#I hate jkr but I love the gays don’t get it twisted

[noodle-the-queen]

POV you ask me what my fave MLM ships are

I went a little crazy with this one

[jewishbarbies]

I didn't know about the antisemitism in hp because while I wasn't explicitly taught "this is antisemitic" I still learned those tropes. I just didn't know they they were tropes. The only thing I knew was nazi propaganda, because that was in textbooks. We didn't learn about everyday antisemitism. We didn't learn about the history of jews in any other country. And that doesn't excuse me or the school I went to. But I know better now, and I can look around and recognise certain tropes. But I can also recognise that jkr was hateful to so many different groups of people. Jews, the Irish, asian people, gay people, trans people, ironically women in general (Ginny Weasley in particular who only existed as a character for Harry to save and get married and have babies with) and women who like "girly" things (Lavender Brown deserved better.)

at this point, so much of pop culture is steeped in these antisemitic things (tropes, imagery, caricatures, etc.) and a lot of fantasy lore in some areas is just antisemitic to its core so while I’m angry I have to sift through the distressing nonsense, I try not to get angry at people who genuinely don’t understand. because you can spread antisemitism while not being an antisemite. the entirety of the witch aesthetic is stolen and twisted from jewish caricatures, antisemitic history, and practices appropriated from indigenous cultures - but that’s just The Witch now. same with goblins. that’s just what That Thing is to people now, so if you want to stop it, you have to throw the whole thing away and barely anyone is actually willing to do that. on top of that, they believe they don’t have to.

with HP specifically, I don’t blame anyone for not picking up on the bigotry from the books they read as children. now, if you reread it as an adult and still don’t get it, that’s another issue. but at least with the antisemitism, it’s much more obvious with the movies and a lot of people try to excuse JKR from it bc of that, when she had such a heavy hand in making those films. she had/has enough sway to change literally anything. and I think a lot of people understood the antisemitism more when they could see just what these goblins were supposed to look like, and that brought it all together. however, there are people obsessed with goblins (I think there’s a lot of neurodivergent people who have a special interest in goblins for one reason or another and that makes it more difficult to let go, in my experience) who absolutely refuse to come to terms with the antisemitic nature of the creature to begin with, when it’s antisemitic originally AND in JKR’s interpretation. I never got into HP so I didn’t know about the goblins, having not seen the movies, and it was really easy to not interact with it once I did. I can genuinely understand how heartbreaking it is to find out something you love goes against what you believe in, bc for jews it’s just part of our lives. we find out creators of and the things we like are nazis or antisemitic every single day. moreso than usual as of late.

imo the racism and general bigotry of JKR should be more than enough for HP fans who claim to care about other people, but it’s hella odd that antisemitism is the sticking point for so many people. they’ll say they’re streaming the movies and playing the games and reading the books but but but they’re not giving money to JKR and therefore not supporting her transphobia and racism, but you mention her antisemitism and the fact that the HP game was just antisemitism the simulator and they immediately dismiss it. her bigotry is embedded in the work. it’s in the imagery of the franchise. hell, there’s a storyline where a villain is a villain bc he wanted to stop the holocaust. that speaks for itself, and should be enough for literal adults.

(on the It’s The Thing Now point, it’s happening with lizard people as well. everyone is calling themselves a goblin and making lizard people jokes and it’s just apart of the young people dialogue now. I could go on for hours but I think I made my point.)

[kitkatopinions]

Of course you would erase Blake’s canon bisexuality. Blake has been confirmed as bisexual way before ten years and it’s even brought up multiple times by the writers like when talking about her new hair where they referred to it as the “bi bob” and Yang is still a sapphic no matter the case. They literally sold only one jacket with bumblebee in the store versus the many other things they advertise and sell that the jacket sold in comparison is barely anything that they make in total

Blake and Sun never dated or confessed to liking each other and Blake never once spoke about finding Sun attractive or said anything out loud about how much she liked Sun and Pyrrha and Jaune never went on a date either or confessed to liking each other or said anything about being attracted to the other before Pyrrha passed, so it just seems like you have a double standard and don’t recognize your own hypocrisy. The only ship that did was Renora and they never went on a date either, they only confessed to each other and that wasn’t until way after volume 3 and they’re not even together now.

The thing is you as a viewer knew Pyrrha liked and was attracted to Jaune without her outright saying so because she showed that she is through her actions and body language. This is no different than Blake and Yang showing that they are attracted to the same sex through their actions towards each other like blushing at one another, sharing loving looks and embracing and holding each other throughout the volumes. So Blake and Yang are not just queer coded they are queer and in love and the writers purposely show that through their actions and they don’t need to say their sexuality every five minutes for you to understand that because even you said that you knew that they were in love, so clearly the writing has made that obvious. And again Blake is confirmed bi and Yang is still sapphic

But I’m sure you won’t understand what I’m trying to say and twist my words and that’s fine. Some people will never see reason or their own bias in their take. You clearly can’t see Blake and Yang without rt’s scandal even though crwby are the ones writing the show and not the people who were actually homophobic and racist. It’s no different than Disney having shows with queer characters in them. Just because the company is rotten doesn’t mean the people who write the show have the same are the same

Okay, since you actually took the time to at least attempt to make an argument here, I'll indulge. This is a long post but I do expect you to read all of it if you're going to play like you're actually trying to have a civil debate after slinging angry hate anons at me for days.

