JK Rowling has challenged Scotland’s new hate crime law in a series of social media posts - inviting police to arrest her if they believe she has committed an offence.
The Harry Potter author, who lives in Edinburgh, described several transgender women as men, including convicted prisoners, trans activists and other public figures.
She said “freedom of speech and belief” was at an end if accurate description of biological sex was outlawed.
Earlier, Scotland’s first minister Humza Yousaf said the new law would deal with a “rising tide of hatred”.
The Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021 creates a new crime of “stirring up hatred” relating to age, disability, religion, sexual orientation, transgender identity or being intersex.
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Ms Rowling, who has long been a critic of some trans activism, posted on X on the day the new legislation came into force.
I am so fucking sick of these bigots pretending the science of “biological sex” is on their side.
In recent years, multiple studies of the brains of trans people have revealed areas of differentiation from those of cisgender people. And unless these bigots are prepared to argue that brains are not part of biology, they only have two choices: Deny the science somehow or accept that they’re just bigots who want to hate, regardless of the science.
And because unlike bigots, I like to back my shit up:
- https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-020-0666-3
- https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2804855
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8955456/
On top of that, there’s some indications of oligogenic causes resulting in various allele differences that wouldn’t necessarily show up on a brain scan.
In conclusion: Fuck bigots and their attempts to co-opt science in order to support their bigotry.
I’m glad you’re backing it up, but honestly, the answer to this whole “biological science” bullshit is simper- it’s none of their fucking business how someone else identifies. I don’t care what “science” says is a man or a woman. If someone says they’re a woman, it’s not my fucking business to tell them they aren’t.
Absolutely agreed. I only bring it up because the bigots like to claim science is on their side (while usually rejecting science to back up some kind of religious nonsense). So it’s nice to be able to throw actual science in their faces.
I’m glad to now have it for myself, so thank you for that, but I don’t know that showing them real science will work because they are not coming at this from a rational position. All they see is “man = penis, woman = vagina” and no amount of science will change their mind. Even bringing up basic things like people born with both sets of genitalia doesn’t phase them. “Well that’s just the exception to the rule,” as if that’s a thing in science. So when they say that they have science on their side, what they mean is that they’ve found some scientific studies that agreed with their preconceived, unscientific notions.
As they say- you shouldn’t play chess with pigeons.
What I’ve heard a lot of people do is not make a whole show to convince the other person but to convince people who may be on the fence or uneducated on the subject. Any third party observer who might just be learning about stuff.
Would you rather trust a random screeching about people birth genitals or someone who is posting scientific evidence to back up their claim and being calm and knowledgeable about the subject.
I get it though, fuck em.
The issue at stake is people’s own fragile identities
Let me clarify: JK Rowling’s childhood learning of “boys have penises and girls have vaginas” runs so deep into her understanding of how she understands being a human that giving it up is scary and threatening.
Everything new to a conservative is scary and threatening.
Tbh I think her hate comes down to two things: she was raped by a man and is paranoid because she never dealt with that trauma in a healthy way and she recognized the right wing as a crop to be harvested. She’s an ideological predator.
Sad that she was raped but immediately declaring all trans people rapists just makes her an asshole. It’s a shame that people actually listen to her crap too.
Thanks foh dah tip
Except it is important in competition where lines must be drawn if we are to enact protected classes. If we don’t need to then that is a different discussion, but for now there are many segregated competitions of all types that exist, which means you’re wrong.
By “competition,” do you mean sports? A form of entertainment?
Why should I even care? Sports are not important to the way the world functions.
Deny the science
Sure thing Bob, let me just stack that in-between “Evolution” and “climate change” on my shelf of “Things that don’t fit my bigoted, hateful, and selfish worldview, so I just conveniently ignore them.”
They will always find a fallacy to argue you that they are right. It’s a belief. You need to bring them to realize they are wrong.
Hard fact, evidence based fact isn’t the bast practice to change these beliefs.
“It’s basic biology” mfers when they see advanced biology 😣
Biological sex exists, it’s just not binary, and the mental part of this has a massive psycho-social component to it that few take into consideration. Brain research on this is still in the chicken vs egg stage it seems based on those papers.
