divorce is so funny. like never mind
life gets so much better when you realize that there are no rules. you don’t have to get your license at 16 if you don’t want to. you don’t have to date anyone in your teen years if you don’t want to. you don’t have to move out in your early 20s if you don’t want to. you don’t need to go to any social gathering that you’re not in the mood to go to. and you don’t owe anyone an explanation. sometimes you don’t wanna do something just because you... don’t wanna do it. that’s it. live your life how you wanna live it.
I always feel so worried about anyone I know who's 22-23 because I know those ages are the most hyped up yet shatteringly lonely times for most young adults when they expect so much from themselves and have been set up to fail at the same time but don't see that yet because they did everything they were supposed to and have probably started to feel so lonely and don't understand why seeing friends is suddenly getting way harder and time is going faster than ever
Those are like the speed batting ages where you are swinging so hard so fast trying to get this and you're striking out and even when you do hit you realize your just running in a circle and it starts to weigh on you and no one else is acknowledging it.
If you're 22-23 it's okay keep going, please try and remember to eat and sleep well and that there's nothing for you to win at, and you're not done changing no matter how set things feel
they should make a pill that makes people in their 20s feel good about where their lives are going
I'm about to wii sports resort to violence
I'm about to have a wii fit
Can't let British people have air conditioning because first they'd call it something twee like "the climate fixer" and then in 20 years they'll call it "the climb" or "the climmy"
growing up is an endless process of me looking back at younger versions of myself and being like…. wow she was so young. but look how well she did with what she knew
how lovely to think that there is a future me out there thinking this exact same thing about present me
“growth isn’t always constant. relapses happen. it doesn’t erase all your success.”
— Unknown
ik this is a horny blog but i REALLY love the concept of making out without the intention of taking it further,,,, like just long slow kissing and cuddling with nothing else on your mind other than being close and soft with each other is nnnnh
nerdybreeding
Ugh this is a moooooooooooooooood
ju4ncito-deactivated20230804
life is crazy im losing the idgaf war
"oh sorry, i guess i was infodumping again" - sad, shy, apologetic
"you sly dog, you got me monologuing" - cool, strong, confident
Being followed by a car for 2 turns in the city: "I'm about to be murdered. Let me call my mom and write my will because this is it"
Being followed by a car for 6 hours on country highways: "The relationship between Blue Subaru and I is beyond compare. We're family. My road brother."
Looks like we can’t isolate, ignore, ibuprofen our way out of this one boys
What makes JKR's shitshow even harder to process is that she didn't just ruin a book series. Harry Potter was an entire subculture. Like Star Wars and Star Trek fans, Harry Potter fans dedicated their lives and careers to the series. I don't know if I'd call it "underground," but liking Harry Potter got you beaten up when I was in school, so it was more of a dedicated indie culture than a mass-appeal fanbase.
Harry Potter was so huge that fan works developed their own followings. Potter Puppet Pals racked up hundreds of thousands of followers and was nearly as relevant as the series itself. For fanfiction, Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality got so big that it has a Wikipedia page. The band Harry and the Potters spawned the wizard rock music genre. A Very Potter Musical developed a fanbase and launched Darren Criss's career.
Harry Potter also has extensive ties to fandom history. Everyone in my generation (millennials) remembers coming home from school to read Harry Potter fanfiction on the Internet. Today, most people just post their stories on Wattpad or Archive of Our Own. But at the time, the fanbase was splintered between fanfiction.net and dozens of individual websites and forums, some made for specific ships. Since they all had individual hosts, a lot of those sites have been lost to time.
And there's the infamous My Immortal fanfiction, which is an Internet legend with people still searching for the author. Everybody read that one (and laughed at it) in middle school.
Pre-social media, fan sites like The Leaky Cauldron and Mugglenet had massive followings because they were one of few sources for news, theories, essays and fan content. Some of these sites still exist after being around for over a decade and building their own legacy.
Before Deathly Hallows came out, fans were so desperate to know what happened that Mugglenet published a book called What Will Happen in Harry Potter 7: Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Falls in Love and How Will the Adventure Finally End? Yep...Harry Potter was so big that people wrote separate books about what would happen in an upcoming book.
And that's not mentioning all the book release parties, Harry Potter-themed events, monuments, fan films, restaurants and even a theme park. A lot of fandoms have those, but Harry Potter infiltrated every aspect of popular culture.
