#(not jkr friendly)

[hermioneclone]

No, Tumblr, a thread about hot JKR is totally not a TERF because a cis white woman says so is really not "based on my interests". 🙄

[welcometotheravenclawcommonroom]

Snape: ugh. I hate my life. I have so many problems.

Mcgonagall: well, you create most of them yourself, you know.

Snape: I am trying to brood, Minerva. Kindly cease ruining the ambiance with your factually correct statements.

[ice-and-starlight]

I’m jumping you back into the hp fandom. I need to know your in depth opinions on jily!

Are you sure? I mean, are you sure?

...Alright, then.

WARNINGS: This is going to be so very extremely anti. Anti-Lily, Anti-James, Anti-Jily, Anti-JKR. Just... so much negativity. Seriously, please don't read this if you like even a part of any of these.

Are we clear?

Okay.

So, to begin with, James and Lily are held up as paragons of virtue for a lot of the first half of the series, and I'm honestly convinced that's what JKR intended them to be. Even when she tries to make them more like characters than ideals, it's fairly half-hearted from an author who has brought us such great examples of depth and complexity as Severus Snape and Albus Dumbledore.

There is so much room for extrapolation and fan interpretations, not least of all because both of them exhibit some deeply disturbing behaviour that mostly gets glossed over by the narrative. And my interpretations aren't going to be kind. Mostly, I'm sad to say, as a reaction to 1) fans of Jily trying to shove it down my throat when I was a teenager and 2) JKR's anti-trans warmongering making me highly critical of a lot of her attitudes towards gender, sexuality, and relationships.

So, first, I'm going to try and detail what we actually know about them from canon. Then, I'm going to talk a bit about how knowledge of JKR's prejudices and biases have affected my interpretation. Then... I'm going to drag Jily through the mud.

So, James and Lily met on the train to boarding school at eleven. James picked on her friend based on a social prejudice that's new to her, and she removed them from the situation. Over the following years, James picks on her friend frequently, which she doesn't ever seem indignant about, culminating in the event where James, who's had a crush on her for a while and obviously enough that Severus noticed it, tries to threaten her into dating hi., Lily puts him down harshly, and then leaves her newly ex-friend to his mercies after he insulted her. At some point about a year to a year and a half later, they start dating after 'James deflated his head a little'. They marry straight out of school, and join a vigilante group to fight terrorists together. Also, James goes into training to become an Auror. There is no mention, afaik, as to what else Lily is doing in that time, besides that we know that she and James 'thrice defied' Voldemort, presumably in person, given that I'm sure a lot more couples 'thrice defied' him in some way during the course of those three years. They have a child two years into joining this war, and go into hiding to protect him. They know there's a spy in the Order, and this fractures their friendships (well, James's we're never told who Lily's friends are besides Severus except that she has them), while James chafes at the restrictions of being in hiding. Eventually, Voldemort finds them, and James tries to hold him off without a wand while Lily runs upstairs to get Harry, then stands over his crib begging Voldemort to spare her baby.

That's... pretty much all we know of them from canon.

Metatextually, we know that Lily is meant to represent the unconditional love of the mother, the selfless sacrifice, and James is meant to represent the ideal that Harry's striving to become. (Ask me some time about how disturbing I find the parallels between Jily and Hinny.) And that together, they are meant to be the shining example of love and happiness and bravery and justice. (Also ask me some time about how there isn't a single adult in Harry's life who looks at him and cares (or doesn't care) about him for him, instead of because of who his parents are.)

And given what I now know about JKR's ideas about gender, gender roles, and therefore the standard hetrosexual relationships of our society... The disturbing inconsistencies between what we're told about Jily and what we actually see of their relationship begin to make a lot more sense.

So on the one hand, I fully believe that Lily and James belong together and deserve each other. On the other, I don't really mean that as a good thing.

James's feelings towards Lily are not selfless and they're not kind. He bullies her friend and tries to use that as leverage to get her to date him, and literally only stops where she can see him after that. Lily... finds that good enough. Frankly, given some of the details and turns of phrase in the the Prince's Tale, I would go so far as to say she passively encouraged him even before that. Look at the way she talks to Severus about the bullying. She condemns James's behaviour once, in passing, to stop Severus from bringing him up so that she can continue to scold him. (I'm not passing judgement on whether that scolding was justified or not, that is a whole different meta.)

