What Can ‘Harry Potter’ Fans Do To Change The World This Giving Tuesday?
Dec 03, 2019
Charity, Fandom, Fans, Music, News, Puffs
What can we, as Harry Potter fans, do to make the world a better place?
From Dumbledore’s Army, to S.P.E.W. and the Order of the Phoenix, J.K. Rowling’s stories are one long lesson in tolerance, kindness and standing up for what’s right, so how can we make sure we’re living in line with those values?
It doesn’t always have to mean donating money this Giving Tuesday—your time, voice and understanding can be just as powerful. Plenty of amazing Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts themed non-profits/charities are out there doing their part to make the world brighter this Giving Tuesday (December 3rd, 2019), and we’re here to show you just a few options available to support their efforts. Whether through donations, buying their merchandise, volunteering/contributing or just spreading the word about their cause, we hope this inspires you to act this Giving Tuesday!
Lumos
J.K. Rowling’s children’s charity aims to spread the word on the harmful impact of institutions on children, and works to reunite children with their families where possible. J.K. Rowling spoke more about their work at the One Young World Summit this year, which you can see here. To support their work by donating to their cause, visit the official Lumos website here.
You can now also support Lumos by purchasing A Magical Time of Year, an album of Christmas classics recorded by actors from Harry Potter, Fantastic Beasts and Cursed Child! £1.20 per album sold (or equivalent) will be donated to Lumos.
The Harry Potter Alliance
Helping wizard activists enact positive change in the world, The Harry Potter Alliance have been behind huge campaigns, and their current #DAFightsBack campaign is working on bringing people together to do some good, “focusing on actions that connect and bond activists in new ways and help us respond to each challenge with energy, imagination, and – most importantly – love”.
Their completely free Wizard Activist School is a brilliant way to learn how to become an effective activist by harnessing the power of various fandoms. To donate to HPA, join a local chapter or their virtual Dumbledore’s Army. To find out more about their work, click here.
The Protego Foundation
The Protego Foundation aims to make the world a safer, fairer place for animals by empowering fans to stand up for animal rights, connecting magical creatures in the Wizarding World to the plights of real-world animals. Their Adopt a Pygmy Puff campaign sought to encourage muggles to adopt and rescue companion animals, rather than buy them from breeders, their Erumpent Rescue campaign worked to save rhinos, and their Find Dougal campaign highlighted the plight of chimpanzees in the wild. Donate and find out more about their work here, and listen to Protego’s Founder, Tylor Starr, on Evanna Lynch’s vegan podcast, The Chickpeeps!
Transfiguring Adoption
We recently caught up with Transfiguring Adoption at LeakyCon, where they were holding a special event for foster-adoptive children with avid supporter of their work, Chris Rankin, who opened up about being adopted in a blog. Their incredibly important work helps to support foster-adoptive families (read our interview with Founder Darren Fink here), and their local chapters are crucial to supporting families across the U.S.. Donate or join their local teams to help them continue their amazing work!
Foster & adoptive children get their turn w/the Sorting Hat at the @TransfigurAdopt event @LeakyCon. @chrisrankin asks what house they are in & signs their badges. Chris was adopted himself so he has a special connection with these little witches & wizards. pic.twitter.com/5dcIcGeSw9
— The Leaky Cauldron (@leaky) October 12, 2019
The Potterhead Running Club
If you’re hoping to be very literally active with your activism, the Potterhead Running Club is for you! Run like Ron runs from spiders to raise money for their charity partners, and get an awesome Harry Potter (or Fantastic Beasts) themed medal as a reward (they now also do runs for other fandom badges!). Find out more here.
TSWGO
This Star Won’t Go Out is an organization whose mission it is to support families facing childhood cancer. TSWGO was founded in memory of Esther Earl, an avid Harry Potter fan who died of thyroid cancer in 2010. Esther celebrated her love for Potter at Leakycon and the event remembers her annually with the Esther Earl Ball.
TSWGO has a new grant giving venture called Project LOVEly. Learn more about the organization and the new project at TSWGO.org.
Buy a book!
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Quidditch Through the Ages and Tales of Beedle the Bard – all originally published as companion books to raise money for Comic Relief and Lumos – are still helping to raise funds for both charities.
Purchase e-books and audiobooks from Wizarding World here, and physical copies from Bloomsbury here and Scholastic here. Be sure to check the book/edition you want to ensure they’re donating to the charities. If not, you could always make a donation to either Lumos or Comic Relief manually.
Support Wrock
Wizard Rock has always been a space for activism, and Harry and the Potters made Rolling Stone this year with their new album Lumos, connecting Harry’s story in Deathly Hallows to real-world struggles with facism and divisiveness. Never has there been a more crucial time to support voices bringing communities together—not to mention the work Wrock does to support charities, libraries and local artists! Draco and the Malfoys, Lauren Fairweather, Tonks and the Aurors, and recently retired (but still very active in the community) The Whomping Willows are LeakyCon legends who often lend their voices (literally) to greater causes. Go out and support their art, because it’s certainly making the world a brighter place!
Support Fan Creators
Fan creators make the world a better place each day by bringing people together, spreading the importance of art, music and writing, and many often donate their work and time to the above non-profits. We of course suggest supporting our resident artist, Sydney Dean, supporting Team Starkid and Puffs with their brilliant productions, supporting Black Girls Create, and donating to the Wizards in Space literary magazine fundraiser (read our interview with Olivia Dolphin here). Remember that creating is magic!
We’re thankful for everyone that has donated to our campaigns or supported us in our work to create safe and inclusive storytelling places. 20 days left to reach our goal! ✨🍁🍂🌾 https://t.co/Qpyy9oUUzl
— Wizards in Space: 10 days left of crowdfund! (@wzrdsinspacemag) November 28, 2019
Are there any more wizarding non-profits, activists or creators you’d like to highlight? Do you help out with any of the above? Share in the comments, or via Facebook, Twitter or Instagram — we hope you do your part this Giving Tuesday!