OR, and hear me out, you could just not be a total asshole? Maybe have a baseline of tolerance and respect for the people who made you a billionaire? No? Then fuck right off and accept the consequences of your hatred.
It seems billionaires have really wacked out midlife crises. Instead of buying expensive cars and cheating on their partners, they come out as terfy nazis, build hate platforms, and crash companies. I mean to be fair, at this point the sample size is only two, JKKK Rowling and Musk, but it’s still surprising that it’d happen twice.
Bill Gates started a charity.
Steve Jobs killed himself because he thought he knew better than his doctors. Well, that’s wacked out too, but at least it’s not being a Nazi…
These guys need to get on John McAfee’s level
That dude’s videos are extraordinary.
John McAfee’s poop hammock is perhaps the best story about him.
For the uninitiated:
Have you seen the (censored) GoPro footage he released?
Oh you son of a…
At last this guy was entertaining, not only disgusting like these modern “billionaires”. Pff.
Bill gates didn’t start the charity as a midlife crisis.
It’s a tax dodge and a lot of other ways of protecting his money while also doing a little reputation washing/ morality banking
Wasn’t he 45 when he started the charity? That sounds like a perfect candidate to be a midlife crisis, haha
Just because it was midlife doesn’t mean it’s a crisis.
He started the charity as a shelter for his obscene wealth. That is all.
I’m not obscenely wealthy, so I don’t have the experience…but it seems plausible that a billionaire midlife crisis could be “Where am I going to put this ridiculous amount of money that I’ve earned through less-than-ethical means?”
It’s plausible that a man who made his billions fucking everyone over who was even remotely near him….
… developed a conscience?
https://apnews.com/article/business-philanthropy-b8acb10f529ac2dbaff7631021d823c9
It’s a tax dodge
Have you ever worked with the Gates foundation? Because calling it a “tax dodge” like that is completely baseless, they’re a really reallyngood charity, like honestly one of the best in the world, and also that’s very ignorant of how taxes work.
and also that’s very ignorant of how taxes work.
You could just google it and alleviate your own ignorance of all the scummy ways both the foundation and the trust are used to avoid taxes (and other expenses.) here’s a forbe’s article with the stuff they’re actually allowed to talk about. The “good work” you’re so keen to point out… is part of the grift.
Specifically so schmucks like you pounce whenever some schmuck like me says “they’re not that nice.” That’s the part about “reputation washing”. he gives some money - literal pocket change for somebody that makes nearly 11 million per day.
you don’t get that fucking rich by being “nice” or “decent” or even human, really. this is about Bezos, but it puts their wealth into perspective. Decent humans, with that kind of wealth could solve global housing. Or they could solve the food shortage. he hasn’t even come close to that. No. The foundation isn’t a force for good, even if it occasionally does good shit.
for example, the Rich Douche exploited the pandemic to make money, by investing in vaccine companies. And refusing to release the IP on the Vaccine. Because that would hurt
histhe foundation’s profits.My dude, I have worked with the foundation to help create diagnostic tools for deseases that would otherwise gone unnoticed in developing countries.
The work we have done has saved thousands and thousands of peoples lives. So you can take your.
The “good work” you’re so keen to point out… is part of the grift.
And shove it right up your arse. If saving peoples lives is a “grift” to you because bill Gates didn’t sell his shares in Microsost before he gave them to his trust, because obviously the shares will keep increasing in price, then honestly I don’t fucking care.
And yes I know Bill Gates did shitty things and screwed a lot of people over in his early carrier to become so rich and I’m not excusing that. But the Gates foundation isn’t part of that and has done way too much good for humanity as a whole for some ignorant chucklefuck with no first hand experience of what they do to dismiss it as a “grift”.
All that may be true, but it does a lot of good too.
Steve Jobs killed himself because he thought he knew better than his doctors. Well, that’s wacked out too, but at least it’s not being a Nazi…
Steve Jobs was always a piece of shit, and he had that diet well before he got cancer. But yeah the fact he continued to double down in the face of death shows how much of a narcissist he was.
You can add Markus Persson to that sample group
Oh yeah!
So you would like it to be enshrined in law that it is acceptable for whoever holds power to arrest people whom they believe to be assholes?
