#james Potter your average privileged abuser

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Uhh okay so I saw another thing thats like said that not only he was a bigot; racist sexist and homophobic, but also that he radiated and radiates toxic masculinity????????

Do you know what toxic masculinity is? Spending years insisting that a girl go out with you, to the point of blackmailing her by saying that you’ll stop bullying people in exchange for a date. Toxic masculinity is also abusing others just because you’re jealous that they interact with the girl you like, because you see her as property or a conquest rather than a person. And it’s also toxic masculinity to run off on a motorcycle with your friend to mess around when you should be at home taking care of your newborn child, instead of leaving your 19-year-old wife to deal with everything while you’re out acting like an idiot.

That is toxic masculinity. It’s the most heteronormative, basic, shallow, and patriarchal behavior a typical straight guy with less personality than a rock can have. And it’s exactly how James Potter behaves throughout his life.

Do you know what else is toxic masculinity?

Acting like the nice guy, the victim, the understanding one, while you’re sleeping with a girl in her twenties when you’re nearly forty, and then running away when you get her pregnant. It’s also toxic masculinity to find it funny and laughable to see a man dressed as a woman. And who does this? That’s right—Remus Lupin. That is basically his entire personality.

So I don’t know where people get their ideas about toxic masculinity. Toxic masculinity is not just whatever they decide to use as an excuse to hate a character. It is a sociologically established concept in behavioral analysis. Maybe if these people bothered to learn how to read and actually opened a book on the subject, they’d stop talking nonsense. I challenge anyone to give me just one—just one—example of Severus Snape displaying behavior characteristic of toxic masculinity. Just one. In seven damn books. Let’s see if they can.

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What’s your view on Lupin and his dynamic with the rest of the marauders?

Oooh this is a fun ask! Thank you! My response got away from me a bit, so I'm popping it under a cut.

It's hard to just talk about Lupin in relation to the rest of the Marauders because those four had such interconnected dynamics. My take on the Marauders is that they were friends because they were the only four boys in the Gryffindor dorm. If there had been a fifth or even sixth student there, or if Lupin and Pettigrew had been less dependent on friendships, then I think James and Sirius would have been best friends with each other and just buddies with their other roommates, and Lupin would have either been the kind of loner who has friends just not close ones, or maybe he might have formed a stronger bond with a fifth or sixth student. As it is, I think he was still that kind of loner to some degree, but since these four boys formed a friendship group, it was less apparent. I'm not sure how many intimate conversations he had with any of the others, though. His relationship with James didn't seem to be very different from his one with Sirius and my reading is that those two were closer to each other than the other two, and Lupin and Pettigrew had no one they were closer to than anyone else.

James and Sirius were best friends, and their status and dynamic affected Lupin and his relationship with both them and Pettigrew. They were also confident, privileged boys. Sirius' family was likely emotionally abusive, while James' was almost overly caring to the point of spoiling him. My view on Lupin, though, is that he grew up in an average middle-class muggle/wizarding home with loving parents until he was bitten by Greyback. From the Harry Potter Wiki:

Remus was born on 10 March 1960 to Lyall and Hope Lupin. His father worked at the Ministry of Magic and encountered the werewolf Fenrir Greyback, who was on trial for killing two children. Lyall was the only one at court to realise that Greyback was a werewolf, as Greyback pretended to be a Muggletramp. Outraged when Greyback was released, he voiced the opinion that Greyback deserved nothing but death.  This opinion cost the Lupin family dearly, as Greyback decided to revenge himself upon Lyall by targeting his son. As the nearly five-year-old Remus slept peacefully in his bed, Greyback forced his way in through the window. Though Lyall was able to get there in time to drive Greyback off with powerful spells, he was unable to prevent him from completing his evil goal. Remus became infected with lycanthropy and he became a werewolf himself.

