severus not know of his involvement then? Do you have an explanation for this?

And finally, Severus rightly revealed Lupin as a werewolf imo as Lupin showed by his irresponsible handling of his affliction: He forgot to take his potion, thereby endangering students. Though I'm not sure whether that was Severus's primary motivation.

Sometimes, I think that JKR has not thought this through so well...

Snape 100% still thought that Sirius was the one who betrayed the Potters. Nobody else knew except Sirius (and Voldy), so why would Snape? He very specifically misses the part in the Shrieking Shack when the truth is revealed - as far as he's aware, traitor and murderer Sirius Black has somehow got Harry et al saying they think he's innocent. Lupin is saying it too, but Snape has suspected Lupin is still buddies with Sirius all year. When he's raging in front of Fudge, he still believes it. There's not really any indication that Dumbledore has repeated the story to Snape yet, and there certainly hasn't been enough time.

I'm not sure Snape actually knew about Wormtail's involvement. For one, not all Death Eaters knew each other, and for another, we don't really know the extent of Wormtail's involvement. iirc, there was a known spy in the Order but nobody suspected it to be Wormtail. I hardly imagine he was doing much for Voldy besides passing information, which wouldn't necessarily require him seeing other DEs, including Snape. So I don't think it's a likely inference that Snape knew Wormtail was the source, not Sirius. His rage was definitely because he thought the man responsible for Lily's death (other than himself and Voldy) had got away.

As for revealing Lupin's lycanthropy, that was probably a mixture of genuine concern for the students and his own spite. He knew Lupin often forgot to take his potion, and so he knew best how much of a threat he really posed. Plus, he no doubt was well aware of the jinx on the DADA position, and knew Lupin would be out anyway, so he decided he may as well be the catalyst for his own satisfaction.

#severus snape #hp discourse #harry potter #anonymous #ask #omg thanks for this anon I love meta questions #I would look in my books for references but half of my stuff is in storage and I only have books 5-7 with me

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2hero2academia · 2 years

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Season 1 Episode 3- “Roaring Muscles” (part 2)

sometimes working out feels great. it gives you a high like no other and makes you feel like you could do anything

sometimes working out makes you feel so shit you puke your guts up mid workout

question: is this all might’s truck? does all might own a truck? does all might have a driver’s license? these are all important questions that i need to know but never get answered. i’m losing my mind

izuku’s extra training finally catches up to him some six or so months after he starts training with all might, and he conks out in the middle of a run.

all might initially tells him “hey it’s not healthy to overwork yourself” despite being the person to give him a workout plan where he only sleeps four hours every weekday, but then izuku gives a little speech about wanting to be the best hero there is and not just scraping by. you know, in a lot of harry potter aus (obligatory fuck jkr), people make izuku a gryffindor because he’s a brave little boy with a heart of gold, but honestly i think he’d make a better slytherin. he has ambition for days, he’s a weird little fanboy creep, and he’s known for having a sharp mind. anyways, what were we talking about? overworking yourself and how it’s actually totally healthy and cool?

all might remembers episode 2, when izuku told him the type of hero he wants to be. take a sip.

all might is once again inspired by izuku’s tenacity and picks him up by his scruff like a wily kitten, promising to make him a better plan for the next uh (checks watch) four months? all might calls himself an old man because he’s at least fifty and probably feels seventy, but izuku is quick to say “you’re not old, all might” which proves that they actually aren’t related because everyone knows that children will always take any opportunity to call their parents old as dirt

ua’s entrance exam happens on february 26th which is very interesting because from what my limited research has shown me, most japanese high schools hold their exams in january. ua’s a little bit late, which is weird considering it gets literally thousands of applicants that it then has to go through in less than 2 months. crazy. go beyond, i guess

in preparation for the exam, izuku’s piled up all of the trash dumped on the beach and is screaming on top of it. that feels like it must be a great way to destress. i wish i had a mountain of trash to scream on top of when i had to go in for finals week at my high school

all might is super proud of izuku because he went above and beyond (plus ultra and all that) and cleaned up all of the beach and not just the area that all might told him to. izuku’s kind of out of it because i assume he just didn’t sleep at all last night so he could work on cleaning the beach instead

the ten months have passed, izuku’s cleaned the beach, the time is at hand. izuku is finally ready to inherit one for all.

