#wizard racism

[blorger]

Look, listen, this is a very important question for the culture: why does the hp fandom at large like to act like Lucius Malfoy meant to open the chamber of secrets?

Book 2 Lucius Malfoy was clearly in his live laugh love era; the Great Diary Reshuffle of 92 was very much an improv moment, a petty action to mess with a Weasley and get rid of a cursed artifact at the same time. I'm sure he went home feeling real proud of his innovative problem-solving.

Even when Draco recounts the letter from his father, all we get from Lucius is basically "sit tight and watch", not exactly the words of someone invested in the outcome.

I'm very much in the "the diary was left to Abraxas Malfoy and Lucius had no idea what it really was" camp, tho that is just a personal spice I like to add to the books, am unsure of jkr's actual intentions (if she even thought it through to that extent)

[ghostlypawn]

currently viewing elphaba through the disability lens …. thoughts…..

[creature-wizard]

Imagine clinging to the Wizarding World franchise despite knowing what an antisemitic, racist, transphobic person its creator is, when y'all could be crowdsourcing your own magical world that isn't complete dogshit right here and right now. People conjured Goncharov out of thin air; you people could bring your own magical world to life if you were willing to put in an ounce of effort.

[the-patchwork-girl-of-oz]

Wicked the musical from Dorothy’s pov:

My tiny teenage robot babysitter is yelling at my teenage scarecrow babysitter’s colorful girlfriend for turning him into a robot and she wants to kill me because I accidentally killed her sister with my house and I have no idea how they got together because she’s obviously in love with the sparkly fairy and he wants to date the tiny robot boy and everyone is missing organs and this drama is too much for my little 12 year old mind aunty Em please come pick me up.😭

[woggle-bugger-me]

The Royal Book of Oz is so much worse than I thought.

Ok, so before today I'd never actually read The Royal Book of Oz (AKA the 15th Oz book and the first one written by Ruth Plumly Thompson) all the way through, having only read extracts. I knew it had racist content, but I figured I'd give it a chance so I could form my own opinion.

My opinion is... My god. It's so bad.

Anyway, here are my rambling thoughts. Warning: Racism and xenophobia are discussed. Here we go...

Rant no. 1: The Silver Island

Pretty much everyone in the Oz fandom knows that the Silver Islanders (or "Silvermen" as they are called, which is gross) are an outdated, racist depiction of a fantasy East Asian culture. This isn't news. But what I find interesting is that they... don't really do much wrong. Yes, they kind of kidnap the Scarecrow, but they think he's their long-lost emperor. They do treat their servants badly, which is portrayed by the narrative as a bad thing, but the narrative also treats literally all of their cultural practices as wrong in some way, and the way they treat their servants is not portrayed as being worse than anything else.

The Silver Islanders are characterised is a similar way to the various small communities that appear in the Baum books. They're eccentric, but mostly harmless. However the Scarecrow (and by extension the narrative, since we are supposed to agree with the Scarecrow's viewpoint) views them as this group of immoral wierdos who's way of life is inherently inferior to the Ozian way of life. To be clear, the fact that they're not all evil villains is a good thing - it'd be way more offensive to depict them as all being antagonistic - but that doesn't change the fact that we, the reader, are clearly supposed to see them as lesser.

In this book, the Silver Island (AKA Fantasy Asia) = bad and cringe, meanwhile Oz (AKA Fantasy America) = good and cool. That basically sums up the way the Silver Islanders are depicted.

Rant no. 2: The Scarecrow

The Scarecrow is really unpleasant in this book and it's honestly uncomfortable to read. He insults the Silver Islanders pretty much as soon as he meets them, and when he meets Happy Toko, who's the token "good" Silver Islander, he "befriends" him (I'm putting "befriends" in quotes because he treats Happy like trash throughout the entire story) and then straight-up refuses to pronounce his name correctly. Keep in mind, Happy Toko is nothing but nice to the Scarecrow the entire time, and the Scarecrow doesn't call him by his actual name once.

The Scarecrow is also a really reactive character here. He spends most of the book complaining about his situation, but barely does anything to actually improve it. Compare him with Dorothy, the other main protagonist of the book. She takes charge and is an active player in her adventure. The fact that a 12-year-old is more proactive than this adult man says a lot about the way the Scarecrow is characterised here.

