#There's plenty that I do genuinely like about Harris and some that I genuinely do not

[maeamian]

Well the shoot themselves in the dick brigade got what they wanted let's just hope they were right.

[anchorandrope]

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[ashotofogdensoldfirewhiskey]

How about jealous Ginny for a prompt? I mean there are plenty of jealous Harry stories but for once I want to need to see a jealous Ginny! Loved the overprotective Harry btw❤️🩷

They - quite literally - run into her at the Leaky Cauldron. 

Ginny was walking backward, grinning wickedly at Harry as she tried to surmise just how many photographers would swarm Diagon Alley once word had spread that he was there, while Harry continued to argue he should at least be allowed to don the Invisibility Cloak. 

“No, no, I’ll look insane talking to myself all day. You’ve got to face society, sometime, Potter,” Ginny was saying. “Some would say it’s your responsibility, no your duty to–”

“--my duty?”

“--to spend the day dodging photographers for your girlfriend. Isn’t that your whole deal? Self-sacrificing, hero–”

“Rita Skeeter is worse than Voldemort.”

It was precisely the moment when Ginny let out a loud, unattractive Ha! that her back came into contact with a person turning away from the bar. It’s all a bit of a flurry for a few moments - a folder of papers flutters to the floor, Ginny stumbles and corrects herself with an “Oh Merlin I’m so sorry,” Harry jolts forward helplessly as though to catch… something. 

Ginny turns to apologize more earnestly, when she realizes that she knows the person she’s just crashed into. 

“--I’m such an idiot, are you– Oh! Cho!”

“Er, hi,” Cho Chang says, a bit ruefully. “It’s good to – oh, no, don’t worry, I can–”

Cho flaps her hands uselessly, for Harry has bent over to pick up the papers Ginny had knocked to the floor. 

“Here,” Harry says, stuffing the papers haphazardly back into the folder and thrusting it out toward Cho. 

“Thanks,” Cho says, and then a horribly awkward silence swallows them all. 

Ginny struggles for anything to say. The only idiotic thing she can think to say is - You look pretty - because Cho does. Her silky black hair is swept up into some elegant looking chignon, and it’s clear she’s done up her makeup a bit more than usual. She’s wearing smart robes that are fitted elegantly, and her soft-pink nails are perfectly shaped. 

“Are you two off to Diagon Alley?” Cho says, with an air of desperation to fill the silence. 

“Yes,” Ginny says, latching on to the subject like a life raft. 

“Yeah,” Harry agrees. “Picking up school things for Ginny.”

“Oh!” Cho says, turning to Ginny in surprise. “Do you have another year of school left, then?”

The question, in conjunction with Cho’s very grown-up elegance, leaves Ginny feeling particularly infantile and irritable; their two-year age-gap seems suddenly to span decades. “Yep,” Ginny says, a note of petulance creeping into her tone. “Finishing up my NEWTs.”

“Good for you!” Cho says, in a way that manages not to sound patronizing, even though Ginny's certain it is. “I don’t know if I could go back to school, after every–”

Harry, shooting an alarmed glance at Ginny’s expression, interjects. “Did you do some shopping today, as well?”

“Oh! Er, no. No I… I just finished up a job interview, actually, in one of the back rooms here.”

“Did you?” Harry says, raising his eyebrows. “Nice. Hope it went well.”

“Me too,” Cho says, looking at Harry a bit shyly, now. Ginny narrows her eyes. “Actually, I’m glad I ran into you. The job - it’s in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.”

“Really?” Harry says, and he sounds genuinely interested now. “What role?”

“Oh, something administrative. I’m not very interested in field work, I’d much rather be working on the policy side of things, but – well, I’d actually wanted to thank you. Everything was so in flux after—well, in May, and I never got a chance to–”

“Thank me?” Harry says, sounding baffled. “You don’t–”

“I do,” Cho insists prettily, wringing her hands prettily, sounding pretty. “You were so brave, what you did. Facing him. I don’t know what would’ve happened if you– And honestly, I wouldn’t even have had a chance at this job if it weren’t for the DA. I think they only interviewed me because I mentioned I’d been a part of it–”

“Really,” Harry says awkwardly, “it’s nothing, you don’t need to–”

“It’s isn’t nothing, at all!” Cho says emphatically, tucking a silky strand of her hair behind her ear. “You’ve made such a difference for everyone and I’ve been wanting to tell you but I–”

“Don’t be modest, Harry,” Ginny interjects hotly. Cho’s gushing so much they all might drown in it. In fact, Ginny wouldn’t mind all that much if Cho did. 

Harry shoots her a wary look, and then turns back to Cho. “That’s, er, really nice of you to say.”

“I mean it,” Cho says. “I heard you’ve joined the Aurors, is that true?”

“Er, yeah–” Harry says, ruffling his hair anxiously. It strikes Ginny then, as it so often does, that Harry is quite good-looking, now. Not that he hadn’t been, before, but months of regular eating and living out from under the thumb of the threat of constant death has been good to him - go figure. He’s filled out and bought clothes that fit and Ginny’s very much enjoyed it all until this moment, when it strikes her that he could stand to be a bit less handsome, all piercing eyes and messy hair and wry smirks directed at Cho bloody Chang. “I have.”

“I knew you would,” Cho says, like she’s some insider expert on Harry’s tendencies. “We’ll be in the same office, then, if I get this job!”

“Oh!” Harry says, coming up short. “That’s—” he shoots a glance at Ginny. “That’s great.”

“That’s wonderful,” Ginny says in a passable impression of earnestness that she’s positive does not fool Harry. “Really, really, wonderful.”

Cho looks at Ginny as though she’s only just remembered that she’s there. “Yes, well. Are you still interested in doing the Quidditch thing, Ginny?” Cho asks. 

“Oh, who knows?” Ginny says brightly. “Maybe I’ll do the Quidditch thing, or maybe I’ll go be an Auror too. It’ll be a regular party, the three of us.”

Cho’s smile falters a bit. “Yes, that would be lovely.”

“Lovely,” Ginny agrees. “Just lovely.”

Harry coughs, and then they’re plunged into a miserable silence once more. 

“Well,” Ginny says heartily. “We’ve got to get a move on. Those photographers won’t dodge themselves, you know.”

“Oh, of course,” Cho says. “Well, it was lovely to see you both.”

“Lovely,” Ginny agrees. 

“Yeah,” Harry says. 

“Best of luck at school, Ginny,” Cho says, and Ginny hates that she sounds like she means it. “And maybe I’ll be seeing you in the office, Harry.”

“Oh, yeah,” Harry chuckles, “Maybe! Good luck.”

“Thanks,” Cho says, and then she gives them an awkward wave and departs. 

Once the door has closed with a jingle of the bell above it, Ginny turns to Harry, her eyebrows raised.

“Ginny…” Harry says with trepidation. 

“Looks like you’ve got a new office best mate!” Ginny says with supreme sarcasm. “I’ll tell Ron he’s been usurped, he’ll cry for a bit but I’m sure he’ll manage–”

“She might not even get the job–”

“Oh, no. She will. I mean, she name-dropped you and the DA, that’s sure to give her a leg up, never mind that she wasn’t even at school last year with the worst of it, never mind the whole thing disbanded because of her stupid friend–”

“I don’t think that’s what she–”

“I’m just so glad that while I go months without seeing you, you’ll get to pal around with Cho Chang, I was so worried that you’d get lonely without me, but now–”

“Ginny,” Harry says with an awkward laugh. “Come on, you know that’s not how it is.”

“She can go on thanking you for what a bloody hero you are,” Ginny continues. “I don’t think anyone’s told you that in about five minutes, so it’ll be good to get a nice top up from her when you’re feeling down.”

“Well, sure,” Harry joins in. “You know I can’t go more than six without being reminded.”

Ginny pats his chest. “So brave. There. Do you think that’ll last you until we get to the book shop?”

“I might need a quick round of applause in the apothecary.”

Ginny snorts. “Oh, come on, then,” Ginny says. “Maybe we’ll run into Fleur’s little sister, too, if we’re really lucky.”

They make their way through the brick entrance to Diagon Alley - a far cry from the days of the war, the street is bustling and busy once more. They take a circuitous route to Flourish and Blotts, taking care to walk quickly so that not too many people take notice that Harry Potter is in their midst, and because Ginny cannot bear the sight of her brothers’ joke shop, once alive and bustling and colorful and loud, boarded up and quiet. It’s a bit too on the nose. 

They make it nearly to the front door of the book shop before Ginny can’t take it anymore. “Did you hear the way she asked if I was doing ‘the Quidditch thing’?” she snarls, halting them just outside the door. “Like it was some cute little hobby, never mind that she was a Seeker too. Not a very good one, mind, but still!”

Harry has the gall to look faintly amused as he pulls her off to the small alleyway next to the shop. “I’m sure that’s not what she meant. Professional Quidditch is really difficult, she knows–”

“Oh you’re sure, are you?” Ginny spits, rolling her eyes. “Just like she just knew you’d become an Auror? Someone alert Professor Trelawney, we’ve got another Seer on our hands. No one without a powerful Inner Eye could’ve possibly predicted that–”

Harry grins and shakes his head. “You do know I’m not thrilled about this either, don’t you?”

