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Counterpoint: James would be unabashedly into pop because literally nothing about him says "I am self-conscious about how people may perceive me." Eleven-year-old James straight up barged into peoples' conversations and said the first thing that popped into his head. SWM James did not for a moment think that publicly humiliating a girl's bestie would make him less likely to date her, and in fact onlookers seemed to generally agree that what he was doing was Way Cool. James met Vernon Dursley and made him ragequit that lunch, probably completely without trying, because James is blithely unaware that it might be weird and/or embarrassing to ride a broom instead of drive a car, and attempts to cow or humiliate James can't make it past his immense self-confidence/ego.

James cares what his parents think and what Sirius thinks, and his parents don't care what music their precious boy listens to as long as he likes it. Sirius initially makes fun of James for liking pop, thinking it's their usual banter, but backs up when he realizes James is actually hurt/now self-conscious about it and then apologizes because That's Not How They Are With Each Other, which Sirius mildly regrets later when James is blasting his music and dragging them all to concerts, but it's kind of worth it to see James jumping up and down and singing along at the top of his lungs.

James Potter would be into pop and he would not be ashamed. He wouldn't even consider it reflecting badly on his masculinity. Whatever he does is awesome Mum and Dad and Padfoot say so

get outta here, sirius black would not be a pop boy💀 he is a rocker and you know that. if any of the marauders were pop boys, it would be james, but he’d be deeply ashamed of it because of his fragile masculinity.

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I'm really glad you mentioned James, because from my very American outsider's perspective, the extra-canon lunch between the future Dursleys and the future Potters seemed to involve a class element as well as a Muggle/Magic divide: Vernon tried to brag about his car and how much money he made (indirectly, but that's the only reason to ask James about his) and James was just... amused. The Potters may be new money, at least to the extent that much of their current fortune probably comes from Fleamont's Sleekeazy empire, but they're still an old pureblood family and James grew up/was still wealthy; it seems like that class difference would have been immediately obvious, much to Vernon's dismay? If Petunia is also aspirational (moving from working class to middle class), could she have resented Lily for also marrying up, and into a higher social strata than she did, despite James being something as 'disreputable' as a wizard?

Some people think James was deliberately rude to Vernon, and while he could definitely be an ass when he felt like it, that doesn't seem to be the case here: He 'made the mistake' of showing his amusement and later felt bad about it and apologized to Lily, but that seems to have more to do with Lily being upset than James intentionally offending Vernon and owning it. Could it be more that James didn't see a reason to take Vernon's boasting seriously, and Vernon's pride took a hit?

One thing that confuses me about the Dursleys is how they're supposed to be a parody of the British middle class, but isn't Vernon like director/chief of a company? Like, he owns a business and it doesn't seem to be a failing one so wouldn't they be more accurately described as upper class? Maybe it's just me who's dumb but it's something that really confuses me lol

thank you very much for the ask, anon!

the dursleys would never be thought of as upper-class, because that implies a certain aristocratic or gentry connection which they evidently don't have.

the most they could be is upper-middle-class - which is one of those fun british class-brackets which has a very specific "look" in the wider cultural imagination, and which defines itself as something vastly different from being middle-middle-class or lower-middle-class in terms of its vibe.

which is to say, this intra-class division isn't really financial [although that is a factor - just not the only one] so much as it's based in performance. how one changes social class [which is possible, these class divisions aren't immutable] isn't by becoming rich, it's by learning how to perform. mundungus fletcher, for example, could be a billionaire, but the way he presents himself to the world would still read as working-class. the teenage voldemort has nothing in his bank account, but he behaves in a way which is indistinguishable from his posh pureblood friends.

the dursleys' class performance - the way they dress and speak, the way they behave, their attitude towards their possessions [such as vernon's pride in his car], the places they want to go on holiday - indicates a bang-in-the-middle vibe, simultaneously aspirational to someone like petunia [who grew up below it] and hilariously unimpressive to someone like james potter [who grew up above it].

the best illustration of this is to compare them to the grangers, who are clearly upper-middle-class. the financial difference is negligible - vernon, as a company director, could feasibly be on a salary which was in the same ballpark [or which potentially even exceeded] what a dentist who only or mainly took private clients [which is the case for many dentists in the uk] could expect to earn - but their performance of class is totally different.

