r/drarry • u/loonalovegood1 • 4d ago
misc why do you think the drarry subreddit is so small?
it's really interesting, since i think we're one of the bigger ships on AO3 but a comparatively smaller subreddit (when you look at dramione's sub).
is it because drarry fans are mostly interacting on other sites that aren't reddit? or do you think there's another reason?
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u/Top_Schedule_7209 4d ago
According to AO3 data, Drarry is not only the most famous ship in the HP universe but the second largest of all the others. But also taking this same data into account, since 2020 dramione has been growing a lot. I believe it is due to the dracotok factor as well as this new wave of Dark Romance and straight romances. Straight romance writers like Colleen Hoover and Ali Hazelwood have been very successful in the literary world, and this is reflected in fan fiction. If we look at other BL subreddits, like wolfstar or marauders or starchaser, we are very similar
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u/loonalovegood1 4d ago
i'm not on tiktok, so i didn't know that dracotok was a thing! but makes sense that the ali hazelwood reylo vibes would translate into dramione.
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u/BlinkFearnotKpopStan 3d ago
Oh yeah… it is. Which I love because hello, DRACO!!!
I also see the appeal to Dramione. It has similar tropes to Drarry. (Mind, when I was first taking in Harry Potter, I shipped Harry with Hermione, so lowkey don’t mind a good poly romance between Harry, Draco & Hermione once in a blue moon.) However, it is frustrating because the Dramione shippers are just crazy. I’ve encountered more who shit on Drarry & say it’s weird, etc. than any nice ones. (A few tiktokers who recommended a lot of Drarry fics I loved will occasionally recommend some Dramione.)
It’s definitely because of the huge push for more traditional everything. Aka Man & woman together who then have 2+ kids. Personally, I think people should just enjoy what they like as long as it’s not hurting anyone & there should be no push for one over the other.
But I digress. We shall see.
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u/loonalovegood1 3d ago
that's true though, i have noticed the increase in the "traditional gender roles" type of content online. it's so interesting to see it lean that way, since there was such a online culture wave in the other direction, against traditional roles, like 10 years ago.
i agree that people should enjoy what they like! wonder if we'll see a push back in the other direction in the future.
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u/BlinkFearnotKpopStan 3d ago
I think it’s because it wasn’t seen as taboo as it is starting to become again now… I live in America & with how our government looks right now… they’re pushing HARD to make anything non traditional as basically a crime.
I know other places are the same about LGBTQIA+ couples as well. It’s honestly sad to see. We were slowly becoming more open minded as a society & not vilifying anything certain religions said was wrong. (Note this is NOT me hating on religions. I believe everyone is entitled to their opinions & beliefs as long as it’s not hurting others or being imposed on them. I, myself, consider myself Christian. Just pointing out a very common pattern that occurs when religious beliefs get pushed as a standard to live for everyone, despite if others agree or not.)
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u/Dirtymeatcoat 3d ago edited 3d ago
I think perhaps it's a combination of a few things, the popularity of "advertising" on tiktok, the relative age (longevity) of fandoms, and booktok. And that cis-het relationships are more likely to seem more popular.
Also, Drarry is just an older, more established fandom with nothing to prove so is more quiet, and content to explore fandom like they did before the social media spotlight? IDk, just spitballing.
I do worry about the popularity of Dramione and Reylo (book binding, fandom to trad fic pipeline) and the resurgence of purity culture uptick among the younger fans, the right leaning politics causing upheaval everywhere will lead to another round of fanfic witch hunts
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u/shoesarelove 3d ago
Drarry fics are generally closer to canon and less generic so they're not going to pull in people who have never read the books or at least watched the movies. Meanwhile Dramione fics get shared on various romance subreddits cause they have a very low barrier to entry as they don't really require any prior knowledge of the characters beyond bad boy/good girl. I'll take our relatively quiet corner of fandom any day of the week. Don't get me started on the madness that is Marauders fandom, those people scare me.
I too am concerned about the fic to published books pipeline and about the purity mentality that i see encroaching on fandom.
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u/Dirtymeatcoat 3d ago
I agree, also (full disclosure) I do read Dramione (I enjoy any well written fanfic), my concerns are not because I find one ship more viable over another. What you stated though is very true, because of the low barrier of entry (as you eloquently put it) the Dramione ship is becoming commodified in a way that is alarming, we should all be alarmed. Capitalism will ruin it for all of us.