“I can’t imagine why,” Ginny rants. “It’s perfect, your girlfriend will pop off to Scotland and you can hang round with your ex instead!”

“My ex?” Harry says, an eyebrow raised. “We went on one date when I was fifteen and it was terrible.”

“Oh that’s only because you were both traumatized,” Ginny says airily. “I’m sure she’ll be thrilled at the chance to reconnect now that you’re both older–”

“Ginny,” Harry says, the amusement replaced with something firm. “You’re not really worried about this, are you?”

Ginny can’t look him in the eye. She’s so irritated, so bothered, that it takes her a moment - she wants to say yes of course I’m worried, did you see how annoyingly pretty she was and the way she looked at you - but she doesn’t. Because it’s not true, not really. As she’s tried to rebuild in the rubble after the war, Harry’s been the one thing she’s sure of through all of it, and she reckons he feels the same. No, she knows he does. She knows he’s not interested in doing anything with Cho Chang.

Ginny takes a deep, calming breath, and meets his eyes. “I just really fucking hate that she might get to see you every day and I–” her voice catches. 

Harry pulls her in and gives her one of those hugs that seems to calm every cell in her body, like he might be able to shield her from everything bad in the world. She can’t believe that in two weeks, this is a comfort she won’t have, anymore, reduced instead to stolen moments at Hogsmeade weekends and words scribbled in letters.

“I really fucking hate it, too.”

Ginny burrows her head deeper into his chest, and breathes in the woody smell of him. Finally, she says. “You were right, you know. I can admit it.”

“What?”

She pulls back and looks at him. “I really should’ve let you wear that damn Invisibility Cloak.”

[thefiery-phoenix]

PLATONIC YANDERE WEASLEY FAMILY HEADCANONS

They're very protective of each other, that's for sure. Molly might be the first one to meet you, or the Weasley children at Hogwarts. Heck, you might not even be related to the Weasleys and they'll still think of you as one of their own when they see the chance to make you theirs for good, you're just too naive and innocent for this world. And no doubt Harry and Hermione would play roles in helping them with their obsession with you as well since they are yanderes for you after all

Arthur would LOVE to talk to you about your knowledge of Muggles if you know about them that is. But don't worry, there are still plenty of other things he'd LOVE to talk to you about. It's actually kind of nice and adorable seeing him get so excited whenever you bring up the topic of Muggles, the way his eyes shine and light up with excitement like as if he's some sort of kid in a toy shop. But Molly has to be there to rein him in in case he makes you feel too overwhelmed with his questions. Arthur doesn't care if you're pure blood, related to them or not, half blood, muggle or heck even if your dad is Voldy himself. Unless of course, you're good. He'll still look after you like his own and care for you, and of course, keep you far far away from the prying eyes of the evil Malfoys and dangerous things like Death Eaters and concerning yourself with the activities of the Dark Lord

Bill is the chill and easy going brother who'll understand how you're feeling since he's a pro at it and he's also the oldest Weasley, he's the brother to 6 siblings of his. He's a good listener and always has good advice for you whenever you need to ask him about something and he'll also love it if you talk to him about his work and stuff. And he'll also tell Fred and George to lay back off a bit if their pranks become too much to which they'll apologize instantly. They would never think of hurting you, not even in their worst nightmares. And if you were brought into their family by force, he'll know how you're feeling and he'll make sure to always be there for you no matter what. Oh, and no dating, NONE of the Weasleys would ever allow you to date someone at all. Nope, you're their precious little baby and they don't want some riff raff tainting your innocence

Molly is a really coddling and protective yandere for you. She'll always make you nice hot lunches and meals when you need them, she'll always give you the comfort and love you need from a mother and of course, she'll get jealous when you talk about your past family. You just can't seem to hate her no matter what since she's being so nice to you, hating her would literally be a crime. She looks after you so well and that's actually part of a plan she has in mind. Oh, yeah, she's crafty too. She wants to win over your love and affection by doing these sweet things and all that, but she does truly genuinely care for you. And if you ever mention the name of someone you like, I seriously pray for that poor schmuck, be it boy or girl since I believe in gender equality lol

Charlie loves you as well and he's the adorable nerd, who'll like talking to you about dragons and stuff. Like Bill he's also laid back and easy going, and trying to make you feel more comfortable with the family. He'll tell you funny stories from his time in Romania, some of the hilarious things his brothers and sisters have done, their embarrassing stories and stuff that'll be sure to have a smile on your face. He would literally cry if you wanted to enter his field, he'd be so freaking happy and pleased, no doubt he'd actually say "IN YOUR FACE!" to the rest lol

Percy Weasley is the uptight stick in the mud, the spoilsport and sometimes the killjoy but he truly does want what's best for you despite him being arrogant and pompous. He tries to be a good example for people and his family but it's frustrating when no one follows him or even strives to be like him. He'll try to get you under his wing before the twins try corrupting you. He'll help you with your homework, ask you how your day is going and if anyone's bothering you, he'll teach them a lesson. He knows he isn't supposed to use his status as Headboy for personal reasons but he won't tolerate it if someone decided to make his sibling feel bad about something. And if you guys are at Hogwarts, he'll make his duty to check in on you every single freaking day and act like some sort of pompous watchdog for you

The fun loving Weasley twins, who love pranking you and the others, but will never go too far with their pranks for you since they would never want to see you cry. They're the best to come to when you're having a bad day or when you feel like crying. In which case they'll cheer you up by some of their pranks and make you laugh since they can't stand to see you cry and be sad. And as for the person whoever made the mistake of making you sad... they'll be on the wrong end of their pranks and NO ONE, I repeat NO ONE wants to be on the wrong end of their pranks, trust me on this. And they'll even take your opinion for their products at their joke shop Weasley's Wizard's Wheezes, and go as far as naming something after you and giving you some of their stuff for free, low prices or discounts ESPECIALLY for you. Lol, they'd just rub it in Ron's face and he'd so freaking jealous

Ron would be the really overprotective type for you. Normally the Weasleys are just over protective of you but he's INSANELY over protective. And it's mentioned in canon too that he's really protective over Ginny when she starts dating Terry Boot, Dean and Harry. And if you think he's bad there, he's WAY worse when you're concerned since the way he sees it is NO ONE is worthy of being your s/o, you're the baby of the family and he will NOT allow someone to ruin you. He'll love to talk about Quidditch with you and maybe even show off some of his flying skills to you, to impress you. And he will not think twice to defend you if some prat like Malfoy decides to be a prick to you, and what'll make his blood boil even more is if Malfoy decides to take an interest in you. In which case the entire Gryffindor house would have to get involved in trying to hold him, the Weasley twins and Percy from literally punching the hell out of him. And of course, with the help of his trust y friends Harry and Hermione they follow you with the Marauder's map and keep tabs on what you're doing just for your safety of course

And last but not the least, Ginny, the youngest of the family but knows how to get something when she wants it. And that includes your attention. She's kinda crafty and demands for your attention regularly. And she will snatch you up like some feather if you're spending time with someone else, except for Molly of course. NO ONE has the guts to dare to go against Molly lol. And of course, she'll introduce you to Luna and even Luna would turn out to be very protective over you. For someone who looks so innocent and calm like her, she does know how to get rid of people who bother you and make you sad. There's always someone watching you no matter what, be it a Weasley, a Granger, a Potter, or a Lovegood... they're all there for you and they're at the back of you, scaring people off who they don't like seeing close to you since all they want is the best for you, that's all. They might not have much, but they have family and it's home...

[sepublic]

When discussing the benefits but also the dangers of fantasy in TOH, it makes me consider how this ties into Belos’ bigotry, religious superiority, white supremacy, etc. Because I see how in the parallels to Luz and the depictions of his witch hunts as a ‘game’ he played as a kid, the show is getting into the thought process behind white supremacy and the like; Specifically, by suggesting that it comes from the same core principle of “I was born special, I’m a hero.”

Because think of it this way; I was born inherently better than others, it’s in my blood, I have to defeat evils? These aren’t unlike what white supremacists believe about themselves. After all, TOH is coming off of Harry Potter, which is criticized for the “It’s in his blood” trope with the protagonist.

This is foiled by Luz, who wants to believe at first that she’s special and things will automatically come to her because of it, but then Eda has to explain; Sorry kid, but if you want things you have to work for and earn them, just like anyone else. Some things can be attributed to luck on Luz’s part, but it’s not as if she’s blind to this and saying it’s ‘destiny’ (unlike someone else), plus in general we all have a bit of privilege in some ways.

And again, that ties back into Christian white supremacy, particularly the Puritans, who believed their colony would be a "City upon a Hill." That it’s their goal to enlighten people, or else root out the evildoers; You can see how this evolves into evangelicalism in the U.S. and the right’s obsession with anything new as satanic, even if it’s something like Elvis Presley or Pokemon (which Dana grew up with, coincidentally), or more recently, furries.

(No really, this actually happened I kid you not. It seems like an exaggeration but I swear it genuinely happened and it truly is absurd that it did.)