the grangers go skiing and spend their summers in the south of france; the dursleys' ideal holiday destination is majorca - which, while this is very unfair to a lovely bit of spain and the lovely people who live there, is used by jkr because it has that sort of middle-tier association in the british cultural imagination [posher than going to the costa del sol, rougher than staying in a converted farmhouse in cantabria]. the grangers name their daughter "hermione" - which, whether they get it from greek or from shakespeare, is a statement of their class performance - while the dursleys name their son "dudley" - which is the same.

and - of course - the grangers are dentists, which means they went to university. vernon makes drills - but is not an actual builder; which, while a blue collar job which would be understood as working-class, is also understood as something authentic - and clearly did not.

the interesting thing about the dursleys' class-status, though, is that vernon seems to have gone down from a childhood which was upper-middle-class. not in the same way as the grangers - apparently city-based, europhile, undoubtedly voted for tony blair in 1997 - are upper-middle-class, but in a way specifically associated with posh people who live in the country - whose poshness is considered to be more parochial and more politically conservative.

marge dursley - with her tweed and her bulldogs and her brusque manners - is a perfect stereotypical example of this. so too is smeltings, the fee-paying boarding school which both vernon and dudley attend - it wouldn't be unusual within the dursleys' class-bracket for dudley to be privately educated, but it is unusual for this to be at a school with the vibe that smeltings [whose uniform, for example, is so obviously based on that of schools like eton and harrow] has.

it's really interesting to think about why vernon might have ended up shuffling down to the middle of the middle, especially because there are plenty of careers for a man from that country-posh bracket which would retain his class-status without requiring a university education - above all, going into the army. that he doesn't do this - that he becomes a managing director, a job which has financial but not cultural cachet as an upper-middle-class signifier [if you care about these things - which i do not] - has a certain degree of deliberate choice behind it.

and this provides a fascinating comparison with petunia - who was clearly raised working-class and has ascended into the middle through performance, and who then becomes desperate to retain her status by continuing to perform "correctly". vernon also lives behind a mask, which also depends on the correct performance of a class-bracket which he wasn't born into, even if his class journey is one of descent.

vernon and petunia's fear of magic relates to this - they're both terrified that the neighbours will learn, if they discover the existence of magic, that they're not as bang-in-the-middle normal as they claim to be.

and this is fundamentally because magic is something eccentric and strange. and eccentricity [especially in dress and manners - the thing that vernon hates about wizards] is read as either a sign that someone is very posh or a sign that they are very much not.

but not as something in between.

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May the 6, Boys having a bet on who would be the best diver. This day is also known as the Great Fainted Day, as half the school lost their mind and/or fainted for an 'unknown' reason.

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Ok I loved your answer to anon as about ws. But now I need to ask you something, since I noticed it is something fanon people as well as canon enjoyers love as a hc that you nearly can't escape it and I am a little afraid to say that, because it seems like I am the only one here...I'm talking about the leather jacket. I mean I don’t dislike it, and it can be a very cool detail in certain fics, but where does this come from at all? Just because he rides a motorbike and is kind of a rebel? It's just..people almost demand it and it's used so inflationary tbh I sometimes kind of get annoyed by it. I've seen it too many times. I'm a bit astounded how persistent this is is all

Hahahah i was thinking if I should mention about the leather jacket thing but I let it be 😂 yeah it is very presistent detail even thought we never get that in canon! I think it is mostly because of the motorbike/rebel thing, although it would be really fun to know if we can trace this back to one origin point like with Draco in leather pants..... And look, I like it even thought i don't really care about them irl. But I also understand the irritation because nothing it more annoying that something you don't like becoming widely acceptable fanon to the point where people kinda act like you are doing something wrong by not agreeing hahaha.

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Moonchaser Week

Day 4 Prompt: Soulmates Summary: AU where soulmates are somewhat rare and not everyone gets them, James is really excited about his, Remus doesn't think he deserves one, Sirius is convinced that he and James are soulmates, one of the above loses out and it is Moonchaser Week so...