He's also relentlessly rude to the Silver Islanders, insulting both their culture and them as people at every opportunity. There's this one cringeworthy scene where he attends an important meal and freaks out over the local cusine. Not only is this an unfunny, xenophobic jab at Asian cusine (haha get it? Asians eat weird food!), but it also makes no sense for the Scarecrow's character. He doesn't eat, so why does he even care?? There's also a horrible scene where he meets his grandchildren and starts full-on bullying them. He literally yells at them, calling them "little villains" because they can't find Oz on a map. They seem to be pretty young kids, by the way.

Now, it does make sense for the Scarecrow to have difficulty adapting to the Silver Island culture. He's been suddenly thrust into a very important position in a culture that he isn't familiar with. It makes sense for him to be a fish out of water. The problem is that he never changes his views or has them challenged. This isn't a story where the Scarecrow has difficulty adapting to a different culture but eventually comes to respect and appreciate them, it's a story where the Scarecrow spends all his time being racist and complaining, then fucks off back to Oz, leaving Happy Toko, a random servant, as the new emperor.

Also the Ruth Plumly Thompson books are technically considered canon, meaning that the Scarecrow is canonically a racist now. Let that sink in.

Rant no. 3: The other Ozians also suck.

To be fair, none of the other Baum characters are as awful as the Scarecrow, but they're still portrayed pretty poorly here. Here are some examples:

The Wogglebug: In fairness, the Wogglebug's always been a bit of a dickhead, so he's not that out-of-character, but I'd argure that he's even more of a dickhead here. He argues that a person's geneaology is what makes them important, which is ironic since, as Mari Ness points out in her Royal Book review, he's literally a giant insect.

The Tin Woodman: Nick's a minor character here, but there's this one bit where the Wogglebug is asking everyone about their family trees and the Tin Woodman says that he no longer associates with his meat family. It's probably a coincidence that Nick was poor, and came from a poor family, before he became Emperor of the Winkies, but still...

Also, the Wogglebug insults the Scarecrow, who later disappears, and Nick doesn't give a damn. This is his closest friend, who he clearly loves, by the way. Though tbf with the way the Scarecrow is characterised I'm not sure I can blame him.

The other Americans who moved to Oz: Don't appear here because Thompson hates any character who isn't a part of the aristocracy.

Rant no. 4: This matters.

This matters because the previous Oz books had themes of acceptence, and that you should treat other people well, even if they're different than you. Baum definitely fumbled with this in his books (shoutout to Victor the phonograph, you deserved better), but its still mostly a consistent message.

However, the message is altered here. Now, instead of "queerness doesn't matter, so long as they're friends", it's "queerness doesn't matter, unless you're poor and/or not white, then fuck you I guess." And I know people are going to read this and point out that Baum was himself racist, and that his racism bled into his books, and those people are right! We absolutely should criticise Baum's racism! But - and I'm not an expert in 1900's American racism so feel free to disagree - Baum's Oz was never as racist as Thompson's Oz.

Keep in mind that Royal Book isn't the only example of Thompson's racism. There's a later Thompson book which literally frames slaves revolting as the bad guys. Say what you will about Baum, but at least he depicted slavery as the evil that it is.

It also just sucks to see the Scarecrow being so racist, since he's one of my favourite Oz characters. I like him in Baum's books, but I hate him in this one :(

Anyway, this turned out a lot longer than I thought it would. This post was meant to be just a few bullet points but it turned into a mini essay. Turns out I had a lot more to say than I thought.

[maxdibert]

Ngl, we need your analyses and posts on TikTok. The amount of brainless people (Marauders fans) spewing such immense shit on this app is crazy. I need more balance on my fyp and they need to be educated about classism and racism

Honestly, I’m not on TikTok at all; I only use it to watch meme videos and stay updated on political news from my country. But I avoid exploring fandoms because I know it’ll just piss me off. I mean, I already get annoyed watching random videos unrelated to that because of the sheer amount of nonsense people spout, so for my mental health, I’ve completely banned myself from watching opinion videos on any topic. The problem nowadays is that people think that just because they have a microphone and a camera, they’re automatically qualified to share opinions about anything, even if they haven’t got the slightest clue what they’re talking about. You hear so much idiocy that your brain feels like it’s going to explode.