Anyhow I think that’s important, because it’s not just the message that Christian white supremacy is bad, it’s why people even believe and buy into these things to begin with. A lot of alt-right 4channers and the like fall into these rabbit holes because they feel cheated out of the implicit, unconscious promises of white supremacy and feel as if they’re owed something; So obviously women and PoC, the queers, the ‘diversity hires’ and affirmative action, this is what’s cheated them.

And you can see the connection between white christian ideas and how that can translate into a lot of fantasy stories, hence “It’s in your blood” and “It’s destiny,” as well as Isekai Colonialism; The idea that what if another world and its inhabitants just existed for you. These tropes are inspired by outdated ideas that Christian white supremacy, an outdated belief, has plenty examples of and sometimes even inspired.

And this is why it’s important to engage with these things critically and question them… But at the same time, Luz is still allowed to love Azura, it’s just about maintaining a critical eye and being self-aware of what you internalize and don’t. Hence her learning to differentiate reality from fiction and not become delusional; Hence King doing the same!

By making that connection, it does explain this type of bigotry by framing it in a way that viewers can actually relate to, even if they also condemn it just as much, if not moreso after understanding. It ties even the genocide with tropes like the dragon slayer, the endless horde of monsters you don’t ever have to feel bad about or question killing, or the DnD Evil Race; Which on their own, these stories aren’t necessarily in advocacy for genocide of course, some of them are just inspired by previous ones without making that connection. And most people know not to let it affect how they see reality.

Because it’s one thing to let yourself be petty and find catharsis against a genuine, extreme example who has gone out of their way to hurt you (those definitely exist, alas); But it’s another to actively search for people to feel angry towards, amidst groups unrelated to you, and provoke them until they give you that ‘justification’. Because you’re not responding to anything, you are the aggressor; In essence, you are performing a witch hunt, in a need to feel like a hero enacting righteous judgment.

Because you’re desperate for the power of putting someone else beneath you, which is what the mundane bully does, out of the belief this conversely translates into you being above others; Again, the ‘chosen one’ beliefs, the Christian white supremacy. And suddenly you better understand why Evangelicals raged over something as innocuous as the Pokemon games that Dana grew up with, back when they first came out.

So Luz understands; She does understand, better than some people, in fact. She understood the Collector. But just because she understands, doesn't necessarily mean Luz approves or excuses; She still has every right in condemning Belos because she never let herself go that far, and this behavior would be condemned even by those trying to make up for it; It’s why they try to make up for it. And the fiction Luz wants to happen for herself (which isn’t the same as the fictions one enjoys) isn't centered around there being hidden bad actors amongst the populace to constantly root out; Luz is only going to react, not act, and consistently, predominantly sees the best in others.

In the end, Belos latched onto Caleb marrying Evelyn, and then the Grimwalkers, and finally Luz, as a way of a proving a point to himself; That wiping out witches WAS in service of humanity, it would actually help them, by showing how he 'rescued' a human from temptation. I'm sure he genuinely loved Caleb, but in an extreme form of Luz's Wing it like Witches, at some point he subsumed Caleb's input and agency to instead make him into a docile trope to make decisions for.

And when Caleb didn't go along with that story, pointed out how it didn't fit the reality of the situation; Philip killed him! His priorities shifted from doing it for Caleb's sake, for the sake of HIS fantasy; He saw an opportunity to live out the Witch Hunter story and it mattered more to him than actually helping someone, or realizing in relief he didn't have to.

Hence the Titan saying Belos "fears what he can't control" due to "his need to be the hero in his own delusion." It’s a quote applicable to real life conservatives who look for things to outlaw, because hating makes them feel like righteous saviors; Remember Pokemon? Gotta save people from themselves and any potential temptations… Belos couldn't control Caleb, and the Grimwalkers? Belos' way of re-attempting his 'side quest' to again, prove that what he's doing is for the sake of humanity, in the absence of actual humans to work with.

Not that he cares about this for fear of hurting others, but because he fears it means he isn't the special hero. Note that Belos doesn't feel guilt over any witches and demons he killed in For the Future, it's telling; As is the assumption that even if he was treated with hostility when arriving in both Gravesfield and the isles, Belos still understood that murdering the colony was wrong… Yet ignores this lesson when it comes to demons because of hypocrisy, choosing to go after the world that was canonically accepting and would be much harder to attack.

And when Luz shows up, Belos abandons Hunter (showing how much he really cared) because Luz is a real human to save, even if she's technically a queer girl of color; But if you remember how Americans kidnapped Native children and assimilated them into Christian society and culture, it actually makes perfect sense because it's another form of genocide. And it's just as racist and insincere as the murder. And just like many homophobic Christians, Belos selectively chooses what to apply from the Bible because he knows it speaks contrary to what he does and he fears that, it’s something he can’t control despite his attempts to.

[padfootswhiskers]

With all respect, I think u guys give jkr's writing skill too much credit . Ik she said she planned everything abt hp books from the beginning( I don't believeit tbh), but she wrote some of the weirdest dumb stuff ever for the sake of the plot that don't make any sense ... Remus's life and even his name, for example.The fact that Remus hasn't visited Harry for almost 12yrs is ridiculous . "He thought Harry was safe - he felt worthless. He was a coward. " wtf?! No he didn't do it bc Harry shouldn't know abt his parents and wizarding world the End. srslyWheree were lily's friends? Oh they all passed away...Harry's grandparents THEY ALL PASSED AWAY ...problem solved (jkr is so good at this) and plus imo that also happened simply bc if Remus checked on Harry, he would be a father figure to him 100% (the role given to Sirius), and jkr didn't want Harry to have the same close connection with Remus as he did with Sirius. It would make harry -Sirius's relationship unimportant... Take Sirius's other relationships, for example. When he escaped Azkaban, he had no family, no lover, no one. Initially, I was like, "Yeah, okay," and that seemed fine. But later, it occurred to me that maybe he was written that way because he had to be solely for Harry. Like, he shouldn't care about anyone but Harry. Sirius isn't allowed to prioritize anyone over his godson.

to be fair, anon, i think two things can be true at the same time. a lot of stuff does happen in the hp universe for plot reasons---this doesn't necessarily mean it's always bad writing.

the plot required harry to be unaware of the wizarding world, alright. i don't see how this means remus would've taken, like, custody of harry or something if it hadn't! remus IS a coward. he IS extremely self flagellating. it IS completely plausible that he knew petunia wasn't a great person and left harry there anyway!

(take DH for example. he says tonks will be safe with her parents right after he tells them that her parents have been tortured for information. he isn't a stupid man, he's being deliberately cowardly.)

i understand that you probably really like remus, or at least the good bits of him, but character traits you dislike do not equal bad writing. remus consistently shows himself to be extremely passive-aggressive, conflict avoidant and unable to actually follow through on his conscience. i don't know about you, anon, but i can definitely see a man who convinced himself that withholding information about a wanted murderer was OK, convincing himself that harry is safe and better off without him.

jkr didn't have to use plot reasons to thwart remus and harry's budding relationship so that sirius could step in because...there isn't a scenario that exists wherein canon remus would step in to be an orphaned harry's father figure. i'm genuinely curious as to why you think he might. THAT, if anything, is what seems ooc to me.

as for lily, that seems to be pattern with jkr's 'popular girls'. i can't name five of ginny's friends if my life depended on it. it was also obviously done so that the snape reveal would have a greater effect. but lily isn't an established character the same way remus is.

as for sirius? i don't think it's unrealistic that he didn't have a lover/anyone waiting for him. i think people tend to forget he was only barely 22 when he got locked up; plenty of people haven't begun sorting out their lives at that age. lest we forget, he was also fighting a war pretty much the second he left hogwarts. not great for the dating scene, that. i don't think it's unrealistic at all that he hadn't thought about girls (or boys) or settling down at that time in his life.

but even if he had, i can't fathom a world in which he wouldn't transfer the love and devotion he had for james to james' son.

[seriousbrat]

you said james changed but did he? no apology in sight... still tricking lily and going behind her back to hex snape.. leaving his wife and newborn alone in their secret hiding spot to mess with muggles..

genuinely lol what is this 'leaving their hiding spot to mess with muggles' thing, I think you're the second anon who has claimed something like that recently and it's like.... where lmao. when did that happen? who r these muggles? 😭

if you're referring to the prequel, that was almost certainly, like 100% certainly, before harry was born when lily and james were fighting for the Order along with the rest of the Marauders and not in hiding. This is what Lily says, years later, in her letter to Sirius:

James is getting a bit frustrated shut up here, he tries not to show it but I can tell -- also, Dumbledore's still got his Invisibility Cloak, so no chance of little excursions. If you could visit, it would cheer him up so much.

doesn't that imply he wasn't sneaking out? and if he had left the hiding spot in the past it was "little excursions" with Lily's full knowledge and approval, with the safety of the cloak. I don't see the big deal, and it's possible that Lily was leaving the house on occasion too when they had the cloak.

people are so determined to see things in the worst possible light it's kind of funny. It's not enough that James was a dickhead and a bully in canon, he has to be this insidious abusive master manipulator guy who somehow conned Lily "you make me SICK" Evans into marrying her and having a kid with him. Like, no offence but it's just not that deep.