We don't know what they looked like while they were dating, but we do know they probably weren't even dating for a full year before they got married. Understandable given the state of war their world was in, but... not something I'd hold up as a sign of good decision making on either of their parts. James 'got the girl' (I don't think I need to elaborate on why I find that whole dynamic skeevy) and Lily... I get some serious 'I can fix him' vibes from her decision to date him, and that never ends well. After that, we're told that James and Sirius are trying/want to become Aurors. (I think. I can't actually remember where... Please correct me if I'm wrong and that's only fanon.) With no mention of what Lily's doing afaik.

We know she fights for the order, but... I expect, if you asked JKR what Lily's career was, the answer would be 'housewife'. Within a year or so, she's pregnant, a year later, she's in hiding, a year later, she's dead.

Now, I do understand that part of the justification for all of this will be 'it was war, they were young and in love', but it seems like a really stupid thing, to me, when they've been personally and repeatedly targeted by Voldemort himself, to have a baby. They're really young, James can't possibly be out of training yet, there is a mass-murdering dark wizard gunning for them, Lily is part of his preferred demographic to torture and kill, and their reaction is 'you know what would make this situation better? A baby!'?!

Now, why would Lily, who from what we've seen was a passionate, (self-)righteous person, be willing to take time off from fighting a war that's both extremely personal to her and also escalating fairly quickly, to dedicate herself to raising a baby? Because motherhood is the epitome of womanhood. How could she not?

Hello, JKR, I can see you there behind the curtain again.

As for James in all of this... Well, I've written a draft ranting about James Potter that I didn't post because I try not to spew negativity all over the internet anymore (I tried that once, it wasn't fun for anybody). But I will say that I think there are some deeply sinister interpretations of a rich spoiled bully immediately going into law enforcement after school while his 'headstrong' wife ends up staying home to watch the baby.

TL;DR: Lily and James are that perfect married couple who on the surface appear to be every romantic dream made real, but when you scratch the surface, a lot of ugliness oozes out. At best they were young and stupid and made some significant mistakes that they never got the chance to learn from and reflect on because they died so young. At worst they were a toxic, abusive mess vying for power over each other and we only never got to see them fall apart because they died so young.

(Of course, they never would have, because we know that this is JKR's idea of an ideal relationship. Yikes.)

They are so severely fucked up, and if they'd actually been presented that way, I might have actually found them engaging and interesting, as individuals and as a couple. But I took a hard right into 'I'm fucking done' because so many people bought into the stereotypical heteronormative love story of a couple who can do no wrong.

[secret-llorona]

Is it a persecution festish when she is literally being sent death threats, rape threats and so on everyday?

[kittyregime]

Ladies, please be aware that your 20+ years of feminism will never matter as long as you refuse to submit to the TRAs

[hallows-sun]

Can I request Draco x Harry (from Harry Potter) moodboard please with themes of lovecore, enemies to lovers and dark academia please

(no spoons for id)

[multifandomshorts]

I love you Albus "The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions" Dumbledore

[supermarine-silvally]

Yara 😍 what's your hogwarts house, camp halfblood cabin and personality type if you don't mind answering

"I don't mind at all. I'm here to answer any questions you might have. I've been told that I can come across as a bit intimidating, having inherited my father's infamous glare and all, so this should help me work on that."

Ask Yara (or any of my OCs) anything!

[existingtm]

Dumbledore and House Favoritism (Or Lack Thereof)

Contrary to popular belief, Dumbledore doesn’t actually seem to have much bias for Gryffindor over Slytherin and the other two houses. At least not to the point of affecting his major decisions regarding students. Let me give some examples of why popular arguments to the contrary are flawed.

---

House Cup: “Gryffindors have never gone so long without winning. Slytherins have got the cup six years in a row!” - Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, pg. 99

In all the years Harry attended Hogwarts, we only know of Gryffindor winning the cup in books one, two, and three. That means that in the text, Slytherin is confirmed to have won the house cup more times than Gryffindor has been confirmed to (in recent years). Before Harry came along, Slytherin was having the time of its life.