Today, there's a thriving culture of "Harry Potter adults" with themed weddings, baby showers and Etsy stores. Putting your Hogwarts house in your Instagram bio is pretty much a prerequisite for joining the "bookish" community. Warner still produces new content, like the Fantastic Beasts series, although we've all seen what a disaster that's been.
Everyone has at least a few memories associated with Harry Potter even if it's just watching the movies. I had great memories associated with Harry Potter. But looking back at the subculture, history and thousands of fan works, it doesn't seem fun anymore. Studying the fandom or being part of it comes with an awkward tension because you don't want to seem like you're condoning JKR's bigotry but can't divorce her from the series. This subculture was spawned by a woman who turned her legacy of magic and wonder into one of abuse and hatred.
I don't expect people to write paragraphs about how much they hate JKR every time they post about Harry Potter, but it's still uncomfortable to see people make new content or wear their Harry Potter Etsy tote bags like nothing happened. Even if they clarify that they don't support her, it's just a weird, tense situation for everybody.
People dedicated years of their lives to running Harry Potter fan sites, writing fanfiction, cosplaying characters and making fan movies. If I were in that situation, I'd have a mild identity crisis. I'd ask myself "Did I waste all those years? Should I delete my content? Where do I go from here?"
So ultimately, JKR didn't ruin "just" a book series or even "just" a fandom. She tanked an entire culture, which inspired people to look at Harry Potter more critically. The issues that people brought to the light tainted the series's legacy even without JKR's personal issues.
Once, Harry Potter was a series for generations. Now, former fans hope that the series fades into irrelevancy. Unfortunately, JKR didn't just tarnish her legacy--she took decades of history, millions of fans and a worldwide subculture along with her.
it’s crazy having been super-involved in the HP fandom for more than a decade and watching the fallout from this
quidditch (the real sport) has changed its name to quadball
the harry potter alliance (a nonprofit) has rebranded to fandom forward
the sub-subcultures that sprung up within the HP fandom have now distanced themselves from the main fandom and have become independent groups in their own right
HP was so integral to the development of early online fandom (as OP’s mentioned) that now there’s sort of just a weird... hole in the internet
for many HP fans, it took up a lot of their life. three conventions a year, wizard rock shows, HPA fundraising, granger leadership academy, nightly fanfic, podcasts, quidditch games.
when fans (rightfully) shunned JKR and began to leave the fandom, a lot of them (myself included) were left rudderless. how do you reconcile the fact that most of your friends, hobbies, sometimes even jobs, were due to the work of such a hateful person? as OP said, did i waste my life?
i’m obviously not saying that this is the worst part about JKR’s bigotry (the worst part is, of course, the bigotry) or that HP fans are the worst-done-by victims (who are of course trans people)
but it is WILD to see such a juggernaut of internet fandom be virtually scrubbed away
It’s also not even just asking if you wasted your life, at least in my case. It’s a chunk of your life just gone. the first movie (which is how I found out about it) came out when I was starting the third grade, and the last one came out the summer after I graduated high school. obviously it wasn’t the only book I read, nor was it even my favorite series, but it was a constant presence for ten years of my fucking life before you even get into the subculture that existed even after the last movie came out.
the cosplay I made for the midnight release of the sixth book when I was eleven? the one where I handmade Ravenclaw badges using cereal box cardboard and safety pins? completely tainted. it’s not a happy memory anymore.
the extremely detailed canon-divergence AU fic that I brainstormed with my (now dead) college roommate over a period of months? fucking ruined. that’s a whole-ass part of my relationship with her that I no longer have and can never get back.
every time I felt like shit because I was being bullied, and identified with Hermione and Luna Lovegood so I didn’t feel so alone? the time I broke down into tears because I got to the bit in Deathly Hallows where the trio sees Luna’s “friends friends friends” painting and felt seen? NOPE. THAT’S FUCKED. I NOW RETROACTIVELY STILL FEEL LIKE SHIT.
it’s like finding out that your mom is a serial killer. like, obviously the actual victims are the people who were murdered, and the worst part of the situation is that your mom fucking murdered people, but it also means that a fundamental part of your life, a huge chunk of the events that shaped who you are as a person, is just fucking gone now.
i go absolutely ape shit buck wild when people ask me if i want to run errands with them like Let’s Fucking Go. and my mind absolutely maxes out of dopamine when they ask if i wanna stop for coffee. and if someone took me to the park id go bonkers in funcking yonkers
i got so high last night that i started ghostwriting for a golden retriever apparently