Sirius’s awkward relationship with femininity
I should start by clarifying that I’m not transphobic and I think it’s personally fine to have trans headcanons for characters for a long list of reasons (fits the narrative, personal projection, better understanding of themselves, etc). But when it comes to Sirius Black, I think the way a chunk of the fandom portrays the tran headcanons or the fem headcanons, could really be done a bit better. I’m not trying to be a canon bootlicker or anything, but in canon Sirius does have a strong relationship with masculinity, such as being one of the male figures in Harry’s life, being the eldest son, the way that he carries himself (the arrogance and bullying), being James’ best friend/partner in crime, even the fights he has with Molly are from his perspective of a more father/uncle figure rather than a mothers perspective. Though he is much more deeply connected with his mother than his father, even to the point that they fight and argue but her (Walburga) heart was broken (this comment was made by Kreacher but I feel he wouldn’t blow something like that out of proportion). And there’s good reason for that, he is the eldest son, the first heir of the family, someone who would probably have made a strong head of the Black family had he not been sorted into Gryffindor or even ran away. Which is why it’s interesting that he can be headcanonned as so fragile and needy of others when he’s been determined to live his own way from the day he was born.
I think it dampens his character, as something else to take note of, if there were going to be an accurate portrayal of his character as trans then I feel his personality and ways of doing things would be so much more similar to Bellatrix’s than any other character in the series. Someone who is the eldest daughter of the family, and deals with the cost of being a woman very often. Like having been married off to a man, despite clearly not wanting to be with him at any given moment, she fights tooth and nail for Voldemort's attention so it can only be assumed that she was the same in school, someone so determined to make a name for herself but constantly failing because she’s a woman. Having trans headcanons for Sirius feels so awkward because his character never once deals with any brunt of oppression, and yes it’s a headcanon but for so many characters that I personally headcanon as trans it’s usually with a reason of underlying allegories or comparisons of their story to issues that the trans community has to deal with constantly. To tie it all together, Sirius stays rich, his uncle Alphard gives him money, and Grimmauld place, continues to stay in his name despite having been disowned, which I feel makes it so hard for me to see him as trans because he’s never once suffered from something the female characters in his family have. There’s no mention of his obligations of him having to be married to a slytherin pureblood woman, there’s no fight that he has to conduct in order for his voice to be heard, even when Voldemort tricks Harry into thinking Sirius is tortured, he’s not actually being tortured. He doesn’t ever have his life on the line in that sense, unlike Andromeda (another one of his cousins) who did run away from home, was tortured, and lived in constant fear that she’d lose everything because she’s a slytherin woman from a pureblood family.
If Sirius was to even have his voice taken away in the order meetings then I feel that could make an argument for the trans headcanons however he’s usually the one who starts the arguments, not able to listen to what the others (usually Molly and Severus) are trying to tell him. From the way he’s described to the story narrative that he faces, it feels out of left field that he’d be portrayed in that way.
And it’s not that there aren’t any characters who couldn’t be described with trans allegories/headcanons, there are plenty enough in the Harry potter universe. Severus Snape, Ron Weasley, Tonks, Luna Lovegood, Moaning Myrtle, just to name a few whose narratives easily fit. I don’t want this to come off as an anti fem/trans Sirius, because it’s honestly not even that deep, I think people should be able to treat the characters how they’d like, but I just think it’s an observation that I have to make on how weird it feels to see Sirius like that. And also because every time I see fem/trans Sirius my brain autocorrects it to being Bellatrix and it’s heartbreaking to find out that it’s not her every single time.