Point One:

Of course you would erase Blake’s canon bisexuality. Blake has been confirmed as bisexual way before ten years and it’s even brought up multiple times by the writers like when talking about her new hair where they referred to it as the “bi bob” and Yang is still a sapphic no matter the case

Blake is no more a 'canon confirmed bisexual' than Dumbledore was canon confirmed as gay years ago just because JKR made a tweet. Content creators don't get to treat their 'queer rep' like behind the scenes easter eggs that TrueFansTM will get if they follow them on twitter. When I say that neither Blake or Yang is canon confirmed as queer, I am saying that it isn't confirmed in the show, not that the writers have never claimed it in extra side content. That's called trying to get points without doing the work, and it's weak. Also, here's Arryn Zech the voice actress describing Blake as straight in official RWBY side material as late as 2019

And for good measure, here's Yang in RWBY Arrowfell which came out in 2022 describing Blake as being like her sister

So yeah, I'm looking for actual in show canon confirmation, not weak-ass tweets or some shit while they put this in some of their other side content.

Point Two

They literally sold only one jacket with bumblebee in the store versus the many other things they advertise and sell that the jacket sold in comparison is barely anything that they make in total

Actually, no, they also sold pride shirts at one point specifically for Pride with Pride rainbow flags that all four main girls were standing in front of. I'm going to assume based of your posts so far that you're actually either a teenaged child or someone who has never critically engaged with the portrayal of queer people in media, and assume you've never thought about why it might be problematic for people to sell merchandise branded with gay pride flags all while their show has no single confirmed queer main character, but it is in fact at the very least suspicious. It's really weird for you to be like 'well compared to the other stuff they sell, this isn't a super big deal' especially considering RT's horrific bigoted history. It's like if you went into a store that you knew horribly mistreated its queer workers and knew they wouldn't let their employees wear LGBTQ+ pins and saw a 'Pride Month' section and then was like "Well, this isn't a problem at all because they clearly sell lots of other stuff." That's what you sound like.

Point Three:

Blake and Sun never dated or confessed to liking each other and Blake never once spoke about finding Sun attractive or said anything out loud about how much she liked Sun and Pyrrha and Jaune never went on a date either or confessed to liking each other or said anything about being attracted to the other before Pyrrha passed, so it just seems like you have a double standard and don’t recognize your own hypocrisy. The only ship that did was Renora and they never went on a date either, they only confessed to each other and that wasn’t until way after volume 3 and they’re not even together now.

This is an official date. It is literally a date. Sun asked her out and she came and confirmed they were going TOGETHER.

This was Jaune asking Weiss out in song form, and then he later proceeds to have an open conversation with Ren where he says he's "completely head over heels for her."

Here's where Weiss asks out Neptune.

Here's where Pyrrha and Jaune literally kiss before she dies. All of this happened in volume two and volume three. Note that these people all got confirmed as interested in the opposite gender through means of either a date (Blake and Sun,) an asking out (Jaune and Weiss,) or a kiss (Pyrrha) but this does not mean they HAD to get together, likewise Blake and/or Yang could've been confirmed as interested in girls without it leading to the two of them getting together (to preserve the 'slowburn.') But my point is that Nora and Ren are the exception, not the rule, they're some of only a few main characters who didn't get their interest confirmed in some way (either through a date, kiss, open conversation of feelings, or other things like that.) You're literally tricking yourself into thinking the early seasons weren't packed full of heteronormativity in order to pretend that RWBY just doesn't do casual or non-endgame-slowburn stuff when the show in the early seasons was filled with non-endgame not-slowburns. You literally forgot Arkos??? Kissed??? In volume three??? Also, your statement that Ren and Nora didn't kiss until volume seven and now they're not even together makes me think that you're not getting the concept that Blake and Yang being confirmed as queer never relied on them getting together, they could've been confirmed eight ways to sunday without getting in a relationship with each other right away.

Point Four:

The thing is you as a viewer knew Pyrrha liked and was attracted to Jaune without her outright saying so because she showed that she is through her actions and body language. This is no different than Blake and Yang showing that they are attracted to the same sex through their actions towards each other like blushing at one another, sharing loving looks and embracing and holding each other throughout the volumes. So Blake and Yang are not just queer coded they are queer and in love and the writers purposely show that through their actions and they don’t need to say their sexuality every five minutes for you to understand that because even you said that you knew that they were in love, so clearly the writing has made that obvious.

Again, I'm assuming you're either a teenage child or have never analyzed media before, so let me help you out.

When writers want their viewers to pick up on the feelings or motivations of their characters without stating or admitting it, they do this thing called coding, where viewers see through tone and looks and little moments that characters feel or think certain ways despite the fact that they are not CONFIRMED to think or feel or want the things we're meant to pick up on. Then later on they might confirm that thing by having it stated indisputably. In relation to queer representation, a lot of media acted under censorship where they were not allowed to actually have their characters openly be queer and so they coded them as queer through things like lingering looks and touches, blushing, hand-holding, standing too-close together, things like that.