@ghostsfanficevents

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Marauders Fandom Vent Post

CW: The following is anti-Regulus, anti-Barty Crouch Jr, anti-Slytherin Skittles, anti-Death Eater whitewashing, and a little general ranting about canon vs non-canon.

I should be finishing my Moonchaser Week fics but I made the mistake of browsing around and wow wow wow there are some truly terrible takes and I kind of really hate it.

"Regulus was abused and--" Really? Was he? Because all the info we get on him in canon is that he was Orion and Walburga's 'golden boy,' probably after Sirius started getting rebellious, definitely not reason enough to be Voldy's No. 1 Cheerleader until he was personally offended by the pursuit of immortality/mistreatment of Reg's house-elf. Just because ten billion fics follow-the-leader'd a handful of Big Fics where Sirius and Regulus were regularly Crucio'd on the daily from early childhood (and were still somehow functional when it landed Neville's parents, two adult and experienced Aurors, in the madhouse) does not make it canon. REGULUS WAS NOT A POOR ABUSED KITTEN AGAHGAHGAH

Oh, and speaking of the Longbottoms: "There's no proof Barty Jr really tortured anyone and he probably didn't even do anything at school so we don't know--"

Yeah, I guess that's fair. I mean, he was a dyed-in-the-wool Deatheater and was sent with two known murder-y/torture-y Deatheaters specifically to "take care" of the Longbottoms, who were as mentioned tortured into madness, but maybe Barty Jr was just sent along to take minutes or serve tea or something! No-one desperate to avoid Hell Prison might try to avoid it by saying they were innocent of the thing they did! We should believe the fascist fanboy who hangs out with other murderous and torturous fascist fanpeople.

"But Barty Jr was under the Imperious by his father! He was abused so--"

Yes, because his father stupidly broke his son out of Hell Prison as his wife's dying wish, tried to hide said son and couldn't control him because Barty Jr was a Voldy fanboy who kept trying to rejoin/restart their little Dark Magic gang! I'm not defending Barty Sr, he made a lot of very poor decisions throughout, but he Imperious'd Barty Jr to keep him from wandering off and doing Death Eater things like, oh, torturing and murdering Muggles and Muggleborns! There's no indication that Barty Jr was Imperius'd or cursed or abused or anything worse than having an emotionally distant workaholic father before he went into Azkaban, and there are lots of kids with emotionally distant parents who don't join hate armies and try to resume said activities after, again, his dying mother sacrificed herself for his freedom. Shockingly, Barty Jr is actually terrible!

I know, I know, it's fandom, do whatever you want, but I just don't understand this bizarre dual-vision myopia. Either canon doesn't matter, you can do what you want and ignore whatever's in the books, in which case why bother citing canon events at all? Or canon does matter, in which case your wildly speculative and sometimes outright incorrect 'facts' should at least be acknowledged as exactly that, rather than stretching the intended meaning of the phrase 'it could happen' so far that it snaps! Why are people so desperate to whitewash these murderous fanatics, they aren't even actually hot, their fans have decided they're hot and therefore should be whitewashed and I don't understanddddddd

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Moonchaser Week

Day 2 Prompt: "I can't believe this" Summary: James and Remus are boyfriends and living together, Remus thinks he's boring compared to Sirius so James will get bored of him, James thinks that's ridiculous and tells him so, cuddles, tooth-rotting fluff, possible Muggle AU.

Real Life™ got in the way, but hopefully I'll be able to finish/edit the rest of the fics by midnight tomorrow (my time). Better late than never, right? (lol)

@ghostsfanficevents

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Moonchaser Week 2024

Day 1 Prompt: Getting Together Summary: Remus pining for James, his unrequited love turning out to be requited, a kiss, implied one-sided Sirius/James, very very brief mention of one-sided James/Lily.

This is my first published actual fic in... a while, and it's Moonchaser, which is somehow even more of a rarepair than Prongsfoot, not to mention it was hastily edited due to time constraints so there may be wild typos ahead, but... Here we are!