No, not even a little bit. There is a difference between being an asshole and committing a hate crime. Hate crime laws, when properly crafted and enforced, are an important component of a functional society. They can act as a deterrent, but they are also a way for those materially harmed by a hate crime to get justice. Free speech is never a universal right, anywhere in the world. There are always legitimate restrictions to ensure the public’s overall health and safety.
What is the difference?
No, not even a little bit. There is a difference between being an asshole and committing a hate crime.
I’m not sure there is a difference with this law.
Hate crime laws, when properly crafted and enforced, are an important component of a functional society.
I’m not sure that’s true. Freedom of speech is an important component, and sometimes that means tolerating distasteful speech.
They can act as a deterrent, but they are also a way for those materially harmed by a hate crime to get justice.
What constitutes harm though? The UK tends to include offense (or offence) as a harm.
Free speech is never a universal right, anywhere in the world. There are always legitimate restrictions to ensure the public’s overall health and safety.
Absolutely, but being offended by a bigot probably shouldn’t be criminal without some component of advocacy for violence.
A person commits an offence if they communicate material, or behave in a manner, “that a reasonable person would consider to be threatening or abusive,” with the intention of stirring up hatred based on protected characteristics.
You know it doesn’t work that way but spout nonsense anyway.
That’s already the law. Look at Florida.
Are you seriously arguing against hate crime laws??
It’s becoming harder and harder to be a Harry Potter fan nowaday.
I don’t really understand what it is about X Formerly Known as Twitter that turns previously respectable people into, well, this.
Everybody should take a break from social media once in a while, it’s better for your health.
It doesn’t turn these people, they were shitty all the time, they just get a platform on X so it becomes visible
Part of it is that having a large captive audience hanging on to your every word really starts to amplify toxic characteristics in those with the predisposition for shittiness. Like Musk or Trump, their descend only came when they became active on social media.
Twitter is a horrible thing.
I really dont think Rowling started off this shitty. From what I’ve heard it sounds like she has baggage regarding men she hasnt dealt with and its led her down this incredibly shitty path
The books have some really problematic themes that add up over time. If HP ended with the first book, they would be a curiosity, but they add up and JK had a really crooked world view when she wrote them. It’s likely her editor soften them in the beginning, but they had less control as they got more popular.
Not to challenge, just don’t remember the later books, what are some good examples of that?
I stopped reading about halfway though and that was when they were being released. I’d say my mounting issues at the time was the weird pettiness of the good characters, the cheapness of Harry(why didn’t he pay for the car he helped wreak? Why didn’t he pay rent to the Weasley family?), and books ending with cheap drama(how many times did Harry loose a positive father figure?). If you want a larger breakdown, here’s a good one that goes into a lot of detail.
They were always awful. They just needed a platform where they could blossom into the terrible people they always were.
Oh yeah it was definitely Twitter that made her a bigot. She was an upstanding and progressive citizen before a website made her bad! /s
That’s like saying “I don’t really understand what it is about alcohol that makes people racist”
If I remember correctly, it all started when she retweeted something that was a bit ignorant and was called out for it on Twitter, but then she kept doubling down until it got to this point, when she could have just stopped talking about it.
It’s not that Twitter suddenly turned her into a bad person, but it definitely brought out the worst in her.
No it just revealed her beliefs to a wider audience. Twitter like all social media doesn’t bring out anything - it’s just a lens that gives the viewer a perspective they might never have seen and these view are then amplified by others who share them. Rowling was always this person, social media just allowed her to share and amplify her views.
I disagree. Social media and the “contrarian” attitude they carry, especially Twitter, can help consolidating and radicalizing your opinions. You get exposed to a very toxic way to carry out conversation (especially on Twitter, where you have constant dogpiling and wannabe famous people who try to “blast” others) so that if they are the only places you discuss about certain subjects, can bring you to shift your views as well.
I am not saying this is the case for J.K. Rowling (I don’t know), but I don’t think we can immediately discard the idea that the dynamics of the medium also affected the result.
I see your point but there are about a hundred or so thoughts I have a day that I am way way cowardly to record. The position she is in with a large fanbase, lots of money, and interacting with pixels probably contributed to her lack of filter.
So right she might have been intrinsically not a very good person prior but all this stuff hasn’t helped her keep a lid on it.
