cloud. '02. agender ace lesbian. slytherin. southeast asian. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vtMLLOzuc6GpkFySyVtKQOY2j-Vvg0UsChMCFst_WLA/htmlview?safe=active i like to talk about the things i wanna change about the worldbuilding of harry potter !
My pronouns are they/them ! I don't really have hard no's for gendered terms used to refer to me .
I'm a '02-liner (meaning i was born in 2002) and from Southeast Asia . I am currently in uni studying Geology and I use my spare time to think about my hyperfixations <3
I'm neurodivergent and I usually vibe on my own but I'm open to chats ! I'm bad at replying though so don't be afraid to bump up messages
I've been on Tumblr since 2012 but this is the first time I have ever tried to be more active instead of keeping in the background .
Fuck JKR !!
Free Palestine, Free Congo, Free Sudan, free everyone who has suffered and are currently suffering under a capitalistic, warmongering white supremacist society . Never stop talking about the genocides and human rights injustices currently happening around the world . Share, save, boycott, educate, donate when and if you can !
Current Fixations / Interests / Fandoms
Harry Potter (specifically the character himself, as well as Drarry)
MXTX Novels
Percy Jackson
ATEEZ
Genshin Impact, Honkai Star Rail
Disclaimer
(Especially for those who are particularly focused on Harry Potter canon and/or certain dynamics.)
In my headcanons and posts, I will stretch canon pretty thinly. I will rewrite and redo huge chunks of what we know as the Harry Potter canon. This includes huge changes in the history, the timeline, and the ethnicities of a lot of characters (read: majority of the characters we know in my AU are now BIPOC). Everything I am doing is purely for my own enjoyment and I just wanted to share the things I made with anyone who wanted to have a read.
I do not follow any Marauders fandom headcanons nor do I consider myself part of the fandom . This means my Lilys and Jameses will have vastly different friend groups than what you're used to if you're from the Marauders fandom .
If you're particular about dynamics, I am a fixed DMHP account . I don't post NSFW on this blog since I focus on worldbuilding and more SFW character building, but I'm just throwing this out there :3
Have a good day ! (My AUs under the cut)
Current AUs
Nandhini's Legacy - my main AU and the reason why I made this blog in the first place ! This is a Harry Potter AU where the Potter family are South Indian (specifically Tamil [James] and Telugu [Lily]) and the Black family are SWANA . New elements in the story include entirely new fancasts for the entire cast, the introduction of a Magical British Museum (the new primary antagonist besides Lord Voldemort), OC siblings for characters like Harry and Pansy, and several timeline changes .
Related Links : Families Masterlist, Fancast, Main Tag
pls ask me abt this au i have so much to say
Son of Hecate Harry AU - a PJO x HP crossover AU where Harry was born to Lily and James but with the additional blood from Hecate . In this AU he was taken away from the Dursleys by a satyr and raised in Camp Half-Blood . By the time he arrives at Hogwarts, Harry has already undergone one quest and is only at the institution because of another prophecy (not Trelawney's) . He is accompanied by fellow demigods and witches Yurika Haneda (Slytherin, Hermes) and Poppy Caxton (Hufflepuff, Athena)
My Mortal Companion - the AU in which post-War, Harry retains his title as Master of Death and believes his next destiny is to be the sole Unspeakable in the Death Room since he's the "only one who could do it" . Features Harry's relationships and dynamics with various psychopomps and death deities of diverse pantheons
Related Links : Main Tag
Favourite of the Fae Harry AU - an AU where Harry is highly favoured by the Fair Folk of Great Britain, but only in the way a human might highly favour what they deem a particularly cute pet . Includes tidbits of Harry being his mother's son because Lily was their previous favourite, and Harry having difficulties with socialising in the "proper" human way because he was used to the constant transactional socialising of the Fae
alright kiddos buckle up, cloud has Opinions today
let's talk about the alpha douchification of harry and baby girlification of draco, as blackcathjp so wonderfully said
i will tell you that this isnt my first rodeo when it comes to mlm ships being shoved into heteronormative gender roles. ive been in the yaoi fandom, ive been in the BL fandom, ive been a weeb since i was aged single digits. im perfectly aware of how deep in mlm ship spaces this issue is. but today's subject of interest is drarry, and why i dont like a certain popular characterisation of drarry.