We don't see how he changed because the story isn't about him, it's about his son, but there's plenty of evidence that he did, a BIG example being that a girl who couldn't stand the sight of him and was extremely vocal about the fact ended up marrying him. Something changed, and it's just highly unlikely that James, a fictional character, constructed an elaborate ruse behind the scenes that we see no evidence for to trick Lily, and every other character, into thinking he was an entirely different person. If that had been the author's intent for these characters who, btw, do not exist outside the text we're given, there would be proof of it. Rather, we're given evidence he 'deflated his head' and that lily fell in love with him and that they were happy together.

I've already said it but I don't think James not telling her about fighting with Snape (who, let it be said, at that point was also instigating) is a good thing. Obviously. It's dishonest and he should have told her. But I also think a likely reason he didn't tell her was not wanting to hurt her. That doesn't make it okay, but there can be problems and slip-ups and things to work through in a relationship without it being some big evil insidious manipulation.

Sev hid all sorts of things from her too, important things like "I'm thinking about joining the Death Eaters btw lol". People lie and hide things, especially teens. Maybe the simplest explanation here, rather than this weird jamespiracy thing, is that a seventeen year old boy was kind of shit sometimes but ultimately dedicated his life to protecting others, fought bravely in a war, grew tf up, and sacrificed himself to save his wife and child.

idk like to me it's not that deep, and it's continually bonkers to me that some snape fans will have wildly different standards for their innocent baby boy (idk him) than they do for every other character. bro did way worse stuff than not telling his gf he was getting into fights, james did worse stuff, and yet I still love them both and u wont convince me not to

[twopoppies]

I wasn't active today so I'm just seeing Harry's pap pics and the fandom uproar about it and the only thing I want to say is can people leave him the fuck alone???

If he does pap walks with beards everyone gets mad because the closeting.

If he does pap walks with friends everyone gets mad because obviously they're using him for clout.

If he does pap walks with his team everyone gets mad because they never leave him alone.

If he does pap walks alone everyone gets mad because why is he using lime bikes so often.

Now he's doing "pap walks" with fans and everyone is getting mad because apparently that isn't genuine enough.

I want to ask the fans that apparently known better than Harry's team what's best for him and his career what they would do? How they pretend to promote Harry personal brand if everything he and his team does is apparently wrong.

I have seen some people saying that they should just let his music speak for him and stop with the nonsense papwalks but that is just naive. Even someone as famous as Harry needs to promote his personal brand or they just dessapear. Like Zayn for example, he's an excellent singer and an even better musician that decided to not play the industry game and that's ok but that's a decision that has clearly affected the potencial reach of his career and is obvious that that's not something Harry wants for himself so HE NEEDS TO PLAY THE GAME.

And don't get me wrong, there's plenty of things his team has done that I don't like and don't approve of but I'm not gonna pretend that I know better because even as disastrous as Holivia was it helped Harry to elevate his celebrity status and career, if people want to pretend it didn't whatever but common.

I'm sorry for ranting but I hate how condescending this fandom can get, we lack an incredible large amount of information to even pretend to know was better for him.

You forgot: if he doesn’t do pap walks at all, people make up all sorts of rumors about him and then say he’s being elitist because he doesn’t come on social media and give us access to him.

Other than that, I absolutely agree with you.

[severus-snaps]

so i was just reading this and although i do have some beef with parts of it (famously, snape snuck up and attacked james whilst his back was turned and James was innocent and doing nothing wrong at all...and not Snape attacked in retaliation bc james immobilised snape first and then turned around to bother lily and if Sirius had seen Snape sneaking away they'd just bother him next anyway)

so the essay itself is about comparing snape's reactions to harry seeing SWM, and in the events in the Shack in PoA, e.g. Snape's Anger

i'd always just assumed that snape was angry in both of those situations but the essay suggests that snape was actually terrified when Harry looked in the Pensieve - after all, we saw him demented/shouting/shrieking with anger/trauma flashbacks in PoA and it's enough to make everyone think he's unhinged, compared to some sarcasm and control, but a definite reaction, after Harry views SWM.

but the essay feels... shallow still. it goes on to say that there are other memories in the pensieve (likely the ones featured in The Prince's Tale), which I agree with - and yes, at the time of Harry seeing SWM:

"Harry has not yet heard about the prophecy. So if he heard this, I bet he would be quite full of questions about what the prophecy was, if it concerned his mother. And then he would find out that Snape relayed it to Voldemort, which he did not take well when he found that out anyway. The damage that would come from Harry overhearing this exchange would be enormous!"

and: "But that’s not the extent of “The Prince’s Tale”; there is plenty more damaging information to be found there. Harry would also learn that Snape has sworn to protect him, which would also make things complicated – I can just see Harry flaring up at Snape and shouting, “I don’t need your protection!”"

all of this is true, but Snape wouldn't care; Harry knew that Snape was protecting him since PS, and possibly in PoA, and saw Snape again trying to protect the school in GoF/as a foe of Barty, knows he's an Order member already, etc. On some level, Harry knows Snape is protecting him/the school/is not a Death Eater

but it's a little half-baked. It says that Dumbledore would be angry with Snape for Harry seeing Snape's memories (and if someone could tell me why the author thinks that, that would be great; it was Snape who asked Dumbledore not to reveal the best of him, not the other way around, after all, so i am confused)

and there is a meta somewhere (maybe here, maybe reddit, maybe elsewhere) that says the other memories Snape stored away for Occlumency lessons were probably some of the same from The Prince's Tale, and that's why Snape removed several, and I have no issue with that. Snape cared that Harry saw them because he was humiliated, yes; because of Lily, absolutely; but more than that, because Harry is mentally connected to Voldemort right now, and the next few memories of Snape in that chapter are Snape apologising to Lily (not very "he only desired her") - immediately followed by his defection (which is not very "span a tale of deepest remorse" but more "genuine remorse")... and Snape's promise to do all he could to keep Harry alive/defeat Voldemort. of course snape is shitting himself, but not because of Dumbledore or Harry's reaction. If Harry had seen Snape's memories in OotP, Snape wouldn't even have made it to the next book

none of which is probably news to anyone here, but i had to get it out of my system because the essay had some good points but apparently wound me up enough to ramble about it

[metalomagnetic]

1) Would you ever write another Snack? Turmoil is one of my favourite fics of all time and you get Severus’ internal monologue so perfectly!

and 2) What do you think happens after the events of Turmoil? Do Sirius and Severus get their happy ending?

Lots of love, always ❤️

I don't know if I will write another Snack, but I would like to! They are both such interesting characters, foils to each other.

Oh, I have so many thoughts about Turmoil universe! There are three possible endings.

The most likely, is canon-like. They work with Dumbledore, pretending to be on Voldemort's side, and they win. But this means Severus dies as he did in canon, because he would still be the one to kill Albus, and thus make Voldemort think he owns the elder wand. Sirius would never recover from it.

Or, by a miracle, Severus ends up surviving somehow- I would like that the best. They can finally be free, and Sirius would adopt Delphini, why not, since he would know about her as he is pretending to be on Voldemort's side. But I don't know how Sirius would ever forgive Severus for agreeing to 'sacrifice' Harry at Albus' orders. (Severus doesn't know Dumbledore means for Harry to survive, that there are the Deathly Hallows at play here. He has no idea about that, so when he gives Harry the order to die, he genuinely believes Harry will die, and I don't think Sirius would ever forgive this).

There's also the possibility Sirius finds out about Harry being a Horcrux now, from what Dumbledore tells Severus in his last year of life. Because Severus is now with Sirius, he cannot make himself sacrifice Harry, because he knows Sirius would lose it. So, in this case, they'd make the horrible choice to save Harry, by telling Voldemort Harry is a Horcrux.

Thus Harry is taken prisoner, but unharmed, kept safe, given to Sirius and Severus to protect.

Voldemort wins the war. However, even if this is tragic news for the world at large, and neither Severus nor Sirius are too happy about it (what with V killing Lily and James) they do have each other now, and they do have Harry, and the knowledge they are protecting the only thing left of Lily/James. They are high ranking Death Eaters, the most treasured, since they told Voldemort about Harry (neither are stupid enough to say he's a Horcrux or that they are aware what Horcruxes are, they just drop plenty of hints that Voldemort realises on his own, finally) so the world is at their feet. They enjoy all the privileges and the new world would respect them.

Harry, however, is not happy- he's a prisoner, even if a very comfortable and treasured prisoner, and most of the people he loves died, while he's made to live under Sirius and Severus supervision whom he obviously hates. At best, Sirius could persuade Voldemort to spare some of Harry's friends, maybe Ron, maybe even Hermione, to make his Horcrux 'happy', but that's a best case scenario.

So, pick the ending you like best! They all have some bad parts, but I would chose the one where they work with Dumbledore and make the world a better place for Harry, and Severus survives. Maybe, eventually, they can reconnect, even if Sirius will never truly forgive Severus for telling Harry Dumbledore wanted him to lay down his life. Perhaps Harry would convince Sirius that he doesn't mind, that he forgives and respects Severus. It's the most hopeful ending of all. Plus, it has Delphini in it, and everyone knows I love that girl, and especially would love her raised by Sirius.

