Im gonna be so real can yall actually talk about ways we can support trans women in the UK instead of giving all the attention to fucking JKR. I already know that Harry Poter sucks, I wanna know how to actually HELP people. Something something you have to love the oppressed more than you hate the oppressor
every day british actors wake up and think to themselves fuckkkkk i HAVE to help the incredibly bigoted woman make more money so she can funnel it into killing trans people i have to do it bro if i don't do it i will die
stuff like this is awesome! it’s a great way to help a charity and let people know your tattoo shop is trans friendly! and a fuck you to jk rowling of course.
read this and remember it. read this and remember that she is going to use the profits of her fucking ego-stroking reboot to decimate trans rights. read this and remember that every time you pay into her IP, you are emboldening her to hurt us more.
our lives matter more than your fucking nostalgia.
trans lives matter more than your fucking nostalgia.
Im gonna be so real can yall actually talk about ways we can support trans women in the UK instead of giving all the attention to fucking JKR. I already know that Harry Poter sucks, I wanna know how to actually HELP people. Something something you have to love the oppressed more than you hate the oppressor
Senara, as a resident serious adult with a good grasp on the UK political and cultural landscape, AND the Harry Potter fandom, may I ask:
What impact does the fandom actually have on policies that impact transgender people?
I want to be the best ally I can be to trans folk, and I have seen discussions advocating that the Harry Potter franchise falling into oblivion is the only real way to de-platform JK Rowling.
I don’t entirely disagree - but I also suspect that the fandom as we know on Tumblr and Discord could be a much less influential bubble than it thinks itself to be, and not the main target audience for new movies, shows, and merchandising.
Is simply not consuming products from the franchise enough, or is engaging in extremely niche discussions on a cloudless micro-blogging platform still fanning the fire of Harry Potter, and giving ammunition to JKR to continue on her rampage of infantilising those who challenge her and targeting trans rights?
I don’t want to be naive or wilfully ignorant about my participation in this culture. But I want to know if blogging about Snupin smut and reading fanfiction on free independent platforms still trickles down to making JKR’s voice louder.
I also sometimes think that Harry Potter achieved the status of undeniable cultural staple, and oblivion is simply not an option - much like Alice in Wonderland and Peter Pan. I can force myself to forget and never engage with it again, but is it at all realistic in a global scale?
Is there an erroneous assumption that most of us on tumblr and discord are on team “fuck JKR, read fanfcition and pirate the books”? Or are offline elder millennials buying HP merch and reading the books to their kids carrying the franchise on their backs?
Or none of this matters, because HP is already part of the popular imagination, and it’s the tragedy of our times that big corporations will inevitably milk it forever?
Hope this is not too much of an awkward question, I really appreciate your insights
the way that the fandom impacts trans rights is by earning jkr money.
jkr's public transphobia - her comments on twitter etc. - absolutely contributes to recruiting others to the anti-trans cause, and that shouldn't be downplayed.
but being loud and wrong on social media isn't the same as having political or legal authority - jkr doesn't have this, and she doesn't deserve people thinking she does.
how she causes material harm to trans people in the uk [which then hurts all trans people, because other places may choose to follow suit] is because she donates colossal sums of money to legal cases which challenge trans people's rights. it's not just yesterday's judgement from the uk supreme court - in which the plaintiff was an anti-trans group she's on the record as having donated £70,000 to - she does it all the time.
she can donate this money because it's loose change for her. she makes millions every year.
and it doesn't come from mid-tier detective fiction, does it?
so, yes, here is the first truth - if she doesn't earn any money from you, you're not contributing to the overarching way her anti-trans crusade has an impact, and that matters.
but there is also a second truth - that you need to go beyond that.
several things need to be borne in mind:
jkr is one of the most visible - if not the single most visible - transphobes in the world. but she's not the only one.
the tendency to make her the figurehead of a transphobic movement, and to assume that disengaging with harry potter without doing anything else is enough may be comforting. but it's also wrong.
indeed, a lot of the people who have the greatest power to harm trans rights are nowhere near as visible as jkr - politicians, lawyers, journalists, academics, doctors, and so on. the supreme court did not reach its judgement because of jkr. the assault on trans rights which will unfold from the judgement will not happen because of her.
i'm not saying this to deny jkr's influence or to imply that she's not dangerous.
