To think JK Rowling is a fabulous human being

[TheAdventuresoftheWishingChair]

I just came across her book, 'Very Good Lives' which is all about overcoming adversity. I think it's so important that successful women talk about the times they've failed and how success is about pushing past that. I'm reading it just at a time I need to hear that message. I can definitely recommend buying a copy if you are in need of a boost or have some pennies to spend on something nourishing.

I was also looking into her charity, Lumos, and I had no idea just how much she was trying to help disadvantaged children. I love that she's putting her money and position to good use.

The term 'national treasure' generally makes me want to poke my own eyeballs out with a rusty kitchen utensil but AIBU to say she is an utter treasure and we are lucky to have her. She makes the world a better place.

That's all!

I greatly dislike her for a great number of reasons.

@Lockeduporknockedup

I greatly dislike her for a great number of reasons.

That's nice, dear.

Could you elaborate @lockeduporknockedup ?

i mean, I find some of the writing in the Harry Potter books a bit clunky, but she's an amazing woman.

@CatandtheFiddle
Of course.

1. She didn't mention minorities when writing the books but then, when she realised that she could make more money by backtracking and saying that certain characters were gay or BAME, she did so. If she genuinely cared about characters being diverse then she would have written them that way in the first place, not afterwards. If their sexuality and race don't matter enough to write them in then they don't matter for her to write it all over twitter. It's genuinely offensive that she's using minorities to capitalise on. Trying to shoehorn diversity in twenty years after the books were written just highlights that she never once considered black or gay people when she wrote them. That, combined with her transphobic tweets, are one reason why I dislike her.

But, further to that, she won't go far enough for there to actually be any acknowledgement of black or gay characters. All the black actors were cast in her absence, after banging on about Dumbledore being gay on social media is was entirely omitted from the spin off films and the play with black Hermione wasn't even written or cast by JK.

1. Her books are genuinely really poorly written. There are a great number of plot holes and she didn't plan the series so the first book has absolutely no relationship to the end. Nothing to dislike her on personally there but it irks me that so many incredible writers go under the radar and she's so successful for through pure luck.
2. She tried to adopt Navajo culture into Pottermore as if she'd invented it in an attempt to profit from an oppressed society's culture.
3. I could go on about how her charity just allows her to pay less tax and how she's perfectly calculated it to stay at the top of the list to promote herself but that would be too much effort.

I have my reasons to dislike her, others have their reasons to like her. It's a matter of opinion.

Tell you what I'm starting to find more and more amusing, is the woke millenials with Harry Potter tattoos enraged by biological fact. And now every time they look at their tattoo they will probably be angry and sad 😂😂

Always....

@JigglypuffsCaptor 😂😂😂😂

Now that IS a heartening thought!

Her common sense is a light in the creeping darkness that sucks in what being a woman is. I am a woman, I still menstruate, but that is not my label. If I was a transwoman I would be a transwoman, not a woman.

Daniel Radcliffe as a man can tell women what being a woman is, but he is talking BShit as he is not a woman. It's like me telling a man how to be a man - impossible!

I can see them now, packing up their HP memorabilia in their childhood bedroom that they still live in at the age of 32, sobbing 😂😂 the screams of "why JK, Why?!" As they place their specials edition "Snape wand" from e-bay in to the final perspex box of reality.

Tell you what I'm starting to find more and more amusing, is the woke millenials with Harry Potter tattoos enraged by biological fact. And now every time they look at their tattoo they will probably be angry and sad*

They can cover those tattoos with avocado.

It seems some really lovely people don't agree with us!

There's a lot of very uncouth penis waving there, not very proper of a lady at all.

@Enough4me

Her common sense is a light in the creeping darkness that sucks in what being a woman is. I am a woman, I still menstruate, but that is not my label. If I was a transwoman I would be a transwoman, not a woman.

Daniel Radcliffe as a man can tell women what being a woman is, but he is talking BShit as he is not a woman. It's like me telling a man how to be a man - impossible!

yes, this a thousand times!

[quote Lockeduporknockedup]@CatandtheFiddle
Of course.

1. She didn't mention minorities when writing the books but then, when she realised that she could make more money by backtracking and saying that certain characters were gay or BAME, she did so. If she genuinely cared about characters being diverse then she would have written them that way in the first place, not afterwards. If their sexuality and race don't matter enough to write them in then they don't matter for her to write it all over twitter. It's genuinely offensive that she's using minorities to capitalise on. Trying to shoehorn diversity in twenty years after the books were written just highlights that she never once considered black or gay people when she wrote them. That, combined with her transphobic tweets, are one reason why I dislike her.