One of the things that irritates me the most about the Marauders fandom and Marauders stans is their blatant double standards. They legitimize themselves by claiming to hate JK Rowling and adopt this false progressive mask that capitalizes on the LGBTQ+ community to justify distorting canon. But in reality, it’s just a cheap pinkwashing tactic to trivialize the actions of characters who were, at best, bullies, and, in some cases, outright psychopaths (like some of the Slytherins, who are forgiven simply because they fit neatly into their Pinterest boards). Then they turn around and claim they can’t extend the same leniency to Severus, using completely fallacious and decontextualized arguments that, to top it off, don’t even align with the story’s foundations.

Take the topic of racism, for example. Equating blood purity with racism is an astronomically absurd socio-cultural leap. Racism is a political system established by colonialism and perpetuated by capitalist dynamics. It literally objectifies a portion of the population, dehumanizing them to the point where they aren’t even considered people, but beasts of burden. It’s rooted in the exploitation and expropriation of entire cultures, leading to the enslavement of their people, who were reduced to being property—mere objects of trade and consumption. Starting from that, even mentioning racism in this story feels like a massive insult. There’s no historical precedent of wizards colonizing Muggles, no record of wizards enslaving Muggles, no apartheid against Muggles. Muggle-borns haven’t been excluded from magical institutions due to segregation, haven’t had to attend separate schools, and haven’t been barred from working in magical government. They’ve always had the same rights as pure-blood or half-blood wizards. They’ve had the same opportunities, the same educational foundations, and the same access to jobs and social resources. Claiming that “blood purity = racism” not only reveals a complete lack of basic knowledge about how systems of oppression work (particularly race), but also a crude and pathetic attempt to use a serious and real societal issue as a frivolous token to prop up an argument based on fallacies. I genuinely hope that those who constantly throw around the term “racism” in this context are just kids who haven’t come out of their shells yet because any adult with some life experience and common sense should feel utterly ashamed. And I say this as someone who isn’t racialized—I don’t think you need to be to have some basic common sense or even a minimum level of general knowledge.

Moreover, the racism angle doesn’t hold water because it wasn’t Rowling’s intention. If anything, her intention was to create an analogy with 20th-century fascism, which is basically the big trauma of any standard white European person. And even then, she did a terrible job of it. While Voldemort might initially seem to parallel Hitler, the social reality of the wizarding world as presented by Rowling diverges significantly from the factors that facilitated the rise of fascism in certain countries during the first half of the last century.

For starters, in this case, pure-blood wizards—or even Voldemort’s non-pure-blood followers—aren’t a majority but a minority. This alone is a fundamental variation in the dynamics of events because in countries where fascist dictatorships were established, or at least attempted, the acceptance rate of radical ideas was majority-based or at least had a substantial popular backing. It’s not Muggles who’ve had to hide for centuries, not Muggles who’ve chosen to create their own communities separate from wizards, not Muggles who’ve opted to remain in the shadows. It’s the wizards. Another key difference.

The anti-Semitic rhetoric that gained traction in Nazi Germany was based on the perception of certain minorities (minorities—and this is crucial) as “the other.” This “other” was dehumanized to the point of creating a narrative that turned them into not just enemies but a threat to the general population. This was achieved through relentless propaganda campaigns, aided by an economic crisis and resentment towards the rest of Europe after the sanctions imposed following World War I.

In the case of blood purity, the minority is pure-blood wizards, and the issue stems from their disdain for the idea of Muggle-borns freely participating in their world. Ironically, they fear this could begin to dismantle the insular world they’ve created for themselves and lead to social advancements and changes in their traditions. Voldemort exploits this and directly appeals to the upper classes and powerful families (unlike traditional fascism, which appeals to the masses, not small elite groups) who have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. He doesn’t need a smear campaign against Muggle-borns because he’s already capitalizing on the prejudices of the elites he’s targeting. Nor does he need to mobilize the entire wizarding population because, as far as we know, the vast majority either oppose him or remain neutral. Voldemort wouldn’t have won an election; he imposes everything through sheer force.

