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waxingrunes · 1 year

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I’m seeing too much of this across all channels and I need to write a little something on my humble blog with my humble amount of followers, because how else am I going to get this off my chest.

Some of you need to remember that this whole world we created is pure, fiction. It’s based off fiction and we are building off fiction, forking off in different directions with characters we love.

The canon vs fanon debate is ongoing and quite honestly, mind numbingly pointless and you all consistently contradict and overlap one another with whatever discourse you’re riding that week. You lot wanna argue a point by saying, “these are my hc’s and I can do what I like with them stop taking everything so seriously teeheehehehe” then uno reverse that the next minute by screaming, “that would never happen *insert name* is this or is that” but fuck canon right? Fuck JKR? Or is it more, fuck the parts of canon I don’t like and I’ll take the parts I do so I can shove them down the throats of creators who represent these characters in an opposing light. The amount of posts I’ve seen floating around these sites that are people preaching to their audiences about how dumb they are (unless it’s meant to be satire, I’m not a brainless sensitive lump with no humour bone) for liking certain things, or enjoying certain things, or preferring certain aspects in a character is astounding. Take pause before jumping on your high horse over a fictional character and shaming people for moulding them into what they enjoy. Is this not the beauty of fiction, imagination; the ability to twist and turn over different traits and appearances within our palms and make them into our own little dress up dolls?

Here’s my two cents as a WOLFSTAR artist, not a Marauders— if I want to make Sirius into a teacup and Remus into a sea slug and have him curl up to sleep every night in his bowl, then I’ll do that with fine china detail. If I want to make Sirius someone who refuses to wear nothing but a specific shade of tangerine and Velcro strapped trainers, I will. One day I might throw Moony into a boxing ring and have him be a middleweight champion, stained by the blood of his opponent whilst his wolf is chomping at the bit to come out just before the full moon threatens to take centre stage. If I want to make Sirius 6ft tall and Remus 5ft1, I will. Why not draw an AU of them as the rocks from Everything, Everywhere All At Once? Maybe, they can be something as simple as a boy and a boy who look the way you want them to look, fuck the way you want them to fuck and fall in love and fight, and scream, and cry, and make up a million different ways.

Let’s get more specific as the seal’s broken. Why not make Remus plus sized and give him a beard or a dad’s bod at age 23. Or maybe because he’s lighter haired he doesn’t have dark hair like that and only has a smattering of it across the ugliest of his scars. Consider this— moony with softer hips but fuller sturdy shoulders. Or long, slender limbs with a deceptively hidden strength owing to his wolf, stronger than James though he doesn’t look it. Onto Sirius, try to tell me I’m not going to put him in thigh highs and fem the shit out of him whilst he holds a bat in one hand covered in the blood of someone who tried to disrespect his Moons. Alert the press when someone erases every single one of his tattoos only to replace them with hyperpigmentation. What about giving him a beater’s build and a long thick trail of naval hair that he likes to call his ‘seeker’s delight’. What about a hairless Sirius who has a soft life and likes to make herself pretty for her 6ft 4 boyfriend every weekend when he gets on the train to visit.

How about, I stick with my personal holy take on the boys and present you with a harmless middle ground where Moony is whatever the fuck I want him to be physically, emotionally, or characteristically but always a wet fucking cloth for Sirius. A grape, under a thumb, you could say. And a Sirius, who is too whatever I want him to be physically, emotionally, or characteristically but will always be Moony’s biggest cheerleader.

Stay with me whilst I offer you the brain stretching, risky, taboo thought for you to ponder on: stop trying to please people. Stop absorbing all these takes that pressure you into thinking you’ve got to include every fucking thing that shaves you down and boxes you into their squeaky clean little creator! Indulge in what you like. Make it public, make it known and make it as loud as you want. Feels good on this side of freedom.

Lastly, quick (none of this has been quick) circle back to myself being a Wolfstar artist, not a Marauders one. I will not be shamed into drawing the women in this fandom, I will not try to even out my art with equal parts women and men, in fear of being called misogynistic. I came here for Wolfstar and I stay for them; I get 95% of my muse from them and enjoy drawing these idiots nearly every single day when I can. I’ve a busy life, a job, the luxury of a family that love me and a couple friends I’d like to keep too. If and when I draw, it’s going to be what I want to draw and want to indulge in, not to check off your boxes of inclusion. I am not going to defend my choice of indulgence to you. I am not going to refute women or wlw ships and in fact, eat up stories or art where they’re prominent. Will I have muse or will to do a piece on them? Probably not. If I do, I will and if it’s not done to a standard deemed appropriate enough by the council, well shit I hope I get an honourable mention in one of your hate threads on Twitter.