first of all let's pose the question : why is harry the manly alpha head honcho douchebag dumbass jock ? why is draco the naughty bratty overdramatic babygirl princess ? why do yall feel the need to push harry and draco into these stereotypical gender roles, especially in smut ? whats up with that ?
yes harry is a quidditch guy but that doesnt automatically make him a dumbass jock ? the guy's not stupid. i wont elaborate because i and several others have discussed harry's intelligence in other posts already (will link if asked), but yeah harry's not a "dumbass" or a "himbo", at least not in the way you people love to characterise him as. hes not even trying to be a dominating presence. hell, the guy wants to skeddaddle out of situations 8 times out of 10. hes a rough kind of dude, sure, but thats more for his own protection and not out of a need to dominate or control other people. it's weird and stupid to reduce harry's character just to make him fit yalls' homophobic and heteronormative view of mlm dynamics.
SPEAKING OF THAT, what is up with people overplaying draco's overdramatic tendencies and tying it to being a sub and/or a bottom or being the 'feminine' one in the relationship ? i love my bratty subs as much as the next person (my no.1 blorbo rn is a bratty sub who BITES), but if draco's only a bratty sub because hes an overdramatic princess diva who is so, so helpless without the presence of testosterone in your eyes, you need to reevaluate. yes hes a bit helpless in canon but again he was a kid with no pratical combat experience caught up in a war. + his parents' safety being dangled in front of him who wouldnt be helpess in that scenario ?
people absolutely love to explore draco's gender beyond being masculine and theoretically i love that because i love seeing people interpret characters all over the gender spectrum but there's just something about the popular draco gender exploration that just ,,, irks me, for the lack of a better word. people make him smaller ??? than he actually is ?? more helpless ??? like the height and size difference between drarry in canon isnt that noticeable but by god do people stretch it out to infinity and beyond. to make the fem-coded half of the ship smaller and more helpless and more dramatic is, frankly, toeing the lines of misogynistic if it isnt there already.
and why is it that it's always harry who is hypermasculine and draco who is hyperfeminine ? why not have both be feminine ? both be masculine ? both be all over the gender spectrum ? whyyyyyyy do they have to be male x female coded ??? hello ?????? if i wanted a heterosexual ship, i wouldnt be here
like come on guys, theres a bunch of different ways to write mlm ships and a bunch of resources out there to help you get going. why are we still sticking with the heteronormative gender roles in this day and age ? have we not grown out of it yet ?
THIS DOESNT MEAN I DONT HAVE AN ISSUE W HYPERFEMININE HARRY AND HYPERMASCULINE DRACO TOO. i despise heteronormative gender role coding. let queer ships be queer without the lens of heteronormativity.
Ok so the reblogs on this went a little off from where I read this originally, and I wanted to clarify my interpretation and response to the above.
I am a person that enjoys the canon and fanfic/fanart/etc that feels like the canon. I like Draco best when he's got that mean, sardonic personality that we see in the books. I like my Harry emotionally distant and the introvert we see from canon.
That being said, I'm 100% down with characterizations of Draco or Harry (or any of the characters) that differ from the above. I'm open to reading how a writer can approach where we leave off in canon and continue forward with these character's stories. I can and have enjoyed flamboyant, flaming homosexual Draco as well as macho, hypermasculine Harry. I've read trans, genderfluid, or nonbinary readings of the characters and found them to be great! Homosexual, Bisexual, Pan, Demi, Ace, Drarrysexual. I have enjoyed them all. I'll continue to enjoy them!
(I do not care about top/bottom discourse and have no preference or opinion on it.)
The best part of fandom, and fic especially, is being able to see a writer take a character and go "what if?" Fanworks that can take from the canon character and make me believe he would fucking say that!
I do agree there are trends in fandom, certain characterizations that get repeated or inspired by. However just because it's a trend or a popular reading of the character, doesn't necessarily mean it's OOC. If a fic is not ticking certain boxes for me, I will disengage. Sometimes the more popular characterizations are ones that I really do not vibe with. Luckily, Drarry particularly is a huge fandom, so at least you're not stuck with one particular trend over another! There's room for all of us in the pool.