i'm saying it because i think it's important to remember that she has a vested interest in you feeling tiny and hopeless in the face of her money - in you thinking that she's the head of a movement and that movement is winning.
instead, the uk terf movement is fragmented and riddled with internecine beef. plenty of its factions don't actually like jkr - and she doesn't like plenty of them.
it can be fought, and it can be fought at the grassroots while she's in her mouldy tower being a bigot on twitter.
it's worth being absolutely clear that yesterday's supreme court ruling was not - in and of itself - new legislation. the uk supreme court does not have the power to make new laws. only parliament can do that.
it was a "clarification" - which is to say that it was an interpretation - of existing legislation. it - by itself - doesn't compel an institution or organisation to change anything. and it is, therefore, an interpretation which can be pushed back against.
this has already started - there's an excellent summary of objections to the judgement, which also provides a rebuttal to the crowing many terfs are doing about how trans rights are being rolled back by pointing out all the ways in which they will not be surrendered:
However much campaign groups might try to claim otherwise, it will still be indirect discrimination to put a policy in place excluding trans
sadly, this is behind a paywall. it's summarised here, in an article from the same writer, a practising barrister who is a specialist in employment and discrimination law:
The supreme court judgment is contradictory and confused. And there seems no prospect of the Labour government sorting this out, says discri
and all of us can do things which enable that pushback to continue, above all, in making clear to our mps that they only have our votes if they - at a bare minimum - continue to defend trans rights.
find their contact details here:
Information on how to contact your local MP
if you have an mp who is clear that they support restrictions on trans rights, then actively oppose them - call for them to be reselected at the next election [sadly a while away...], canvas for an opponent etc.
support institutions which continue to defend trans rights. the supreme court judgement doesn't force places to, for example, ban trans women from entering women's toilets [parliament could pass legislation which does, but that doesn't exist yet, and that's why you need to contact your mp], but plenty will be frightened into doing so. be loud about how you value and will continue to use businesses and services which don't bend to transphobic pressure.
donate to trans charities. lots are circulating, but here are some specifically northern irish options, which tend to otherwise get overlooked:
The Rainbow Project is a LGBTQIA+ Charity based in Northern Ireland, providing health and wellbeing services for our community
Mermaids Northern Ireland delivers services to trans young people and the important people in their lives.
boost stories about the impact of transphobic legislation. it's crucial that you don't underestimate how little the average person knows about this [and about jkr's role in it in particular] - and this is something which helps anti-trans messaging sound more reasonable. but we can reach them first.
what you do with harry potter as a thing beyond this is always going to be subjective. i've set out more on my personal approach before - here - and, of course, you may do what you want.
but - since you've asked - i think two things are true:
on the one hand, harry potter is a juggernaut. the tumblr subsection of the fandom could disappear tonight and the impact would be minimal - harry potter is probably one of the most mainstream cultural products in the world.
and that's how it makes jkr money - branded merchandise, the theme parks, the studio tour, royalties from streaming, and so on.
fandom doesn't require you to engage with any of these. and i do think it's acceptable to understand a commitment not to give jkr money as a viable and sincerely significant harm-reduction strategy.
however.
on the other hand, the vitality of the fandom plays a role in making harry potter marketable. this is undeniable.
and this is the case for all areas of the fandom - i see a lot of cope ["jkr would hate my queer otp!"], but people can get sucked into liking harry potter through anything. having a non-canon take on things, or writing dead dove, or whatever doesn't prevent that.
but it's especially the case for areas of the fandom which are prominent in pop-culture independently of jkr.
i don't just mean the marauders subfandom here - i think we can all stand to grapple with this implication, and i think there's a tendency from people in less prominent fandom subsections to think that they don't have to, which exists at the other end of a spectrum from the tendency from people in the marauders subfandom to assume that their lax approach to canon absolves them from any connection to jkr.
this is a difficult circle to square because it's something which gives jkr visibility indirectly. there's no way, for example, that she's in contact with e.g. artists whose songs go viral in marauders tiktoks, whose youtube comments are then flooded with "can't believe i'm thinking about harry potter's dead dad 😭". and she doesn't earn money from it.
fanfiction and fanart also lives in this indirect space.
jkr doesn't gain any money from it - and that is important. it's also a medium which may engage with the subject matter of the series critically - through taking issue with how she writes about gender, for example - and this is important as well.
but she doesn't gain nothing from it either.
