#and this was before the whole jkr scandal

[pianapplez]

Honestly my twelve year old self went hard. I thought, after reading 4 of the Harry Potter books in spanish (native language), that since my mom wanted me to wait before continuing because “the books got dark” that i would just. Reread them in english. And i thought, since i wasn’t great at it, i would just have the spanish version with me so i could check what the words i didn’t understand meant in the actual context of the book. I did use google translate sometimes. I stopped using the spanish version after the fourth book because it was just too much of a hassle to be flipping through the pages on both of them. Anyway, every english teacher i had from ages 12-16 always complimented me on my knowledge and my accent, which probably improved after trying to learn every single song on Hamilton.

This is also how i managed to basically never study for an english test in high school. Thank you, twelve year old me. There was literally no reason for you to do that but you did it anyways.

[quietmtntown]

putting aside my not wanting teens in the fandom as an adult it makes me uncomfortable

of course people like this are against south park. South park is anti censorship.. they are pro censorship it all makes too much sense.

Second Fox news is a 100 times more responsible for people being shitheads over a cartoon show.. itcausd jan 6 after all.. if i was going to blame any show for fucking society over its tucker carlson show.. not a silly cartoon.

Kids being dick isn't on the cartoon they just happen to be dicks with bad parents.. its called BLAME THE PARENTS..

its not the wokest show true its but neither are a lot of shows it spoke out against gay conversion/ promoted gay marriage long before stevhen universe/lok/ loud house had gay couples sp did it first. it had sterotypes yes but it was still something big with their gay character at the time being it was like 1997 when they promoted gay acceptance. . good luck finding that on other program of the time peirod.

.

Most of us adults hated the transphobia / but point me to a network /show that doesn't have someone problematic behind it. willy Wonka the choco factory was based on books written by an antisemite who hated the movie.. so i get no guilt out of enjoying . . disney himself is known to be sexist/racist/antisemitic or we going to just no longer watch the movies from his era? I doubt it. disney has a whole bunch of c hild abuse scandals/ same with nick/ and i dobut anyone is going to stop watching disney /nick shows i know i dont.

heck i dont even hate people that enjoy the hp books/ want em harassed/ cause im not a hypocrite.. / just dont want em to buy the game since jkr puts those funds towards evil causes butohwellcantdomuchabouthat.

. its a take on society as a whole and society is messy so its not going to be a wholesome show

these guys and the people that agree with them remind me of the news people insisting the joker movie would cause movie shootings.. or video games=kids murdering people..

its a ridiculous notion always will be.

idk what teenager needs to hear this but please stop watching south park

[crossdressingdeath]

Another thing on Harry Potter - JKR cannot write characters. That sentence sounded weird but I mean it. She cannot write character arcs!! Or character development. The character arcs for all the characters I can think of are terrible. And that's not even getting into how she writes romances. No character in Harry Potter is properly developed and I've always felt sad about it because I latch onto characters easily and the sheer wasted potential of some of these characters!! Ugh.

Yes. Honestly the only romance that even slightly works is Ron and Hermione’s, because we hit that middle ground of not being in either character’s head (so we don’t have JKR’s truly painful ideas of what being in love feels like (fuck off with your personified dick Harry, I don’t know how teenage boys feel about love but I suspect it’s a bit more complicated than that)) but we actually... see them (everyone wave hello to Malfoy and his wife who isn’t so much as mentioned before the epilogue). JKR decided that everyone needed to be (straight) married with kids and apparently forgot that the audience won’t give a shit about these relationships if they don’t... see some actual development. Also there’s the whole thing where everyone marries their high school sweetheart (or. person-who-went-to-their-high-school in some cases) as if that’s in any way how life works. And of course it’s all straight because we can’t have more than one gay wizard in all of the UK apparently (the scandal). Her character writing is better than her relationship writing, I guess? But it’s still like... I’m so much more invested in the secondary characters, and that is... not a good thing. Your secondary characters should, as the name implies, be secondary.

[orlissa]

It’s half past midnight, but I’m worked up, so bear with me.