Even with the parallels Rowling attempts to draw, albeit clumsily, they don’t hold up.

What really bothers me is that both racism and fascism are incredibly serious and complex issues that people in this fandom casually throw around as buzzwords to give themselves an air of importance while engaging in hateful discourse. Ironically, they treat these topics with the same frivolity, lack of depth, and ignorance as Rowling herself did when she tried to shoehorn them into her plot. The very same people who pride themselves on hating JK Rowling fall into the same oversimplifications, the same lack of perspective, and the same privileged, narrow view of social issues as she does. It’s pathetic.

What’s even more pathetic is that this behavior reveals that everything about them and their fandom isn’t progressive at all—it’s just empty performativity, built on shaky foundations, reeking of classism and body-shaming.

And I don’t even know why I’ve written this whole essay—I’ve been drafting an official document on the side, and I got carried away lol.

Anyway, you get what I mean—these people are idiots. That’s the summary. xD

[mrstellmeafuckingsecret]

mary envying dorcas because she's so comfortable about her ethnicity, she's so well versed in her culture, so fluent in her language. she has so many friends who are people of colour, she isn't scared of falling into stereotypes, she embraces her skin colour - she's simply who she is, without fear of judgement.

dorcas envying mary because she's so comfortable in her skin, she doesn't feel the need to be the Black girl doesn't have the need to prove herself as Black enough, she's a person before she's a person of colour, she isn't scared of judgement - she's simply who she is without fear of not belonging.

[just-in-cays]

.

[thatfeyboy]

I'm so tired of seeing people trying to name check the Perfect Privileged Person to beat on. Just grabbing terms in a vacuum to make a guy that's the most punchable possible. Do any of you even care about the harm that does? Conflating rape, misogyny, racism, homophobia, transphobia, etc. with a caricature exclusively made from unchanging external traits? I'm not seeing anyone support saying anything like "women are scum" for TERFs and RFs existing, but add white to it or cis and I'm sure you are only punching up now. You can't just decide a skin tone, gender, or orientation is good or bad and then yell at that group and expect anything good to come of it. I'm sure saying "white racist" or "male misogynist" or "female sexists/classist" is just too hard and saying straight men or white people or whatever TOTALLY gets the point across better and doesn't collaterally damage the fuck out of trust between people and communities. I'm sure none of those people you lump together have systemic problems or face bigotry; very based.

[aquadestinyswriting]

A Stand on Holy Ground

Genre - High Fantasy, drama

Themes: friendship, fantasy politics, fantasy racism/xenophobia/bigotry

Warnings: fantasy racism/xenophobia/bigotry, likely a bunch of swearing, fantasy violence, blood mentions

Stage - In Progress

Pov - Third Person

Synopsis

Selene has been watching the rising tide of violence against the dwarven community within Toreguarde from her tower, and is not best pleased about it. When it becomes clear that the gang responsible for most of this violence, the notorious Brotherhood of Cleaving, is being bankrolled by someone on the Council, she tries to step in to help as many people as she can; starting with her close friend and ex-adventuring partner, Egrim Shiverstaff.

Author's Note

Please note that this whole WIP is based on events that took place in a Dungeons and Dragons 3rd edition campaign, Destiny's New Servants, which was played between 2015 and 2018. That is all.

Chapters

Chapter 1

[alpaca-clouds]

DnD's World Problem - It's a bit of a waste

Okay, let me talk about the main world of DnD: Toril. And about the thing that it mostly gets reduced to Faerûn - which is in fact a continent - and specifically the Sword Coast, so the western coast of Faerûn.

And that is exactly what I want to talk about: There is an entire world there - but DnD has barely done anything with it in 4th edition and nothing with it in 5th edition. And I absolutely understand why, but I also think that ignoring these parts of the world is not the best way to go about it.