I do want to respond to the criticism that Draco being a diva, flamboyant or transfeminine is enforcing heteronormative or heterosexual gender roles. Yes, I can see the argument that there are biases a writer or artist can have and they inadvertently use stereotypes that have been perceived negatively. Yes, we can analyze where these stereotypes originate from and why some are more popular with certain characters or ships over others. I do have a theory why Draco over Harry is the one we see this a lot with, but it's not because of writers using heterosexual relationships as a template.
Fanfiction isn't published work. It's not a transaction between creator and audience where the audience can be let down. Fic/fanart is shared with fellow fans. Criticism, especially criticism that a writer is enforcing negative stereotypes or enforcing heteronormative gender roles, about a fic they wrote for fun does feel like we're assuming the worst intentions of the writer.
Attributing negative social consequences to their works, or assuming they are writing from a place of ignorance feels wrong. These are fanworks. There's no publisher distributing fic to mass audiences. There's no promotional circuit the writer is doing. Fanfiction is something a person has to seek out. We've gotten really good at ensuring fic is categorized and segmented appropriately over the past few decades.
I think it's important to remember that fandom is made up of fans. We're all here out of a shared love for the canon work. We love these characters and the relationships they have with each other. Fans create and share fanworks because they want to express and share the emotions and joy these characters inspire within them. DL;DR
it's been a while since i checked this thread out. i was offgrid for a few days because of uni but im back with more Opinions
see now some of yall are still not getting the point of what im trying to say. "fanfiction is written for fun" is true but you just cant use that to absolve yourselves of the responsibility to pay respect to the very real identities you are trying to write. would you still say that if people are misrepresenting your cultural identity or someone else's cultural identity?
the entire point of my post is how people choose to write mlm relationships consciously or subconsciously based on heteronormative gender roles, and that they should reexamine that. is it fun to misrepresent queer relationships? is it fun to consciously keep doing it?
I do have a theory why Draco over Harry is the one we see this a lot with, but it's not because of writers using heterosexual relationships as a template.
like it or not, a lot of us grew up with heterosexual relationships as the primary influences on how we view relationships as a whole. there will be times that it will influence what we're writing because what we know is part of what we can write. maybe this is not the case for you or some others you know specifically, but this can be the case of others. especially others who are not well informed of the nuances that are in queer relationships that you cant find in cishet relationships.
Fanfiction isn't published work. It's not a transaction between creator and audience where the audience can be let down. Fic/fanart is shared with fellow fans.
yes it is shared with fellow fans, but it's fellow fans who might identify with the identities you are misrepresenting. youre certainly not obligated to do anything but it is just human courtesy to be aware of who is impacted by your works that you willingly share to the public.
Criticism, especially criticism that a writer is enforcing negative stereotypes or enforcing heteronormative gender roles, about a fic they wrote for fun does feel like we're assuming the worst intentions of the writer.
Attributing negative social consequences to their works, or assuming they are writing from a place of ignorance feels wrong.
literally nobody is saying anyone is the bad guy with the worst intentions here. what we're trying to examine is if yall still have things you have to unlearn. you wont grow as a writer, whether professional writer or fanfic writer, if you still hide behind "fanfiction is made for fun" blanket for everything.
fanfiction is made for fun. write what you want, write what you love, write what makes you happy.
but that doesnt absolve you from the responsibility to be respectful of the identities you are representing in your work.
additionally, it is not "fun" to not even try to represent identities respectfully. especially if youre writing about identities you yourself dont even identify as.
fanfic is not magically exempt from consequences. fanfic writers are not magically exempt from accidentally writing from a place of ignorance.
just because youre a fanfiction writer doesnt mean you are exempt from chances to learn and grow.
if you dont want to do that then let's be on our merry, separate ways. i will continue to advocate for what i believe in, you can continue to advocate for what you believe in. the internet is a vast space, after all.
I’m bothered by the tendency in fanfiction to give Lily a fiery temper for which she is notorious. Fanon!Lily will hex people for doing the slightest thing to upset her, and everyone knows this. Often, she throws punches and small objects at those who incur her legendary wrath. The Marauders live in fear of crossing her, for hell hath no fury like a Lily Evans Potter who has been mildly displeased.
So, um, guys, in canon… Lily doesn’t actually do that.