[steddieunderdogfics]

This week’s writer spotlight feature is:  Capriciously_Terminal! @capriciouslyterminal has 106 fics on ao3 in the Stranger Things fandom and 105 of them are in the Steddie tag!

@mustardyellowlilac recommends the following works by Capriciously_Terminal:

Where the Sun Can't Reach

Spit Me out, You Don't Know Where I've Been

It's the Ritual of the Thing

Baby I'm Your Man (Don't Fear the Reaper)

It's as if she writes memories, rather than stories, and that makes them tangible and devastating -- @mustardyellowlilac

Below the cut, @capriciouslyterminal answered some questions about their writing process and some of their recommended work!

Why do you write Steddie?

I started writing Steddie because the characters of Steve and Eddie have such specific and human voices that I literally couldn’t get them out of my head after watching the first drop of S4. (Also I’d just gotten a new puppy who didn’t love sleeping through the night so I had plenty of time to think). The more I wrote for them the deeper I found myself in their voices and thinking about what they could do and I had to keep going until I ran out of steam.

What’s your favorite trope to READ?

I love a good “Steddie interwoven into previous seasons’ canon events” story. Especially if an author makes it SO specific. I want Steve and Eddie in Starcourt. I want Eddie Munson popping up at the pumpkin patch. I want Eddie Munson in the background at Starcourt drooling. I want him to spend this whole time watching Steve’s character growth and finding it impossibly hot before getting twisted up in the horror.

What’s your favorite trope to WRITE?

I definitely love adding Eddie Munson to canon (thinking about him and life-guard Steve Harrington is where this all began, afterall). However I think that I, as a person, am just as obsessed with The Horrors. As such adding monstrosity/new flavors of spooky to this show was my favorite thing to do.

What’s your favorite Steddie fic?

I can narrow it down to two! My favorite piece of Steddie fic that changed my brain chemistry has got to be fastcardotmp3’s “that’s just wasteland, baby!” (https://archiveofourown.org/works/42351597) because the scene in the lake? The genuine wonderful take on in media res apocalypse living? Dot’s talent for characterization/love? I’ll never live it down. Actually, go read everything by fastcardotmp3. Do yourself a favor. The other has to be “every mistake was made purposefully” by birthdaycandles (https://archiveofourown.org/works/41795838/chapters/104862381). It turns out I’m a sucker for excellent narration and watching Steddie/plot shenanigans from Tommy Hagan’s prickly point of view. It gave me everything I’ve ever wanted.

Is there a trope you’re excited to explore in a future work but haven’t yet?

I always wanted to write a When Harry Met Sally AU about Steve and Eddie meeting throughout their lives/development. I don’t know if I’ll ever pick it up again but it’s still there knocking at the back of my mind. I’ve also got like fifteen of the drabbles in i love you you dope with bits of continuation in my head too.

What is your writing process like?

In general, my writing is a very all or nothing process. It’s either going to go all day, through meals, and not stop until the idea is finished OR I’m going to be stalled completely. Generally, though, if I’m in my crazy inspired phase I’ll have an idea (specifically the beginning of something) and if that idea sticks in my head for more than a single day then I probably can’t leave it until it’s done. However, this did change with my writing i love you you dope. I decided to answer p0ck3tf0x's "100 Ways to Say I Love You" list one prompt at a time. Once a day. RIP. This led to a writing process which was more of a sit down after work and immediately write the first thing you could think of until it’s done kind of affair. I can’t recommend that style lol. It led to some pretty intense burnout by the end but I am proud of how many ideas came because of it. It showed that, through tenacity, most ideas could be something worth pursuing.

Do you have any writing quirks?

I can’t help but put first and second person pronouns in descriptions as if speaking to the reader and I’m a frequent and blatant tense shifter. It’s all over the place at times lol. I also LOVE a good stream of consciousness description, flitting from one image to another, which probably lead to these grammatical quirks and a shit ton of run-on sentences.

Do you prefer posting when you’ve finished writing or on a schedule?

Before I started writing i love you you dope I very much preferred finishing my writing before I posted it. It took ages but nothing felt worse than having to leave something unfinished because I’d lost the plot (which has happened several times).  However, part of the draw of i love you you dope was that (as a challenge) I had to write and post daily. While I learned I can write on such a grueling schedule, I can safely say after finishing it that I prefer having the time to ensure something’s to my standards. Or, at least, until I’m tired of looking at it and just want other people to see it.

Which fic are you most proud of?

If we branch outside of my Steddie work it’s a fic for a little show called Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency that I think I’ll never top. A Road Song in Quartet that Smells like a Trio is basically my novel/brain-child about my favorite rowdy vampire boys and I have to shout it out everywhere I go. However, to stick to the Steddie, I had such a great time with characterization in writing It’s the Ritual of the Thing. Some of those descriptions are still some of my best work. Or, I’d have to say, Can We Both Be Lonely If We’re Both Looking at Each Other? It’s an AU modeled after the world of The Magnus Archives Podcast and not only was I proud of the way I was able to layer monstrosity on both Eddie and Steve but I just loved the world. I actually planned out a whole main plot for the world that never saw the light of day.

How did you get the idea for Baby I'm Your Man (Don't Fear the Reaper)?

I can’t remember which came first, the title or the idea of Eddie meeting Death as played by Steve Harrington, but the song title by Blue Öyster Cult had definitely been sitting in my head for a while. The idea initially started as a Seventh Seal reference with Eddie having to challenge Death with Steve Harrington’s face to a game of basketball but that scene wasn’t working so instead we got a trip through various S4 locales and a fun Death with good hair.

When writing Spit Me out, You Don't Know Where I've Been, what was something you didn’t expect?

I honestly didn’t know if anyone would vibe with the language/story. For a fic that focused a lot on unease, offal, and how hard it would be to picture a future in a small town I was waiting for people to not touch this one with a ten foot pole. So to hear that it actually channeled people’s feelings or that it was something that people enjoyed (as opposed to just me shouting stressful things at the sky) was a big expectation dodge.

What inspired It's the Ritual of the Thing?

When I was in high school I had a friend who asked me out once, the first person to ever do so, and my first instinctual response was to genuinely ask him why he was really calling me after school. He insisted that he really did want to ask me out and for some reason that made my blood run cold. The date did not go well, obviously, but I remembered the gut punch to think someone wouldn’t want you/the desire to say no just because it frightened you for years afterwards. It felt like such an Eddie thing to feel, especially if Steve Harrington was the one to ask him out. Honestly…I poured a lot of my own worldview into Eddie Munson as I wrote him and that’s where a lot of this came from.

What was your favorite part to write from Ritual of the Thing?

I’d have to say it’s a toss up between two parts. Firstly, I’ll never get over the descriptive imagery in the beginning (I’ll never forget lines like “Suddenly it’s like he’s a Jack-O-Lantern with his mouth carved open. A candle sits on his tongue and its light is shining out of his eyes”). It was the kind of sentence I was thrilled to read after I wrote it. Secondly, I was really proud of Eddie and Robin’s conversation after Steve told her about his asking Eddie out. I loved both of their voices in that moment and the thought of Robin trying to explain how much Steve could love you even after you’d had to let him down…and her little fake nightmare discussion.

How do/did you feel writing Where the Sun Can't Reach?

On one hand it felt like I was exorcizing something because I show my class The Sandlot once a year and that means for one day I watch the scene where the kid fakes drowning to make-out with the lifeguard four times. That’s too many times. I had to process that. But I do remember that feeling of loneliness that could come with summer. That could come with wishing for a room somewhere with someone you loved when it felt impossible. I remember when the smallest of things could mean the world when you had nothing else…so in a way maybe I was exorcizing that too.

What was the most difficult part of writing Where the Sun Can't Reach?

Besides the jokey answer of reliving the aforementioned scene from The Sandlot on purpose, I’d have to say trying to accurately consider the physics/feelings of Eddie’s trip into the water. The feelings/actual consequences of hitting his head. I’m not too sure I got the details right but I remember working on it so many times that I eventually threw in the towel and went with what I had.

Do you have a favorite scene and/or line from any of your fics?

I think…it’s gotta go to my lone vampire Steddie fic I Go Hungry Every Night. The whole thing’s one big treatise to Upside Down skinned vampires and food/service as a love language? And also the fact that I love vampires/monstrosity. I just went way too hard with the line: “If you asked Steve what the opposite of tracing constellations in someone’s freckles in the afterglow would be he’d say this, making shapes in the pieces of the wound they’ve given you. The one that weeps red slowly.”

Do you have any upcoming projects or fics you’d like to share/promote?

While I wish I did, and I’m always thinking about various unfinished fics in the strangest moments of my life, I think I’m pretty knocked from my Steddie writing mojo. I love you you dope was an incredible process and I am so proud of it…but I think it cauterized my writing brain for Steddie. I’d love for people to poke around the fics I wrote and I will say that other people’s intrigue sometimes pulls my attention back to old ideas…but I do believe I’m a bit out to pasture here lol.

Outside of these questions, Is there anything YOU would like to add?