Okay, so: what happens when feminism works against itself? Or: a short essay on/explanation of a phenomenon I’m seeing more and more of in media.

Right at the begining, let’s go back to World War II. The United States of America. Men are leaving for the front, so women are entering the workforce in a so far unprecendented number. Women are leaving the home, the domestic work, and are taking a considerable part in production! But then the war ends, the men get back, and of course this female freedom generates a lashback.

In the following years, women are strictly restricted to the domestic sphere by society. Culture is telling them that the only thing they should aspire to is to be the perfect housewife and the perfect mother. Betty Friedan would later (1963) call it The Feminine Mystique. And for some people, it was great. For other people, it caused severe psychological problems. Depression. People realized that the suppression of women--societal and legal--cannot go on any longer, and so the Second Wave of Feminism came to be.

One significant component of the Second Wave was that, basically as a rebellion, it turned away from the feminine. You told us we can’t be anything but feminine? Okay, so now we’ll be everything but. And so being overly feminine becomes highly suspect. If you’re overly feminine, you’re submitting to the patriachal oppression. If you’re a feminist, you shouldn’t be like the other girls. (Meaning: you shouldn’t be preoccupied with feminine triffles.)

Which like... made sense. For the time.

But times change, and eventually something called the Third Wave of Feminism happened. Which basically said okay, but maybe it’s not that bad to be like the other girls. The Third Wave says it’s okay to embrace femininity. Moreover, it would great if everyone did! Like, it’s okay for guys, too, to like feminine things! But anyway, like pink, and make up, and cute stuff, because liking all of those things doesn’t negate you being a feminist. Let’s not just celebrate the female, but embrace femininity as well. And I think it’s great. And it’s also what our generation grew up on, basically.

But here comes a twist. Because there is a generation that is basically made up of the daughters of those who worked for/benefitted from the Second Wave. Those women are in their fifties and sixties now, mostly, and they still have this ingrained idea of female good, feminine bad. You have to reject feminine things, because that’s how you’ll help the feminist case, because femininity is how the patriarchy has oppressed us.

(And just a funny little detour: although I generally don’t agree with his ideas, it’s really funny that back in the 30s/40s, William Moulton Marston, the creator of Wonder Woman, actually managed to articulate that the real problem maybe isn’t that women are not valued, but that feminine qualities are not valued, and if even men realized that it’s good to be caring and soft, the world might be a better place.)

Anyway, I actually remember reading a post here about a con or something with a panel of middle-aged female writers (I think one of them was Tamora Pierce) going on how they didn’t like that in Brave the conflict was solved by mending the tapestry, which is such a feminine action. Only to be told by the mostly young adult audience that they thought that it was completely fine, and even carried a nice symbolism. But, once again: the older generation was raised to treat anything overtly feminine as suspect.

Where am I going with this?

This older generation, the daughters of Second Wave feminists, are the ones creating (popular) media texts now. The original author of the Enola Holmes books (which implicitly started my whole tired) belongs to this generation. JKR* belongs to this generation--and just look at how the only overtly feminine character in the book, Fleur, is treated by the narrative! And so, so many women in media belong to this generation. And they are feminists. They are dedicated to further their feminist idology. BUT what they most likely do not realize most of the time is the their version of feminism is outdated. The feminine is not suspect anymore. The heroine outright rejecting femininity isn't revolutionary. She is annoying. Maybe even hurtful. Because we do not have to make compromises between liberty and femininty anymore.

*I have started theorizing about her and her writing, without actually writing it down, way before her transphobe scandal began. I do not condone her actions in any way, but I do understand her thought process behind it.

[douxreviews]

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald Review

By sunbunny

“The time’s coming when you're gonna have to pick a side.”

Writing this review without major spoilers seems like a Herculean task. So let’s start with this. If you’re uninitiated in the Potterverse, you’re going to be very, very confused by this mess movie. If you’re a casual Potter fan, you might like this mess movie. I honestly don’t know what it’s like to be a casual Potter fan. If you’re like me, a diehard Potterhead who definitely owns a wand and, at last count, three Harry Potter scarves, prepare for disappointment. Or maybe you trust JK Rowling more than I do and trust that this mess movie is setting up bigger and better things or has been horribly misjudged. If so, I’d love to know what you think.