my personal view is that the only way to remain in fandom is two-fold:
as discussed, make sure you're actually doing something in defence of trans people in your real life...
and make sure that your indirect contribution to jkr's nonsense never becomes a direct one.
that is to say, don't spend any money.
and - and this is the important thing - actually mean that.
i think that a very important thing to do if you want to stay in the fandom is to work on building yourself a mental defence against the fear of missing out.
by which i mean... in the circles in which i move, people seem - at the moment - to universally agree that they won't be watching the new television adaptation.
but i find it very striking - and very concerning - that lots of people seem to be taking the view that doing this will be easy, because the tv show won't be any good.
i strongly - strongly - advise you to prepare yourselves for the opposite. expect that the show will be absolutely outstanding. deal with your disappointment in missing out in advance. and do not engage with it, no matter what it tries to tempt you with.
we are about to see an unprecedented level of fan service. every single complaint people made about the film series will be addressed. it's going to make sure that ron is written book-accurately. it's going to give romione or hinny or whatever as it "should have been" in the films. it's going to whip out some really big name casting [cillian murphy has had months to shut down the rumour that he's voldemort... and if it comes to pass, his casting will bring a legion of peaky blinders fans on board. do not be one of them.]. i would bet my house that it's going to make wolfstar canon.
and it's going to do this because it knows that's how people who have committed to not watching it will waver - that, when faced with "i've got the chance to see x done properly" or "god, i love y in everything else they're in", people will go "lol, no ethical consumption under capitalism" and consume anyway.
but there is a more ethical strand of harry potter consumption, and that's consumption which does all it can to limit its impact to only benefitting jkr indirectly, and which takes that task seriously.
On Paapa Essiedu as Severus Snape (HBO Harry Potter)
As HBO's Harry Potter series rolls into pre-production - a sentence that, ten years ago, would have undoubtedly brought me extreme joy but in 2024 simply makes me regret the money that will be flowing into anti-trans politicians' bank accounts because of it - casting rumors have started to leak out.
The first of these is that I May Destroy You's Paapa Essiedu is being courted for a role as Severus Snape. As a former ardent Harry Potter enjoyer, I have several things I would like to say about this, and will do so in the form of a likely incohesive yet numbered list.
I've never personally seen Essiedu's work, but I hear that he is an exceptionally talented and charismatic actor, and I wish him well.
Unfortunately, I will likely be judgmental of any actor who decides to condone JKR's bigotry and ongoing wealth by signing on to this project.
I'm enthusiastic (or would be, if I could be enthusiastic about HBO HP to begin with) about the idea of introducing more actors of color to play Harry Potter characters. I was a long-standing proponent of a WoC Hermione, including the casting of Noma Dumezweni in the unfortunately atrocious Cursed Child, and also of a mixed-race Harry.
I find it interesting that production thinks it is a good idea to cast a handsome Man of Color as a canonically unattractive, prejudiced, perpetually antagonistic, former hate group member who essentially joined the Wizarding version of the KKK and who is mainly remembered as an incel who regularly bullied children, including the child of the (presumably white, though this casting is yet to be seen) woman who was the object of his unwanted affections and for whose murder he was partially responsible.
Severus Snape, of course, is a complex character who deserves (if any of these characters 'deserve' anything when HBO HP will, again, be funneling money into the pockets of the anti-trans movement in the UK) to have his story told in a nuanced way.
He is still a character who signed up to be a Death Eater, which has always been Harry Potter's allegory for a violent white supremacist hate group.
Time will tell whether this casting will be representative of the series as a whole; that is to say, whether there will be enough actors of color within the show in general so as to make casting a Black actor in this specific role no longer problematic.
Time will also tell whether James Potter and company will be cast as actors of color, or whether the bullying flashback in OotP is about to take on a wholly new implication despite, and I cannot reiterate this enough, Severus Snape being the one who eventually joined the genocidal hate group.
We have yet to see whether the remaining Harry Potter fandom at large reacts to this casting decision with any more grace than racist Lord of the Rings fans did on release of the Rings of Power TV series or Star Wars fans did at any point within the last decade. I hope for Essiedu's sake that the mistakes of the past are not repeated, and wish him peace and protection in the face of the potential onslaught to come.