Writing Steddie was something that kept me sane during a really stressful transition from college to adulthood. These characters and all the people I got to meet/talk with in this fandom have been one of the greatest joys in my life. I’m so honored, like honestly floored, that anyone would nominate me for something like this. The thing about writing fic is that oftentimes when you start it can feel like you can’t possibly amount to what other people do. Like you’re just a little voice that doesn’t have anything special about it even when you tried so hard. But I stand as someone who felt that way and still found that people did enjoy what I wrote and if I can do it, honestly, anyone can. <3

Thank you to our author, @capriciouslyterminal, and our nominator, @mustardyellowlilac! See more of Capriciously_Terminal's works featured on our page throughout the day!

Writer’s Spotlight is every Wednesday! Want to nominate an author? You can nominate them here!

[moiravim]

I Miss When We First Met: Chapter 5

YN Potter falls in love with Draco Malfoy. Along with that, her relationship with her brother, Harry begins to fall apart as she was sorted into Slytherin. Will Harry find out about the relationship between his enemy and his sister?

IMWWFM: Masterlist

It was now Saturday and you decided to eat breakfast before going to meet up with Neville.

You hated eating in the Great Hall because it always felt like people were staring at you.

While eating you feel something tap your leg. You look down to see Draco handing you a note under that table.

You opened the folded note to read it said; 'You're pretty good at dueling. Maybe we can practice together sometime'.

You try to hide your smile from him as you finished eating.

When you're done eating you go back to your dorm to change. You chose a green sundress that you found buried in your wardrobe.

It wasn't really your style, but you thought Neville would like it and you were excited to finally have a friend. It also seemed comfortable for a warm day in hogsmeade.

When you're ready you rush to the South exit to meet with Neville. You find him standing outside of Hogwarts, waiting for you.

"Hey Neville! I hope I didn't keep you waiting..." You say with a smile.

"Hi, YN. And don't worry, I just got here." He responds. The two of these start walking on the trail from Hogwarts to hogsmeade.

"So, what's your favorite class so far?" He asks me with a genuine smile. I think for a second before responding; "defense against the dark arts is pretty fun. Although it does get pretty chaotic... Maybe Astronomy? It's very calming"

You went to add on to your statement but I was interrupted. "Neville? What are you doing here with her?" You hear Harry say.

It seems like you can never get away from the people who hate you. "She's my friend" Neville defends.

"She's a Slytherin! She's as evil as the rest of them" Ron responds in an annoyed tone. You look at the group of friends uncomfortably before saying; "just leave me alone. I haven't done anything to you".

Harry's face almost looks guilty as he tells his friends that they better get back to the common room.

You sigh as they passed you and Neville patted your shoulder. Your pace starts to speed up and you smile as you see hogsmeade come into view.

You both wandered around looking at all the shops before going to the three broomsticks to eat lunch.

"I got you these..." You say as you hand him some of the candies you saw him looking at while you were both in honeydukes.

"Oh... You didn't have to get me these" He stated. You smile at him, responding; "Don't worry about it. I have plenty of money, really. Harry and I both do".

He nodded, smiling. "Thank you. It's really generous of you"

The two of you continue to chat while eating your lunch. You complained about how Harry hates you for no reason while he complained about how annoying Draco is.

You learn a lot about each other, for example, his love for herbology.

By the time you both got back to Hogwarts you were closer than anyone. The two of you actually had a lot in common, and he seemed more like your brother than Harry.

You soon realized Harry probably felt the same way about Ron and Hermione.

[kikueatgoo]

I don't really like posting politics ( more into reposting and spreading things ) but I do just want to say this to try and explain it for some people.

Is Kamala Harris the best presidential candidate? Yes. It is her or Trump, there is no third or other option, there really isn't.

So it's between her, a POC woman who's agreed with the green party on plenty of issues, cares about marginalized communities, and is wanting a two-state solution and permanent ceasefire for the genocide in Gaza. Or Trump, an old white man who's wanting to be a dictator and drive the country into the ground, is an open bigot in every fucking way, and wants Israel to 'finish the job'.

Obviously, I'm picking Kamala Harris. And genuinely, if someone isn't, whether it's because they're not voting at all or voting third-party ; I'm not going to be happy with them.

Voting for her is, if nothing else, harm reduction. It is more time to continue to organize and work towards improvement.

It is another nail in the coffin for right-wingers, so that eventually maybe it won't be an issue anymore. Maybe one day, with years of effort and progress, I won't have to be scared me or my friends are going to die in the states.

We do not get progress overnight, we don't. Especially in the states due to how large the country is, but it is an option. We've seen it, and we've had it even in this last year we have.

If you wait around for a 'perfect' president to vote for, you'll never vote. And even if you don't personally like either option, vote for the one that will, if nothing else, help keep people alive a little longer to keep living and fighting.

[stromuprisahat]

I don't know if you've read Harry Potter, but if so, what do you think? Personally, I have a problem with grossophobia in books, as well as the way Lily Evans, Harry's mother, was written. The books completely shattered the visions I had of her in the movies. This female character is awful to me, in her treatment compared to Severus and James. How can you keep from laughing at your best friend, being harassed, head down and underwear out?

I've made myself read HP some sixteen? years ago... mostly so I'll be acquainted with it enough to criticize it, since I hate all those fashionable crazes, and I found them annoying and stupid already as a teen. I didn't particularly like it, with the exception of the third and the fifth book, and I've managed to finish the whole then-published series soon enough to witness the insanity that was publication of the last book (and guess enough of the story to genuinely hate the ending).

I've never re-read them, and I don't really intend to, although I have the series in Slytherin edition, because IT'S FUCKING SYLTHERIN BITCHES! and I have it whole in Czech once they published it with pretty covers, in case mum and my great-uncle decide to read it.

I know the books have plenty of issues, including stuff I wasn't thinking about while reading them, but honestly- the only good thing I took from them is that the Hogwarts Houses are fucking cool, and once I made my family do the official sorting tests, plenty of our relationships suddenly made sense. Oh, and wands! If you need to constantly carry around a phalic item, it better be a magical piece of wood!

As for Lily, I don't remember nearly enough about her, aside from her and Severus' relationship being both-sidedly toxic af, and Marauders being a bunch of assholes to specific students. That said, I also deeply despise Snape, because childhood bullying is no excuse to terrorize children (*cough* Baghra 2.0 *cough*).

Also, me being over thirty put some things into a perspective. Fighting the Dark Lord in teens, early twenties- why not, getting a job after school is no less terrifying-, but why the hell was everyone pregnant immediatelly?!

[vidreview]

VIDREV: "Plagiarism and You(Tube)" by Hbomberguy.

[originally posted december 7th 2023]

i didn't initially plan to do a full VIDREV for this one. it's a long video that speaks plenty for itself, revealing a veritable cottage industry of video essayists who've found great success in brazenly stealing the works of marginalized creators. it's an infuriating watch, especially as someone who has put a lot of work over a lot of years into getting better as an essayist. at a moment when the gormless profit-chasing business degree havers of the world are pretty unambiguously winning in every avenue imaginable, it's gratifying to see someone like Hbomberguy use his significant platform to at least make a dent in that trend. i had a few gripes, sure, but i didn't figure they were worth the trouble. of course now it's been out for a few days, the video already has over 6.8 million views, and people are still talking about it on every single social media website of note. watching that discourse evolve from afar has sharpened some of the round edges on my aforementioned gripes, and given me reason to think that maybe weighing in isn't a totally fruitless endeavor. and besides, what's the point of having a video essay review blog if you're not gonna review what is arguably the video essay of the moment? ahhh, there's a Faustian bargain if ever i heard one.

in this post, i'm going to be critical of Hbomberguy's "Plagiarism and You(Tube)" on a few fronts of debatable importance. but first, i want to make it clear that i am genuinely grateful to Hbomb for putting so much time and effort into this investigation. plagiarism is a serious accusation that requires commensurate evidence, and Harris's got that covered in spades. the case is made so much harder to deny by the frequent juxtaposition of a plagiarist's voice-over with the original plagiarized text on screen reacting to minor trail-covering alterations. these sections occupy the bulk of this video's near 4 hour runtime, and while i have some issues with that length, i understand that the deluge of evidence is precisely to make sure that none of the plagiarists in question can continue dodging accusations the way they have done previously. in this process, Hbomb lays out a consistent playbook utilized by all manner of plagiarists, and (hypothetically) gives viewers the tools and awareness they need to better spot plagiarism in the future. this matters because, as he rightly points out, youtube isn't a fun little hobby site for posting silly cat videos anymore, there's real money to be made on the platform and virtually no oversight to protect creators with ethics and integrity (i wanted to pull a direct quote here but alas, you can't ctrl+f a video). it's an open question as to how or whether we can fix this problem, but we don't get to that conversation until we acknowledge that plagiarism is a legitimate, widespread, materially harmful phenomenon online. none of what i have to say in this review is meant to minimize its broad success in calling attention to a very real problem!

that said…

in the days since its release, i've seen a lot of back and forth over what this video is about. on one side you have folks calling for the blood of James Somerton and others mentioned in the essay, saying "fuck these people specifically." yet on another side, many insist that you're missing the point if all you see is more drama for the drama mill. "this is a systemic problem" they say, "that's what the video is about." i'm inclined to agree more with the latter than the former, as Hbomb does consistently circle back to talking about the unpaid victims of plagiarism, ending the video by explicitly highlighting underrated queer creators and even saying outright that he doesn't want the end result to be limited in scope to just retribution against these specific plagiarists.