In today's modern media, sometimes queercoding is used as a way to try to get LGBTQ+ audiences invested without actually confirming (or last minute confirming in the famous example of Super/natural,) and without risking driving out the homophobic members of their fanbase. This is called queerbaiting.

Queercoding and queerbaiting allows queer people like me (and I'm assuming you) and allies to the queer community to see the intended romantic subtext and pick up on all their little (or sometimes big) clues and understand the intended romantic reading, while allowing plausible deniability for both the writers and/or company (to fly under censoring or assure a bigoted fanbase that it's 'just a fan theory') and the homophobic people who ALSO watch the content. Queercoding and queerbaiting is all things that can be written off as 'unintended' (like Qrow and Clover) or 'like brothers' and 'like sisters' (again, the RWBY Arrowfell dismissal of Yang referring to Blake as being like her sister.)

Queercoding looks like this:

ON THE OTHER HAND Canonical queer confirmation is writers making their characters openly and unapologetically queer, it's kissing, it's dating, it's having open conversations about their feelings, it's active confessions of love, it's being open about their sexual orientation or their labels or their identity, it's sometimes living together, or sleeping together. This obviously doesn't mean characters have to be proclaiming their sexuality every five minutes as you randomly accused me of wanting, but confirmation is undeniable.

Because a homophobe can watch RWBY up till now and go "well Blake and Yang are clearly sisterly" and you and me both might be shaking our heads that they're an idiot and a bigot for not picking up the clear signs, but there's nothing we can actually point to that would definitively prove him wrong as of yet. But meanwhile that same homophobe would probably turn off the Owl House the minute that Lumity gets canonized.

Canonly queer confirmation looks like this:

Do you get the difference, here? Do you understand? BLAKE AND YANG ARE CODED, NOT CONFIRMED.

People like you and me are meant to read Blake and Yang as in love and as queer wlw, and we're meant to see them as romantic, but THEY ARE NOT CANON CONFIRMED, because they have NOT BEEN WRITTEN TO BE ANYTHING BUT CODED. If you want to get mad at someone for that, get mad at the RWBY writers, they're the ones who haven't actually given them one single moment that indisputably proves that they're queer at all.

(I want it on record that no shipper is to blame for liking, believing in, wanting, or feeling seen and represented by coded queer content. That's fine and natural and kind of what the writers are trying to do. But it just isn't canon.)

Fifth Point:

But I’m sure you won’t understand what I’m trying to say and twist my words and that’s fine. Some people will never see reason or their own bias in their take.

This is actually angering to me when you came into my inbox hurling insults and saying that I secretly hate queer people and women and you've been ignoring like ninety percent of what I said with every new ask you sent. YOU are the one who has been determined to misunderstand and twist my words. YOU are the one who got furious because I said that Blake and Yang were not yet canon confirmed to the point where you were just angrily attacking me in my comment section. You don't get to play the victim now, you're the instigator here, you're the one who has been wildly irrational, you're the one who wants so badly for RWBY to be perfect representation that you've spent the last two days attacking a queer woman.

Sixth Point:

You clearly can’t see Blake and Yang without rt’s scandal even though crwby are the ones writing the show and not the people who were actually homophobic and racist. It’s no different than Disney having shows with queer characters in them. Just because the company is rotten doesn’t mean the people who write the show have the same are the same

"CRWBY" includes Miles Luna, and sleazy VAs who turned out to be dangerous bigots, and all kinds of things. CRWBY is not a couple of good apples you can pick up and show me, it's a big barrel full of apples and many of them are contaminated by RT. See this link here where my sister laid out some receipts. Miles Luna (with his history of misogyny and specific biphobia) was not only one of the creators and main writers of RWBY for years and years and years, but he's also been the head of animation at RT. I think pretending that there's zero overlap between CRWBY and RT is naive at best and actively harmful at the worst.

Anyway, thanks for trying.

[flying-elliska]

Just binge read the Bone Season series by Samantha Shannon and !!!!!! amazing. Now I want to yell about it for a bit, bear with me (essay incoming sorry)

- the concept already, urban fantasy dystopia, just feels both so fresh and so obvious it's surprising it's not more of a Thing, and the world building is next level. the modern technology + Victorian aesthetics is not just cool (although it is) it evokes the fact that Victorian England was a brutal, very unequal and fucked up society, so it really fits a dystopia. Plus Scion is also an evil empire that invades other countries, which is also thematically relevant, as is the fact that the MC is Irish.

- I'm obsessed with the concept of a magical mob and Underworld (unsurprisingly) and people who are pushed to the margins of society because their very existence has been outlawed and bond together to find freedom but are also forced to exist in a state of constant brutality and the damage it all does

- the first book throws a lot of plot and world building at you in ways that can be a bit overwhelming and confusing, and doesn't give you a lot of time to connect emotionally to the characters, so that took me a while, but it's really worth pushing through for, i love them all now.

