A plethora of pertinent posts

Sarah Biffin (1784-1850): The Artist Who Painted With Her Mouth

Full entry here. Patreon here. Books here – yes, the second book is out!. 

And if you’re around HeroesCon in North Carolina this weekend, I’ll be there at Artist Alley table AA-1924! Come say hi! 

Art notes after the cut.

The expelled half-giant. The young werewolf. The repentant Death Eater.

He protects them and gives them a second chance. All he asks in return is their loyalty.

And, if on occasion he requests that they undertake a certain task, invoking their debt of gratitude - well, that is no more than he is owed.

He once thought to add a certain disowned Black to his collection, but quickly realised his mistake.

Sirius is not an outcast, but a rebel. He knowingly chose his path, and chooses what price he is willing to pay for it. He refuses to be used.

Harry was an outcast due to a childhood filled with abuse and neglect. 

Vernon made him an outcast by dismissing his claims of magic, berating him, locking him in a CLOSET and putting bars on his window, and let’s face it, even though her editor made her cut it out, Jo intended for there to be physical abuse. 

Petunia made him an outcast by enabling and contributing to this abuse, as well as making Harry do dozens of chores while doting on Dudley. 

Dudley made him an outcast by bullying him and threatening any students at school who wanted to be his friends. 

And the rest of the wizarding world made him an outcast when they bullied him for being an outsider.

Harry James Potter became an outcast the moment he was placed with The Dursleys.

Yeeeeah…. why the fuck did he leave Harry with the Dursleys??? I mean, putting him in a random wizard’s household with no blood relation would’ve made more sense.p if he was truly trying to hide him.

The expelled half-giant. The young werewolf. The repentant Death Eater.

He protects them and gives them a second chance. All he asks in return is their loyalty.

And, if on occasion he requests that they undertake a certain task, invoking their debt of gratitude - well, that is no more than he is owed.

He once thought to add a certain disowned Black to his collection, but quickly realised his mistake.

Sirius is not an outcast, but a rebel. He knowingly chose his path, and chooses what price he is willing to pay for it. He refuses to be used.

Harry was an outcast due to a childhood filled with abuse and neglect. 

Vernon made him an outcast by dismissing his claims of magic, berating him, locking him in a CLOSET and putting bars on his window, and let’s face it, even though her editor made her cut it out, Jo intended for there to be physical abuse. 

Petunia made him an outcast by enabling and contributing to this abuse, as well as making Harry do dozens of chores while doting on Dudley. 

Dudley made him an outcast by bullying him and threatening any students at school who wanted to be his friends. 

And the rest of the wizarding world made him an outcast when they bullied him for being an outsider.

Harry James Potter became an outcast the moment he was placed with The Dursleys.

Once Harry is in school Dumbledore still doesn’t show up enough except to demonstrate to Harry that he’s not like other authority, he’s okay with rule-breaking and he’s Harry’s friend, or at least someone trustworthy (the mirror of Erised). Then he rewards Harry for serious risk-taking and endangerment of himself to fix a problem the adults couldn’t. From the very beginning he was TRAINING Harry to feel like he had a RESPONSIBILITY as the Chosen One, from the very first year and the first time we saw Harry had an extremely averse reaction to losing points. He feared social ostracization and when something bad happened, he was ostracized until he fixed it. Setting him up for later books when…

Book six, Order of the Phoenix, or as I like to call it The Book Where Dumbledore Shows His Fucking Colors. Here’s Harry in the midst of teenage angst compounded with a hero complex. He’s just been let off a summer of extreme isolation– Dumbledore– after an extremely stressful school year where he had to compete in an extremely dangerous competition and confront an extremely dangerous mortal enemy whom EVERYONE is telling him is a figment of his imagination at BEST, one that killed his best friend. And no one talks about how important Cedric fucking Diggory was as a symbol for Harry, a boy with a father who’s alive and loving, friends and loved ones and social acceptance because he’s good at sports and doesn’t have masses of baggage hanging off his past. He watched this icon of what Harry’s life COULD have been if not for Voldemort be KILLED by Voldemort. For the first time Harry had to see something truly good be ripped away and then get tossed BACK to the Dursleys who were VERY careful to tell him he wasn’t good. 

So all this happens complete with Dumbledore not being fucking around like he needed to be, and of course Umbridge, but I’ll be honest I don’t think that cunt was near as damaging as Harry grappling with madness that wasn’t even HIS, anger and rage that came from Voldemort that Dumbledore again passed up the chance to help him with by passing him off to Snape. Who has made no secret of his HATRED for Harry. To teach him delicate mental magic. Yeah that worked great. He kept Harry separated from the ONLY guardian Harry had that was worth the name and barely even helped him through the DEATH other than to absolve him of his anger by telling him it’s Voldemort’s. 