Hermione sends attack birds after Ron. Molly’s disapproving rage frightens her children and her husband. Ginny has a reputation for hexes. Maybe you’re thinking of one of them?
Here’s what Lily does when faced with something that might or does make her angry:
a humiliatingly long character analysis of lily evans
Someone sent me an ask that briefly mentioned how misunderstood Lily is, and before I knew it I was typing out this monster. I am. sorry. This is literally just me rambling about her, what I find compelling about her character, and why her character is so often misunderstood.
This is long as hell so I'm putting it under a read more lolol
Part of the reason I like Lily so much (other than my being ginger and projecting onto any redheaded female character I see) is that even though she isn’t explored as much as her other Marauders Era counterparts, we know enough about her to start building the framework for her character. And what I see is a girl who was incredibly interesting, kind, and flawed.
One thing I always think about in regards to Lily is that she was dealt with a pretty unfair hand. As soon as she receives her letter, she’s basically torn between two worlds, both of which have been less than welcome to her. On one hand, we have the muggle world that she’s known all her life, but once she starts integrating into the wizarding world, she likely feels a bit of a disconnect with that world. To twist the knife further, her sister- whom she loved dearly and grew up so close with- starts outwardly resenting her with such unbridled hostility that they likely couldn’t even be in a room alone together without major conflict.
On the other hand, we have the wizarding world– a world she’s not as familiar with and one she soon learns holds a demographic of people who hate everything she is and would rather see her excommunicated or even dead. And even though finding out you’re a witch/wizard is probably such an exciting and life-changing moment, I can’t help but also take note of the difficulties, especially if you’re the only one in your family with magic. You’re essentially uprooted from the only way of life you’ve known at an already complicated age, and now you have to quickly become acclimated to this new world that you only just found out existed. Not only that, but now you’re suddenly attending a school with classes that are primarily focused on this world of magic (which is still brand new to you), and you have to work extra hard to play catch up in order to do well. Like, that all seems like… a lot for a kid to handle.
And then I remember how young she was when she was thrown into that mess. She was only 11, and kids that age desperately crave any sense of belonging. I mean, that’s something that still holds true for adults, but it’s especially critical for a developing child. So imagine Lily, ages 11-15, struggling to stay afloat in this weird purgatory between these two parts of herself, both of which have been the cause for major and traumatic experiences relating to rejection in her life.
(I say it was the “cause” even though it’s obvious that those things were never her fault at all, but when you’re a young kid navigating the world, the only thing you’re able to process is that the common denominator is you, therefore you’re the one who must shoulder the blame.)
So now we have this tween-teenaged girl who has a dysfunctional relationship with two major parts of identity and probably feels absolutely lost.
This is why her hesitancy to end her friendship with Snape makes sense to me. Even though by fifth year he’s already well past toeing the line with the dark arts, Lily was willing to overlook some pretty egregious and troubling things in order to maintain the relationship. I kind of interpret that as her way of desperately clinging on to any sense of belonging she has left; her relationship with Petunia has already been poisoned, and now there are people who resent her existence as a witch; if she loses Severus too, what and who else does she have? And what tone does that set for her, if everyone and everything she’s come to hold close to her ends up turning her away?
It’s also important to note that not only is Severus one of her few remaining connections to the muggle world, but he’s also a wizard who grew up in the muggle world; he understands her, and I don’t doubt that he gave her some stability at times when she needed it (her finding out about her being a witch, her having trouble acclimating to the wizarding world, etc).
I see this as being one of her flaws and I can actually appreciate how relatable and realistic it feels. Lily is not a bad person; on the contrary, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone to describe her as such. Not to get all clinical and boring, but the interesting thing about (unhealthy) coping mechanisms is that it can actually be really hard to identify them in your own behavior. Unless you’re in therapy and/or are actively psychoanalyzing yourself, you likely don’t even realize how many of your common behaviors are born from self defense mechanisms put in place by your brain after past events.
To me, it makes sense why she avoided actually confronting the idea that Snape was too far gone. We know that she was aware of the path Severus was taking, but it almost seems like she was still convinced that she could save him, and could possibly steer him back in the right direction. It’s only when she becomes the target of his bigotry that she realizes that the Snape who called her a ‘mudblood’ was not the same Severus who was the one who held her hand and introduced her to this new, exciting world.