And while Dumbledore’s decision to change the winner so abruptly at the end of book one is a dick move, it was one more for the benefit of story payoff than serious character development, and it wasn’t because of house favoritism. I mean, if a group of kids got through a dangerous set of security measures, and one of them ended up having to kill their evil teacher who was hosting a dark lord, I too would give them a lot of points regardless of house. Especially if I knew that one of them, currently eleven, was going to die soon. Also, Neville deserved the recognition he got.

The largest number of points Dumbledore awards to Gryffindor are 200 points each to Harry and Ron after they rescue Ginny from the Chamber of Secrets. I mean seriously, that amount of points has nothing to do with house affiliation. If a couple of twelve-year-olds took out a gross con artist teacher, saved an eleven-year-old’s life, killed a basilisk, destroyed a dark object, and nearly DIED, I would also have given them a lot of points.

---

Sirius Black’s “Prank” Involving Lupin and Snape: All the text says about Dumbledore’s handling of it is, “[Snape] was forbidden by Dumbledore to tell anybody,” - Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, pg. 229.

There’s no mention of house favoritism playing into this. The most likely reason for why Snape was forbidden from telling anyone, was to protect Lupin. Lupin had no voluntary part in this situation. He should not have had to fear being exposed as a werewolf because Sirius decided to do something fucked up as a joke.

The text never says if/how Sirius was disciplined for his behavior, so I can’t make any judgements on Dumbledore’s actions in that regard.

It feels weird that this incident is used as an example of house favoritism since it seems to be more about the individuals in question. There’s not really enough information about the Marauders Era to determine what kind of biases Dumbledore did or did not have back then.

---

Gryffindor Characters Getting Away with Stuff in General: They do. However, other houses, including Slytherin, get away with stuff they shouldn’t as well. It’s less of a house problem and more of a this-school-is-under-regulated problem. I mean, think of all the shit Malfoy gets away with for one. The Wizarding World has ridiculous safety standards. It’s good for plot reasons, just not for practical reasons, lol.

In addition, most of the examples of letting Gryffindor students get away with things center around Harry. It’s kind of necessary to let him get away with some stuff considering the role he has to play in the story and in defeating Voldemort. These instances are personal issues rather than house issues.

We don’t see Dumbledore dish out punishments to students very often; that’s more the role of McGonagall and Snape when it comes to their respective houses. So, again, it’s hard to tell if Dumbledore has a general house bias in this area.

---

Influencing Harry to have House Bias: I would like to remind everyone that Hagrid is the first to impart a biased perspective about Hogwarts houses and the Weasleys continue to reinforce these beliefs. Dumbledore, on the other hand, encourages the houses to stand together against evil. He advocates for house unity. He shows compassion to Slytherin students, most notably wanting to save Malfoy from a terrible fate, regardless of any wrong he’s done, because he recognizes that Malfoy is a child who should have the chance to turn away from evil.

---

Tom Riddle: I can’t recall Dumbledore acting out of any malicious intent toward Slytherin students either. Even with Tom Riddle, their beef is about each other, and Dumbledore doesn't act out of cruelty.

Dumbledore made honest mistakes with handling Tom’s mentality, which a lot of people would have made, and dare I say, he was more patient than a lot of people would be when someone displays the traits that Tom did. Regarding not letting Tom stay over the summer, there are two main things: 1) Dumbledore wasn’t headmaster and wouldn’t have been able to make that choice. 2) We don’t know whether or not he approached Dippet regarding the matter. Again, there’s not enough information to make a call on this.

Tom’s parseltongue unsettling Dumbledore isn’t because of the Slytherin house, it’s because of the Slytherin family lineage and their history. That’s more of a personal bias, and yes, Dumbledore did have some bias toward Tom. Again, I would say that he was remarkably patient with Tom, though, and he let his bias influence him far less negatively than it would influence other people. Sadly, we know how that patience paid off (it didn’t). The main thing is that Dumbledore didn’t let that bias carry over to the entire house of Slytherin.

---

The only bits of Gryffindor favoritism I can think of are regarding competitions such as quidditch, which Dumbledore isn’t involved in regulating or scheduling, nor does he allow those biases to influence any decisions. It’s all friendly competition to him because he has no serious stake in it.

---

In summary, Dumbledore seems to have slight biases for specific characters rather than houses as a whole. The magical world is horribly underregulated (for fun plot reasons rather than anything realistic). And Dumbledore is all for house unity rather than tearing one house down when it comes to anything important.