Grow up. I am the type of person who has a more or less rigid taste on these boys and what I, enjoy representing them like and you runts will run your throats hoarse before I turn an ear. I am not the type of person to see someone who doesn’t like what I prefer and start slamming my keyboard and slap them with a red card. I’ll move on but appreciate the take in silence. Some of you really, come across like you’re stomping your feet in a tantrum, some of you sound like you’ve never been told to shut the fuck up a day in your life and some of you, some of you, really think you’re a messiah.

Fuck your canons, fanons and righteous attitudes towards people who are quite literally, not real. You are not a deity of the Marauders, you are a fucking loser offline just like the rest of us.

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firendgold · 1 year

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Since I saw that you're doing the violence ask game can you answer 22, 25 and 7??

I sure can.~

This one got long af though, so another readmore.

(still choosing violence)

22. your favorite part of canon that everyone else ignores

This is another one I've answered already, but tbf... it was yesterday. So I can pull my second favorite part of canon instead so you don't have to re-read an older answer.

There's two moments that tie: one in year 5 and one in year 6. Year 5's moment is a nice warm-and-fuzzy "the trio are such good friends" scene, in the midst of Umbridge torturing Harry with her quill:

It was nearly midnight when Harry left Umbridge’s office that night, his hand now bleeding so severely that it was staining the scarf he had wrapped around it. He expected the common room to be empty when he returned, but Ron and Hermione had sat up waiting for him. He was pleased to see them, especially as Hermione was disposed to be sympathetic rather than critical. “Here,” she said anxiously, pushing a small bowl of yellow liquid toward him, “soak your hand in that, it’s a solution of strained and pickled murtlap tentacles, it should help.” Harry placed his bleeding, aching hand into the bowl and experienced a wonderful feeling of relief. Crookshanks curled around his legs, purring loudly, and then leapt into his lap and settled down. “Thanks,” he said gratefully, scratching behind Crookshanks’s ears with his left hand. “I still reckon you should complain about this,” said Ron in a low voice. “No,” said Harry flatly. “McGonagall would go nuts if she knew—” “Yeah, she probably would,” said Harry. “And how long d’you reckon it’d take Umbridge to pass another Decree saying anyone who complains about the High Inquisitor gets sacked immediately?” Ron opened his mouth to retort but nothing came out and after a moment he closed it again in a defeated sort of way. “She’s an awful woman,” said Hermione in a small voice. “Awful. You know, I was just saying to Ron when you came in . . . we’ve got to do something about her.” “I suggested poison,” said Ron grimly.

Just seeing the trio bounce off each other is soothing (especially after reading days or weeks worth of fanfics where they all suddenly hate each other or were never really that good of friends or whatever). Harry's gratitude and stubbornness, Hermione's caretaking and forethought and plotting, Ron's voice of reason and necessary dash of humor... all perfect. Also, just... Harry is so used to going things alone, toughing things out by himself. It's heartwarming and sad that he still doesn't expect Ron and Hermione to do something as simple as waiting up for him to get back from hellish detention. Also also: Crookshanks curling up with him. ^^

Year 6's moment is just between Harry and Hermione:

Hermione stopped dead; Harry had heard it too. Somebody had moved close behind them among the dark bookshelves. They waited and a moment later the vulture-like countenance of Madam Pince appeared round the corner, her sunken cheeks, her skin like parchment and her long hooked nose illuminated unflatteringly by the lamp she was carrying. ‘The library is now closed,’ she said. ‘Mind you return anything you have borrowed to the correct – what have you been doing to that book, you depraved boy?’ ‘It isn’t the library’s, it’s mine!’ said Harry hastily, snatching his copy of Advanced Potion-Making off the table as she lunged at it with a clawlike hand. ‘Despoiled!’ she hissed. ‘Desecrated! Befouled!’ ‘It’s just a book that’s been written in!’ said Harry, tugging it out of her grip. She looked as though she might have a seizure; Hermione, who had hastily packed her things, grabbed Harry by the arm and frogmarched him away. ‘She’ll ban you from the library if you’re not careful. Why did you have to bring that stupid book?’ ‘It’s not my fault she’s barking mad, Hermione. Or d’you think she overheard you being rude about Filch? I’ve always thought there might be something going on between them …’ ‘Oh, ha, ha …’ Enjoying the fact that they could speak normally again, they made their way along the deserted, lamplit corridors back to the common room, arguing about whether or not Filch and Madam Pince were secretly in love with each other.