… and the mechanism by which he gets it is by eating all might’s hair.

as all might encourages izuku to eat his hair (offscreen so the viewers aren’t traumatized), we get a nice shot of izuku’s sick ass kicks. why the hell wasn’t he wearing shoes while cleaning up the trash. all it would take is one cut from a shitty piece of garbage and izuku would have every disease ever in a heartbeat. i don’t trust this beach and izuku shouldn’t either. i don’t go to beaches barefoot even when i know they’re probably clean. to be fair, i kind of just hate beaches in general, so that might be a part of it. i’m like anakin skywalker, i hate sand. what were we talking about? eating all might’s hair?

is the exam location not just the main building? why are there three doors? school’s still in session at this point, so i wonder if the entrance exam is sort of like a break week for the students. that would be neat, i think.

i’ve been learning japanese lately, and while i can barely even recognize all of the hiragana, i’ve started learning a couple of kanji! one of the words i learned was 学生 (gakusei) which means student. i don’t know what the first kanji means by itself or what it means in this, but i got really excited when i recognized a kanji

izuku’s still traumatized because he had to eat all might’s hair, but he’s also worried that he hasn’t actually inherited the power because he doesn’t feel any different, which is funny because he should be getting super senses any second now. more on that when we get to the third movie. sorry.

katsuki’s here too. izuku kind of freaks out at the sight of him because he assumes katsuki’s going to end his entire bloodline for daring to take the exam, but katsuki just growls at izuku and walks on by. izuku is as baffled as the audience. apparently, ever since the sludge villain incident, katsuki’s stopped being a bully. he’s still a huge douchebag, just not a bully

izuku proves to be the most relatable person on the planet by tripping and deciding that this is what kills him

luckily for him, a nice girl stops him from falling flat on his face and accepting the cold concrete embrace of death.

thanks nice girl, i hope we see you again

this is perhaps one of my favorite izukus. i love when he looks like a scrawny noodle boy because at this point in time he is canonically ripped. he canonically has a six pack, but he just looks like a soft and squishy little noodle boy

he’s also super lame! and i love him for that

if there was ever a voice i wasn’t prepared for in the english dub, it’s presentation michael’s. oh my god that voice hit me like a freight train and not in a good way. i feel winded. is… is that sonny strait?

anyways, it’s time to learn about the exam that the hero kids are going to be participating in! telling everyone about it is the voice hero: present mic. izuku fanboys over him because he’s a nerd guy. katsuki calls him a nerd guy.

present mic begins explaining the exam right as the episode suddenly starts displaying captions out of nowhere. the way it works is that you have to beat up some robots to earn points. the more points you get, the better you do. also, people who apply from the same school are sent to different fake cities so they don’t help each other out during the exam, which is lame. katsuki also thinks it’s lame, but because he was looking forward to crushing izuku… in the exam. how many fake cities does ua have? stupid question, i know, but also the answers kill me.

tenya has a question

tenya asks about the fourth robot shown on the handout and also tells izuku to shut the fuck up. kind of mean, tenya. some of us have social anxiety

present mic goes on to explain that the fourth kind of robot is worth zero points. it’s functionally an obstacle and little else and there’s one in each of the cities.

is the implication here that there’s a battle center a-z? or is it some arbitrary amount, like a-f? it’s killing me. i need to know how many fake cities are on ua’s campus

izuku psyches himself up for the battle to come and the credits roll

episode 3 is perhaps a quieter moment in between the high points of the sludge villain incident in episode 2 and the meat of the entrance exam in episode 4. it’s funny that this episode has so little going on in it, because it has one of the most important things in the story contained within it— izuku receiving one for all. either way, the preamble is almost done, we’re just about at the starting line, just about ready to leap into the story proper. we just have one more episode to go.

refill count: 0

#2022 mha liveblog #season 1 #bnha #mha #midoriya izuku #all might #bakugou katsuki #uraraka ochako #present mic #iida tenya

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