@ghostsfanficevents

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Daily Prongsfoot Thought 30

Age of Sail AU: Young James and Sirius are best friends and the closest of companions, much to the disapproval of Sirius’ parents, who consider the Potters inferior for Various Reasons. In an attempt to separate Sirius from James’ “bad influence,” Orion and Walburga send him to stay with relatives in France and continue his education on the Continent; Orion is supposed to accompany him, but when he falls ill, Sirius’ black-sheep Uncle Alphard takes Orion’s place. James and Sirius have a tearful farewell and swear to meet again, cutting their palms and becoming “blood brothers” to seal their oath, but Sirius and Alphard’s ship is attacked and scuttled by pirates, with uncle and nephew among those believed slain in the process.

James is heartbroken and ends up entering the Royal Navy, partly to advance his family’s good name but also because he’s vowed to eradicate all pirates as the scourge they are. James is rapidly making progress towards a captaincy of his own until his ship is boarded by a pirate vessel flying a silver star on a black field. James ends up locked in combat with a strangely familiar pirate—

Pirate!Sirius/Navy!James, of course, as Sirius and Alphard were in fact rescued by the pirate captain who attacked their ship when it accidentally sank; Alphard and the captain fell in love, and when Sirius decided he’d rather stay with his uncle (and be free to find James again) rather than return to the rest of his family, Sirius was trained up to replace said captain. James’ entire understanding of events is upended, and as the boyhood friends are once more together, Sirius is more than happy to show James some of the other liberties that come with a life of piracy. 🏴‍☠️

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I’m so sorry you had to deal with this! This very specific kind of concern troll needs to be banished to a very small island with no shade and no wi-fi, because there’s something extra infuriating about this kind of “helpful” criticism. Some people can’t accept that different authors have different writing styles, even varying their style between projects, and not everything that doesn’t match their personal preference is automatically in need of their superior taste. I’m someone who also enjoys a more verbose writing style on occasion and has received criticism like this in the past, and it still hurts/infuriates me even though I now know it’s not my writing that’s the problem, it’s their entitlement that expects everything to be content made to be consumed specifically by them.

If this is your most recent Prongsfoot fic, I’m doubly sad because I haven’t read it yet; I’m abstaining from fic as a reader while I try to work on my own fic, and the problems I have with that just make it worse that someone would offer unsolicited crit like this. I’m sure I would’ve loved the fic, and I’m sure others do already, but if you feel you have to delete the fic, do what’s best for you. Just don’t internalize this as being on you or on your writing style, because I know that’s such an easy trap to fall into. This is on that commenter, who even in the most generous interpretation should have contacted you privately and asked if you wanted a beta/editor, not just assume you were “making mistakes” because they didn’t think it lived up to their expectations. Like you said: You’re writing for yourself and the people who appreciate you, not for people who don’t think you’re “doing it right” if you don’t do it exactly like they would!

/internet hugs

just received a hate comment on my recent fic telling me that i was using too many filler words and that it was like i was trying to hit the word count 😭 this person then proceeded to give me THREE examples of where i was apparently 'too obvious' with my writing 😭 they recommended i should 'show, not tell' and that i should delete a few sentences 😭 im literally crying this is a FAN WORK, that i do FOR FUN out of the love of my HEART i am doing this for FREE bc i love the characters???? this was so discouraging im honestly astounded WHY would you go onto a FANFIC and then criticise the writing???? i write fanfic bc im severely depressed and it brings me joy if you dont like my writing you could just click off? idk it just made me really sad because what does that even mean 'you used so many fillers [proceeds to give me 10 examples of where i used fillers and it was like you were trying to hit the word count' ?!!?!?!? WHAT WORD COUNT? 😭 THIS ISNT SCHOOL???? TELL ME!!! WHAT WORD COUNT?!?!?!? IM NOT WRITING AN ESSAY!!!! LIKE WHAT EVEN WOULD I GET IF I HAD A LARGER WORD COUNT????? I DONT GET PAID FOR THIS 😭 I JUST WROTE THAT MUCH BC I LOVE JAMES AND SIRIUS??? idk im just ... really sad? it was just shocking to read? like this is a labour of love idk i feel like deleting the entire fic now

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Ooh, fun! Thank you @fiendishfyre for the tag! <3

Oh no, I'm going down the picrew rabbit hole again... Anyway, open tag if you haven't been already!