Okay now that that’s out of the way, spoiler time.

SPOILERS ARE COMING. YOU’VE BEEN WARNED.

Instead of a traditional review, I’ve decided to take the controversial bits of the movie (or at least what I found to be controversial) and dissect them a bit.

First off, Minerva McGonagall was not alive, let alone teaching at Hogwarts, in the 1920s. Furthermore, you cannot apparate or disapparate inside Hogwarts grounds. Those are just straight up errors in continuity and should not have happened.

Johnny Depp as Grindelwald. Mistake. Just frankly a mistake. Before you attack me on this, know that I was a HUGE Johnny Depp fan for nearly two decades. And then he hit his wife. The first Fantastic Beasts was already completed (or close to) when the allegations became public so you really can’t blame the PTBs at Warner Brothers for leaving him in the movie. Now, the decision not to recast? A lot more controversial. Famously, the actor who played Vincent Crabbe (one of Draco Malfoy’s lackeys) was arrested for marijuana possession during the production of the original eight films. His part was cut out. Completely. No more Vincent Crabbe. This is why optimists like myself hoped Warner Brothers or whoever makes these decisions would see the light and recast. They did not. I felt so guilty that my money was in whatever oblique way, financially supporting him, I made a donation to his ex-wife Amber Heard’s favorite charity (Children’s Hospital Los Angeles) after leaving the theater.

Okay now that that’s done with onto my plot grievances and there weren’t a few of them.

Grindelwald (like his successor Voldemort) is shown to be the magical equivalent of Hilter. Allegory was a big thing in the original novels. The subjugation of muggles/muggleborns was meant to mirror racism in the world today. So why. In the world. Would they have A JEWISH WOMAN LIKE QUEENIE GOLDSTEIN JOIN FORCES WITH GRINDELWALD WHY WOULD THEY DO IT WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY. She’s a Legilimens (mind reader), which means she can hear thoughts. And, yeah, Grindelwald is probably skilled enough in Occlumency (the art of deflecting mind readers) to put her off his I HATE AND WILL ENSLAVE MUGGLES agenda but she was in a huge crowd of Grindelwald supporters and she didn’t pick up on anything in the least bit dodgy?

It is suggested that, if the wizarding world gave way to Grindelwald, the Holocaust could have been prevented. WHAT? That’s crossing a line. Bringing real world atrocities into this is crossing a line. I’d been spoiled on this particular point but that didn’t make seeing it any less horrific in the theater.

Nagini, Voldemort’s snake who he controls fairly completely, actually started off as an Asian woman (the script says she was captured in Indonesia, the actress who plays her is Korean, and the name Nagini is Indian, do with it what you will) with a curse. That is just so obscene. That a person, a real, flesh and blood person was cursed to turn into an animal and that the curse was used in a magical freak show as an attraction…I have no words. Let’s add in that, in her “wisdom,” JKR has decreed that all Maledictuses (Maledicti?) are female and the whole thing is just a disaster. The human Nagini disappears completely into Voldemort’s pet, doing horrible things like killing on command and (I still shudder to think about it) possessing the decaying body of Bathilda Bagshot in order to set a trap for Harry in The Deathly Hallows until she’s finally BEHEADED by Neville Longbottom. Gross. It’s gross.

I’m getting depressed by this litany of awful so let’s wrap it up with the Worst. Credence is a Dumbledore. Excuse me, what? Unless it turns out that Grindelwald is lying to Credence (PLEASE LET THAT BE THE CASE), Aberforth and Albus left a certain GINORMOUS FACT out of their family history as told to Harry (and Ron and Hermione). Also, I mean, if Dumbledore had a brother or half-brother or whatever don’t we think Rita Skeeter would have dug it up while writing The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore? She looked heavily into Dumbledore’s background and I’m not saying she’s a reliable source but she had a nose for scandal, surely she would have found some inkling of this and included it in her book.

