Myfandomrealitea - My Fandom Reality

Disliking characters who aren't straight, white, cis men isn't inherently/always racism, internal prejudice, misogyny, homophobia, ect and every time I see valid criticism of a character being met with a siren wail of "bigotry!!" I want to physically transform myself into that Benfleck smoking meme.

Harry Potter Alternatives

Often the hardest parts about giving up the things you love most revolves around a lack of alternatives to fill the void. It can be daunting to think that what we've spent hours up to years of our life enjoying, filling our time with and finding community around is just suddenly gone. Particularly if its still there, you're just trying to avoid it.

Understandably, the same can be said for Harry Potter, its recent game release, and people who may be finding it hard to let go of the universe. So below are book, movie and gaming recommendations for people to explore that offer an alternative to lining the pockets of a bigot. The point of this list is to help support and ease the transition for those who want to but are struggling to phase supporting Harry Potter out of their lives.

Please also feel free to reply or reblog with your own recommendations, and share your own opinions if you've played or looked into any of the things suggested.

Game Alternatives

Divinity: Original Sin 2

Magicka 2

Genshin Impact

Wizard of Legend

Outward

Fable

In Verbis Virtus

The Witcher

Skyrim

Pillars of Eternity

Dragon Age

Noita

Avencast: Rise of the Mage

Book Alternatives

The Secrets of The Immortal Nicholas Flemel

Mistborn: The Trilogy

The Skulduggery Pleasant Series (10/10 personal favorite)

The Invisible Library

The Shadowmagic Trilogy

The Maze Runner

Mageborn

Good Omens

The Witcher

The Sandman

The Name of the Wind

The Magicians

Discworld

TV & Movie Alternatives

The Lord of the Rings

The Magicians

Shadowhunters

The Dark Crystal

The Maze Runner

The Sorcerer's Apprentice

Percy Jackson Trilogy

Guardian - The Great & Lonely God

Legend

Alchemy of Souls

Nowhere Boys

Willow

The Wheel of Time

Merlin

The King: Eternal Monarch

Hellbound

Ghost Doctor (not relevant to the genre, but hilarious and sweet)

I think we all need to learn that being wrong or undereducated isn't always something that has to be shamed and vilified. I'm going to use AO3 as an example, because its a prominent one.

I am constantly seeing people who don't actually understand the Archive, its history and its functions making suggestions for "improvements" that would actually have adverse effects when you look beyond the surface, because AO3 isn't like most other websites and these people simply don't know/understand that, so their suggestions are based on the assumptions and information of other sites.

And then I also see people who's only responses to these suggestions are insults, demeaning mockery and generally just comments that shame and criticise the person without actually helping them understand why what they're suggesting is the opposite of beneficial.

All this does is create resentment and an unwillingness to understand. Not everyone knows how to research something properly. Not everyone knows how to evaluate and understand information given to them. Sometimes, we do in fact need people to spell out what might seem obvious, because it isn't obvious to everyone.

The way I look at it is this;

Imagine if you're in school, or at home, and you ask the teacher/your parent a question. Let's say you ask them why the sky is blue. Imagine they laugh at you, mean and mocking, they sneer, and they say; what, you don't already know that? If you're too stupid to already know that, I'm not going to tell you. What a ridiculous question why don't you just automatically know why the sky is blue?

How would you feel then? Would you understand any better why the sky is blue? Would you be willing to ask again? Would you be any more motivated to know?

Everyone loves to say if you're uneducated on something, just don't speak about it, but there's not just 'educated' and 'uneducated.' Someone who's studied something for years will know more than someone who's only done a few weeks worth of research. Someone who's better at researching might be able to find information that someone who isn't as good at researching won't. Its not as cut and dry 'simply don't speak' because quite often, we assume we know enough to speak.

The incredible majority of what we know in life is secondary information. Its what we're told. What we witness and learn from other people. All life passes down knowledge generationally. Laterally. One to another.

And its okay not to know stuff. Its okay not to know everything there is to know about something. Its okay for someone else to know something you don't. And often, if you don't even know what you're looking for, it can be hard to learn what you need or want to know.

