In my last article about wizard rock and work, Jarrod of Gred and Forge told me about how his employers had Googled him and discovered he was in a wizard rock band. One of our commenters, Jennofwashington, brought up an interesting point. “How much do you disclose immediately about your involvement in a fandom?” She meant in the work environment, but it got me to thinking about the reactions that people have when you talk about wizard rock.
I don’t know about most people in the fandom, but about 99% of my life is spent with Muggles. This is not to say that my friends and family aren’t fans of the Harry Potter books. After all, I have spent 6+ years bullying anyone I know into reading them, and no one has ever come back to complain it was a waste of time. On the other hand, nor has anyone ever said to me “Gee, did you hear about that Harry Potter con? We should go!” or started a sentence with “I was reading theories about Snape still being alive the other day…”. Those are things that I say. I’ve found that reactions to my fandom involvement with wizard rock come in three forms: enthusiasm, acceptance, and judgment.
The people who tend to be most enthusiastic are people who have their own brand of “fandom” themselves, be it science fiction lovers, comic book readers, live action role players, or members of other fandoms. For them, liking wizard rock is not any different than waiting anxiously for the next issue of Secret Invasion or dressing up in tabbards and beating their friends with PVC pipe covered in foam. I am lucky to have several people like this in my life. Their motto is, “It’s awesome that you’ve found something you love so much!” Conversations with these people go something like this:
Me: I got my wizard rock EP of the month shipment today!
Them: Sweet! Anything good?
Me: Yeah, I like all of them.
Them: Cool. Did I tell you about that awesome girl I met at Pennsic?
The acceptance group comprises most of the people I know. These are people that accept that I’ve got this Harry Potter “thing”, but would never directly ask me about it. It’s just one of my quirks that they don’t really understand. I posted MTV’s recent story about Terminus on my personal blog to show my friends I wasn’t the only wizard rock fan. One of the responses? “Oh dear. I don’t know that that pelvic-thrusting Voldemort is helping your case…” (referring to Mark of Ministry of Magic‘s dancing during The Parselmouths‘ “Voldemort Fangirl”). Their motto is along the lines of “Freya’s a little strange, but we love her anyway.” Our conversations go something like this:
Them: I was taking a nap in the park the other day, under a tree.
Me: And Whompy stole your pillow?
Them: Wha-Whomp-huh?
Me: Sorry, it’s a wizard rock reference.
Them: Ok. (small smile) Anyway…
And then there’s the judgment. I have found some people who are just entirely close-minded to the idea that I listen to music about books. The other day I went to my local comic book store to ask them to put up a flyer about the Whomp the House Tour, Part Deux show that my local HP fan club is hosting. One of them asked me who The Whomping Willows and Justin Finch-Fletchley and the Sugar Quills were. I explained the concept of wizard rock to them. He smiled and said they would be happy to post the flyer. The other looked me up and down and smirked. Smirked! Granted, I was wearing a Gryffindor shirt, but you work in a comic book store. I can’t have been the geekiest person you’ve ever encountered! People like this seem to have the motto of, “Wow. Why would anyone would waste their time on that?” I try not to have conversations with these people.
But enough about my encounters with Muggles. I want to hear about yours! Tell me how people react to your interest in wizard rock. Does your family think you’re crazy? Is your significant other concerned that you will leave them to follow wrockers around the country? There is a Facebook group for that, by the way. Have you converted your friends to love wrock?
Email me at freya@wizrocklopedia.com, with the subject line “Muggles and wrock” and let me know. You might be featured in an upcoming article!
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