Bits and Pieces

How dare JKR write baby nifflers into the script and give me only one short scene with the cuties? They could have lightened up a LOT of what happened later, which was almost exclusively grim.

Weirdly, there was no reference to Grindelwald’s obsession with the Deathly Hallows. I mean, he obviously had the Elder Wand, but that was it.

First mention in HP canon of…okay I already forgot what it was called. The blood oath that meant that Grindelwald and Dumbledore couldn’t attack each other. Unclear why they wouldn’t just use an unbreakable vow (which got a shoutout this movie, so you know JKR didn’t forget about them). Also a bit of a retcon because in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Dumbledore admits to being too scared to face Grindelwald because of the possibility that Grindelwald knew what happened to Ariana and Dumbledore was afraid of knowing the truth. Although that disclosure happened when Harry was in “King’s Cross” and it remained delightfully unclear whether Harry was imagining the whole thing or Dumbledore was really talking to him. “Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean it is not real?” As far as problems with this film go, it’s way down on my list.

You’d be forgiven for thinking it, but the ship Leta and Corvus were on was not the Titanic.

Favorite performances of the movie include Jude Law as sexy Dumbledore. Young. I meant young did I say sexy? And Zoë Kravitz as Leta Lestrange.

one out of four baby nifflers

sunbunny

[elfwreck]

Problems with Audrey's candidacy:

In her bio, she mentioned that she currently writes in Harry Potter fandom; did not even hint at why some fans think this is problematic. (Not just, "I denounce JKR's terfdom," but not even "it's been part of my fannish life for years and I just can't let it go.") - No awareness of current fandom community trends.

Q&A 1 - Is unsure she's qualified. (Acknowledges both that she's new, and that this may give her a fresh perspective. This is a very minor mark against her; it would not matter if there were not other strong candidates.)

Managing pressure, workload - talks about Strategic Planning's tools; does not talk about how to balance a workload without preset tools.

Family is against her being on the Board, which means there's no support in the case of scandal, drama, etc.

Goals without plans - talks about migrating to a "more consolidated interface" but does not seem to have any idea what that might be.

Q&A 2 - Additional warnings - Does not seem to have any idea of how complicated it'd be to add them. Admits she doesn't understand the full issue.

Claims AI works are "inherently derivative"; does not acknowledge that someone might use AI for pieces rather than a complete work. Doesn't want AI works on the archive; admits she has no idea what to do about that.

I do not know what “Archive level Minor warning” refers to, whether that is the yellow banner or the “underage” mandatory warning, so I do not fully understand the question. - Does not try to find out what the meaning might be and answer based on that.

Supports allowing authors to block public bookmarks; does not seem to acknowledge this could be weaponized.

Has no idea what kinds of controversy Fanlore faces, and did zero research to find out. "I am confused by this question to the point that I don’t have an answer."

Tag wrangling, fandom expectations in synning: "I don’t have enough knowledge to fully understand and answer this question. I’ll learn and increase my understanding of tag wrangling procedures."

Comment bots, spam in comments: "I do not believe I am fully equipped to answer this question."

Q&A 3 - Cost of membership - Says it's not too high, without acknowledging why some people believe it is. Has obviously not researched why volunteers are not automatically given voting memberships. (There's identity & legal issues involved.)

Legal committee controversy - "The Legal committee is working with communications to share information about their work. As I am not on either of those committees, I will watch them roll that out as they choose." So, does not show any sign that she knows what the complaints were, much less how to address them.

Seems to think paid positions will fix volunteer misconduct.

Says EOTWR should recruit candidates and volunteers to the movement - implying that nobody currently in the OTW supports it. Seems to find it offensive that a fan group asked for consideration and support from the Board for their goals.

So. Four flat-out "I dunno and I couldn't be bothered to figure it out" answers, and a whole lot of "eh that's outside of the problems I care to fix" answers.