and yet, when i see a meme like this one:

i can't help but think… is that what the video is about? is someone who just sees the drama missing the point? yes, certainly, Hbomb says as much, but how much does he actually say it compared to everything else? what's the proportion of (to be overly reductive) "drama content" to "systemic criticism"? because it seems to me that anyone who only/mostly gets "wow fuck these people in particular" out of this video has done nothing less than take the video in aggregate. the bulk of its runtime is spent detailing very specific acts of plagiarism, and while yes, as i said above, this abundance serves a very real purpose, it shouldn't go unacknowledged that the tone of these sections is often one of ridicule and mockery. i don't mean that as a criticism in and of itself, to be clear. you can draw a line from here directly backwards through all his "Measured Response" videos, dude cut his teeth on knocking overconfident hacks down a peg, a bit of ridicule and mockery is to be expected. but that does ultimately mean that Hbomb spends most of the video saying "fuck these people in particular," in a tone of voice he honed through many other videos devoted to saying "fuck this guy in particular", only occasionally stopping to add that "plagiarism is popular and insidious and even creators you trust might be doing it" before moving onto the next scornworthy particular guy. so it kind of doesn't matter that one is "the point" and the other is "missing the point" because he's genuinely saying both things, and he's saying one of them significantly more often than the other. you can't tell me the dunks aren't at least part of the point, and if they're part of it then they can and will be misconstrued by some as the whole point. the entertainment and spectacle of knocking these plagiarists down a peg is an indulgence that, while certainly earned, does exist in concrete tension with the systemic arguments that are meant to take priority. now, some of this does come down to how internet culture has shifted in the last decade to facilitate a much more aggressive style of engagement overall, which Harris cannot control no matter how often he says "don't harass the plagiarists." there isn't really a perfectly right way to go about this, and under the circumstances i do think he did far better than others might have done in his stead.

but even still, i think this misapprehension is made worse by the essay's conclusion, which in my opinion largely fails to tie the whole thing together into the systemic argument that supposedly is "the point" some viewers are missing. Harris commendably points out how the so-called AI revolution is at its core an act of automated civilization-scale plagiarism, and that future instances of plagiarism may be harder to catch precisely because of this technology. frankly i wish that perspective had taken up a solid 10% of the runtime rather than a couple paragraphs at the very end, seeing as on balance it's the far bigger and more likely threat to the livelihoods of people watching than old-school direct plagiarism, but that's me. what really bugged me was the brevity with which he discussed possible solutions to the problem. he rightly points out that youtube implementing a plagiarism reporting system would just be another tool for bad faith actors to silence marginalized creators on the platform, and then… he kinda gives up? he shrugs his shoulders and says, well, for now, just talking about plagiarism and spreading awareness of it is enough. for as well-intentioned and, generally speaking, true as that is, it bugs me as an essayist because i believe that a big part of the job is or ought to be expanding the audience's ability to imagine what's possible even if you aren't 100% sure about the answers yourself.

these are all very much "how i would have written it differently" criticisms, so they aren't particularly worth much, but i do feel it's odd that he doesn't even broach the subject of federal regulation, platform control, unionization efforts, or even just good old-fashioned consumer activism. virtually every website that the creative economy hangs on is a venture-capital backed corporate venture, and their ad-driven models for profiteering at a moment when wages are stagnant and layoffs are happening everywhere is, like, the reason this is such a problem. to address plagiarism as a systemic issue, we need to understand the systemic enablers of it as a behavior. if creators weren't getting such a small slice of the revenue pie, if we had more control over the platform and what rises to the top, if the companies that owned these platforms were beholden to federal regulations, if the government increased arts funding and gave out grants to independent creators that involved third-party quality checks, if online video creators had any manner of collective labor power, if the cost of living was lower by way of public healthcare, free education, mass public transit, and affordable housing, then this would be a drastically different conversation. these are not non-sequitors! this is as much an economic problem as it is a cultural one, so any proposed solution that stops at changing the culture is necessarily incomplete and doomed to fail.

look, i don't expect Hbomb to have the answers. nobody has the answers. but i think it's a bit short-sighted to leave so many possibilities unsaid when the one concrete possibility discussed is immediately (correctly) written off as a bad idea. it leads to a conclusion that feels iffy, a bit defeated, lost at sea, and that's an infectious mood. if the first step to solving plagiarism as a systemic problem is to encourage talking about it openly, i think it's equally important to at the very least gesture in the direction of the many possible avenues for a systemic solution, no matter how impossible or ridiculous they might seem in the current political climate. in point of fact, i think it's of utmost importance to include these possibilities precisely because they seem impossible, otherwise we will forever be trapped in a world of insufficient half measures, meekly reifying the conservative austerity of the liberal order because it's easier and safer than taking a wild shot in the dark.

again, i want to stress that this is a deeply subjective criticism. i'm an ornery Marxist, of course i have these kinds of gripes. and it's easy to get lost in criticizing what isn't there, which as an exercise generally tells you more about the critic than the object being criticized. so, to close out, i'm gonna shake my fist a little at something that is there.

there's a moment at about one hour thirty-five minutes in where Harris turns on some colored lights to get that patented blue-purple Bisexual Lighting, and then he says this:

This is a whole style of video now, and by "style" I mean one person did it first and then a bunch of boring people ripped her off. Stealing from lots of places is inspiration, but stealing from one place is plagiarism… unless you call it The BreadTube Style, and then it's fine. I don't even know what a BreadTube is, I just woke up one day and was told that I was in it, and that people hated me for being in it. I don't even know what it is!

i understand where this jab is coming from-- the whole BreadTube scene was a melodramatic nightmare, on account of being an audience-invented genre which that audience (and later creators who emerged from that audience) often inaccurately treated as a coherent movement. i understand the frustration expressed by a lot of creators in that first generation of left-ish essayists (Hbomb, Lindsay Ellis, Dan Olson, Contrapoints etc) with the atmosphere of that moment, and certainly don't begrudge them a desire to distance themselves from it and ridicule its shortcomings.

but this brief little jokey aside left a bad taste in my mouth. the creator he's talking about being "ripped off" here is obviously Contrapoints, who brought a colorful theatricality to her early work that elevated it above being something she shot for cheap in her apartment. this went hand in hand with her Socratic style of essaying, giving her characters a strange and vibrant world to occupy. i don't want to say she "did it first" because, let's be real, Natalie Wynn did not invent the idea of using dramatic lighting on the internet. but she was certainly the first person i saw on youtube doing it in video essays, and yeah, a lot of people followed her example including me!

but that's not the same thing as plagiarism, is it? this whole video is an extensive exploration of what genuinely counts as plagiarism: taking someone else's words and pretending that they're yours. style is almost never part of that conversation across the whole 4 hours, except where it involves use of prepackaged assets like transitions and stock footage, which Hbomb deliberately notes is fine and normal except when people act like they're the ones who invented it (this particularly comes up in the Legal Eagle section). by the terms of this joke, Abby Thorne of PhilosophyTube falls under the category of "boring people" who were "ripping off" Contrapoints even moreso than those who just lit videos like her, because she even does the Socratic-style dialogues! but somehow i don't think Harris would call that plagiarism. if the concern re: bisexual lighting in BreadTube is attribution, all i can say is that Natalie Wynn is one of the single most discussed and cited creators in the whole field. virtually everyone i can think of who "ripped her off" back in the day openly acknowledged being inspired by her at every possible opportunity. of course that's just my own biased recollection of the history, so who knows, maybe there are people out there acting like they did it first. but unlike most of the other victims of plagiarism provided in this video, Natalie Wynn is not wallowing in obscurity. her work is IMMENSELY successful, to the point where she's arguably the closest thing to a household name you can get from this space.

now, i'm sensitive to a joke like this because i always felt like if anything Natalie got too much credit for "inventing" the so-called "BreadTube style". her use of colored lights was striking and unique, yes, but it was also rudimentary and not particularly complicated. i worked in film lighting for enough years to see this "style" as equivalent to late 1910's era silent films blindly grasping at the bare fundamentals of montage that have become the backbone of all cinema. it's good, but it ain't Citizen Kane. i really hoped people would take Natalie's baseline not as a concrete template, but as a challenge to get even more ambitious and filmic with their lighting setups! instead things have stagnated, and we've kinda circled back around to a very slightly more colorful version of the standard pre-Contrapoints look. this is by no means to play down the work that Natalie did, because i know from my own years making video essays that it is NOT easy or simple to set up even rudimentary lighting that looks good. but come on man, have some perspective. she's a philosopher, not an electrician!

what's worse is that later on in the video, Hbomb talks about how many creators were inspired by AVGN to do twists on his formula, and why this was a good thing. near the end, when he's very rightly shouting out many underrated queer essayists, he spends a good chunk of time celebrating the spirit of remix that is so unique to the internet, insisting that there's a real tangible difference between plagiarism and inspiration. this is good! i agree with him! which is why it's so bizarre that there's this one aside that equates using bisexual lighting to plagiarism! it's a disarmingly hypocritical moment in an otherwise relatively on-point video, and its presence kind of weakens the rest of the essay for me (especially if you're sensitive to how near this comes to being all-out drama youtube, as clearly even Hbomb is by his own admission in the video).