It also works both ways.

It okay to be corrected on something. Its not a personal attack. Someone telling you your information is wrong and correcting you isn't trying to humiliate you or demean you. They're just correcting your information. Say thank you, absorb the new info, and move on.

If your immediate instinct to someone who is civilly correcting you or telling you your content is incorrect is to lash out, consider why.

The onus of responsibility is on you, the reader, to ensure you're prepared to encounter - or avoid - content in whatever capacity. And here's a fun little fact for you:

You can filter by kudos and other criteria in order to find works that likely fit your "quality demands."

You can look at rec lists. Collections. Bookmarks. You can ask for recommendations from other users who share similar standards and interests to yours. And, yes. That means every. Single. Time. Because again; if you have specifics you want, its not up to the author to jump through hoops to bestow their works at your heels like a peasant to a 14th century King. Its up to you to go looking for it.

If you're so bothered by other writers and their "mediocre" content, here's a suggestion.

Write it yourself and stop complaining.

"Then just…. don't skim the unfiltered character tag? Filtering out a NOTP, a rating, and a few major squick tags takes literal seconds and is how the site is meant to be used."

Do you fucking hear yourself? Do you have any idea how many ships there are, especially in a big fandom? Am I supposed to astral-project to imagine every single combination of characters I'd find disturbing to read about? Every possible setting? And if I miss something, it's on me? Are you for real?

And hell, that's not even a solution. It's not that I would never read an incest fic, I would. It's not that I would never read that particular incest ship or that particular rating, I would. So why the hell would I filter for it? But shit like that is something you need to ease into, and that means not dumping it in the summary or tags that you read specifically to decide if the actual fic is worth it.

What's squicky can be so heavily context and situation-dependent that it is ridiculous to the max to act like authors are free to be as gauche as they like in tags and summaries, and it's readers' fault if they get majorly squicked by something they wasn't quick enough to "argh my eyes my eyes stop reading" on.

Let me say this even more bluntly:

I love reading rapefic, it's a major kink for me. When it's written well, and in a specific way. Ergo, I'd still absolutely hate it if it were commonplace for people with rapefics to make the summaries and tags explicitly vivid. Please, in all your apparently infinite wisdom, go ahead and tell me which combination of filters I should use to not get upset by shitty summaries while skimming fic summaries for something I'd actually like!

Poor or gauche writing in and of itself can make something squicky or potentially upsetting.

So screw everyone who replied to this post with some variation of "Just get better at Not Reading Things while reading". You can't always predict what you'll find squicky and you can't filter for "this thing I only find squicky when it's not done in a way I subjectively find tasteful". Maybe don't be so intent on making the archive miserable to use, mkay?

--

Actually there's nothing wrong with blocking or reporting people, deleting comments and refusing to respond/engage with hate and baiting on any level whatsoever. They are not owed your time or explanations. They are not owed your energy. You are not immature or incapable for choosing to refuse to engage instead of choosing to argue and expend energy.

Obviously if you're making uneducated, incorrect or bigoted content then yeah, be prepared for people to call you out and challenge your statements and views, but I'm talking in general.

Hate comment on your fic? That's cool, baby. Just delete it.

Someone's trying to bait you into arguing about your stance on something? Whatever. Its all groovy. Block 'em.

You got a clear visual that someone's just gonna keep coming back at you? Have a report button. Its free. I'll give you as many as you need.

You don't need to facilitate that. You don't need to see it. You don't need to spend your time trying to challenge someone who's obviously either in a bad mentality or is just a shitty person as a whole. You simply Do Not. You don't need to allow that person to have a space and a voice within yours. You don't need to allow them to be able to spew their bullshit for you and everyone else to see outside of their own little bubble.

Next time you get a hate comment on AO3? Wham, bam, its gone, ma'am. No thank you. Anon hate mail? Not in this household.

You have no obligation to facilitate any of it, and anyone who tries to force you into thinking otherwise is simply incorrect. Their action does not inherently demand your reaction. Plus, its objectively more hilarious to know that the sole outcome of their spitefulness and negativity is them getting even angrier because you're refusing to engage and refusing to feed their need for a response.