He must have had to grapple with conflicted feelings at a very young age about being a danger to those around him and having this painful, traumatic experience every month that others didn't have to go through, and that was forced on him by someone acting out revenge on his dad. He would have few memories, if any, from the time before he was bitten. His sense of safety would have been forever compromised by the experience, and that feeling that most (most, not all, mind you) children have, that their parents will protect them and that their home is safe, would have been robbed from him. As he grew older he may have had conflicted feelings about blaming his father. He very likely would have taken on the lesson that speaking up and fighting for justice gets you or the innocent people around you hurt. Whether this meant that you're better off keeping your mouth shut, or that justice inevitably come at a price, or both, I think his processing of his experiences would have affected him and is apparent in the way he later handles his friends' bullying behavior. He may have also developed ideas around bullies or abusers and the like that define them in relation to their targets, ie. because Greyback, a werewolf capable of ripping adults to shreds when transformed, preyed on children who are even smaller and weaker in comparison, Lupin may have framed predatory behavior in his own mind as relational in this way.

I assume that Lupin's condition would have made it difficult for him to make friends. So when he gets to Hogwarts and ends up in a dorm with three other boys, two of whom are confident and bear the signs of/have the natural entitlement of being raised in privileged homes, it would have been important to him to be part of the group and to be taken under the wing of these kids. When they found out he was a werewolf and reacted with support, Lupin must have felt grateful and lucky to have such friends.

My own interpretation of why they did it is that James and Sirius saw it as an opportunity and an excuse to do something that felt ambitious and grand, like becoming animagi, that they could justify because it was in the service of a friend. Really, though, I think they did it for themselves. Lupin was an excuse to break rules and do dangerous things. If they had merely wanted to ensure Lupin felt supported, they could have made a myriad of other choices that were less focused on personal gain and breaking rules and more about serving his needs. I think that while there's an argument to be made for keeping Lupin company as animals while he's a werewolf being an act of serving his needs, leaving the Shrieking Shack and endangering the local population is more about reckless behavior and using him as an excuse for it. It fits in with how James and Sirius are described and their interest in breaking rules and taking risks that would have a greater cost for others than themselves if something goes wrong. By using Lupin as an excuse, they could leave the school illegally and run around the countryside undetected.

We also see that Sirius didn't respect Lupin or give his needs and wants much consideration in the way he used him for the "prank" against Snape: he doesn't seem to have gotten Lupin's consent for it, and he treated Lupin like a weapon to be wielded, with no regard for what it might do to his conscience if he hurt, infected, or killed another student.

Lupin described the incident in PoA like this:

Sirius here played a trick on him which nearly killed him, a trick which involved me. ... Sirius thought it would be - er - amusing, to tell Snape all he had to do was prod the knot on the tree-trunk with a long stick, and he’d be able to get in after me. Well, of course, Snape tried it - if he’d got as far as this house, he’d have met a fully grown werewolf

His phrasing isn't just passive, it focuses the action on Sirius. "Sirius played a trick" "Sirius thought." He never mentions that he had reservations, or asked Sirius not to, etc. Which makes sense if you see Lupin as someone who's just grateful to have friends, let alone ones he can trust with knowledge of his condition, which would cost him his place at school and future career options if it got out. It also shows that Sirius, at least, wasn't all that concerned about meeting his friend's needs and doing things to ease his condition when it interfered with what he was interested in doing. Whether James intervened to protect Sirius from the consequences of his actions or to protect Lupin from them, he and Sirius were close enough friends by that point that I can imagine any breach of trust between Lupin and Sirius bleeding out into his relationship with James too.

I think all of this informs Lupin's dynamic with the other Marauders. James and Sirius are both dominant boys and the only way that works is that they're best friends who dominate together (otherwise they would be at odds with each other). If Lupin and Pettigrew were more similar they would have been closer, but I think Pettigrew was too much of a people-pleaser. Lupin was intelligent and I think if it hadn't been for James and Sirius he may have blossomed more into his own person at school despite his condition. He would have had limited patience for someone like Pettigrew who was sycophantic. I can't really see the two of them having long conversations let alone interesting ones, because Peter would have been worried about saying the right thing and Lupin would have gotten bored with that quickly. I can also imagine moments where Peter would have said what he thinks Lupin wants to hear when they're alone, and said something different to agree with James and Sirius when they were around, in which case Lupin would have come to learn quickly that Pettigrew can't be relied on as an ally. So when it came to feeling the need to stand up to James and Sirius, he would have known he had no support. As for James or Sirius pushing back against the other on Lupin's behalf, I don't think they would have.

