The Witch Trials of JK Rowling

I’d buy this as a book too. I could tell by the way JKR didn’t talk in sound bites and left some things a bit unexplained for the newcomer that they were having much longer conversations together. I’d definitely read a book if they put one together with the longer transcripts. They could revisit their discussions in light of Cass being published in future.

Agree it was excellent and the final episode especially so. Let's hope it reaches far and wide. I know so many captured by this

That was an excellent series. It wasn't about a position on trans, or even JKR as a "gender critical" feminist. It was about Meghan, and her concern with how you know you're right. And, most importantly, how you can be sure of your own integrity. I'd like to see it come out as a book.

I think it was powerful that Meghan choose voices from that side of the debate that were (in their own ways) thoughtful and who could perhaps have partially understood some of JKR's perspective (like being on the recieving end of cancel culture for contrapoint).

I think it's important to find points in common rather than seeing people who disagree simply as "the enemy".

I was impressed by Noah's thoughtfulness on detransistioners and seemed sympathetic to parental concerns about transitioning. I was waiting for the clincher of how Noah knew transistioning was right for Noah and how had taken time coming to that conclusion. But it was all trust in HCPs and Noah was still so young.

What Noah lacked was the perspective older people have, of how older women who have struggled with puberty, same sex attraction, gender stereotypes or sexual harassment and how we got through that discomfort of growing into women, and how it didn't mean that we weren't really women, or couldn't want to have children or breastfeed some day (obvs not all do!) But that outside the pressure cooker of school as a teenager, we could find out tribe of other non conforming women, or our unfeminine career/interests or same sex partner or feminism or all of it.

Instead Noah and parents trusted that HCP knew what was best for Noah. They didn't have the perspective that actually all of this is new, experimental and fundamentally based on an untrue premise - that all people with cross sex identification or even most of them are going to always feel that way and so the "kind" thing to do is to medically alter them to be as close to the opposite sex as possible, as young as possible.

Anyway, I've now listened to the final episode, JKR is so intelligent and measured, and brave. Really important series and Meghan and her unique experience and care really brought a lot to the interviews.

I thought it very good to give Natalie and Noah a platform. I know it's not us going "no debate" but it is a very polarising topic and I don't often hear reasonable points from the other side.
I don't necessarily agree but fair play to them for speaking and fair play to Megan/Jo for allowing them a platform.

Sorry for double-posting but I just wanted to say that JKR’s final statement at the end of the episode gave me goosebumps - the woman has so much integrity.

I’m half way through this week’s episode and I’m struck by the difference in tone: Megan is putting proper questions to JKR and challenging her, very unlike the tone of last week’s episode with Contrapoints and Noah. Although, given how young Noah is, I would expect Megan to take a less challenging tone with a vulnerable teenager.

At any rate, the challenging questions are a good way of allowing JKR to address issues and beliefs head on and I’m very much in awe of her ability to explain herself so clearly and so fully. It’s very obvious that Rowling knows her stuff and has done her research.

Noah was such a bright, measured young soul. The naïve faith in “the experts” knowing what would help Noah’s mental health broke my heart. I think all of us could see where this is heading.

Poor child.

Just listening back to Noah and his biggest issue with J.K. Rowling is that she shared a story (Maya Forester’s I think) to a large audience which show trans people to be the bad guys. Noah says it is fair to say that they were the bad guys in that story. So I guess the argument is that we should all keep quiet when trans people behave badly? He says it was dangerous for trans people that this was shared shared on a large platform.

In todays episode J.K. Rowling talks about how some trans activists said that gender critical people were pleased when a 10 year old was assaulted by a trans person in a bathroom because it made trans people look bad. I do think similar issues applied in some corners of Twitter when Brianna Ghey was murdered. (Not that anyone was pleased but that they were accused of being pleased by the other side of this debate).

I do think there is extremism and only seeing in black and white on both sides of this and Megan has tried to stay neutral and see if she can ask both sides to consider if they may be wrong but overall it felt like it was biased towards the gender critical argument. This could be confirmation bias on my part or that there are better arguments to be made and that J.K. is more considered and less fundamentalist in her view.

I have heard episode 7 now which is about putting the opposite point of view to J.K. Rowling and her answering the points raised. She comes across really well. I feel that this was not done in the other direction - although I imagine it would have been difficult to do so.

Is Phelps-Roper (consciously or unconsciously) associating the views she held as a member of the WBC as being equivalent in timbre/character to Rowling’s beliefs/stance?

It cut both ways. Either side is capable of being equivalent to the WBC in timbre and character. By their timbre and character shall they be judged themselves.

Or either side could be wrong in other ways, different from WBC. It is possible to disagree respectfully about abortion, and as it is possible to disagree scientifically and factually about the physical effects of hormones, or from experience of the long-term decision-making capacity of seventeen year olds.

I expect Rowling will listen and take their arguments seriously and answer them seriously. Which is not the same as agreeing with them. If she comes up with counter arguments they will be serious, far more solid than theirs, and without Natalie's emotional manipulation or Noah's naivete. I hope so, anyway!

Same. Also, I was listening with mounting horror at Noah’s story thinking they sounded young but perhaps early 20s. When they dropped the comment about being 17 and you realised the mastectomy was at 16, it was so shocking. Illustrative of the certainty these kids experience when they’re right in it, though. It must have been an impossible situation for Noah’s parents.