I think the mistake we make is thinking that people are better than they are. I probably have some hidden bigotry that I am unaware of right now but given a space to be exposed to it someone would notice and point it out. If you only know of someone from one thing they did you can form an opinion of them based on very limited information. Get to know them better and you find that hidden awful. Twitter is a tool of constant broad interaction and it preserves bad takes long enough to see them. Add a culture of never admiting to being wrong and filtering by who you agree with and you have a cycle of awful that turns perfectly boringly not great but OK people into monsters defending genocide. Maybe we shouldn’t know anything about the author, replace their name with a serial number or pseudonym and let the art stand on it’s own. Though the racist jewish, wait no goblin, bankers was fairly intense tbh.
sorry to join the little dogpile, but its not X, those are her beliefs.
There are a LOT better books out there then childrens books about wizard school, which she absolutely lifted from Jill Murphy.
Jill Murphy
The worst witch right?
I see the movie has Tim curry in it. I’m sold. Appreciate the recommendation
Dude… my friend’s and I get together (video conference) to watch the film every year in late October. It also features Charolette Rae (the matriarch on Facts of Life) Dianna Rigg (Queen of Thorns on Game of Thrones) and Fariuza Balk (The Craft, Waterboy etc.)
The Worst Witch was a series of books though that Rowling absolutely read before “coming up with” a boarding school for magic using students, but get this: In Rowling’s imagination its BOYS instead of girls who are the main focus, and the protoganist is the messiah instead of a girl screw-up with a heart of gold. Its not in the film but there are houses with colorful characteristics, the protoganist is from a non-magical family and the scary, raven haired potion teacher seems to hate the protoganist while the kind, grey haired headmaster is patient and understanding. She has two friends in the invisible (to non magic users) castlesque boardings school thats surrounded by a forbidden forest where she hangs out with two friends, one who’s straight laced and academically sharp and the other who’s a bit goofy.
Anyway Tim Curry does a musical number
Have you read the books as an adult? If that wont kill your fandom, I don’t think anything will.
I mean tbf, the books were written for children. If you don’t like them, then maybe it’s because they’re not for you anymore. Or are you referring to something else?
As a kid in the target age range, I bailed after the second or third time Harry gained and lost a positive father figure. There were mounting little issues and the longer the books got, the less rewarding the payoff got. But even I assumed that setting up normalized slavery in your world would lead into a story line that denounces it. Instead, JK didn’t address it in a positive manner and we ended up with HP Adults writing essays defending House Elf Slavery.
Fair enough. Probably also doesn’t help that the civil rights organization that Hermione founded, or rather attempted to found, was called SPEW. As in, synonym for “vomit”
My first time reading them, at the age of like, 10? 11? I was so excited for Order of the Phoenix because it was coming out soon and I’d loved the first one that I got as a birthday gift. I slammed through 2 and 3, then 4 just kept going and felt so bad that by the end I wasn’t excited for Order anymore and didn’t finish the series until Order was releasing as a film. They weren’t even that good as a kid if you read anything else
They weren’t even that good as a kid if you read anything else
Here’s an excellent analysis of how and why the Harry Potter hype of the late 90s was very intentionally manufactured and sold to kids.
I don’t like Harry Potter to begin with, but I don’t really have a huge problem separating the artist from the art if the only thing they did was be hateful.
Roald Dahl was a major antisemite, but I still think he wrote great children’s books and suspense/horror stories. H. P. Lovecraft was bigoted about pretty much anyone who wasn’t a white man. Again, a really good writer.
Where is becomes hard to separate them is when they actually do something about their disgusting ideas. Roman Polanski and Woody Allen are pedophiles. I will never watch either of their movies. And I think both have made very good movies. I feel that I was wrong to watch the ones I did.
So yeah, Rowling is an utterly contemptible piece of shit, but if you like Harry Potter, it’s okay.
There were always questionable elements from the books, like the depictions of goblins and elves. But knowing what we know now, these elements cannot be brushed off any more.