[radiohead-spiderman]

Aroace spectrum Hermione Granger because she’s ME

[hannaxjo]

it's a good day to draw lesbians

[welcometotheravenclawcommonroom]

Draco: I’m not scared of Granger!

The rest of Slytherin, who know very well where she SHOULD have been sorted: well, you bloody well should be.

[ice-and-starlight]

”Because motherhood is the epitome of womanhood. How could she not?”

The irony aside, what did you expect her to do? Leave Harry by himself? Get a baby sitter? We have no idea if abortion was an option. And we also know nothing about James working and Lily not after Harry was born.

Of course they’re bad ppl. Also good ppl. Like everyone. And Harry realizes that and that’s part of him growing up. He also knows very little of them as do we.

I’m sorry but that post is really reaching. Harry is the focalisator in the series. We regard his parents through him and that’s part of the narration. He’s a kid, even in the seventh book and he idealizes his parents AND he realizes some of their flaws, especially James’ and the other Marauders. But he’s still a kid and he needs to idealize them in order to not fall apart. There’s a reason he brings them back with the stone and not Dumbledore.

Let people write their fanfics and move on with your life kfkkdkdk

I mean, I was absolutely thinking of an abortion, if it got to the point of needing one. Also just using protection (don't tell me wizards don't have magic condoms; they have charms for making magic protective bubbles around their heads, someone absolutely adapted that for putting one around their dicks), until their situation is less 'we might die at any moment'. I know it happens, I'm not saying it's unrealisic, but I do think it was careless of them to bring a baby into that situation.

And my scathing opinion on that point was less for Lily and her choices, and more for the hand behind the curtain, specifically in relation to her TERF sentiments that make such choices about a character feel significantly more sketchy.

I know we know nothing about what Lily did or didn't do for work. If that's your way of saying that James being or wanting to be an Auror is fanon, then that could've been made clearer. As I said, it's been long enough since I read the books that I'm not sure on that point. Perhaps it's more commentary on the fandom than on JKR, but it's still commentary on the ship that there is a pervaisive sense of 'we know what James was doing, professionally' that goes hand in hand with 'we don't know what Lily was doing, professionally' that does imply that Lily's professional life is less important than James's, which is a very stereotypically heteronormative perspective in our culture, and one I don't like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Any in-depth look at Lily and James is going to involve a lot of extrapolation. We, as you say, get very little information about them from the book, because Harry is the point of view character. We also never actually see them and their actions without another character's interpretation in the way. Even when Harry summons them with the stone, there's enough ambiguity about how the stone works that we can't be sure if that's actually their spirits, or if the stone uses Harry's memories/needs/feelings to create them. Even pensieve memories are, of course, someone else's memories, and therefore potentially tainted with that bias.

Yes, of course Harry idealises them. Especially because of how the Dursleys treated him, they became a symbol of a happy loving family to him. That doesn't mean he was right. He's also not the only one. Sirius, Hagrid, and Dumbledore all do it too, to name a few. Severus also idealises Lily, and does the complete opposite to James. There are rose-tinted glasses everywhere when it comes to Lily and James. It makes every single bit of information we get about them unreliable, which means, again, that nearly everything is subject to interpretation.

In my original post, I managed to outline the facts that we know about them and their relationship with one paragraph. That's not a lot of detail to build an in-depth opinion on. If I was reaching with my opinions, then I've gotta say, so is everyone else (who has an opinion on Jily, anyway).

...And, Anon, I never said anying about people not being allowed to write whatever the hell they like. In fact, I've written some things about how much I abhor censorship. If you took my answer to a question about my personal opinion on a ship as a judgement on whether you should enjoy reading or writing that ship or not, I think you need to reflect on why you feel so defensive about it. (Genuinely; I have been there, and I get it.)

Let people write their meta and move on with your life.

[crazycatsiren]

Hypocrisy is Harry Potter content posts with "fuck jkr" and "terfs dni" in the tags.

[astraldreamsss]

Remus (To James, Sirius, and Peter): you idiots!

James: I’m sure you’re right but why?!

[skywitchmaja]

when writers describe a character you’re meant to find attractive/likable with “golden brown eyes like honeyed sunlight” and a character you’re meant to fear/dislike with “eyes so dark they were almost black” well i just think they should be hunted for sport <3