Gory Angels

Found this picrew by @alerterin and I love it

Tagging @itmeanssungod @sommerregenjuniluft @kaaaaaaarf @fxreflyes @plecotusauritus @polaroidcats @acrossfromladystardust @lupinsmoons @sunattacksthemoon @prongsfish @spookymoonie and open tag :)

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Ooh, fun! Gonna try to at least get out some microfics for this! ❤️

A Reminder! Moonchaser Week starts soon, if you want to be tagged in any reblogs (excluding your own if you intend to participate too) leave a comment and I'll write out a list Moonchaser Week will run from the 29th of April to the 5th of May, let's show this rarepair some love!!!

Also!! Share this, reblog it, get the word out that this is happening!! Share the moonchaser love!!

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Daily Prongsfoot Thought 29

Building on my previous post: Literally Lovecraftian Prongsfoot.

James, the literal embodiment of another galaxy’s sun, seeing tiny mortal lives flash past in the span of single heartbearts, taking human form with eyes that still blaze with his solar fire, solely to meet Sirius because no-one else has so much love to give and so little love given to him.

Sirius, born to a House of Black with star-tainted blood, battling his innate urge to devour James in every way because that’s how much Sirius’ love is consuming him, afraid to show James his true self for fear of driving him away and finding that James isn’t horrified at all, Sirius will always be beautiful and fascinating and Sirius to James.

Both of them as a pair of happily-wedded monstrosities, impossible beings wrapped in human flesh, on a never-ending honeymoon that lays the universe out before them like a cosmic buffet for two.

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Daily Prongsfoot Thought 28

Prongsfoot wholly, completely in love is almost Lovecraftian, because normal people can’t possibly grasp the way they feel about about each other; from the outside it seems unhealthy, destructive to themselves and to the world around them, because when they're together their morals undergo a seismic shift to mirror each other rather than any societal norms or expectations. At their most enmeshed, the lines between “I” and “him” start to blur in a way that would terrify anyone else; being known is being vulnerable, and Sirius and James know the best and worst of each other with a kind of acceptance that others just can’t offer.

In sharp contrast to how others view them, like the eye of a hurricane, James and Sirius experience both perfect dynamism and perfect stillness when they’re together, their respective wavelengths synching in perpetuity like a runner’s high: It feels so right that nothing they do together can be wrong. It’s in this state that they pull off their most outrageous achievements, and it’s in this state that they’re at their most dangerous.

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Remus always blushes whenever he gets too close to James and hopes that James doesn't notice it

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Daily Prongsfoot Thought 27

Non-Magic AU or Hiding From The Magic World AU:

James starts leaving sappy little notes around for Sirius before they’re even dating, “as a joke,” but the affection is very real and Sirius loves them, although he won’t admit it. This continues after they get together, and when they move in together after school, James is always up first anyway for those early-morning runs, so he makes both their lunches before work and always puts little love notes in Sirius’. This continues after they get married, with some of the notes being purely smile-inducing and others being decidedly spicy; and when Harry comes along, of course James puts encouraging little notes in his lunch, continuing throughout Harry’s school years. Harry pretends to be annoyed by it as he gets older, but he actually looks forward to seeing them every day because his dads adore him and Harry thrives with this kind of love and support.

Granted, Harry acquires somewhat mixed feelings about both the notes and his dads’ still being so very in love when he and Sirius accidentally get their lunches switched and Harry gets an eyeful of one of James’ “spicier” notes to Sirius, but…

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Daily Prongsfoot Thought 26

Consider: Prongsfoot, pining for each other, oblivious to the other’s true feelings.

Sirius feeling guilty every time he has sex with someone else while knowing that the one be really wants is James, just knowing that James would want his first time to be special and wishing he’d waited, but figuring that James would never return his feelings so Sirius may as well have what fun he can.

James, who is in fact still a virgin he’s waiting on sirius, but who’s blown a head-turning number of guys since his sexual awakening because he knows Sirius is much more experienced and doesn’t want to disappoint him when James finally makes his play.