The Elves were directly based off of “Brownies”
It’s also highly unusual that elves were depicted this way, considering most fantasy stories hold them in high regard as being magical beings seeing themselves above humanity for reasons that are normally geniunely sound (Better moral compass, natural magical talents… Whereas in Harry Potter it’s the exact opposite, humanity seems to be the highest creature and Elves feel like to squabble before them…
There’s no way the “Brownie” similarity is unintentional
So what’s a Brownie? Well it was a way of explaining slaves to young children back in those days, to brush off the casual cruelty by lying to kids. Essentially the myth of the “Brownie” was to re contextualize the suffering of the black slave as a magical event, a beautiful mysterious thing to be observed not with horror, but with wonder. A big part of the myth claimed that you can’t give a Brownie anything nice like proper clothing, or else this “breaks the contract between Man and Fae” and they run back into the woods never to be seen again.
“No it’s okay children, they’re magical forest people called Brownies! And they LIKE doing that work for us! Oh and we can’t give them anything nice, or they’ll disappear forever! And you wouldn’t want that to happen! No no, really, they’re faeries, and they like being whipped like that!”
Feeling disgusted? Good, that sickness in your stomach is proof that you’re a better person than JK Rowling.
tl;dr Harry Potter elves are a resurrection of Pro-Slavery Propaganda used to indoctrinate children into thinking it’s okay to treat people like shit. They had to GASLIGHT LITERAL CHILDREN into thinking that black people were magical elves, in order to stop them from feeling bad about slavery… and JK decided to bring that back for her kid’s book.
As much fun as Hogwarts Legacy is, I hope she rots in hell and then is reborn as a transgender woman to learn basic empathy.
It’s also highly unusual that elves were depicted this way, considering most fantasy stories hold them in high regard as being magical beings seeing themselves above humanity for reasons that are normally geniunely sound (Better moral compass, natural magical talents… Whereas in Harry Potter it’s the exact opposite, humanity seems to be the highest creature and Elves feel like to squabble before them…
Have you never heard of Santa’s elves? Or Elves in Shakespeare’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’?
Well, there’s elves, then there’s Elves.
I’ve been meaning to read the latter, and we’re all aware of the former, but there’s a lot of conflicting legends of Santa’s Helpers
most fantasy stories hold them in high regard as being magical beings seeing themselves above humanity for reasons that are normally geniunely sound (Better moral compass, natural magical talents…
Oh sweet summer child… You better not know about elves in folklore…
I’m guessing they watched the LOTR movies and said, “yep. That’s what people thought elves were.”
I’m very torn on this issue, like I 100% agree on Polanski and Allen(especially Woody not that Polanski isn’t incredibly shitty too but most of his work isn’t about sexualizing minors, whereas the primary and ultimate love interest for Woodys stand in character in Manhattan is a child). I might, and big emphasis on might watch Chinatown or the Ninth Gate again after he’s dead and in the cold cold ground, but I damn sure won’t pay for any of them if I decide to make that call.
And I only say this because there have been so many shitty people in Hollywood and the movie making business in general I think it’s impossible to watch most without supporting someone awful. Weinstein produced a ton of great films, Brando anally raped Maria Schneider in Last Tango and the scene we see is the one and only take if memory serves(I don’t watch that film anymore but I still watch the Godfather every few years), Kevin Spacey and Brian Singer are predators but I’m sure I’ll watch the Usual Suspects again at some point in my life.
I obviously don’t besmirch anyone that simply can’t bring themselves to engage in art by people we know to be bastards. But I kinda look at it the same way as buying a pair of Nikes, there is certainly a lot of profit from suffering that produced those shoes but I don’t necessarily think anyone is a bad person for wanting some new Jordans
Honestly learning everyone in Hollywood is a fucking creep explains a lot about how genuinely disturbing the actions of male leads in “Romantic Comedies” tend to be
Try half the shot in a “Romance” movie in real life and even at the time most of them originally came out, you’d go to jail and no one would feel sorry for you.
My bigger issue with Polanski is that he should have been extradited decades ago.
100% agree, he should be locked up
Edit: the following isn’t what I think about him, but I do think he’d have been more likely to suffer the proper consequences had the Manson family not murdered Sharon Tate, it in no way should give him any sympathy or protection and it’s pretty fucking gross that it does, but I don’t think it’s a non factor
Yeah honestly if history remembering who Edison and Dahl were didn’t sink GE and Wonka, Harry Potter will be fine… but fuck, she did suicide her own legacy
While I am not defending Twitter by any means. I feel like what actually breaks people’s brains is becoming a billionaire. You lose all empathy for other humans.