- I love the main character, Paige, so much. she's a survivor ; clever, witty, action oriented and very down to earth ; she's also very competent in ways that feel earned, and interestingly flawed, not some gratuitous emotionless Strong Female Character with plot armor or a 'not like other girls' complex. She's proud and she has a mean, ruthless streak. She's brave, too loyal for her own good, and impulsive to the point of recklessness, and sometimes her gambles pay off and sometimes she has to pay a very heavy price for them (it made me yell at the page several times). It's really cool to see a female MC that is so invested in the politics of her world. I hate that so many female mains in fantasy or dystopia are these isolated loners who hate politics, only really care about a handful of people and want to retire to their husband/2.5 kids happy ending as fast as possible, with a plot-line that focuses over personal development rather than political goals, because it sends this weird message that women are not meant to be in the public space. (Not making this into a rant about the Shadow and Bone books but lol I could)

Paige has to shoulder massive burdens that nobody in their right mind should want and that's understandable, but you do get the sense that she enjoys being a criminal, running free and scheming and climbing over roofs and outwitting her enemies and sticking it to the government. She doubts herself sometimes, worries about people only valuing her for her powers, but she doesn't have a lot of time to waste on self-consciousness, angsting or moping about her feelings. It's very empowering to read. And she's fiercely compassionate in moments where it's actually very dangerous for her to be. She has this constant struggle between the part of her that finds injustice intolerable and the part of her that is grimly pragmatic. This is exactly what women in fiction have been excluded from for too long, complex dilemmas about action and morality taken seriously, not just love triangle shit. It's great. Although wow does she deserve a break. Ouch. Baby </3

- the world is incredibly fucked up but there seems to be no sexism/homophobia/racism, which is refreshing to read. the main romance is m/f but there's a lot of ambient queerness, just because and not to 'make a point' ; the author has confirmed that the MC is demisexual, her bff is gay, the love interest is pan, there's a badass trans commander/mob boss, you get randomly informed that this henchwoman has a wife or that this mobster is trying to save his boyfriend, it's great (and it's not a word-of-god after the fact thing like jkr it's actually shown on the page, they just don't use any labels)

- the main romance is a slow build that is very low-key at first, enemies to reluctant allies to friends to lovers, but becomes really powerful over time. the fact that the MC is demi means it can't rely on 'omg so hot i can't stop thinking about him!' clichés - nothing wrong with attraction at first sight but it often leads to lazy storytelling and irritating instalove, tell over show romances. the characters are drawn to each other but it's more of a meeting of minds and souls at first, admiration and common goals, and their actions are still first and foremost guided by strategy, not sentiment. (sidenote I've often wondered if i wasn't at least a little demi myself. that would explain why i have such high standards for credible romance lmao.) also there's a significant power imbalance at the start but it gets very much deconstructed before anything can happen and it's an interesting negotiation. Warden could easily have fit in the 'brooding immortal douchebags' category but there's an alienness and gentleness to him that lifts him above that, along with the respect and space he gives to Paige and their shared experience of trauma and hopes for a better world. Her hot-headedness and his calm, deadpan sort-of-humor play off each other really well. Also I love the idea that develops over the series that their connection isn't a distraction from their fight but that it makes them stronger and allows them to resist and find solace from the deluge of constant horror that is their world. their whole dynamic in s4...no words. also the second time i read a scene where one character is bandaging the other's wounds and there's touch aversion involved and like, I LOVE that.

- lots of complex different bad guys. some are just brutes, some are sadistic masterminds with superiority complexes, some are deceptive and manipulative and morally ambiguous. love that the Big Bad Guy is a woman - female characters being fully realized means that sometimes, they're just incredibly evil (as long as it's not tied to their gender, i love that). Paige and Jaxon's relationship is fascinating - he's a terrible, manipulative person but i do feel in his own way, he cares about her and wants to see her thrive ; but that's not necessarily a good thing as he sees it as a justification to make her go through awful things. She knows he's awful but she can't get over the fact that he took her in, taught her, believed in her and gave her a sense of belonging and freedom when nobody else did ; she was super proud of being his mollisher and it makes sense it would take time for her to rebuild her sense of self without that, on her own. I like that the ambiguity isn't resolved (it's also a very good illustration of how emotionally abusive parental dynamics can get their hooks in you). The fact that he's aroace really works there too, could have been a lot creepier otherwise and i feel that's really not the point.

- also it's really cool how each book really feels like its own thing, it never feels repetitive, there are huge twists and a shift of focus each time - the penal colony in Oxford in the first, the London Underworld in the second, traveling through England in the third, Paris in the fourth, etc. The pace is pretty breakneck and i wasn't bored for one moment - actually at times i would have liked more quiet moments w the characters. There are two novellas that focus more on that and the second one is an exploration of trauma and recovery that's particularly hard hitting and beautiful. The first book does feel like a beginner novel, it's a bit clunky in terms of exposition, pacing and character development etc ; and there are moments where all the violence and brutality feel a bit repetitive ; but overall the story builds up so beautifully and in so many complex ways it's just really worth it and it's not for nothing i read the four books and two novellas in five days. just have to wait for the next one now though argh

- anyway more people should read it

[allthefilmsiveseenforfree]

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald

I had a friend create a 10-category, 50-question Harry Potter trivia quiz for my 30th birthday. I have a Ravenclaw tattoo that takes up most of my right forearm. I’ve helped orchestrate an HP-themed baby shower. I’ve held multiple HP movie marathons. And when we were first dating and Wife told me she’d never read the books, I legitimately cried and then blocked it from my memory. When she told me for the second time, months later, I cried again. 

One could say I’m a fan of the wizarding world. 