A World filled with Clichés

Now, anyone who knows a bit about the worldbuilding of DnD, will be able to tell you that this worldbuilding is not exactly creatives in the regard of the different continents. We basically have the following:

Faerûn = Fantasy-Europe

Anchorome = Fantasy-North America

Maztika = Fantasy-Meso America

Katashaka = Fantasy-Africa

Zakhara = Fantasy-Arabia

Kara-Tur = Fantasy-Asia (let's face it: Mostly Fantasy-China and Fantasy-Japan)

Osse = Fantasy-Australia

Faerûn has a lot more worldbuilding to it than any of the other continents. More than that: Faerûn is the one continent that is not based mostly on (racist) clichés of some non-white culture. Duh. Because Faerûn is obviously the European part of the world, and the mostly white people constructing this world were able to imagine a "European world" with a lot more details than they were able to imagine any non-white fantasy world.

And let's make this pretty darn clear: These other continents are not only fairly loose in terms of worldbuilding - a lot of it really is just "this is Fantasy-China, so just... uhm, imagine China but as fantasy!!!" Anchorome and Osse are probably the parts of the world that are most underdeveloped, with nearly no information available that goes past "Oh, this is pre-columbian North America with tribes living on the land" and "Yeah, Australia, uhm, yeah, that's it!"

And yes, this is very much "these parts of the world as imagined by white people in the 90s", as the 80s and 90s were the time when most of this was being created. And yes, that means all the problematic stuff that you imagine now about it... Yeah, that's true.

Let me tell you...

Racist Stereotypes

Okay, fellow white person. When I say "Africa", what do you imagine? I will take a guess: Savana, animals like lions and elephants, people living in mud huts and dressing in like, animal pelts or something. The typical racist "Africa is a country" thing that we saw in a lot of media and still see today, even though recently it has gotten a bit better with some own voices getting to create this media.

Meanwhile Kara-Tur is basically the boiled down version of the China and Japan popularized in Western Kung Fu movies - with maybe a bit of the Jackie Chan stuff thrown into it. It is really just the kind of western stuff, that if you grew up with Marvel comics for example you can find there, too.

Like, Katashaka is basically that Africa that some of the older Black Panther stuff displayed. And Kara-Tur is the kind of Asia that once upon a time Dr. Strange travelled to - and that the Mandarin came from. Like, it really is that bad.

Which probably is why they have not used any of these settings outside of Faerûn since 2000 with very few exceptions. Because by now people actually interacting with this, would rightfully call them out for the racism in it.

So, basically what they are doing right now is, to just act as if those settings do not exist. But... I actually do think that is in a way a bad thing for several reasons.

First and foremost it is obviously a bit iffy that the world got now reduced onto only the "European" part of the world. And sure, Faerûn is supposed to be quite diverse ethnically diverse, but that does not change the fact that it is "medieval Europe, with some Rennaissance stuff thrown in" for the most part.

Because it basically also implies that any non-white cultures are... unimportant for the world.

WotC, take a page out of Marvel's book

Okay, so, what should WotC/Hasbro do, if they actually cared about the franchise (which they clearly do not do, but that's beside the point)?

Well, simple: Do, what Marvel at some point did.

There is a reason I took the Marvel stuff as a reference above, because Marvel at some point realized that what they had done in the way they depicted basically anything that was not mainstream western culture was not okay. So... They hired people from the respective cultures to write about these non-western cultures, do the art and so on.

With all the criticism I have on the MCU, this did show there as well. With Black Panther being the most obvious example of course. A movie that went ahead to actually honor and even celebrate different African cultures.

And... well, DnD could do the same thing. It could not only help to actually worldbuild the entire world of Toril some more, but it also would create super interesting campaign settings for it as well.

Because I could absolutely imagine some interesting campaigns that could take place within an Africa-inspired setting, or some Indigenous-American-inspired setting. That could be very, very fun to play in, if the cultures were created by people from the real-world equivalent of those cultures.

And yes, this brings us back to the issue of: "For fuck's sake, let's just do a bit more with the lore?! Please!"

*sighs* Of course I know that this will probably not happen under Hasbro, because Hasbro mostly thinks about how to implement micro transactions into DnD... Yeah...