In a general sense, yes, it is selfish, to only take a stand when something starts affecting you personally. But I also think it’s important to note that it’s unlikely that this was a conscious decision on Lily’s part. In my eyes, it was easier to delude herself into thinking she still had a chance to save him before it was too late when she was able to separate him from his actions (considering, a lot of the time, she was only hearing about them after the fact, rather than seeing them firsthand). But the elusion is shattered once she sees that the Snape she grew up with– her friend, Severus– is, in fact, the same person who’s out there calling other students slurs, dismissing the malicious use of Dark Magic on others as just “a laugh”. There we see a Lily who is actually revealed to have been somewhat aware of Snape’s involvement with the darker side of magic, and genuinely feels pretty ashamed about her inaction.
Also, this is in no way me being a Snape-anti, and I actually could do an entire separate analysis on his character alone and why I find him so interesting.
Anyways, that moment in SWM is probably somewhat of an epiphany to her. It’s like a dam that’s been broken, and now she’s overwhelmed with the realization of exactly how much she overlooked in order to keep their friendship afloat. And for someone like Lily Evans, someone whom we know is opinionated and unafraid to call others out on their bullshit, that can be hard to swallow and feel pretty mortifying and shameful. And I think this was a huge turning point for her- at that point, she doesn’t have the luxury of avoiding uncomfortable truths anymore and now that she’s getting closer to graduating and being thrown out into the world on the brink of war, this was probably a really sobering discovery.
This is where we don’t have as much info to go off of, and a lot of it is up to interpretation. But we actually have little crumbs to go off of following her graduation and leading up to her death.
One of my favorite little tidbits isn’t in the books, and @seriousbrat's post reminded me about it. Here's the actual entry on Pottermore for anyone who's interested, but I'll summarize: after James and Lily began dating, Lily brings James to meet newly engaged Petunia and Vernon. Everything goes downhill, because Vernon is a smarmy asshole, and James is still pretty immature and can’t help but mess with him (which… fair, I guess). Petunia and Vernon storm out after Petunia letting Lily know that she had no intentions of having her as a bridesmaid, which causes Lily to break down into tears. I mention this because I also think it’s a pretty important aspect of her character; like we’ve seen in her past friendship with Snape, Lily seems more than willing to forgive others most of the time. Petunia is a bit of a complicated character herself, but she was objectively very cruel and unfair to Lily once it became obvious that she was a witch and Petunia was not.
Something that always stands out to me is just how desperate Lily is to earn Petunia’s trust and approval again. Even up until her death, she was more than willing to mend the relationship, were Petunia ever to consider.
This is a detail about Lily that I feel is misunderstood quite a bit. I’ve seen a lot of instances of her character being reduced to a one-dimensional archetype with little to no complexity. And often, that archetype is “know-it-all, prudish, self righteous bookworm who is also a goody two-shoes with a stick up her ass”. What annoys me is that the reason for this is most definitely the scene in which she blows up at James in SWM for bullying Snape, and hurls quite a few insults at him directly after an extremely devastating and overwhelming situation for her. This frustrates me because we know for a fact that she’s the polar opposite of this archetype I’ve seen her reduced to.
In actuality, she’s referred to as popular, charming, witty, bright and kind. From flashbacks we also are shown that she’s opinionated, bold, and not afraid to challenge others. With other context, like her interpersonal relationships, we can also see that she’s pretty emotionally driven and wears her heart on her sleeve.
(I know Remus didn’t mention Lily much in the books, but I really love how he described her in the movies. He tells Harry that the first thing he noticed about him was not his striking resemblance to his father, but his eyes, the same eyes Lily had. He also calls her a “singularly gifted witch” and an “uncommonly kind woman”.
“She had a way of seeing the beauty in others, even and perhaps most especially, when that person could not see it in themselves.”
I know there are mixed feelings on whether or not the films count as canon source material, so take it with a grain of salt, but I personally cannot see a world in which Lily and Remus didn’t become close friends.)
Here we have a direct description of what she was like and who she was, corroborated by recounting of memories of her, and yet for some reason, this feels like the thing that is most commonly lost in translation.