So here we are, at the second entry in the second wizarding franchise, and the only question really worth answering is, is this a world that’s still worth visiting? Well...

Imagine someone you love - it could be anyone, but as an example I’ll use your best friend. Imagine your BEST friend, whom you’ve shared so much with, whom you’ve gone through ups and downs with. That one. Now imagine that every few months, your best friend’s mom sends you a text, or calls you, or puts up a billboard in your town that seems to be actively trying to get you to hate your best friend. Things like “She kicks puppies” or “One time, she made fun of a homeless man until he cried” or “She told me she wants to set fire to a hospital.” Like, real fucked up stuff. Would you maintain a relationship with that friend? With them both? Or would you cut ties completely and just hold onto the memories of the friendship you used to have?

I’m genuinely asking, because J.K. Rowling seems hellbent on shitting all over the things I love in some twisted effort to make me utterly baffled and repulsed by the world she has created. I never thought I’d say this, but Johnny Depp is the least of this movie’s problems, so welcome to Whose Crime Is It Anyway? where the timelines are made up and the plot points don't matter.

A spoilery summary! Our favorite Hufflepuff Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) is asked by Hot Dumbledore (Jude Law) to go to Paris and find Credence (Ezra Miller). You remember Credence, the sweet emo boy from the first movie whose death functioned as the climax of the film? JK JK death is meaningless and impermanent here! It’s the roaring 20s, everyone’s drunk. Newt needs to find him because Grindelwald (Johnny Depp, doing his best impression of day-old potato salad) is also looking for him. Credence is the subject of a prophecy that everyone’s familiar with but the audience, you see, and he’s currently trapped in a Parisian street circus with a woman/snake named Nagini (Claudia Kim, and yes, THAT Nagini). Jacob and Queenie (Dan Fogler and Alison Sudol) also show up again, because they were in the first movie too so they have to be here for this. Jacob’s memory has been restored because...~handwavey reasons~ and Queenie decides to join The Mayonnaise Man’s cause as a wizard Nazi because...she wants to marry a Muggle. Somehow I think she didn’t read the whole orientation flyer. Leta Lestrange (Zoe Kravitz) is engaged to Newt’s brother, Theseus (Callum Turner) but is mostly hanging around to look sad and reveal that Credence couldn’t be her long-lost brother because she killed her long-lost brother by switching him with another baby on a ship right before it sank at sea. And she’s right, Credence isn’t her brother - he’s gone over to the dark side, where the vaguely human amalgamation of cauliflower rice tells him he’s the long-lost brother of Albus Dumbledore! Because why the fuck not, nothing else in this goddamn thing makes any sense anyway.

I would also like to point out I left out at least 40 more characters, many of whom seem to be important but are never named or introduced in any way.

SEVERAL thoughts:

Visually, this world is stunning. The set designers have done an incredible job showcasing new magical settings in rich, vivid detail. The Parisian street circus and the French Ministry of Magic building were particular favorites of mine.

Likewise, the 1927-era costumes are drop-dead gorgeous. This franchise should really be called Fantastic Coats and Where to Find Them.

50 galleons seems so steep. I wonder what the wizarding inflation rate is.

Snakes can fit through bars of cages...

Performances - Redmayne is sweet, but virtually shoved out of the way in his own franchise; Kravitz is cold and removed - is that acting choice secret pain or constipation? Hard to say; Fogler is underutilized, especially after being the emotional MVP of the first film; Sudol is fractured and manic, completely devoid of her earnest warmth from before; Miller barely gets 3 lines, and mostly looks like he’s about to cry; Law is fine as hell and kindly and wise and doesn’t give off weird “I’m going to use children as sacrificial lambs without telling them or anyone else about it” vibes, so that’s already a big step up from the Dumbledore we get in the books; and then there’s Johnny. Johnny “lightly braised tofu” Depp is giving one of his most understated performances in years, to the point that he’s almost...boring? Most genocidal fuckheads are at least compelling speakers, but this dehydrated turnip just sort of glides about, while his followers do dastardly things for him. He doesn’t even kill his own toddlers, he outsources it to his followers. Does nobody believe in honest, hard work anymore? 

Basically all of the details - the set dressing, the costumes, the overall aesthetics and feel of the film - are beautifully realized. However, the foundation is made of smoke and sand and the distant sound of JKR’s maniacal laughter.

Cast and endorse an accused abuser who is teetering on the brink of public collapse? Check. Include outdated Orientalism cliches by casting an East Asian woman as mysterious, dangerous, and literally snake-like? Check. How about a white imperialist Imperius-ing Leta Lestrange's (black African) mother and literally forcing her into sex slavery with no follow-up or reflection on the part of the film or its characters? Check. It’s like some sort of perverse bingo game she’s playing to try to alienate everyone who might have seen themselves in the Harry Potter universe as belonging, because they understood what it was like to be an outsider, to be abused, to be shunned and made fun of and ostracized. Cause fuck all those people, amirite?