So, in that sense, I think even with friends Lupin would have felt lonely sometimes and then would have chastised himself for it, because look at his friends! Willing to become animagi for him! Giving him all those great, fun adventures that were his best memories! Giving him the first feelings of freedom in his young life! Those are powerful experiences and I think they would have clouded Lupin's perception of what James and Sirius were really like. I don't think Lupin saw them as bullies or abusive, because if we look back at the dynamic his experience with Greyback established, he likely saw predatory/bullying/abusive behavior as a dynamic between strong and weak. If James and Sirius hexed people in the halls, it didn't fall into this dynamic because it was against their peers and, after all (Lupin might say to justify their behavior to himself) if the other students were smarter they would be able to defend themselves.

He wouldn't have seen Snape as vulnerable in the ways I think he objectively was. I think Lupin would have felt that if he, who came from a middle-class home with a muggle mother, was accepted by James and Sirius, then they can't be snobbish or prejudiced. I'm not sure he would have understood the difference between various kinds of class prejudice, but he would have felt targeted by the Death Eater kids in Slytherin who were pushing pure-blood rhetoric and seen James and Sirius as righteous and possibly standing up for him by their targeting of Snape. We don't have any reason to assume they did the same with kids like Mulciber and Avery who were more in their own economic and social class, and more vocal about their prejudices, though. We can probably also assume that, Sirius having come from an old pureblood family who was on board with Voldemort's pure-blood rhetoric, he may have known Mulciber and Avery growing up, as kids who inevitably end up hanging out at social events their parents drag them to. (I also think this is one reason that Sirius is so on board with targeting Snape - he's easy prey to him for many reasons, one being that he doesn't have to deal with the consequences. He won't be getting admonishments from his mother for duelling with/bullying someone who's her friend's child and whose family she needs to maintain a good relationship with. Targeting Snape has no bearing on Sirius life outside of school, whereas he can't say the same about most of the other Slytherins.)

But Snape wouldn't have necessarily fallen into Lupin's personal definition of what a target of bullying or even a victim is, and in order to realize why he was he would have had to question the friends who had supported him and, in his mind, made sacrifices for him. He would have started wondering if James and Sirius did the things they did for him or for themselves, using him as an excuse.

As for Pettigrew, he was just tagging along, relieved he was included and that someone else was doing the thinking for him and teaching him skills he wouldn't have learned otherwise, making him feel special and protected. It's interesting what Sirius says to him in PoA:

When did I ever sneak around people who were stronger and more powerful than myself? But you, Peter - I’ll never understand why I didn’t see you were the spy from the start. You always liked big friends who’d look after you, didn’t you? It used to be us … me and Remus … and James … . . . You’d want to be quite sure he was the biggest bully in the playground before you went back to him, wouldn’t you?

Sirius, who only a few pages earlier says that Snape deserved to die for being nosy (and says this in the context of how he himself deliberately set Snape up to die), still lacks the self-awareness to draw a connection between Pettigrew liking big friends like him and James and Lupin, and going from that dynamic straight to Voldemort who he literally refers to as "the biggest bully in the playground."

I think this defines a lot of Lupin's dynamic with the Marauders, though. For James and Sirius, there's a lack of self-awareness and a justification for their actions and perspectives because questioning these things would be uncomfortable and they're boys who aren't used to stepping outside of their comfort zone. Even when he leaves his family's house, Sirius goes to James' and is welcomed by his parents. Which isn't to say Sirius didn't have his own struggles, but for 10 months out of the year he was at school and not with his family and free of their pressures and judgments. When he's older, he doesn't have to deal with it for those two months anymore either. While that break and sense of rejection must have been painful, it would also have been a relief. Lupin didn't get to escape his werewolf condition in the same way. More importantly, Sirius didn't have to step outside his comfort zone while at Hogwarts, and his own ethical measuring stick was based on his own family, so the idea of stepping out of his comfort zone to question his own actions just wasn't something he ever wanted to, or had to do. Even if Lupin had questioned any of this, he would have done so to himself. It's canon that he didn't do so to James or Sirius' face.