The cause and effect may be reversed there.
I mean, it is for most billionaires. But Rowling isn’t a businesswoman who got parents money to invest in a company to rob the proletariat.
She just wrote a book that happened to be a gigaseller.
But either way, billionaires have broken brains.
if you ever have a couple hours to spare, i think shaun made a really great video on this topic: https://youtube.com/watch?v=-1iaJWSwUZs
he talks about JK rowling and harry potter, and how many of JK rowlings beliefs/worldviews are embedded into harry potter. he’s very thorough.
I possess the books and movies, and never interact with the fandom or the author. There is zero need to. Let the art exist in isolation.
NEXT POINT: the stories have their own issues regarding certain portrayals but that is aside from the context of “new developments” a la the author’s modern opinions on things outside the plot of the books.
Yeah, like, I don’t know what Frank Herbert or J.R.R.Tolkein’s stances on trans rights would have been either, and it doesn’t impact me reading their work at all.
On the other hand, I do not want to give this person any money, so there’s that. I won’t be spending money on her stuff.
Frank Herbert I imagine wouldn’t have been a fan. Dune really sets up a battle between natural+religion vs. atheism+technology.
There are nautical ways
I miss when my biggest problem with JK Rowling was her desire to keep writing new material for Harry Potter, but instead of ya know… making spinoff books, maybe do a TV Show, maybe get in touch with Archie at some point for an expanded universe comic: I mean God knows they need the money after Sonic went out for a pack of cigarettes and never came back… oh right Warner Bros. owns the franchise… so I guess DC could have done the Expanded Universe comic?
No instead of doing any of that she just randomly dripped out plotpoints from the internet, and always stuff that made no fucking sense… like
“Dumbledore was gay the whole time, despite the fact that I NEVER HINTED AT THIS! Also Wizards don’t have toilets! They shit themselves and magic away the poop! By the way, Hermonie was always black despite the fact I always described her as being pale skinned!”
The “Dumbledore was gay” was especially infuriating because she wrote the “Fantastic Breasts” movies, and instead of expanding upon the Dumbledore’s gay thing at all, they just use the “They’re just really good friends!” cover, ya know, the one that’s an amazing progressive way to imply that without running afoul of the “Moral Majority”… in 1992…
But the medal ultimately goes to “Hermonie is black!”, because the only reason she came up with it was to try to better canonize the “Cursed Child” play… which wound up having a black actress play Hermonie.
Instead of doing the adult thing and admitting that most writers accepted by the mainstream are white, and therefore an overwhelming majority of characters in fiction are white, and that’s… kind of not good as it shows the bias we’ve given in favor of one specific group over all others, and that maybe in the future we’ll have more racially diverse character casts… but until then, because we have more white characters than white actors, sometimes white characters are going to be played by non-white actors, and even if that’s not how we typically envision the character… Get over it.
No instead of doing that, she just felt the need to make another fucking retcon and claimed she intended to have Hermonie be black the whole fucking time! I hope they fired the moron who cast Emma Watson for the role in the movie then… that talentless hack who knew nothing of the books… checks notes Joanne Kathleen Rowling
I’m sorry but it takes a special kind of narcissim to attempt to retcon, not just a fictional work, but reality itself!
That’s squarely in the realm of “doesn’t matter”.
The works are done, anything said after never happened
Meh it’s weird you hang your tastes on others
deleted by creator
Rowling quote from the article:
Scottish lawmakers seem to have placed higher value on the feelings of men performing their idea of femaleness, however misogynistically or opportunistically, than on the rights and freedoms of actual women and girls.
It’s difficult to accept that someone I used to respect could say such hateful things about people like me. I’m not gonna lie, it hurts to read. What the fuck, Joanne? Is that all I am to you… just a man “performing” my idea of femaleness? Well, fuck you, then. Should I wish for you to feel the same pain you’ve inflicted on others? To be honest, judging by your “performance” in the media the past several years, I don’t think you’re resilient enough to survive it.
It sucks when your heros let you down. There was a guy I really admired and I worked with. When his wife was in the hospital he cheated on her. Couldn’t see him the same way again.
Sorry she sucks so very hard and is not only a disappointment actively hostile.