Regardless of whether s/he should have been, Noah was able to consent to a double mastectomy so presumably was equally capable of consenting to a podcast interview.

I felt that Noah should not have been in the podcast due to being under 18 and so vulnerable;

While I instinctively agree, I thought it was a smart move to reflect a demographic of the times. So many young girls in the same boat as Noah now.

I listened to this episode and noticed that both interviewees said that they’d been on the internet and ‘realised’ they were trans after reading or listening to people on there. Just after saying that it’s not true that people are being influenced by the internet!

I was sad listening to Noah as well, it’s very disturbing that such young people are being damaged in such a severe and irreversible way.

This was the first time I couldn’t listen to a whole episode in one go. I found Natalie’s affected, breathy attempt at a feminine voice, and the hideously sneering, nasal, whiny voice Natalie put on when mimicking a woman expressing her concerns, so fucking annoying I had to keep turning it off. It was making me angry without even hearing what was being said.

I felt that Noah should not have been in the podcast due to being under 18 and so vulnerable; but I agree that the inclusion of Noah is going to horrify a lot of people and wake them up to the reality of how cult like this ideology is and how the most vulnerable children are being exposed to it and dramatically changed by it.

I also thought Noah describing watching hours and hours of videos where girls happily described their transition was definitely a form of self-hypnosis. My kids were hardly ever on screens at 11 and definitely did not have unfettered access like this.

Noah sounds like a delightful young person. I felt a lot of sympathy for the parents as well. How different might the story be if the mum had chosen a different therapist- instead of one with an explicit gender agenda. There were so many mental health issues going on for Noah with gender just a small part or even just a symptom.

I thought Megan's description of how it felt to learn about female puberty for the first time, as a little girl, was excellent. It doesn't mean we are trans to find tubes and periods and bras a shock! That section was the strongest evidence against medical transitioning being allowed in teenagers that I've ever heard.

'They talk about going through a phrase of being obsessed with watching transition videos on YouTube at 11! This is a child who has so many mental health diagnoses - anxiety, depression, OCD, ADHD - being left to the whims of the Internet. Anyway, that truly shocked me.'
@MoltenLasagne Yes that is one thing that stood out to me - like my DC at the age would have watched endless youtube given the chance but it's very difficult to censor what's on there so we didn't allow it unless supervised! It's like allowing your children to talk to strangers about anything!

It's so difficult when a loved one is struggling with mental health. Add into that a fear that this could lead to self harm and even suicide, it's just worse. If someone tells you that not only is there an explanation for the pain, there's a cure, that's exactly what you want to hear.

In my opinion this is the worst part of gender ideology. After "solving the problem" via surgery, your loved one now has a wrecked body and probably still has the original mental health problems too.

Fuckin great.

There are a lot of parents homeschooling their children around here now and I think maybe, if my children got caught up in the cult, that would be what you'd have to do. As parents we still do have that right.

Of course not everyone can afford that, but for those who can.

This idea that transitioning via drugs and surgery will solve all mental health problems - with absolutely no evidence this is true - is so dangerous.

I've listened to Contrapoints part. Everything that I wanted to say has already been said on this thread.

Noah, I had to stop listening to when they talked about mental health issues and that it's never been unpacked. I will listen when I feel more robust.

What I thought was quite telling was we find out straight away that it was Noah's dad who put Noah forward for the interview.

Very well said, Amaryllis.

I think hearing Noah speak about this is a very powerful and important part of this podcast. I suspect strongly that parents of teens of that age (11-17) on the coalface of the emotional highs and lows of puberty and adolescence will be pretty aghast at the lack of safeguarding shown, as they are able to listen to what has happened and process it. The fact also that it has been led by the medical profession. It encourages us all to remember the intensity of this period in any person's life - it has always been hard, but now teens are so accessible to those who want to mould and shape them in some way, I think parents can't keep up. Hopefully it is a wakeup call really. Parents can think about this before they need to really address it and start to speak properly to their kids about the lack of coherence in the idea of gender at all.

I don't think it's a wilful misunderstanding. I think for Natalie it's an inability to do what she wanted JK Rowling to do. She wanted JK Rowling to listen and take her fears seriously. But she didn't offer to listen and take JK Rowling's fears seriously in return. She didn't offer to put aside, even for a moment, her foundational belief that life is so much harder for transwomen than it is for anyone else, for long enough to hear how bad life can be for women, and for long enough to hear how getting what Natalie wants could make life harder for those women who are just as vulnerable if not more so.

Because if Natalie had to accept that so many women are vulnerable in ways that transwomen aren't and that women's fears are genuine and founded on fact, and these fears are not simply the result of failing to listen to Natalie and failing to realise how much more persecuted and deprived transwomen are than anyone else, then Natalie might also have to accept that she really can't have everything that she wants, or at least not ethically.

But if Natalie was able to listen without bursting into tears of self-pity then maybe there would be room for negotation. And then maybe it would turn out there's a way for Natalie to get the things transwomen most need, the healthcare and the protections, without needing the automatic access to everything that protects women. Protection as a transwoman. Well, that's what I hope anyway.