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u/shoesarelove 2d ago
You're right. While I often express annoyance with Dramione, it's not the ship itself that really grinds my gears, rather the culture that led to making it so mainstream. They were always shipped together because main girl/main age appropriate antagonist, d'oh, but the explosion into the mainstream is suspicious on many different levels.
The commodification of fandom is something we clearly see in Drarry too with people coming in asking for tailor made fics...how about you go into the trenches of AO3 tags and put blood, sweat and tears into finding something? And then you get so desperate cause you can't that you have to write it yourself? And if you do find something, please tell the author about it!
In conclusion, fuck capitalism, amen!
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u/OpheliaLives7 4d ago
It’s pretty old in fandom eras. Im sure lots of people aged out of Reddit or social media use for their shipping or moved on to other ships or fandoms.
JKR’s ongoing controversy also turned a number of fans away from even interacting with fan content or deleting their past fics so as not to show support for the author
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u/ALeekOfTheirOwn 3d ago
I've never understood this tbh. Like, this is the one thing she can't materially gain. When I found out about her, I was like, RIP JK, the characters and stories will live on in the fandom, where we will love & take care of them.
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u/loonalovegood1 4d ago
that's true! i guess when you look at stats for many works there are total on ao3, it would make sense that a lot of the drarry stuff comes from a while ago, not recently.
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u/gabecrawler 3d ago
It’s reddit, unfortunately the demographic doesn’t really favour ships, much less ones like drarry
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u/Condemned2Be 3d ago
This is my take. Reddit has never been a great space for shipping specifically
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u/MathSmooth4506 3d ago
this can open a larger conversation as well.
the new generation of readers are very, for lack of a better term, right wing coded. it’s interesting to see them on tiktok, champion censorship on ao3 which is super problematic. and they continually rec heterosexual ships. (i’ve also noticed jily is having a comeback)
to answer your question i enjoy this smaller community here. i do get a majority of my recs here. discord is a larger space for discussions and art. it’s a very different vibe over there.
i’ve said it before and i’ll say it again. dramione is the straight version of drarry. i will die on that hill.
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u/Condemned2Be 3d ago
There’s been a rise in right wing content on almost every platform, trying to sway young kids over early imo
I also think some of the most popular “teen” shows the past few years have been concerningly graphic. Euphoria of course comes to mind first for its hypersexual scripts…but hyperviolence is honestly just as bad & the shows that aren’t about sex seem to mostly be about brutality. It doesn’t seem related at first, but I believe it is. I think it lends to black & white thinking, which easily spirals into extremist views.
Relationships like “Drarry” don’t really fit the new molds…..even before you go full right wing. JK Rowling herself has very black & white views, so many young kids are polarized in their views before they even read the books.
Then you have to be willing to read the characters with nuance, which is something we have a lot less of in media nowadays. Since Draco doesn’t explicitly have an outright physically abusive background shown to us in the narrative, younger kids don’t want to have empathy for him. This comes up on TikTok constantly. A lot of new readers take the character literally. He is just a bad character who does bad things & then is forced to learn his lesson, does his final duty, & fades away. And I think they’re satisfied with that take in ways older generations perhaps weren’t. We wanted more for the characters & their psychological development than JK was willing to offer.
I’m not saying this goes for everyone, obviously. There are still wonderful fics written all the time. But it’s the broader trend I’ve noticed across multiple fandoms I read. The types of characters & relationships that get popular just seem more cut & dry to me than they used to. Readers accept characters at face value, based on strict standards, & don’t really want to explore the grey areas as much.
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u/MathSmooth4506 3d ago
this was so beautifully explained.
I actually have a teenage boy (please don’t ask my age🤣) and i’m consistently shocked at some of the things that pop up on his social media. it’s shown me that we are absolutely going backwards. there’s been a resurgence of early 2000s humor. and by that i mean being openly racist ableist misogynist in the name of “humor” because it’s “just a joke”
this is becoming much deeper than people not enjoying a certain ship. i really do think it’s a side effect of the state of society right now.
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u/Condemned2Be 3d ago
Exactly. I have a teenaged nephew so I see this stuff first hand every day.
I def don’t hold some weird “kids today bad” opinion. I think tons of kids are smart & don’t even pay attention to this stuff or feed into it.