I am not sure she entirelly referes to you. It refers to people abusing transexuality to achieve other dreams or more dreams than just being themselves. At least this is how I understand her argumentations.
Absolutely nobody is doing that. Grow the fuck up, it’s so obviously a completely invented problem they use to demonize people trying to be themselves.
And if any person ends up being a sexual criminal, then they will be dealt with according to the law.
It’s not a crime to be an insufferable piece of shit. Usually. If they make an exception for her, okay then.
No, but it seems like “stirring up hate” is a crime. And, as a public figure who is publicly hateful, she potentially fits that description
Yep, there really needs to be the distinction between private remarks and public instigation in free speech law.
Otherwise you’re not protecting anything except the right of the loudest to monopolize the airwaves via intimidation of dissent and “the other”
It’s not freedom of speech unless everyone feels safe using it, be it from fear of retaliation by the state, or by the tyranny of cousins.
It’s a delicate balancing act, but there is a sliding scale of speech acts, from the harmless, to bigoted, to hate speech, to incitement of violence.
There’s not universal agreement on where to place the line between protected speech and public instigation, but her public comments have been drifting ever closer to that line, especially with her most recent bout of denying Nazi crimes.
Not chilling protected speech is important, but so is enforcement against those who have crossed the line. Countries with stricter laws are generally those who have learned this the hard way.
denying Nazi crimes.
Jfc, when did she start doing that?
Someone else posted the link, but a few weeks ago she described the idea that Nazis targeted research and healthcare information on Trans patients as “a fever dream”, despite the Nazi raids on Magnus Hirschfield’s Institute are a well-documented part of their crimes.
She claimed she was describing something other than the screenshot she quoted after people repeatedly pointed out how wrong she was, but it’s still a troubling escalation in her rhetoric.
No, but it seems like “stirring up hate” is a crime. And, as a public figure who is publicly hateful, she potentially fits that description
According to the article the law doesn’t apply in a general sense.
It appears its written (along with another law) to only apply to an aggressor’s interaction with a specific person. So the law wouldn’t apply to Rowling’s comments from twitter about the group in general. No specifically named person is targeted.
Also, something I just learned from this about Rowling’s Transphobia that was strange to me. She doesn’t appear to have any problem with FtM, but only problems with MtF. I have never run across someone who has such specific bigotry in this case.
Nah, she’s said some awful stuff about trans men too, more paternalistic and insulting than actively hostile though. I’m not going to go looking for what she said though because I’d like to continue having a nice day.
Why are some people so determined to be pieces of shit?
You don’t get rich being nice.
Even if you did (like you won the big lottery or something). Being rich turns people into assholes too. Your ego inflates massively.
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Because its the only way they know how to relate to others or have any concept of themselves, being wealthy makes you a vicious sadistic piece if shit¹, and picking on the weak gives a slight emotional high, especially if you’ve got an audience.
¹not just humans; all apes suck like this.
What are you going to do about it?
Well…nothing, lol.
Pirate her works?
Trans people exist and deserve, like anyone, to be treated with dignity and respect. Get the fuck over it.
Ugh.
If only they would get over it and agree that trans people have the right to exist or believe they deserve to be treated with dignity and respect.
Unfortunately, they don’t seem to have an issue with there being (at least) two classes of homo sapiens, one lesser than the other and thus not deserving of any dignity or respect.
There is, of course, homo superior, but I don’t foresee Professor X swooping in to settle this argument, what with the whole “saving the world” shtick.
Although, to be honest, the world could use a bit of saving right now.
PS: I hope you’re doing well, and getting through Sophie‘s Choice. I’ve heard it’s a tough read, especially after surviving a game of Presidential Election Scrabble…💋💋💋
I’m surviving somehow. I could tell you some crazy mother stories, but I don’t want to write a novel.
you totally wanna write a novel about your mom
Not unusual. Most men have a Freudian streak.
I’m glad you didn’t say Oedipal, because right now, all I want to do is murder her.
We had this conversation not too long ago-
“I thought the Mayo Clinic was going to be like the ER, where a whole team of doctors works on you at once.”
“Mom, I’ve been in the ER four times in the last year. They don’t do that there.”
“Yes they do, I’ve seen the shows!”