And that’s just the offensive choices from a purely political standpoint. How about the offensive choices regarding more trivial matters like linear time and space - like Dumbledore teaching Transfiguration, not DAtDA. Or like Professor MacGonagall being born in 1935, yet somehow teaching at Hogwarts in 1927. People apparating inside Hogwarts. Complete reversals of characters’ personalities and motivations. Characters being introduced and never seen again (where did Bunty go?? Did she die???) Characters NOT being introduced and never seen again (what up Jessica Williams, super psyched that you’re here, sure would be neat if I knew who the fuck you were playing or why that person was important!) If the references are meant for fans’ benefit, it fucking BACKFIRED, because most HP fans I know aren’t looking for a convoluted soap opera where babies are switched, people have secret brothers, everyone's amnesia gets reversed, and people come back from the dead.

Now that I think about it, the practice of confronting a boggart is super problematic. Like people have traumas. It's not all spiders and snakes, Dumbledore! God, Hogwarts pedagogy is shit.

I’m still not convinced that Jude Law’s tasty Daddy Dumbledore could possibly still be in love with this tuna salad sandwich from a vending machine at the DMV. That flashback in the Mirror of Erised is supposed to be full of longing but all I could think was, “is this how straight people think gay sex works?” Would have loved to hear that day in the writer’s room. “Maybe we could have them kiss?” “Too gay. What if they exchange blood vows and hold hands to form a magical amulet?” “Nailed it.” *everyone high fives and chugs a Red Bull* 

There’s just...so much. So much that I wish were different. I don’t quite know how it’s possible for a film to explain both too much and not enough, but here we are. The Crimes of Grindlewald isn’t just a title, it’s a prophecy of what audiences are forced to endure here - it’s not just separating art from artist, it’s not just cultural exploitation and othering, it’s not just queer erasure, it’s not just overplotted and underwhelming narrative, it’s not just cheap shocks and winking references. The rap sheet just keeps getting longer and longer, and I have to wonder when, if ever, Rowling will atone for these crimes.

[aryanna5323]

I have literally never made my own post on here before and only like 3 entire people might see this, but I can't quit thinking about how much i dislike the idea of a black hermione granger. I first thought about this while having a conversation with my sister a while ago, but I just saw a fancast of a black girl as hermione on insta, and I have to spit this out somewhere.

The most obvious problem here is that if you want to have a main character be black.....maybe actually say that she's black? While writing the book? Not after publication? And definitely not after you said a white girl was the perfect actress and just what you imagined? You don't have to be like, "and this black girl came and knocked on our door" in the book, but you could mention her blackness other ways. Show her culture, but not as something weird and different. Describe the way shawdows cast from the candles in the great hall dance across her dark skin if you want. Just fucking describe it. And like not just once? Don't be like oh yeah she's black that's all because that's not all. Being black is about more than just having dark skin.

And also, why would jkr wax poetic about how pale other characters are and the way their skin looked if she didn't feel the need to describe hermione's dark skin at all? You can't just say "well I never said she was white... >;p". Don't make a main fucking character's appearance and culture ambiguous. Imagine giving someone a more genderneutral name like Alex and just never using pronouns. That's kinda strange right? Like are we supposed to say she/her, he/him, they/them? You wouldn't make it so we wouldn't know what to call a character accurately, so why make it where we can't imagine and understand a character accurately? If you're going to identify a character, fucking fully identify them. Let us actually know who they are. Bc again, being black is not that same as being white so that ambiguity is shit. You can't tell me hermione's personality would be the exact same if she were white or if she were black. There are differing cultures and experiences, and you have to include those in the character.

And when you basically surround this character with white characters and don't specifically mention that she's black, you can't expect us not to assume she's white as well. It's especially bad though, when jkr makes it disgustingly obvious when other characters aren't white. Fucking Cho Chang. Kingsley fucking Shacklebolt. I think that's all I need to say on that point.

Basically, if you want a character to be a certain ethnicity, just fucking say it (without going overboard and playing into gross stereotypes!!). It's not that hard. She described a few other characters' non-whiteness. Why couldn't she describe this in one of the main characters then?

Another issue with hermione being black is that there are few other black girls being actively described in this series. While it's fine to have very few black girls in a fictional school when it's a predominately white area in real life, it's not fine to shit all over the most described black girl for having bad hair and teeth. If you mainly only talk about one black girl and you give her bad hair and bad teeth and then say she's not pretty.....this is a problem to me. It feels like jkr thinks black girls in general have bad hair and teeth. Like their natural hair and teeth make them ugly. It feels like she's associating blackness with ugliness. Which, fuck that.

I know a lot of black girls are proud of their hair and their teeth, as they should be. But I also know that a lot of black girls don't like their hair or teeth because what's shown as conventionally pretty for hair is often straight hair, and for teeth it's perfectly closed, straight front teeth since these things are attributed to being closer to a standard of whiteness, which is what is portrayed by the media in the most positive light (which is also shitty and a different conversation).

My little sister is half black, and we spend a lot of time telling her how much we love her curls and how much we love her smile because we don't want her to grow up and think her hair is ugly and damage it to make it "pretty" or if she has a gap in her teeth that she has to close it. So to say that a very popular female character, known for her bad and untamable hair, who purposely fixes her teeth that she hates, is black, does not send a good message to young black girls. It's something I would steer my little sister far away from.