Not a horrific "OMG this person must NEVER be on the board!!!" - but a clear statement that she would focus on the issues that matter to her and push everything else off to the rest of the board.

That's not an evil approach; it's not bad for Board members to have focus areas. It's good for Board members to know their limitations and what issues they don't understand.

But there were several much stronger candidates, who faced questions outside of their strengths and training and said "here's what I could find about the topic, and this is the approach I would start with; I would also check with the experts in this area before making any final decisions."

I did not need to know she was a Republican to know I was going to vote against her.

Why do you personally think Audrey was a bad candidate? For me I think it’s likely she was a more moderate Repub in a deep red area where Dems don’t win, but the platform of the Children and Screens group she is on the board of as well as her survey answers don’t suggest she is anti censorship at all. It’s getting hyperbolic and harassment is never ok, but I think it’s reasonable to be concerned.

--

Her Q&A answers include too many where she doesn't articulate any clear views or plans. It's not that I think her actual choices as a Board member would be all that bad, but given the option I'll vote for someone who has some idea why the hell they're running.

[gcldentina]

The relationship between tina & credence

send me a topic to write a meta about my muse on

You better get ready for this one, oh BOY.

ALRIGHT so. Tina and Credence. In my own personal opinion, the most important relationship in the film.

Prior to a short time before the incident with Credence occurred, Tina probably didn’t take much notice to the Second Salemers. In all honesty, I’m sure they were briefed on not acknowledging something as unimportant as their protests, because there was no way that they would ever pick up a great enough following to do any damage to the wizarding society in America in the 1920s. People were no longer afraid of things like that, and the mere thought of it was laughable, I’m sure.

However, Tina being who she is and having been trained for investigative work, knows how to spot the littlest of details. She knows how to tell something isn’t right. And the day she stood there, just a tad longer than she should have, she noticed that something wasn’t right about the Barebone family. 

She could see the looks upon the kids’ faces, the way that they cowered. This was not normal for any child, not even those who had been roped up into something as ridiculous as Mary Lou’s anti-witch ideology.

It’s for this reason, that despite her better judgement regarding the law, she followed behind them. It’s for this reason that with every bit of stealth she had acquired through years of training to be an auror, that she was able to witness the looks of anger upon Mary Lou’s face. The look of terror upon Credence’s. Looks that sent shivers up her spine, that had her stomach clenching with anxiety.

This is why, on September 18th, 1926, Tina Goldstein followed the Barebones. This is why, the moment she saw Mary Lou’s arm rearing back, a belt in hand, she put an end to it then and there. 

Every move Tina makes is calculated, she is rational in even the most dire of situations. And she knew very well that using magic on a no-maj was very much against the law. However, at the sight of the boy about to be abused by a woman who called herself his mother — well, she wouldn’t stand for that. She could not stand by and watch something so vile take place and not do a thing about it. Wasn’t protecting the innocent what her job entailed anyhow? Wasn’t that what she was trained to do from the very beginning?

But above that, protection is in her nature. It is instinct. 

She didn’t know Credence prior to that day. She hadn’t spoken to him, nor had she ever interacted with him. But she knew that he did not DESERVE what his mother intended to do to him. That no one deserves the kind of things she does to her children. 

Tina was demoted at work for what she did. She was lucky to receive such an easy punishment, when she could have very well been put on trial and sentenced to death for what she had done. She had attacked a no-maj. It was a huge scandal, and a whole crowd of people had to be obvliviated, which was definitely no easy feat.

And while she was definitely upset to have been demoted from her position, especially when she enjoyed her job so much, there was not a single ounce of regret within her. She did not regret protecting Credence. And if she had the chance to do things over, she would have still protected him. It was one of her best memories. In her mind, it was one of the greatest things she’d ever done, and she would not take it back even for a moment. If she had been punished worse than she had been, she still would not have had an ounce of regret for her actions. What she did was worth it.

What she did, as JK Rowling put it, was an uncomplicated kindness. Tina did not have anything to gain from helping Credence. Only things she could lose, but she didn’t care about that. She is selfless beyond belief, and that’s the way she has always been.