Lupin, unlike Sirius, has nowhere to go, so to speak. As far as we know he gets on with his parents, but if he had a rift with the Marauders he would have no other friends to go to. Somewhere he must know that he has no way out of this friendship if he should ever want one, because they know his devastating secret. And who would he be friends with? If James and Sirius are racking up detentions for hexing people in the halls and someone like Lily Evans, who we only hear spoken of as a kind, wonderful person beloved by everyone, spends most of her years at school hating James and his friends and openly telling them to stop being self-absorbed gits, then it's not likely Lupin even has a chance to strike up a friendship with someone from another house because who would want to? Who's going to be friends with the guy who stood by these snooty bully kids and who they see as part of their gang?

So he puts James and Sirius on a pedestal too, kind of like Pettigrew does, except Lupin, at least, has opinions of his own. I think he's just afraid to say them too loudly or assertively. I don't think he argues or even debates with James and Sirius too much because he's afraid of losing the first true, potentially lasting friendships he's formed. Somewhere, I think, he can't believe these guys want to be friends with him. I also think that, after the "prank" with Snape, Lupin gets a bit of a reality check in his perception of Sirius and, more than anything, it makes him question for the first time whether he wants to be friends with them. And realizes that if he doesn't, there isn't much he can do. He's stuck.

As for how James and Sirius view him, I think he's someone who's on their sidelines. He's there, in the dorm with them, he's a nice guy, he's smart, he's fun to chat to, and he enables their behavior. If you asked them what they think of him they'd say sure, he's great, but if you didn't ask them I'm not sure they'd think about him. In some ways, he could have been anyone, but over their years together they get to know each other and it creates a bond. These are guys who believe strongly in the idea of loyalty, to the point that Sirius even says he would have died for Pettigrew purely because he was a friend. Lupin's werewolf condition allows James and Sirius to feel noble and righteous and I think they hide behind these feelings to justify their risky and careless "adventures." Once that truth comes out, James and Sirius see Lupin as an asset and I can't imagine that, as people with clear bullying tendencies, they wouldn't have an awareness (and enjoyment) of the power dynamic it establishes between them.

I don't have much to say about Pettigrew because we know so little about him. I can't imagine he would have contributed much to the general dynamic, being so sycophantic and worried he'll say or do the wrong thing. I know he has very little dignity and self-esteem because of how he reacts when James keeps catching and releasing the snitch in SWM:

Every time James made a particularly difficult catch, Wormtail gasped and applauded. After five minutes of this, Harry wondered why James didn’t tell Wormtail to get a grip on himself, but James seemed to be enjoying the attention.

This tells us as much about James as it does about Pettigrew. In any case, I can imagine moments between him and Lupin where they found themselves alone together while James and Sirius were off doing something and just not having much to say. Long, awkward silences. Most of their conversations were probably about classes or something they all did as a group/James and Sirius did. I think the two of them had an unspoken understanding that they were both friends because of their relationships with James and Sirius (and their dorm assignment) and coexisted. That's about it.

To wrap up this response that I wasn't expecting to be so long (sorry not sorry) I think Lupin's relationship with the rest of the Marauders was fulfilling and enriching in some ways, and toxic in others. I have reservations about Lupin as a character in general, but I also think he was written clumsily, or rather, the way he was written was handicapped by Rowling's insistence on using him to make a statement (ie. the parallel between werewolves and AIDS patients which was very poorly thought out, relies more on the homophobic prejudices of the time than anything else, and warrants its own post). I think Lupin was a vulnerable kid who was grateful for the friendship of more secure people, and who weren't the best influence. The more complex that relationship got, the more Lupin was trapped in those relationships by circumstances, and I think he felt it better not to question that. There's a moment in DH when Harry challenges Lupin's choices in the kitchen at Grimmauld place and Lupin immediately lashes out and assaults Harry. In a way I think this can be read as a revelation about either the influence the other Marauders had on him, or about a shared affinity for being controlling and violent. In another way, though, it felt uncharacteristic and I can't help but wonder how much of that moment is more about Rowling's occasional clumsiness as a writer coming out when she needs to justify creating tension or extracting a character from Harry's support system.

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What a coincidence that this is a fandom “for everyone,” but only as long as the characters are rich and attractive. What a coincidence that the only canonically poor character, the one canonically outside of hegemonic beauty standards, the one canonically outside traditional concepts of masculinity (and who is mistreated in the narrative precisely because of his appearance and mannerisms that don’t align with traditional gender norms), and the one canonically socially marginalized, is the only one you continue to marginalize and mistreat. The only one you don’t punkwash like the other psychopaths you’ve turned into queer icons, even though they’re canonically ten times worse than Snape. But of course, Snape doesn’t count, because Snape was ugly and poor. What a coincidence.