[blorger]

hello and welcome to today's instalment of: why I love Lucius Malfoy, a 64-part epic

Exhibit A:

(CoS, Ron just friendly fire'd himself while trying to get at Draco. Hagrid knows what's up)

We always like to roast Draco for the whole "my father will hear about this" thing but, like, when Lucius DOES hear about it he goes all PTA mom about it (see: Buckbeak).

Exhibit B:

(CoS, Lucius pays a visit to Hagrid's hut)

The man simply can't NOT roast his fellow men

Exhibit C:

(CoS, Lucius is informing Dumbledore that the school governors have removed him, also he's sliding in a Hagrid diss)

it's just... he roasts so well, it's his true life calling.

Also let us not forget that, while Dumbledore constantly claims that there's no safer place than Hogwarts (with him in charge), his solution to most problems seems to be "let the traumatised child deal with it, it'll build character". Say what you want about Lucius's -isms (classism, racism, some other ones I haven't thought of but he's surely guilty of..), the man knows Dumbledore is a bad headmaster.

Exhibit D:

(GoF, Lucius is not feeling Voldemort 2.0)

This is giving "me at a family reunion when I'm forced to interact with the aunt I hate" vibes except more posh.

Exhibit E:

(OotP, Lucius just happened to be by the courtrooms after Harry's underage magic trial, the subject of which was his use of the patronus against dementors)

Draco is clearly a follower of the Lucius Malfoy school of Petty Monickers, he learned at the knees of a true master.

[zenosanalytic]

Nations Symbols Theft

For reasons too nerdy to contemplate or explain(the Leagues of Votann, super-heavy warmachines, and the Imperium of Man), I found myself thinking about narratives where non-human fantasy-persons create some wondrously enchanted artifact only for some human/god(and sometimes Wizard) to steal it, and of course that led me to the awful way Rowling resolved the Griphook & the Sword of Gryffindor situation, and THAT led me to realizing something about the "magical races" in the Harry Potter books which makes said series even worse(tho: I havent read the books in ages so maybe Im misremembering).

What are Griphook's three main complaints to Harry?

Goblins, and ALL ~magical races~ for that matter, don't get a vote in the Wizengamot even tho they're subject to wizard-law

Wizards have no respect for Goblin ownership claims, and as a result are constantly stealing their shit

Goblins, and ALL ~magical races~ for that matter, are LEGALLY BARRED from owning, operating, being taught HOW to operate, or KNOWING how to operate, Wands, which drastically improve one's access to and use of magic(and thus are also symbols of membership in ~The Wizarding World~ which Goblins etc etc MUST live in or be summarily executed or imprisoned by Wizards)

As always, from the moment I first read the Griphook storyline and how Rowling "resolved" it to every time I've ever thought of it since, I was struck by how much this all Sucked Horrendously, but then it ALSO struck me that this is a BRITISH Book. That Rowling was and is Proudly British.

And then I thought, well, the Wizards in Harry Potter aren't even analogies for Brits they're just literally(according to English/British-chauvinists: the Irish, obvsl, disagree Quite Strongly on this issue) British, so who, in the real world, might the ~magical races~ -- always "complaining" about how the Wizards(British) stole their land, and stole their cultural artifacts, and won't give either back; enslaved them, forced them into certain jobs and certain places and certain ways of life no matter what THEY Themselves wanted or are qualified to do; are always being grossly, insultingly, self-satisfiedly, ignorantly condescending to them; hold them subject to Wizard(British) law but give them no say in how those laws are made, force them INTO Wizard(British) society but never ACCEPT them as fellow Wizards(British) -- analogize?

The Goblins in Harry Potter, and ALL the ~magical races~ for that matter, are the Colonized. Rowling wrote them as the Colonized, and Rowling Wrote Them siding with the Fucking Nazis.

[kitabasis]

I’ve hardly seen anyone mention it, so. I think we need to acknowledge that the portrayal of the Gur is. Kinda racist.

and as much as I wish it wasn’t, GAW (game as written), Astarion is, charitably speaking, kinda racist.