With the creation of this show obviously already stirring controversy from LGBT advocates, I can't help but wonder if this news has been dropped as a distraction, or even a sacrificial tidbit, so that the ensuing backlash from awful fucking people will allow production to decry any criticism of the new show without having to re-address JKR's ongoing opposition to both science and basic human rights.
Once again, I hope that this is not the case, because Essiedu specifically and indeed all actors from marginalized groups generally deserve much, much better.
Oh gods, alright. Of course Livraria Lello would be the one to have it. I wonder if they were trying to get rid of it?
I actually would like to talk about Lello and their relationship with Harry Potter and also just ask you to visit the bookstore.
So, anyway, Lello opened in 1906 in Porto, North of Portugal.
JK. Rowling lived in Porto for a bit in the 90’s, where she first started writing the Harry Potter series. It was said she might have frequented it and some important stairs from the book were based on Lello’s stairs. In fact: The book release of Harry Potter and The Cursed Child happened in Lello.
What this meant is that this bookstore ended up having to fight to remain a bookstore. There are so many tourists, a lot of them that only wanted to look at it because it was Harry Potter related somehow and buy nothing. There were (and still are) insane queues to enter the bookstore.
Lello, who wasn’t particularly interested in becoming a Harry Potter museum, ended up having to make a system where people have to pay to enter. If you buy a book that goes above the price you paid for the ticket, the money you paid will be deducted from the book price.
I can tell from going there fairly frequently that they try to be less connected to Harry Potter as possible if they can manage. Yeah they have the books for sale but they also have a plethora of books and their own merchandise to choose from.
Despite JK. Rowling’s involvement with the bookstore, in the Portuguese Wikipedia page, even in the part about the famous writers that went there, there isn’t a single mention of her. Zero. Not in the history nor anywhere else. It’s beautiful.
Last time I went they had an exhibition about José Saramago’s work (portuguese author who won the Nobel Prize) and on the upper side of the stairs had an enormous collection of winners of the Nobel Prize and authors Lello concidered had the quality to also have won (it the Nobel Prize existed when they were alive) and authors that might win.
It’s quite interesting because all was very thought out and you had a whole reason as to why those books were there. Me and my mother ended up chatting for a long while with one of the bookshop employees (they have a lot of young employees btw) and we even ended up chatting with other foreigners that went there shopping.
Also, did I mentionthe bookshop is gorgeous?
As are their book editions (my English edition of Tom Sawyer I bought there)
Have also a photo of the bookstore from 1906 :)
So, if you go there, please don’t go because of Harry Potter. And please don’t shit on it because of Harry Potter too. It’s a very good bookstore and it deserves recognition, but not from there.
Is there any petty sorrow more infuriating than finding a fic on AO3 that sits at the exact intersection of your most obscure ship and your most oddball kink, checking the author's profile to see what else they've done, and discovering that the piece you've just read is the sole outlier in a solid wall of Harry Potter fanfic?
I feel like the folks in the notes saying "this, except [completely different series]" are not fully grasping the manner in which the particular choice of subject matter contributes to the infuriatingness.
I have had to block three separate people in the past hour for popping into the notes asking me to drop the name of the author so that they can read the Harry Potter fics.
"Just let people enjoy things" buddy, I will be first in line to argue that the idea that only morally upright people are capable of creating art is horseshit. Plenty of important art has been produced by awful people. However, let's not gloss over the facts: J K Rowling is a crypto-fascist who's spent the last several years lending vast quantities of material and financial support to far-right organisations both in the UK and abroad, and her ability to proffer this support is directly contingent on the continued popularity of the Harry Potter franchise. You can't separate the art from the artist when the artist is trying to kill you.
Not only is JK rowling (along with Elon Musk) officially being sued by Khelif, she hasn't tweeted once in almost whole week since all this made headlines, which is APPARENTLY significant because six days is the longest she has ever shut the fuck up
Someday I’m gonna need to actually write about this conservative tactic of demanding we basically turn off the part of our brain that interprets words and finds meaning when we talk to them. If they don’t specifically say some exact words, well you can’t respond to those words. You can’t assume JK Rowling is saying she’s a victim of a witch hunt by trans people because she never said those exact words in that exact order.
It’s a fascinating form of intellectual cowardice, where they want to essentially say something without ever being held responsible for saying that thing.
I cannot stress enough she is a primary funder of transphobia. She is not just someone with bigoted views you can seperate from her work, her work funds the bigotry.
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