Roger Zelazny (via quotemadness)

Reasons to Love Harry J. Potter

It has come to my attention that some of us need reminding about the reasons to love one Harry James Potter (this is absolutely no order whatsoever)

Harry James Potter is so fucking pure.

Okay, last Take™ on the Fantastic Beasts non-out Dumbledore thing: I don’t—strictly speaking—think we’re in a constructive place where the bar for queer rep is ~existing~. Like, this is a 5 part series, and if there’s not an organic way where it’d come up, I at least understand that. I feel like there’s so much weight stacked onto “we saw this on screen!” and believe me, I get it, but Yates’s comments were kind of like, “yeah this makes sense.”

That said, Dumbledore and Grindelwald shouldn’t have a monopoly on queerness in the Potter-verse, and it’s frankly odd that there’s been not one modicum of effort to include any characters given the positive reception to Dumbledore’s sexuality in the first place, given where we are as a society, and giving the power and leverage Rowling has in this franchise. These are guaranteed hits, more or less (though ironically I haven’t seen the first Fantastic Beasts).

I think a lot is fans’ frustration boiling over after a pattern of dismissive behavior on Rowling’s part, really. We can admit that the books were progressive-ish for when they came out, and just not super aging well at all. That’s fine and it doesn’t erase how meaningful they were to most of us. But there is this bizarre refusal of Rowling to like…engage with complaints, or do an ounce of research, and her rushing to the defense of Depp (we’ve all seen the video, lady) was really really discouraging. It’s like she’s resting on these laurels, but then when we question the added contributions isn’t not okay. Or at least, that’s the tone handed down from on high.

So zooming out: if it doesn’t suit the story, I don’t want Dumbledore to have some rando boyfriend, or to blurt out “I’M GAY” when a scene doesn’t call for it. But I think it’s more than fair grounds to point out that there is no explicit, canonical queer rep in this franchise, and it’s beyond ridiculous that in Pottermore or these movies, she didn’t bother trying. There can be more than two! I promise! Even more ridiculous that her response to the frustration is to mute people on twitter. 

LGBT PoC

hello, fellow humans …but mostly just brown and black gay and trans people 

in honor of Black History Month and me being tired of having teenagers call me an old man, I made my own chat on GroupMe 

Let boys do what they like. Feminine boys are still boys!

When I went back to canon after months of fanfic and fanon

idk I just love how we Young People Today use ~improper~ punctuation/grammar in actually really defined ways to express tone without having to explicitly state tone like that’s just really fucking cool, like

no    =    “No,” she said. 

no.    =    "No,” she said sharply.

No    =    “No,” she stated firmly.

No.    =    “No,” she snapped.

NO    =    “No!” she shouted.

noooooo    =    “No,” she moaned.

no~    =    “No,” she said with a drawn-out sing-song.

~no~    =    “No,” she drawled sarcastically.

NOOOOO    =    “No!” she screamed dramatically.

no?!    =    “No,” she said incredulously.

I’ve been calling this “typographical nuance” and I have a few more to add: 

*no* = “No,” she said emphatically. 

*nopes on out of here* = “No,” she said of herself in the third person, with a touch of humorous emphasis.

~*~noooo~*~ = “No,” she moaned in stylized pseudo-desperation.

#no = “No,” she added as a side comment.

“no” = “No,” she scare-quoted.

wtf are you kidding no = “No,” she said flatly. “And I can’t believe I have to say this.”

no no No No NO NO NO NO = "No,” she repeated over and over again, growing louder and more emphatic. 

nooOOOO = “No,” she said, starting out quietly and turning into a scream.

*no = “Oops, I meant ‘no,’” she corrected, “Sorry for the typo in my previous message.”

I cannot express how strongly I absolutely love language and writing and communication but if anyone asks why I will be showing them this post from now on

this is great, but I got to “no no No No NO NO NO NO” and immediately started singing “mamma mia, mamma mia, mamma mia let me go”

no no no nO (no no no)= “No,” she said, sticking to the status quo

Goethe-Institut did a web series a while back aimed at new arrivals in Germany and I like how it make sure to teach people that a lot of Germans are rude af

like, this is a genuine scene from an ep:

#Ok but for a second there I was like #this is a bit exaggerated #it’s not that rude to say hi to strangers #just a bit weird #but then I realised #the rude person is probably meant to be the one ignoring the ‘hi' 

Well she’s obviously doing it wrong. You got to mumble “Guten Tag” in no one’s actual direction upon entering the waiting room. Then you don’t speak a word (you gotta grab a magazine though, because if you’re on your mobile people will find that asocial) until the doctor calls you and when you get back to retrieve your jacket you mumble “Auf Wiedersehen”.

If you say “Guten Tag” while sitting down it’s either because you’re passive-aggressively shaming the person you’re talking to for not saying “Guten Tag” (which is of course highly respectable, but weird if they did say it) or worse: 

You’re trying to make small-talk.

See also: when entering a crowded bus, tram, subway or train, you do not say a single word. You look for an empty bench. If there are none, you will have a neighbour. You stop at an empty spot and mumble something like “tschulli-ng” or “s-nch-frei?” to the person occupying the other spot on the bench. You nod in an upward direction. They reply a mumbled “türlich” while vaguely looking somewhere near your face and moving their bag if neccessary. You sit down, nod gratefully, and keep your mouth shut for the rest of the ride. Neither of you wanted this. You wanted freedom. Don’t bother each other.

If an entire bench in front of you becomes available at the next stop, though, it is not the polite thing to free your neighbour and yourself up. No, you stay right where you are. The silent stranger next to you is your silent stranger now.

Welcome to Germany. This is how we express love.

None of these people are joking.

And if you’re the one sitting at the window and you want to get off at the next stop, you begin to loudly rustle with your bag whatever, because that way you can signal the other person that you need them to get up without having to speak to them.

Same in France. That’s one of many things we got in common with our neighbors.

I’m utter shit at human interaction but if there’s one thing I’m good at it’s common transportation etiquette and all of this is true.

The Specter of Failure

This comic was inspired by the essay “Notes on Failure” by Joyce Carol Oates - read it in her excellent book The Faith of a Writer.

Posters are available at my shop! You can find my book and calendar wherever you get your books. 

Taurus

@thefingerfuckingfemalefury Sleepy puppers. 🐶

shhhhhhh no one wake them

:-D

they are having good doggo naps <3

he dies tomorrow

rest in peace knuckles you dead bastard

reblog if ur blog is anti-nazi

if ur a nazi or neo-nazi or support nazi ideologies let this be a fucking harsh message that ur not welcome on this blog and I hope you get socked in the face

It’s international Holocaust remembrance day today (27/01) so you better reblog this today if you see it.

#Harry Potter and the Representation I Didn’t Actually Bother to Write But Still Want Credit For

Burnburnburn

I both love and hate that we’re growing more and more aware of just how problematic JK Rowling really is

Me: *finds it kind of funny* *finds it kind of sad*

im 12 years old sitting on my bed reading it’s midnight it’s summer my window is open the crickets are very loud but very soothing my room smells dusty and warm and no one else exists. im 12 years old. the feeling never goes away.

Nikita Gill (via thelovejournals)