I also don't like the idea of hermione being black and the only one who cares about the house elves' enslavement. I would understand maybe her being black and the first person noticing the wrongness (even though in this century people in general should see the wrongness) or at least feeling the most motivated to stand against it based on her background (it's all a stretch but I'm trying to give the benefit of the doubt here), but shouldn't her friends realize how she might feel being black and surrounded by literal fucking slaves? Why wouldn't her friends join S.P.E.W.? Shouldn't ron specifically, who loves her, try to be more supportive and understanding instead of rude and condescending? Shouldn't harry, who was normally the one standing up for hermione, who made friends with a house elf and freed him after being mortified by his treatment, care a little more? I feel like the house elves' situation was mostly for laughs and barely for plot and almost unrelated to character development (besides the fact that the whole house elf plot was disgusting itself. Saying that slaves enjoy their work and were disrespected by someone trying to free them?? Wtf???? But that's a whole other can of worms more unrelated to having a black hermione). If hermione were black, this could've been made a huge moment where a big movement was started and led by a black girl (as we've seen and as is so often ignored in history! Black women are powerful. Give them their power in literature too!!). Instead of a joke of one whose meetings were never attended except by people who wanted hermione to quit annoying them. Instead of never following through with the house elves and leaving them in the dust when the plot got too busy. Instead of saying hermione is black so she's the only one who can really care about slavery.

Don't get me wrong, I would love a black hermione if the setup were different. If she wasn't told that some of her physical characteristics that balck girls can often be insecure about are ugly, if she were actively described as black and her blackness was incorporated into the character, if she wasn't the only character to truly care about an enslaved species, then a black hermione would be badass. A black girl as one of the main characters, who is so smart, who the chosen one would fail without, is powerful. It's saying black girls are smart and clever and important. It would've been so fucking cool if hermione were black if it was done in the right way. A powerful black girl, one of the brightest of her generation, who stands up for others. She would get all my love.

But I can't get behind her if she's ignored or shit on for things that would seemingly stem from her blackness. I, personally, think that it's better leaving her as white, since i think this is what jkr truly intended and worming around those intentions can lead to some nasty implications, and getting behind other black girls who got (or will get for the yet-unwritten ones!) the attention from their writers that they deserve.

I'm so open to having a conversation about this, especially if this is not how the black community perceives having a black hermione. Like if you're black and you think i twisted things and completely fucked this up, I'm begging you to shit all over me for it. I'm not trying to press my white bitch perspective (when I'm much less knowledgeable) on a community with lived experience. This is just how I felt jkr came across as completely insensitve and shitty with this comment. Or ways I thought having a black hermione was more bad than good if that statement was true, by whatever definition we want to give that word here. But if I'm wrong, I want to learn from this. I don't want to be speaking for black girls here, i want to be standing behind them in support. I just can't make myself spin this situation in a more positive light, not after everything jkr's said about her "gay" characters and about real trans people, without a little assistance (if y'all think I'm wrong and that assistance is necessary, anyway). I just don't have that faith in her. But if black girls truly think that having a black hermione does more good than bad, I'll be behind you and I'll support you.

Love for anyone reading this except for prejudiced bitches, homophobes, terfs, misogynists, and other shitty people of the like! <3 <3 <3

[raywritesthings]

Arrow and Harry Potter

Arrow

my all-time ultimate fave character: Laurel Lance

a character I didn’t used to like but now do: I hated Quentin at first, and I lot of stuff he did/does I still don’t like but I’ve grown to appreciate his complexity and his dynamics with Laurel and Oliver. Of course now that Laurel’s dead he has like nothing to do so it’s just stupid.

a character I used to like but now don’t: Felicity was cute s1...she got on my nerves pretty quickly after that, though. I hate what Diggle has become. Like just look at him s1 compared to now and it’s just sad. I miss when Diggle was his own character.

a character I’m indifferent about: Can I just say any of the new recruits? Like, I just don’t care about any of them. At all. I didn’t start the show for them, I started for GA and BC, why is this so hard for the showrunners to grasp? I’m also pretty indifferent towards Sara, no lie. She’s just kind of there and then not and then there again. She drifts into the story and out and doesn’t really seem to have all that lasting of an impact. I mean she can literally be plucked from the timeline because she’s apparently of little enough importance history won’t miss her. And it totally undermined the whole “journey” aspect of characters when we met her and she was just insta-badass straight out of her new s2 packaging, now with 100% more blonde, some reshooting required. Maybe if they’d bothered to show her training--but that would have required them to actually show a wlw relationship and not just the angsty post-breakup stage so that wasn’t gonna happen. Like I don’t necessarily hate her but I don’t like her much either. She’s just kind of meh to me.

a character who deserved better: DINAH. LAUREL. LANCE.

a ship I’ve never been able to get into: O/F, Oliver/Sara, and lowkey Nyssa/Sara - Nyssa was always so much more invested than Sara from her first appearance to her last. Like you got her going on and on about her “beloved” and then Sara’s flirting it up and kissing people throughout time and space, the heck am I supposed to do with that? Also I haven’t liked Thea/Roy ever since Roy ditched her after sleeping together and left no forwarding address. Dick move, dude.

a ship I’ve never been able to get over: Lauriver, dear god, the beauty and the tragedy will haunt me forever

a cute, low-key ship: I liked Oliver and McKenna, I won’t lie. Moira and Walter were tragic but precious. Also if Tommy had lived I could’ve seen him and Helena having an interesting thing don’t judge me.