Edit: just want to make it clear that I am of the opinion that BG3 itself is less racist than, for instance, Curse of Strahd. However it really grinds my gears to see that very few people acknowledge that tumblr's favorite companion is racist (and frankly, as far as I know, you can only tell him off once which is. Frankly I feel like the game should treat it like a bigger deal than it does). I can understand why you would not want to, because he is a very compelling character and it feels icky for a character you like to be racist so of course you just want to pretend that didn't happen, ignoring it feels. Not great to me.

Especially because only one of the companions is a poc and he's probably the most complained about one which I'm sure have nothing to do with each other

[ginevraweasley-potter]

It has been years since I have engaged in the Marauders fandom. I’m trying to get back more into the “classic” Marauder fanfics such as All The Young Dudes and The Life and Times but they all missed a certain element of “something” for me this go around. Anyways, I’ll try and read through them again to see if I’m being unfair. I do like their premises.

But none has captivated my imagination and interest as CH Darling’s series The Last Enemy (TLE). It’s currently ongoing but I admire the nuanced take on Lily, how she’s not portrayed as this wholly perfect character. She’s got flaws. She’s got ambition. She’s so well written that I am so in love with her. No one’s Lily Evans has captivated me as much as CH Darling’s Lily.

Additionally, the fact that CH Darling started the narrative on the 5th year, meant that the story didn’t shy away from the arrogant toe-rag James Potter and I believe that CH Darling brought justice to Severus Snape’s character. Genuinely, I hate Snape but the multiple perspectives of TLE story - which does include Snape - has provided me with a far better understanding of his character than any internet annotation or analysis has done.

The characterization and growth of both James Potter and Sirius Black was handled well and not unrealistically. They were described as brilliant students and chronic pranksters, which CH Darling highlights and integrates into this series (something that I find is greatly missed by a lot of the earlier fanfics that depicts them as pranksters solely and not academically inclined which I disagree with). I love it! James still holds his prejudices towards Snape and Sirius toes that line between what he has been taught and what he has learned.

Remus and Peter are also given their own spotlight. I love how CH Darling explored the ramifications of Sirius’s betrayal and that it’s not just an “I’m sorry” and it is all better. I suspect that, if the author continues this series until the inevitably tragic ending, they will utilize that event as an important inflection point. I do hope they go on to write till that point because I want my heart to be thoroughly crushed. Peter’s character exploration borders on uncomfortable and resigned pity because dramatic irony understands where his character will go on to be and so you try to read between the lines of his perspective, waiting for that inevitable shift of his character.

What I believe really sets this series apart is the way CH Darling portrays the geopolitical climate of the Wizarding World as Voldemort comes into power. It’s all too familiar with our current state. The author makes the story relatable beyond the romantic themes and intrapersonal relationship dynamics.

I do have my fair share of criticism but for now, I must recommend this series because (while a WIP) it is sure to become one of the Marauder “classics.”

You can follow the author @chdarling and @chdarling-tle

The Last Enemy: The Howling Nights by CH Darling (complete)

It’s 1975 and war is simmering beneath the surface of the Wizarding world...but at Hogwarts, it’s magic as usual as the fifth years prepare for their O.W.L.s amidst politics, pranks, and other poor choices.

Severus Snape wants to prove his worth.

Lily Evans wants a fresh start.

James Potter wants Lily Evans, though no one is more surprised by this than him.

Sirius Black wants to write himself a new story.

Remus Lupin wants to survive the next moon.

Peter Pettigrew just wants to keep up.

But as tensions bubble over, sides will be chosen, friendships destroyed, families parted, and paths forever altered.

The Last Enemy: Dark Marks by CH Darling (on going)

It’s 1976 and the events of the past term at Hogwarts have left their mark on all involved. But it’s a new school year now, with new teachers, new rules, and new regrets. Yet as the war clamoring outside the castle walls grows ever louder, the students inside will learn that some marks are impossible to wash away.

[rjalker]

make sure you block creature-wizard. now trying to gloss over the fact that Kamala Harris supports genocide by ~focusing on the positive things she's done~.

Sarcasm: Diversity win!!!! The genocidaire the white supremacists are going to harass you to vote for is a Black Woman!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This will totally justify all the people being killed in genocide and all the minorities whose identities and oppression are being weaponized to guilt other people into supporting genocide!!!!!!!!!!!!!!