After the incident, she’s been put on watch. She’s not allowed near the Second Salemers, and each time she’s caught near them, she’s reprimanded. The risks of the crowd, and of Mary Lou recognizing her are far too great, and they don’t want her causing anymore trouble. If she did, they’d have no choice but to worsen her punishment. 

But that doesn’t stop her. She’s been watching them. She’s kept an eye on those kids. She’s kept an eye on Credence in particular, but on his sisters as well. She knows that if he’s treated this way, the other two are no doubt abused and neglected as well. Even if not always physically. 

She takes notes. She documents every little change within the kids; within Credence. If she can spot any bruises, any change in posture, in demeanor — she writes it down. I don’t know exactly what she witnessed in that time that Grindelwald had been manipulating Credence, but I am sure she saw his demeanor change in some way or another, and I am sure she documented it. She never did talk to him again though. She at least kept her distance in that way.

Upon learning that Credence was the Obscurus wreaking havoc in the city, however, I can only imagine this devastated her. 

Tina sees Credence in a very human way. She doesn’t look upon him as something she can use, he’s not some beast or being that has lost control. He’s a human being who has been abused and oppressed his entire life. So much so that his magic has turned on him. And he can no longer control himself to the point where darkness engulfs him. He’s lucky to be alive. He’s lucky he can function. And it BREAKS HER HEART to know that he has been treated so terribly, shamed so entirely, that this has happened. For while Tina surely isn’t as well versed in obscurial as Newt is, she does know what they are. She knows why they become the way they are. And for this boy, who she knows suffers at the hand of an abusive “parent” to have formed this darkness is just too much.

But never does her desire to help him falter. She sends Newt after him, believing that he will know how to handle the darkness, while she stays behind to duel “Graves,” to keep him AWAY FROM CREDENCE. She is constantly trying to keep these toxic people away from Credence, risking her own life to do so.

It’s why she rushes into the line of fire. Why she rushes in when Newt and Grindelwald are cowering on the floor, scared to death that they will be hurt, and I can’t imagine that makes Credence feel any better. That he SCARES people because of what he is. But Tina does not let the danger deter her. She is not afraid of him. She knows that he is good, and she knows how he has suffered. She tells him as much, and Credence LISTENS to her because she showed him true kindness when no one else did. She showed him kindness for no reason but to be kind. And he did not forget that. She was the only person to ever show him an uncomplicated kindness. He has dreamed of her ever since she saved him from a beating. 

Unlike Grindelwald who used him, who at first only wanted his help finding the child who he thought was the obscurus, who then only wanted him because he was he obscurus, she wants nothing from him. Unlike Newt, who was there to help when this dark form took over, when all hope seemed lost, she helped him when she knew nothing about him. When he was simply a human being that had been mistreated by someone he should have been able to trust. Who he should have been able to love.

She is sad for him, she has tears in her eyes. She hates that this has happened to him. But she believes that she can help him. That she and Newt could help him. If she could only talk him down, talk him away from the darkness, calm him. She could help him.

But she never gets the chance. And he never has the chance that he deserves. And perhaps that is the most heartbreaking thing of all. To have believed that he had a chance, and for that chance to have been ripped away from him because of the fear of others. She is ashamed of her colleagues. She is distraught at the loss. 

And I don’t play Credence, obviously, but from a canon point of view, I do believe Tina far outranks the other characters in Credence’s mind. Graves/Grindelwald has used him, and he doesn’t really know Newt. But Tina was there. She protected him. And it is actually stated that no one had ever done him a kindness like she had. She is beyond important to him. He would listen to her. Believe her. And even after the events of the film, he probably feels the same way, because she never stopped trying to protect him.

When she finally learns that he is alive, Tina Goldstein will stop at nothing to continue protecting the boy.

And I honestly have a whole theory about how I think Tina will be the one to help Credence in the end. Because JKR doesn’t write relationships like this for them to mean nothing. And this one is too important to be left hanging like this. I expect there’ll be a ton more Credence/Tina interaction.

And if there’s not, I will protest.