But, further to that, she won't go far enough for there to actually be any acknowledgement of black or gay characters. All the black actors were cast in her absence, after banging on about Dumbledore being gay on social media is was entirely omitted from the spin off films and the play with black Hermione wasn't even written or cast by JK.

1. Her books are genuinely really poorly written. There are a great number of plot holes and she didn't plan the series so the first book has absolutely no relationship to the end. Nothing to dislike her on personally there but it irks me that so many incredible writers go under the radar and she's so successful for through pure luck.
2. She tried to adopt Navajo culture into Pottermore as if she'd invented it in an attempt to profit from an oppressed society's culture.
3. I could go on about how her charity just allows her to pay less tax and how she's perfectly calculated it to stay at the top of the list to promote herself but that would be too much effort.

I have my reasons to dislike her, others have their reasons to like her. It's a matter of opinion.[/quote] Regarding number 1- when she started writing HP, people were not as "right on" about those issues though. I do agree that she could have written more ethnically diverse characters though- the UK has been racially diverse for centuries. no excuse there!

3. She tried to adopt Navajo culture into Pottermore as if she'd invented it in an attempt to profit from an oppressed society's culture.

Colonising an oppressed group is absolutely filthy, unless it's men colonising women.

She tried to adopt Navajo culture into Pottermore as if she'd invented it in an attempt to profit from an oppressed society's culture.

The interesting thing about Rowling and diversity is that when she does include it, she's accused of appropriation and when she doesn't, she's accused of not caring about it.
It's almost as if it's not anything to do with diversity or supporting people at all and everything to do with people looking for a way to criticise a highly successful woman.

Regarding number 1- when she started writing HP, people were not as "right on" about those issues though. I do agree that she could have written more ethnically diverse characters though- the UK has been racially diverse for centuries. no excuse there!

She had input on the most recent film script very recently though- and AFTER she had claimed on Twitter that Dumbledore was always meant to be gay. Still doesn’t show up in the film though. She’s trying to have it both ways- claiming to be supportive of gay people without actually giving us any real representation.

I do agree that she could have written more ethnically diverse characters though- the UK has been racially diverse for centuries. no excuse there!

Scotland in the 1990s wasn't particularly diverse tbh. Still isn't where I live in the east central belt.

Nothing to dislike her on personally there but it irks me that so many incredible writers go under the radar and she's so successful for through pure luck.

What, 'pure luck' that her books caught the imagination of millions of people, and they loved what she had written? I don't actually really like Harry Potter, it's ones of those things that I feel like I should like but I have been ploughing through the books for years, and swore I would use lockdown to finish the last one and it hasn't happened. But obviously lots of people don't think like me and love the story, so I'm not going to say she is a crap writer. Remember these books were always meant for kids!

I agree that she can't win: if she writes lots of diverse characters/themes in there she is a cussed if appropriation. If she doesn't then she doesn't care about diversity.

It's interesting as well, we know that our society is constantly chomping at the bit to tear down a successful woman, especially one who actually has opinions about stuff. And here we see it in all its glory. People are now picking up on anything (including her philanthropy, get a fucking grip) to slag her off.

How dare a woman be lucky! The nerve!

Is "pure luck" the evolution of "we're just going to pretend someone else wrote the Potter books"?

I love the 'we're just going to pretend that Daniel Radcliffe wrote Harry Potter from now on'. The disconnect from reality knows no bounds for these people, they seem to think that in life, if you wish for something to be so, it will be so!

The interesting thing about Rowling and diversity is that when she does include it, she's accused of appropriation and when she doesn't, she's accused of not caring about it

She’s a rare talent, JKR, able to both appropriate culture at will, and fail to represent diversity. Those (quidditch) goalposts are moving faster than a well hit bludger

I’m actual laughing out loud at the pomposity and mean spiritedness. And remembering her classy riposte to someone threatening to burn their copies of HP over the last furore (she offered them some matches and pointed out that she still had their money )

when she started writing HP, people were not as "right on" about those issues though. I do agree that she could have written more ethnically diverse characters though

There must be what 40/50 named characters in HP? (It's been a long while). There's a couple of South Asian sisters, an East Asian love interest, an Egyptian referee and a black wizard. Probably more I can't recall.

The 3 leads are clearly meant to be white, as are a few others but most characters are not specified.

That seems like pretty proportionate representation to me.

I read that there's quite a dark underbelly to the Harry Potter subculture - and there is a subculture based around the books totally unconnected to JKR herself. Certain interest groups have used the fantasy alternative universe to groom vulnerable children as I understand it.

No wonder JKR making reality based statements as an independant woman with her own opinions upsets those who've based their lives around pulling others into their own interpretation of the books as a semi religious experience/ cult.