I don’t think I can say why I think that is without mentioning the dreaded M word (misogyny- it’s misogyny), but I also don’t want to get too off topic so I’ll be brief: female characters are typically not given the same grace as male characters. When we have an undeveloped male character, he’s awarded the assumption that despite his lack of depth, there still exists a complex and multifaceted character– it’s merely just potential that hasn’t been tapped into. Whereas when we have underdeveloped female characters, they are taken at face value, meaning that not much exists beyond the little information we have of them. They are not presumed to have a life or a story that exists beyond the surface of what we know like male characters are. That’s why I think characters like Regulus, Evan, or Barty (just to name a few) are more popular than Lily, despite being less developed than she is.
(Before anyone gets defensive, no, I don’t think it’s an individual problem that you alone need to be shamed for. I think it’s the result of a deeper issue regarding misogyny in media as a concept; these are things that we’ve all unknowingly internalized and while it’s not our fault, we still have to do the work to deconstruct those learned prejudices.)
What I find really cool about her character is that despite how much she’s been hurt, she’s also still known as one of the most loving, kind, and considerate characters. There were so many times in her life where the love she received was conditional and ripped away from her– and I think that’s what makes her sacrifice even more poignant. She was able to protect her infant son from an extremely powerful dark wizard, wand-less, knowing that her husband was just murdered in cold blood, just from how much love she felt for Harry. Her love was a force of nature on its own, and I just think that’s such an amazing thing about her.
I know I’m biased, given that she’s one of my favorite characters, but even upon delving into this, I still just find it so incredibly hard to understand how anyone can actively hate her (not indifference, but actual dislike). In my opinion (again, no one is unbiased, and she is a favorite character of mine, but trust me when I say that I’m trying to be objective as possible when I say this), she’s probably one of the most likable characters of the Marauders Era. I think perhaps a lot of people haven’t given her a chance or really taken the time to learn about her character, but it could be a myriad of other reasons that I’ll never understand.
There's so much more I could say but this is long enough and I will stop myself
alright kiddos buckle up, cloud has Opinions today
let's talk about the alpha douchification of harry and baby girlification of draco, as blackcathjp so wonderfully said
i will tell you that this isnt my first rodeo when it comes to mlm ships being shoved into heteronormative gender roles. ive been in the yaoi fandom, ive been in the BL fandom, ive been a weeb since i was aged single digits. im perfectly aware of how deep in mlm ship spaces this issue is. but today's subject of interest is drarry, and why i dont like a certain popular characterisation of drarry.
first of all let's pose the question : why is harry the manly alpha head honcho douchebag dumbass jock ? why is draco the naughty bratty overdramatic babygirl princess ? why do yall feel the need to push harry and draco into these stereotypical gender roles, especially in smut ? whats up with that ?
yes harry is a quidditch guy but that doesnt automatically make him a dumbass jock ? the guy's not stupid. i wont elaborate because i and several others have discussed harry's intelligence in other posts already (will link if asked), but yeah harry's not a "dumbass" or a "himbo", at least not in the way you people love to characterise him as. hes not even trying to be a dominating presence. hell, the guy wants to skeddaddle out of situations 8 times out of 10. hes a rough kind of dude, sure, but thats more for his own protection and not out of a need to dominate or control other people. it's weird and stupid to reduce harry's character just to make him fit yalls' homophobic and heteronormative view of mlm dynamics.
SPEAKING OF THAT, what is up with people overplaying draco's overdramatic tendencies and tying it to being a sub and/or a bottom or being the 'feminine' one in the relationship ? i love my bratty subs as much as the next person (my no.1 blorbo rn is a bratty sub who BITES), but if draco's only a bratty sub because hes an overdramatic princess diva who is so, so helpless without the presence of testosterone in your eyes, you need to reevaluate. yes hes a bit helpless in canon but again he was a kid with no pratical combat experience caught up in a war. + his parents' safety being dangled in front of him who wouldnt be helpess in that scenario ?
people absolutely love to explore draco's gender beyond being masculine and theoretically i love that because i love seeing people interpret characters all over the gender spectrum but there's just something about the popular draco gender exploration that just ,,, irks me, for the lack of a better word. people make him smaller ??? than he actually is ?? more helpless ??? like the height and size difference between drarry in canon isnt that noticeable but by god do people stretch it out to infinity and beyond. to make the fem-coded half of the ship smaller and more helpless and more dramatic is, frankly, toeing the lines of misogynistic if it isnt there already.
and why is it that it's always harry who is hypermasculine and draco who is hyperfeminine ? why not have both be feminine ? both be masculine ? both be all over the gender spectrum ? whyyyyyyy do they have to be male x female coded ??? hello ?????? if i wanted a heterosexual ship, i wouldnt be here
like come on guys, theres a bunch of different ways to write mlm ships and a bunch of resources out there to help you get going. why are we still sticking with the heteronormative gender roles in this day and age ? have we not grown out of it yet ?