It’s also quite the coincidence that you claim to be inclusive, yet the characters you defend are canonically hegemonic in every sense—privileged, wealthy, and above the socioeconomic average. What a coincidence that in your pinkwashed utopia of wannabes who’ve never actively fought for anything in their lives, making a character gay is all it takes to feel like the revolution is complete. Sorry, but no. You can’t sell the idea that you’re opposing Rowling when you’re pinkwashing the very characters she already glorified because she favored them. Do you think Rowling cares if James Potter is trans in your trashy fic? J.K. Rowling would love that you’re reinforcing her narrative that rich, attractive boys are good, and poor, ugly boys are bad, because that’s something she reproduces throughout her entire saga.

I don’t care where you were born or if you were bullied because that clearly didn’t teach you anything. It didn’t teach you class consciousness, nor did it help you understand how social dynamics work, inequality, or how power mechanisms operate between people from different socioeconomic backgrounds. It also didn’t help you understand that defending rich, aristocratic, abusive kids who harass and torment working-class, underprivileged kids isn’t the peak of the pinkwashed revolution you’ve built in your head just because you label them as gay or trans. That’s not how it works, my friend. You can’t fix everything by slapping a rainbow flag on it. Classism still exists within the LGBTQ+ community, just as abusive behavior and social inequalities do.

So excuse me if I don’t care about your ad hominem fallacy, but clearly, you didn’t get much out of university if your reading comprehension is abysmal and you’re utterly clueless when it comes to political and social culture. So take yourself and your TERF rhetoric elsewhere because the only one speaking like a classist TERF defending bourgeois interests with an elite-bootlicking mentality is you. The only one instrumentalizing an important movement like the LGBTQ+ cause (just as TERFs instrumentalize feminism) to justify your reactionary thoughts, internalized discrimination, and need to trample those in disadvantaged positions is also you.

Though, given your history, maybe the problem you have with Snape is that he reminds you, and other Marauders fans, that in real life, you wouldn’t have been the popular kids. You would’ve been the ones marginalized by people like James and Sirius, who would have made your life miserable. And that’s too unbearable because you want to feel like the protagonists, but you never would’ve been. You never would’ve belonged to the hegemonic, cool kids who ruled the school. In fact, kids like Sirius and James would’ve laughed at you. So instead, you turn them into pinkwashed icons, alter their personalities to your liking, and turn the one true character who fits your idea of a non-hegemonic person into a supervillain because that way, you can fantasize about being the popular ones. Accepting Severus breaks your narrative. In the end, all of this boils down to unresolved self-esteem issues.

I have no problem seeing this kind of stuff, nor do I block tags. If you don’t like being hit with a dose of reality and still think it’s a good idea to keep making a fool of yourself because you have zero arguments or basis to defend your point without coming across as a classist jerk, that’s your problem. Honestly, I couldn’t care less because I’ve said many times that I love debating, and frankly, you’re not going to change my opinion. It’s not for nothing that I pay my rent and bills working as a criminal lawyer and helping people in the process of social reintegration, only for some random person who thinks the revolution is about turning fictional rich bully kids into queer icons to come and try to lecture me about anything. Go on, get lost. Kisses.

okay, hold my drink *hands u cursed ancient goblet full of mead* i gotta talk my shit for a second.

ive been seeing a lot of severus snape love recently. and this is fine, obviously, y'all can love whomever you want. but. i need to rant or i will explode. if we're talking about canon. severus snape spends his adult years, seven books of it in fact, abusing children. and his excuse for this is the girl he loved (tho not enough not to join a group actively trying to exterminate her) fell for the hot jock instead of him (a tragedy indeed, i weep 4 him, i really do). and also she died, which, admittedly is very sad.

it is simply crazy 2 me 2 look at that and think *romance* or *genuine care and affection*. LIKE. fo real. snape calls her a slur in public, apologizes in private, hangs out with dudes who commit hate crimes against her friends (CANONICALLY, she says "you've been hanging out with that douchebag Mulciber, how could you do that after what he did to Mary???" this is not a direct quote but like, it's close enough). lame. loser behaviour.