the last i'll say is that i find it frustrating when a creator in Hbomb's position tries to act like BreadTube wasn't A Thing. no, it wasn't A Thing the way quite a lot of people thought it was (including many who called themselves BreadTubers). but these creators were often collaborating with each other to make guest appearances, read quotes, etc. certainly they mentioned each other often enough, which couldn't help solidifying in the audience's mind that there was indeed A Thing happening that involved multiple people with similar creative & political goals, regardless of whether or not that was the creators' intent. it wasn't formal, and it certainly wasn't A Movement (the lack of an articulated ideological spine is a BIG part of why things went sour the way they did), but they were happy enough to play along before Drama blew the whole endeavor to smithereens. and notably, successive generations of creators (like Sophie From Mars, Jack Saint, Lily Alexandre, CJ the X, and yes, also me again) saw the BreadTube genre as a place where interesting things were happening, where the kinds of things they/we wanted to create were encouraged and supported vociferously. it's no coincidence that a LOT of up-and-coming trans creators doing very BreadTube-y things got a huge boost from guesting on Hbomb's DK64 Nightmare Stream in 2019 (including me again, haha, oops), because there was A Thing happening even if most people were wrong about what, exactly, it was. none of this is to say that Hbomb should call himself a BreadTuber-- god no, i hope no one does that ever again, i'm embarrassed that i did back in the day! but this history does exist. mostly i just think this joke would've been better left on the cutting room floor.

okay, i think that's enough criticism for one day. one thought i had coming out of this is that i wish more video essays would publish concurrently with a written version on a dedicated website. not just a transcript but an article-format version. i wonder sometimes about the difficulty of indexing video essays, of getting their contents into a historical record that can be printed out and put into a library. but anyway, all my gripes aside, it's a good video and you should go watch it! preferably in chunks over a day or two!

[folklauerate]

2023 Fic Year in Review

Thanks to @a-regular-jo for tagging me!

List of fics completed

take my hand, wreck my plans, that’s my man series

The Yellow Tulips of Texas

an affair, three ways series

inosculation

cause I’m a mastermind (the west wing au)

in our perfect park

leave the light on

Santa Kate series

fuck it, it’s fine series

I’m on Fire

Modern Omega

Number of words written

502,159 😳

Your most popular fic

The Set Up by a laughably large margin. Although as I checked stats now to answer this question, I see that Bridgerton, Actually (my Love, Actually AU) is now second and it wasn’t before, quite recently actually! It seems it got a lot of holiday readership :)

Your personal fav

This is like asking me to pick a fav child! It’s difficult but I’d have to go with the professor au (take my hand, wreck my plans, that’s my man series). It came at a time where I was feeling uninspired and sort of adrift fandom-wise. Following the completion of Bridgerton, Actually, which was a behemoth and draining to write (though I loved it!), I was in the midst of taking some downtime to just… be. To consume without worrying about creating and to just reconsider. During that time, I read plenty of other things, including fic from other fandoms. I noticed tropes and things I simply hadn’t been exposed to ever/in a while, and found myself really drawn to the idea of an age gap with Kathony. Their fics feature them being near/the same age so often, in an effort to illustrate just how well matched they are. I wanted to do a sort of character study and love story when they had a significant age gap. I wanted to explore the ways Anthony might have been different if he was older, the fears of dying young (perhaps) abated but with no Kate to spur them forward. The Anthony I created in this AU was someone who had lived a bit of a life, hadn’t settled for a marriage for the sake of it, and had grown up and developed his own tastes in between teaching lectures and devoting himself to his family. I feel as though it can be popular to show Anthony devoid of taste or personality in terms of home decor or outside pursuits pre-Kate, and that simply wasn’t an option with him here. I really enjoyed developing this man with cultivated and exacting tastes. I’m getting rambly here so I’ll stop, because I could talk about this oneshot for a while. The point being—this oneshot marked a time of sort of creative freedom for me. When I started writing it, it felt nearly insane. I just wrote and wrote with no real reader expectation because I was writing a daddy kink in a fandom that really didn’t seem to have one. I was writing and entirely possessed by the story and characters and premise itself. I wrote that and nothing else for a while. I wrote it across continents and flights and subways and in my room, alone. I would text Kara about it nonstop and I’d post excerpts and just wrote it and didn’t think about it… and then it came time to post. I genuinely didn’t know how it would be received. And I need to add that it is far from the most popular Kathony fic ever, and it’s not even my most popular Kathony fic ever, but the response was nonetheless astounding. I genuinely couldn’t have expected the way it would be received and I’m so grateful for anyone who spent time with those words and maybe found themselves inspired to push boundaries in their own fic and writing.

Your fav scene

I genuinely can’t pick one. I think I’ve written too much hahaha. I’ll state a few that come to mind now;

In the Texas!Anthony AU I loved writing Anthony meeting Kate’s extended family. I loved giving her an extended family, filled with doting grandparents, noisy cousins, and all the fun hallmarks of Indian American kid life.

The papercut scene in the Prof AU.

Nearly the entirety of the spanking oneshot follow-up to the prof au

And also the Lover inspired fic in the prof au lol

I loved the Balmoral chapter of The Set Up, especially the beginning vignette of three; Charlie/Harry, Hugo/Willie, Kate/ghosts/legacy/history. The moment she lights incense and says a prayer in this really storied, old, English castle is unbelievably significant, I think, in ways that will come to play in the fic now.

So much of the roommates fic is a real love letter to NYC. I did a reread recently and was almost surprised by it myself? I think I’ve had enough time away to be surprised by it and I was. I know those places, I feel those places. I hope the sense of self comes across as significantly for the reader as it does to me.

Writing the aftermath of the shooting scene in The West Wing AU and Kate winning the election as well were really poignant. I cried writing them and I cry rereading them. They’re almost a brilliantly rebellious ode to hope in the face of the perceived hopelessness of US politics. Regardless of whether or not a president like Kate Sharma plausible, I center my politics and general life philosophies around hope. That fic felt like hope and belief in a better world.

A fic or scene that challenged you

Plenty! The Balmoral chapter challenged me a lot until I saw Angels in America and something clicked. I actually can’t think of more right now in a really specific way but I will say anytime I felt challenged I either ignored it or wrote through it. Writing through it was always the answer and right way to tackle it.

A line of writing you’re proud of

There’s definitely a lot I’m a proud of but I am currently traveling and CBA to trawl through over 500k words to find the line I’m proud of. There’s a LOT of prose I’m really proud of though. The recent chapter of Babel where I describe Simon’s party is some of my best work, I think. Sweet Like Honey (stepfather au) has some prose I’m exceptionally proud of. As does the Obsession AU. Some descriptions of Texas in the Texas!Anthony AU are gorgeous. If you can think of anything that stood out to you, let me know.

A comment that touched you

I genuinely treasure every single comment I’ve received and I’m currently working through responding to many (if you get a months late response,,, I’m sorry). I will take this time to impress upon anyone who might be reading that leaving comments can be so encouraging and I do love hearing from readers. Fic really does feel like I’m writing directly for you guys. And so it’s great to get feedback or excited squealing because it makes it less lonely and helps me feel like I’m a part of it with you guys. I love when friends comment, I love when people who I only know through excited screeching on ao3 comment, I really love it all.

Recently, a longtime reader left a comment on my recent update of The Set Up just to thank me for writing this year and it was so moving and so lovely I teared up. It was unbelievably kind and thoughtful. That really snuck in at the end of the year for one that just took the cake for me.

Something that inspired your writing

Everything. Angels in America. Echoing Jo by saying Prince Harry’s memoir Spare. A lot of Haladriel and Darklina works and writers. Bruce Springsteen. Lysistrata. Babel by R.F. Kuang. Little Rabbit by Alyssa Songsiridej. Babylon the film. Singing in the Rain. The West Wing lol. Dachshunds (English cream) and Greyhounds. The British royals. Kafka. Religious trauma. Guts by Olivia Rodrigo (specifically bad idea, right?). Wet Dream and Chaise Lounge by Wet Leg. The people who broke my heart and the people who helped me stitch it back up. My fellow writers and friends, always.

Your proudest accomplishment

Getting over a bad depressive episode and writing slump and purposefully refocusing my attentions to: myself, why I felt compelled to write, and the people who did love me and read my writing and made that clear, as opposed to the people who didn’t.

Do you have any writing goals for next year?

To finish The Set Up. To finish some Perfect Park drabbles and revisit the west wing au for some good election year distraction. And, maybe, to take a little break as I work on original things. I am not leaving, don’t worry. I have set some professional and personal goals for myself that require more of my emotional and intellectual time/space/energy and I need to refocus some efforts there. But I’m not done and I will be back. I’m tentatively planning something quite exciting fic-wise. If it comes to fruition, I’ll tell you all in time.

Tagging @grantairesbottle @amalinwrites who is never on tumblr but I’ll annoy her to do it, @bad-surprise @inkbugfic @ladykettlechips and Rama whose tumblr @ I always forget to do this lol