an unpopular ship but I still enjoyed it: Non-canon but I’m gonna go Lauryssa. Also Constantine/Oliver.

a ship that was totally wrong and never should have happened: O/F, when will these writers learn that ship destroyed both those characters

my favourite storyline/moment: I’m in that rare minority that loved s1 so much more than s2. S2′s where it started going wrong, the fridging women left and right, Slade’s shitty motivation for being bad--he’s a mercenary, for fuck’s sake, it does not need to be about a woman he loved and lost, it’s not complicated--retconning the flashbacks left and right, but s1 was so good. Also loved Laurel becoming BC though I never got why the writers needed to start her off at square one when they showed she could fight the previous two seasons.

a storyline that never should have been written: Basically the entire s4 plot. Magic and nukes are not GA’s thing. Also killing BC on a GA show is such bs. Real GA would have rather seen himself killed first.

my first thoughts on the show: Ok, this is interesting! The fight scenes are good, I want to see how these characters become more like their comic book counterparts.

my thoughts now: Well that sucked.

HP

my all-time ultimate fave character: Oh man, how can you do this to me? TOO MANY, OKAY? I HAVE TOO MANY.

a character I didn’t used to like but now do: Dudley is so much more interesting after book 7. I like the idea that he finally started to realize that his parents and their abuse towards Harry was shit. I know JKR decided to not give Dudley a magic child in the epilogue, but I wish she had. It would have been so nice to see Dudley break the cycle of abuse in the Dursley family once and for all by loving and supporting his kid no matter what.

a character I used to like but now don’t: I don’t know if I dislike him necessarily but I definitely don’t like him the way I used to as a kid - okay, yeah, it’s Dumbledore. I mean he is soooo complex, and that’s a good thing. But a lot of the stuff he did? Not cool.

a character I’m indifferent about: Basically a lot of the OCs that masquerade in fics as barely-mentioned students. It’s fine if you wanna use them, but it’s weird to me when people start purporting their characterizations of them as fact if that makes sense? To that end, I’m also mostly indifferent about all the next gen kids with the exception of Teddy (there’s just a lot there to his character that would be so interesting to unpack - why was Cursed Child not about Teddy Lupin with a better plot gdi).

a character who deserved better: So many characters tbh. Ginny Weasley deserved better from both JKR and all y’all. JKR promised an awesome moment having to do with her being the seventh child of a seventh child (Arthur) and then never delivered. Fandom is shitty to her because she gets in the way of their ships (like especially H/HR and H/D shippers seem to love to demonize a teenage girl in their fics, just saying) and because they seem to think Hermione is enough female rep which is such bs. Ron also deserves soooooo much better from fandom. So, so much better. Hagrid deserved to have one of Harry’s kids named after him. Sirius Black just deserved a better life. Snape deserved not to be abused as a child. Harry deserved like basically everything better. The Weasleys deserved not to be poor - do you see where I’m coming from here???

a ship I’ve never been able to get into: A lot of the non-canon ones (H/HR - she’s like a SISTER to him, he LITERALLY SAYS; H/D - It’s implied in that bathroom fight scene Draco was about to use the CRUCIATUS CURSE like WTF also he’s just kinda shitty to Harry and his friends almost the entire series just saying). Obviously if you wanna write AUs where things are completely different, that’s up to you, but they’re just not for me.

a ship I’ve never been able to get over: Jily, Hinny, Romione

a cute, low-key ship: Deanmus is the gay/bi rep we deserved, not unhealthy and possibly one-sided Dumbledore/Grindelwald. I feel like in book 5 at least Luna might’ve had a thing for Ron which is kind of adorable. Although I also like Ginny/Luna. Also I lowkey think Harry might’ve had a crush on both Cho and Cedric at the same time. Teenage years suck.

an unpopular ship but I still enjoyed it: I mean Romione seems to be unpopular with a lot of fandom but I love it so sucks to suck

a ship that was totally wrong and never should have happened: I’m pretty much ok on all the canon ships. I mean I wish JKR hadn’t tried to push this whole “Snape loved Lily” thing. More like “Snape was obsessed with Lily and never got over her”.

my favourite storyline/moment: ahhhhh I don’t know, maybe Ron coming back to save Harry and destroy the Horcrux.his insecurities? Such a great moment for his character, and his and Harry’s friendship. I also just love how Harry’s whole outlook on life completely brightened up in HBP during the time he was dating Ginny. It was so lovely to see him happy for once. And I love all of book three, it is my favorite. Also the Moody-is-really-Barty Jr. twist remains one of the greatest of All Time and the movies ruined it but I digress.

a storyline that never should have been written: Like I’m not saying it shouldn’t have been written, I just don’t like how Snape’s backstory has given rise to this idea that he did Nothing Wrong, Ever and it was Lily’s fault for ending the friendship that he turned to the Dark Side. Like fuck off, he was already there and it was not her job to be his “savior” when he sure as hell didn’t want saved. Also all the movies. Damn you, Kloves.

my first thoughts on the show books: This is such a great story and world! I love the characters and I can’t wait to see what happens next! (or something along those lines - I was young, okay?)

my thoughts now: While there’s certainly plenty of issues (lack of rep for many marginalized groups, for example) it still holds up as a really strong series. Must resist temptation to begin yet another reread.