Very, very cute scene showing Harry and Hermione getting along casually, something we're not often treated to even in canon. A frankly disturbing amount of fans (particularly fans of A Specific Ship I Will Not Mention Here) have bought into the propaganda that Harry and Hermione aren't really that good of friends just because during GOF, when he'd just experienced his first ever schism with a close friend, Harry privately confessed to missing Ron and enjoying the things he did with his male best friend more. The trio is not "Harry and Ron, then Ron and Hermione". It's "Harry, Ron, and Hermione"; all three of them are necessary pieces of the whole. Harry and Hermione's friendship is different than Harry's with Ron, but it's no less valuable, and not any weaker, or else Hermione wouldn't have stayed in that damned tent.

25. common fandom complaint that you're sick of hearing

Every bit of discourse about Sirius not getting a trial. We know. The injustice is the point. The cruelty is the point. The POINT is to show that wizarding Britain is glitz and glamor and not all that fair to its marginalized peoples and underclass, you nimrods. Frankly, the fanfics that purport to 'fix' it by giving Sirius his "restored Lordship" or a bunch of seats on the Wizengamot or immediate "wizarding guardianship" over Harry or some unnamed hot babes for him to fuck on or off-screen are very... shallow and unsatisfying. Either that or they give him a bunch of money, though this would at least be on brand for the Ministry. But like... yeah. I'm tired of this complaint always going in the same direction and not being a gateway to Greater Commentary On The Series and the World. Because it's not like Sirius and/or Harry become the type of people who rebel against this ideology. If anything, they embrace the pureblood nonsense in a lot of these fics and are just mad that Sirius was the target that one time. Gaaaah.

And, and. Every bit of discourse about Dumbledore leaving Harry at the Dursleys and/or the sacrificial lamb throwaway line by Snape, especially because 99.9% of people discussing it either haven't read the books, haven't read them since the first time and desperately need a re-read, have only seen the movies, are parroting opinions from some other wrong person on the internet, are all read-up but blatantly ignoring what Dumbledore and Harry say (and don't say) over what they THINK they mean, or some other lovely form of ignorance that leads to the same long-debunked takes being re-introduced as GASP-DID-YOU-EVER-CONSIDER soundbites over and over and over and OVER again. I'm so sick of it.

I get it, JKR's a TERF, you don't want to re-engage with her work, and you don't have to. You don't have to give her any more money. Hell, you shouldn't, ever again. But please, fucking make sure your knowledge is correct and not fandom telephone when it comes to Harry's childhood and Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore. I'm not-even-lowkey sick of some of y'all at this point.

7. what character did you begin to hate not because of canon but because of how the fandom acts about them?

I... don't have an immediate answer for this, so I'm going to have to think about it. To you it's only going to take me one line, but for me it'll actually be like... an evening or something.

...

Okay.

This is difficult because (to use the exact terminology) I can't think of a character I've come to hate because of how the fandom acts about them. I definitely have characters whose most popular fanon versions are so irritating or repulsive that it has caused me to look more critically on the real versions of them, though. I guess maybe I'll list those here.

Fleur came to mind first. She seems (and can be) very shallow and haughty in canon at first, but shows compassion and hidden depths in all three of her appearances. She has some veela hair in her wand from her grandmother, and a deep devotion for her younger sister. However... many fanfics (especially harem fanfics or flowerpot fanfics) paint her as either this femme fatale who uses her "veela allure" at will and Cannot Fathom the idea of a man who can resist her (and is thus more vulnerable to falling in love with such a man) or as a super-powerful witch whose family is basically running Magical France (since of course, she is the only French character we know, so why wouldn't she be the most influential person there? /s). Basically, the "foreign" version of what people do to fanon Daphne Greengrass. Ironically, the best fanfic portrayals of Fleur I've seen are the ones that keep her shipped with Bill (with a few flowerpot exceptions, see A Beautiful Lie by MaybeMayba as the prime example), or ship her with Hermione or Ginny... which is sad because I love me some ship variety. (And I still think Bill/Tonks would've been rad as hell.) So I don't dislike canon Fleur, but fanon's "over-attention" to that possible veela heritage and the weird implication that Harry was just "forced" not to notice this perfect woman in his life, rather than just noticing her beauty and not being interested, rubs me the wrong way and disinclines me from including her in many of my own works.

The Bones family is next. Yes, both Amelia and Susan. Susan isn't as bad (I think she has... two lines in Order of the Phoenix? maybe?), but as with most "mostly undefined" HP girls, the personality the fandom has given her (the super sweet politically-savvy Hufflepuff girlfriend of "just do independent!Harry with Lordships and pro-Ministry propaganda and plenty of Wizengamot meetings between Hogwarts classes") is one I've seen so many times it has come to negatively affect my view of the real girl, even though I think the way she calls Amelia "auntie" in canon is adorable. As for Amelia, fanon likes to make her either the Only Sane Man in the Ministry or the leader of the sane faction, who magically is able to fix or ignore all the corruption in said Ministry and can railroad through whatever decisions Harry needs done once he needs to Do Political or Pureblood Stuff Outside of Hogwarts--provided, of course, he's been nice enough to Susan recently.