Half-Blood Prince is where this all starts to go down, Harry is now seen as the ACTUAL hero but that’s still just as ostracizing because the one thing this poor boy wants is to be LEFT ALONE. Dumbledore still doing fuck all except to capitalize on Harry’s hero-worship of him– Dumbledore’s Army come the fuck ON that old bastard never deserved an Army for him, should have been HARRY’S Army– and teach him shit before he takes him out to the middle of the lake with no one the wiser to retrieve a Horcrux. Where Harry has to watch his “beloved” mentor and guardian suffer horribly for him like EVERYONE ELSE HAS BECAUSE OF THIS SHITTY BEARDED FOOL’S DECISIONS. 

Ahem.

But Dumbledore is definitely one of the good guys, you are supposed to belive that. Because he is, he did help to save the wizarding world, he did sacrifice himself, and even as Draco has his wand at the ready he tries to tell him he doesn’t have to do this. Dumbledore is a good guy.

But he raised a child from 12 years old, even infancy, to be a weapon in a war. Harry’s job was to die and Dumbledore didn’t want him any the wiser. When Harry needed him most he ignored him and didn’t even try to secretly let him know that it was for a reason. He left him with abusive guardians. I’d like to reference the abandoning of Sirius mentioned above for this. Dumbledore is a genius. There’s no way he ever truly thought Sirius betrayed the Potters. And he could have fought for him. He could have fought to put Harry in the care of his loving god father. James’ best friend. But he didn’t. Because Dumbledore is not a good person.

The expelled half-giant. The young werewolf. The repentant Death Eater.

He protects them and gives them a second chance. All he asks in return is their loyalty.

And, if on occasion he requests that they undertake a certain task, invoking their debt of gratitude - well, that is no more than he is owed.

He once thought to add a certain disowned Black to his collection, but quickly realised his mistake.

Sirius is not an outcast, but a rebel. He knowingly chose his path, and chooses what price he is willing to pay for it. He refuses to be used.

Harry was an outcast due to a childhood filled with abuse and neglect. 

Vernon made him an outcast by dismissing his claims of magic, berating him, locking him in a CLOSET and putting bars on his window, and let’s face it, even though her editor made her cut it out, Jo intended for there to be physical abuse. 

Petunia made him an outcast by enabling and contributing to this abuse, as well as making Harry do dozens of chores while doting on Dudley. 

Dudley made him an outcast by bullying him and threatening any students at school who wanted to be his friends. 

And the rest of the wizarding world made him an outcast when they bullied him for being an outsider.

Harry James Potter became an outcast the moment he was placed with The Dursleys.

your dress and makeup is now a DISGUISE

your ‘birth name’ is now an ALIAS

getting told by your parents to be nice and not yell at anyone being racist is MISSION BRIEFING

your entire extended family are now FOREIGN DIGNITARIES and you gotta make it thru the evening without being discovered as a RADICAL SPY

carrying a small water pistol and one of those fake-lipstick pens in your purse helps to get in the zone. the best part of being a spy is the nifty gadgets everyone knows that.

IN THE LEGEND, THEY BASICALLY SENT SOMEONE TO TROY TO SAY “THIS HORSE IS FOR ATHENA, NOT YOU, SO OUR RETREAT BACK TO GREECE IS SAFE. DON’T TRY TO TAKE IT. IT WON’T FIT THROUGH THE GATES OF YOUR CITY, SO THERE’S NO WAY YOU DICKS CAN STEAL IT AND PRETEND YOU GOT IT FOR ATHENA. NOT FOR TROJANS.”

AND THEN TROY WAS LIKE “YOU’RE NOT OUR DAD. WE WON THIS WAR AND WE’RE TAKING YOUR STUPID HORSE AS A TROPHY SO WE’LL ALWAYS REMEMBER HOW BAD GREECE IS AT DESTROYING TROY.” 

AND A FEW TROJANS WERE LIKE “THIS IS A TRICK” AND TRIED TO EXPOSE IT AS A TRICK BUT THE REST OF THE TROJANS WOULD HAVE NONE OF IT BECAUSE EVERYONE WAS SWEPT UP IN THE THRILL OF VICTORY, AND ALSO BECAUSE THE GODS KEPT SENDING SNAKES TO STRANGLE ANYONE WHO SAID ANYTHING, BECAUSE THE GREEK GODS HAD NO WORD FOR “SUBTLETY”