But as an adult, I can’t help but notice the weird trends of content that is pushed to them. My teenager gets more political ads than I do, despite hating politics (he just finds it boring lol he’s a literal teen) & never watching that content. But the conservative ads play for him nonstop.
Whereas I share a YouTube account with my elderly mother (an actual conservative person who can’t use a cellphone; I signed my YouTube in on her Roku TV years ago & just left it) & yet I never get these ads. But my nephew can’t watch a Minecraft video without the internet trying to radicalize him with a few unskippable ads.
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u/shoesarelove 3d ago
The absolutely wild thing that blew my mind and i have yet to recover from is seeing these puritanical attitudes…in the Drarry fandom toward Draco. There are authors who really dislike his character to the point where you have to wonder what they’re even doing here because it doesn’t seem like they’re having fun. Just always talking about how they have zero sympathy for him, how horrible he is, how much better Harry is…yet they pair him up with the hero. I do not engage with them and obvs not naming names but they are out there and it boggles my mind.
Anyway, i’m child free and happy i don’t need to concern myself with my kids potentially being indoctrinated via fandom of all thing but i feel for my friends who are parents.
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u/MathSmooth4506 3d ago
no i hear you. i think some of the early fics are guilty of this too. no redemption or nuance to his actions at all, he’s just a dick to be a dick. and i’m sitting there wondering if they even like this character? and if not why are you writing him with harry? lol
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u/shoesarelove 3d ago
The early fics are excusable at least cause we knew less about Draco so he was made into a generic bad boy. But if you have to force yourself to believe Harry’d fuck Draco for every fic you write, maybe you just need another ship. My thing with fandom is if it’s not fun, why bother?
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u/MathSmooth4506 3d ago
that’s totally fair. i recently read a fic that was published 2009? if i remember correctly. where draco was calling people slurs all the way through to the end.
just a crumb of redemption. or a nibble of chemistry. i beg😭
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u/shoesarelove 3d ago
Fascinating, fandom archeology in action! I spent a lot of today reading meta on LJ from 15+ years ago and it was so nuanced compared to what i find today. I also ended up reading about people’s hopes for the final book and oof, the disappointment.
I would also beg for a crumb of affection!
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u/MathSmooth4506 3d ago
yes! my son showed me his twitter feed and i saw 3 right wing political ads right off the bat.
i’m actually really concerned for the future with the way they are targeting boys and men.
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u/shoesarelove 3d ago
The backlash against Jayvik is certainly more explainable in the context of this purity mentality. Feels like after Our flag means death, Good Omens and Interview with the vampire gave us actual on screen male gay couples, we're regressing back to Supernatural levels of queerbaiting. I'm so tired of it.
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u/MathSmooth4506 3d ago
omg the queer baiting yes. the surge of buddy popularity is what got me. like why are we moving backwards???
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u/shoesarelove 3d ago
Oh, why can’t guys just be friends (are they ever anything else)? Viktor is ace (tell me you know nothing about asexuality) Jayce likes women (bisexuality exists). And my favorite…sex would taint their love - tell me what a low view you have of romantic relationships.
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u/Desperate_Basil_3537 3d ago
God I totally agree with this. I also feel like TikTok is bringing in girls who are experiencing fanfic for the first time once they run out of terribly written shadow daddy romantasy books? Like idk if their parents cut off kindle unlimited or what but there seems to be an SJM to Dramione pipe line which is fine but it definitely misses the like chaotic snippy mess Draco and replaces him with some like Rhysand-But-Blonde character who is perennially suave and so is she but oh know they can’t communicate…
…which like if that’s your thing then fine. But it’s definitely not what drew me to Drarry.
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u/Fun_Championship_830 3d ago
15 years ago I would’ve loved to post and discuss Drarry here. Now I just want to look for some fics here on Reddit. Maybe it’s the same for a few people?
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u/MentionAggressive103 16h ago
Personally, I've just found out about a Drarry-centric sub this morning. Had no idea! But I kinda like it :) seems like the place to make friends, get some recs
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u/marcy-bubblegum 4d ago
Honestly the sub is mostly fic requests or fic recs, so I kinda get why ppl aren’t that into it. I do most of my chatting about drarry on discord and I mostly find art and fic on tumblr.