The closest actual answer to this question I have is Tom Riddle. I didn't like him in canon by any means--I'd probably say I was neutral toward him, just seeing him as "the young Voldemort before he did his magical girl transformation". But fanon kind of acts like he and Voldemort are... two different people? There's these pervasive ideas that either Tom could've been "saved" if Certain People Just Did More (to stop him sneaking around and bullying and murdering???), or that Tom wasn't really so bad when he was gathering up supporters, murdering his family members and the few people who trusted him, and generally going around Becoming the Dark Lord--it was just when he made the switch that he became bad. And like... no. I can't buy that. Even in fanfic, I can't get fully behind the idea of a sane Tom Riddle who was Doing Good until he got sidetracked Oh Nooo. He wasn't. I believe Voldemort was saner before he tried to kill a baby and it backfired, but I don't think there was ever a point where he could have been saved. At every fork he made the wrong decision--to soothe his ego, to feel powerful, to feel special, to feel better than others and make them feel that way too. Tom Riddle's a prick. If anything, we should've seen him squirm a little more before he died.

The last one stings, because it's a character I adore: Hermione. Hermione is a very polarizing figure in canon and always has been, I get it. But what particularly hurts me about her fanon portrayals is that they are VERY SELDOM accurate, or even balanced. Either the author sees her as Their Wife and so she is perfect and never does any wrong and basically becomes the main character of the fic (even if she is not actually the main character), or they overinflate her flaws and use it as a reason to hate on her and bash her to oblivion. There's rarely an in-between. I'm not sure which one is worse. If you held my feet to the fire, I might say the former because a character without any flaws or one who takes over the entire narrative and doesn't let other characters breathe is not fucking interesting to me in the slightest.

This especially hurts because I am a huge Harmony fan and like 60% of bad Harmony fanfics are always the same fucking tropes/plotlines. Hermione is unironically referred to as The Brightest Witch of THE Age (incorrect, not what Remus said. he said "the brightest witch of your age I've ever met", basically meaning she's unusually smart for a fourteen year-old girl). She's treated like the next female Dumbledore who has all the answers (even about stuff she wouldn't know) and often guides Harry's every move.

And speaking of Dumbledore--the same girl who is supportive of him in canon and (after Harry) is MOST likely to recognize Dumbledore as a human who can make mistakes is ALWAYS turned into a Dumbledore Skeptic Who Has Been Suspicious of His Motives All Along, and who will do whatever it takes to get her boyfriend away from his manipulations... by taking manipulative!Dumbledore's place. That's right. This version of fanon Hermione ALWAYS becomes the same thing the author is supposedly railing against, because Harry becomes her mouthpiece, spends all his time with her to the exclusion of anyone else, and can't have a single meeting or meaningful scene with any other character unless she is also present.

Haphne fics do this too, but I swear they got it from bad Harmony fics and it makes me so mad. For once, I would love to read a Harmony fic where Dumbledore is portrayed accurately and both Harry AND Hermione are equal, independent partners who don't have panic attacks if separated for more than five minutes. Especially because as a child Hermione never struck me as the kind of person who even would get married or have a serious relationship distracting her from her Great Work!

But yeah. That last one hurts the most because I love Hermione as an individual, as the very important third of the trio, as a potential partner for Harry (though this isn't the right blog for that!), and just as an iconic character.

I... think that's all? Yep. Thanks~!

#kosondroom #thanks for the ask!#fireandgoldposts #the golden trio #ironically I try not to use that tag much but I need it here #Harry and Hermione #I'm sure you can guess which ship I was talking about. I'm sure the whole world could #genuinely begging fanon Sirius(es?) to actually start dismantling the corrupt pureblood politics instead of bending over for them #as I've said many times by now I reeeeally just want to read new and better ideas in fanfic #and my job is hella stressful I can't be out here writing all of them myself #I sound like such a ''my canon right or wrong'' person in most of these asks lol. in actuality I love ignoring Certain Large Swathes #I just find certain ascended fanon tropes/headcanons in the HP fandom in particular to be either boring or aggravating #and thus I would like them to go away once and for all or for us all to Grow Beyond Them #how many times do y'all think I've read incorrect Obscurial!Harry takes? take a wild guess. you won't be in the ballpark #actually if you are a sane fan side note do not go on Quora answers. it will piss you off every day #me as usual saying ''stop making up shit to be mad at Dumbledore about 2023 there's already enough in canon''#make HP girls more unique and complex 2k23 #I'm tired of reading the same OC girl but with a canon name and a different house tie #''she said boomerly'' lmao #this is making me want to either sit down and write another time travel fic or finally sit down and write a harmony #choose violence ask game

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