"Oh but what about regulus" i can hear you say "he loves James potter but snape doesn't love lily???" well. idk. maybe. bit different tho, innit? due to james not being the demographic regulus is attacking (which doesn't make regulus a better person but does make the dynamic between him and james different). ALSO. Regulus chooses to turn against voldemort without hope for anything in return. snape doesn't seem to give a shit about voldemort, he's just sad he's not gonna get to bang lily evans. he switches sides for that reason alone. also doesn't care about what happens to her husband or her son which like. considering lily would be pretty fucking destroyed if they died. once again points to my whole, he doesn't really give a shit about her, theory. lame. loser. behaviour.

also. im sorry. I"M SORRY. but what snape does to neville? to hermione? to harry? gross. a grown ass man out here telling an eleven year old neville he's worthless or hermione she's ugly and annoying. or spilling harry's potion and refusing to grade him for it???????????????

reg and draco are children when we see them at peak suckage and therefore they feel like they can be redeemed much more compellingly (CAN be, not SHOULD be, not HAVE to be, just narratively i think they are easier to turn into interesting, sympathetic characters). but snape? snape grows up into a garbage adult. like he doesn't get better. and again, the only real excuse we're given is his obsession with lily. not very demure. not very cutesy.

ALSO. yall remember that time he got a destitute, struggling Remus Lupin fired from the best job he ever had just because he felt like it? remember that time snape weaponized Remus's lycanthropy and people's prejudice against him just cause. like. literally just cause??? his ego was bruised after the shrieking shack incident so he was like "get wrecked Lupin I'm going to tell everyone your secret so you will be forced back out onto the streets" DO YALL REMEMBER THAT BITCH ASS MOVE????????? THAT HE DID AS A FULL ADULT.

IN CONCLUSION, this is silly and, of course, like i said at the start, everyone can have their own thoughts and feelings about characters, but i simply needed to interject here on behalf of snape haters everywhere because i feel like so much of snape's shitty behaviour as an adult during a time when he was really under no duress and was very safe and cozy, is ignored. and my hater heart just cannot let that stand.

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The only thing I want to make clear is that I don’t think Severus was a better person than James Potter, nor is my problem with James Potter about proving he was a hundred times worse than Severus Snape. My problem with James Potter is that he was a piece of shit, and many people constantly try to justify his actions through victim-blaming and body-shaming, which deeply gets on my nerves.

My problem with James Potter is that it’s perfectly fine to acknowledge that the guy was a privileged rich brat who used that privilege to bully and mess with people at school, surrounded by his buddies like any average bully who couldn’t stand up for himself because he lacked the guts. My problem with James Potter is that the guy clearly had sadistic tendencies, and his fans are constantly trying to deny it or rewrite his character as if he were some playful and friendly pup when he clearly wasn’t.

I mean, Severus was a messed-up guy, and I like him for being that way. He was a bastard and had a shitty personality, but I think we’re all aware of that. Some people don’t forgive him; others like him precisely because of it. Nobody denies it, folks—he wasn’t a good person, and that’s okay. We like him for not being one. What’s not so cool is constantly denying that, yes, he was a victim of bullying, and no, he didn’t deserve that bullying, and no, James Potter wasn’t some kind of vigilante. He was just a rich kid, Draco Malfoy-style, acting like a complete asshole, targeting those he considered weaker to subject them to violence.

If Severus can’t be considered a hero because, despite the good things he did, he also did bad things, then neither can James Potter. Because joining a group of people fighting against evil doesn’t erase the fact that you were an abuser. Getting married and having kids doesn’t erase the fact that you were an abuser. The only thing that can reintegrate you into society after being an abuser is acknowledging that you were one, seeking help to change your behavior, and, most importantly, sincerely apologizing to your victims and compensating them for the harm caused. And he didn’t do that, so he remains an abuser.

You won’t see me saying, "James was worse than Severus," because that’s not the point or the issue. You’ll always see me simply saying that James was a piece of shit, period. The difference with other characters who were also pieces of shit is that people don’t deny it, but in James’s case, they do. So, I feel a moral obligation to remind people of it over and over again so the point doesn’t get lost.