THIS DOESNT MEAN I DONT HAVE AN ISSUE W HYPERFEMININE HARRY AND HYPERMASCULINE DRACO TOO. i despise heteronormative gender role coding. let queer ships be queer without the lens of heteronormativity.
you did not understand the point of my entire post and it shows !!
i curate my content pretty well and ive lived through the era of ao3 not having the "exclude section" of their tagging system yet. do not cite deep magic to me for i was there when it was written
the entire point of the post is to call out the underlying homophobia and misogyny in certain popular characterisations of drarry and mlm ships as a whole. "let people enjoy things !!" and the things in question are a reflection of problematic stereotypes that continue to plague queer spaces up until this day
me being critical of characterisations with questionable undertones does not mean i am policing fandom. not once have i said in my post that "you must be this queer to ride" and i dont even know where you got that from. if you're getting called out or bothered by the post, then i suggest you look a bit deeper into yourself to understand why !!
just because you have the freedom to write anything does not mean you should use that freedom to continue spreading harmful stereotypes of queer relationships ! 🫡 it also doesnt mean you can just write mlm ships in a stereotypically straight fashion ! queer relationships do not need to be assigned heteronormative gender roles !
alright kiddos buckle up, cloud has Opinions today
let's talk about the alpha douchification of harry and baby girlification of draco, as blackcathjp so wonderfully said
i will tell you that this isnt my first rodeo when it comes to mlm ships being shoved into heteronormative gender roles. ive been in the yaoi fandom, ive been in the BL fandom, ive been a weeb since i was aged single digits. im perfectly aware of how deep in mlm ship spaces this issue is. but today's subject of interest is drarry, and why i dont like a certain popular characterisation of drarry.
first of all let's pose the question : why is harry the manly alpha head honcho douchebag dumbass jock ? why is draco the naughty bratty overdramatic babygirl princess ? why do yall feel the need to push harry and draco into these stereotypical gender roles, especially in smut ? whats up with that ?
yes harry is a quidditch guy but that doesnt automatically make him a dumbass jock ? the guy's not stupid. i wont elaborate because i and several others have discussed harry's intelligence in other posts already (will link if asked), but yeah harry's not a "dumbass" or a "himbo", at least not in the way you people love to characterise him as. hes not even trying to be a dominating presence. hell, the guy wants to skeddaddle out of situations 8 times out of 10. hes a rough kind of dude, sure, but thats more for his own protection and not out of a need to dominate or control other people. it's weird and stupid to reduce harry's character just to make him fit yalls' homophobic and heteronormative view of mlm dynamics.
SPEAKING OF THAT, what is up with people overplaying draco's overdramatic tendencies and tying it to being a sub and/or a bottom or being the 'feminine' one in the relationship ? i love my bratty subs as much as the next person (my no.1 blorbo rn is a bratty sub who BITES), but if draco's only a bratty sub because hes an overdramatic princess diva who is so, so helpless without the presence of testosterone in your eyes, you need to reevaluate. yes hes a bit helpless in canon but again he was a kid with no pratical combat experience caught up in a war. + his parents' safety being dangled in front of him who wouldnt be helpess in that scenario ?
people absolutely love to explore draco's gender beyond being masculine and theoretically i love that because i love seeing people interpret characters all over the gender spectrum but there's just something about the popular draco gender exploration that just ,,, irks me, for the lack of a better word. people make him smaller ??? than he actually is ?? more helpless ??? like the height and size difference between drarry in canon isnt that noticeable but by god do people stretch it out to infinity and beyond. to make the fem-coded half of the ship smaller and more helpless and more dramatic is, frankly, toeing the lines of misogynistic if it isnt there already.
and why is it that it's always harry who is hypermasculine and draco who is hyperfeminine ? why not have both be feminine ? both be masculine ? both be all over the gender spectrum ? whyyyyyyy do they have to be male x female coded ??? hello ?????? if i wanted a heterosexual ship, i wouldnt be here
like come on guys, theres a bunch of different ways to write mlm ships and a bunch of resources out there to help you get going. why are we still sticking with the heteronormative gender roles in this day and age ? have we not grown out of it yet ?