I have epilepsy. A special type of epilepsy. A type of epilepsy they didn’t know existed when I was “diagnosed” with it.
For the doctors - teams of neurologists and neuropsychologists - to treat me, the best option in 1991, after my drowning accident and subsequent TBI was a new study at Boston Children’s Hospital. For months, almost a year since the “accident”, doctors had run me through a course of medications meant to control my seizures, but none worked. I was desperate. My parents were desperate. We were willing to try anything.
For two weeks in March, during spring break, in 1992 and 1993, I went to the long-term monitoring unit at Boston Children’s Hospital and participated in a study where I had over 100 EEG leads glued to my head and they tested various different drugs on us to determine which ones would - or even could - control our seizures.
They discovered that, quite logically, that when someone has damage to a particular part of the brain (in my case, the frontal temporal lobe), seizures can be managed by giving the patient medication made to treat problems endemic to that region of the brain— in my case, either mood stabilizers or meds for migraines/cluster headaches.
I learned a long time ago that my time in a hospital, around doctors, going through a lot of uncomfortable and even scary procedures can really pay off in the end— and can even help countless others for the effort.
So don’t fret, buddy. You’re in good hands. I know the strain and pressure of being in a tough place with medical issues. Just be glad it’s 2024 and no time before.
Best wishes!
Thanks! I’m glad I didn’t go through something like that as a kid. It must have been super rough. I can handle it a lot better in my mid-40s I’m sure.
Friendly reminder that Scotland’s freedom of speech laws are different from those in the US.
And the US laws should be more like Scotland’s. Hate speech is implicitly violent and should be treated as such.
If I had her money, I wouldn’t spend my time bullying people and starting fights with the police. She’s clearly insane in the most fundamental way.
The more I know about rich people, the less inclined I am to think that they’re usually well adjusted.
I’ve become convinced that power, including wealth, causes brain damage.
Why not start fights with police/government?
Why would anyone want a high drama life?
A lot of people seem to
But strange enough, her insanity mostly damages others and has no negative impact on her life. How comes?
Money.
Correct
It’s not money, money makes you get out of situations easily, it doesn’t create the situations. And she is creating those situations in ways that don’t require insanity. They only require bad intentions.
Can we just hold one big public figure accountable to the law? Please?
No.
Sigh. Yeah. Thought so. 😭
Chances are they don’t want to try this on someone with money for the good lawyers. Authorities never try the more questionable laws that way.
You want her to go to jail for her tweet?
People who use biology as an excuse to hate on people have no grasp on how biology even works. You should know that gender disphoria, gender transitions and other genders as well come in fact with small noticeable differences, such as the way the brain is wired and even the many mechanisms inside your body. Unfortunately, such differences are not noticeable right off the bat. But they exist. Also FFS, she could have just enjoyed her harry potter money, maybe she could go silent after the first tweet but come on! There’se no reason to go any further, no reason. She now dwells with the likes of her conservative friends - She’s no victim. There’s more money there than many of us could see in a lifetime. She actually has too much -
I live in Canada where we have hate crime laws, they don’t affect 99% of us in any way, because 99% of us aren’t walking around calling for the death of groups of people, based on race, gender, etc. Hate crime laws only affect the people who are truly beyond hateful. Nobody is gonna arrest you for being an anti trans asshole, but that will if you start inciting violence or calling for blood
Ms Rowling, who has long been a critic of some trans activism
That’s a particularly odd way for the BBC to characterize her behavior.
Because the BBC is also a “critic of some trans activism”. They actually have a Mastodon instance that immediately got defederated by a few other instances due to their transphobia.
The British media in general seem to be fillled with TERFs, like the UK Guardian (the Australian paper doesn’t seem to have the issue that I’ve noticed).
Ironic: She tried to insert herself as Hermoine/McGonagall, but she really was Umbridge all along.
I’m glad that Harry Potter wasn’t my favourite series growing up, knowing how bad of a person she is. With that said, it’s still possible to separate the art from the artist, so it’s okay either way but personally I just feel better knowing it wasn’t my number one favourite series growing up.
the movies are way better than the books anyway and her name is nowhere near the movies.
Depends who you ask. There isn’t a single HP movie I like more than a book and the only decent movie adaptions in my eyes were first 2.