THIS DOESNT MEAN I DONT HAVE AN ISSUE W HYPERFEMININE HARRY AND HYPERMASCULINE DRACO TOO. i despise heteronormative gender role coding. let queer ships be queer without the lens of heteronormativity.
just imagine an established drarry au where hermione and narcissa have a truce by necessity even though they still don't like each other but end up teaming up to wreck rita skeeter's life in the wake of a number of invasive and mostly untrue articles about harry and draco's personal lives
consider established drarry just casually using each other's wands all the time because they are so magically compatible and trust each other so absolutely that they can use each other's wands nearly as well as their own so if it's for something minor they'll both just grab whatever wand happens to be nearest at hand
and like. technically it's not pda. but there's something so intimate in the way they are so intertwined even in this that people around always feel as though they're witnessing something private.
I honestly and truly believe all good AUs should be a little “”””ooc”””” in the sense that good characterisation involves understanding that changes a characters backstory and circumstances will have an effect on how they respond to the world around them
Good characterisation isn’t about creating a perfect 1:1 canon replica it’s about understanding why a character is different in your work and about grounding the changes you do deliberately choose to make in canon character traits
It is funny to me how Harry Potter is literally the main character, yet people tend to go like he didn't suffer that much or he wasn't "abused"; Like, how can one misunderstand the literal main character of the damn franchise?
He wasn't abused; yes okay. He absolutely did not grow up inside a cupboard; the tiny place that is mostly reserved for brooms or cleaning supply. He absolutely was not treated inferior to the other child who lived in the same house. He was totally was not treated like a "freak" or a "stain" that his family was ashamed off. He grew up inside a cupboard while there was a literal unused bed in the same house. And you want to know what that screamed to a child, a baby — who slept inside a cupboard while there being a perfectly usable room right there? You are worth nothing and we don't love you and we are ashamed of what you are.
He wasn't starved, or at least he was fed; Yeah, no. We see it from the first book. How Vernon was no food for you and in the cupboard you go — and by the looks of it, that was like his most common punishment. And then, in the second book — you practically see it happen. He was locked, inside a room with only a can of soup that he shared with Hedwig. Now, tell me what it would do to a child — to be given food through a cat flap, and fun fact? Harry got to eat less than people on war rations; in short? He was starved, yes.
He wasn't abused physically so it's not abuse; As for people's thinks abuse isn't abuse until it's physical (which is inherently wrong because abuse isn't only physically, fyi); Harry has learned to dodge Vernon and he states that, very proudly when his uncle tries to grab him. He dodges a flying pan and states that fact, again very proudly as if it is the norm; do you know how heavy pans are? And do you know what would happen when one hits you? If you want an even clearer proof; Vernon Dursley strangles Harry in Ootp. There you go. Also, in the first book, we clearly see Vernon encouraging Dudley to hit Harry. Read between the lines and actually try to understand what that signifies.
And favourite part; When he wasn't treated like a prisoner, or a freak— he was their servant. And that is very much canonical. Tending Petunia's garden during summers and drinking from the water hose in the garden because of how hot it was? Having to wake up early so he can tend the kitchen and when he wasn't doing all that he is locked away. And it is all canon.
In conclusion, Harry— not only grew up to think that he was inhumane, undeserving of love, a freak that didn't even get to have his own bed because someone like him didn't deserve it, physically harmed enough times that he dodges them out of reflex and also the Dursleys' glorified servant; that is not even taking into account what Harry went through in Hogwarts. And after all that if someone tells me; this child, right here — didn't go through much then well, maybe read the books again?
yes!!! we can all agree drarry is practically canon but there's no harm in exploring other ships - and since there's not much written about theo in the hp books it leaves so much space for creativity. do it!!!
