Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To be oblivious to the issue people have with JKR? I thought she was a feminist. What have I missed?

379 replies

laughingnow · 15/06/2025 14:05

People have warned me not to state the view above as ‘it’s more complicated’

OP posts:
Thread gallery
9
miraxxx · 16/06/2025 20:42

MyRootinTootinBaby · 16/06/2025 20:31

I honestly just thought everyone disliked JKR after seeing social media posts etc. It wasn’t until I joined mumsnet that I saw that she had a following. I follow a lot of left media, and so hadn’t realised people liked her. I also work in a secondary school, and the kids don’t seem to like her either, so I just thought it was a universal dislike of her.

I would bet that if she is one of the most popular and admired figures in the UK. You live in a tiny bubble.

TheKeatingFive · 16/06/2025 20:44

I can't remember exactly when I became aware that JKR was causing controversy. But my first port of call was to go and read the original, now infamous post.

And I agreed with every single word of it. It was sensible, driven by a desire to safeguard women, but also respectful and empathetic to the trans community.

The reaction it got made me realise that the world had gone mad.

Shortly afterwards, that was further affirmed when a transwoman heading up a rape crisis centre, told women who didn't want to see a male counsellor that they needed to 'reframe their trauma'. 🙄

I'm still not over that one.

MissScarletInTheBallroom · 16/06/2025 20:46

MyRootinTootinBaby · 16/06/2025 20:31

I honestly just thought everyone disliked JKR after seeing social media posts etc. It wasn’t until I joined mumsnet that I saw that she had a following. I follow a lot of left media, and so hadn’t realised people liked her. I also work in a secondary school, and the kids don’t seem to like her either, so I just thought it was a universal dislike of her.

Question - do you live in the UK?

Waitwhat23 · 16/06/2025 20:48

It's just one in the long list of thought terminating clichés so beloved of those who believe that women's safety and dignity is less important than men's feelings -

'TWAW!'
'No debate!'
'JKR is the devil!'
'There's no such thing as sex based rights!'
'It's all so complicated!'

Chant the mantras or be demonised! Be a good acolyte or be shunned!

Critical thinking be damned!

MyRootinTootinBaby · 16/06/2025 20:49

MissScarletInTheBallroom · 16/06/2025 20:46

Question - do you live in the UK?

Yes

MissScarletInTheBallroom · 16/06/2025 20:52

MyRootinTootinBaby · 16/06/2025 20:49

Yes

Well that's even more depressing.

In my experience the people who believe this nonsense about JKR being an evil right wing bigot tend to be people who don't have a clue about British politics.

One thing's for sure, none of the people who hold this view appear to be capable of thinking for themselves.

MissScarletInTheBallroom · 16/06/2025 20:54

TheKeatingFive · 16/06/2025 20:44

I can't remember exactly when I became aware that JKR was causing controversy. But my first port of call was to go and read the original, now infamous post.

And I agreed with every single word of it. It was sensible, driven by a desire to safeguard women, but also respectful and empathetic to the trans community.

The reaction it got made me realise that the world had gone mad.

Shortly afterwards, that was further affirmed when a transwoman heading up a rape crisis centre, told women who didn't want to see a male counsellor that they needed to 'reframe their trauma'. 🙄

I'm still not over that one.

Yeah, when I first heard that she was an evil bigot who had been brainwashed by the far right into hating a vulnerable and oppressed minority, I thought, "Well, that sounds about as likely as David Attenborough being prosecuted for cruelty to animals, what has she actually said?"

And I went to look for myself, and before too long I was a TERF too.

AccidentallyWesAnderson · 16/06/2025 20:54

TheKeatingFive · 16/06/2025 20:44

I can't remember exactly when I became aware that JKR was causing controversy. But my first port of call was to go and read the original, now infamous post.

And I agreed with every single word of it. It was sensible, driven by a desire to safeguard women, but also respectful and empathetic to the trans community.

The reaction it got made me realise that the world had gone mad.

Shortly afterwards, that was further affirmed when a transwoman heading up a rape crisis centre, told women who didn't want to see a male counsellor that they needed to 'reframe their trauma'. 🙄

I'm still not over that one.

Same, same.

Sommertidenhejhej · 16/06/2025 20:58

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

NImumconfused · 16/06/2025 21:52

TheKeatingFive · 16/06/2025 18:48

I mean, JKR is told she should 'go high' and stop stoking 'culture wars' and yet this is happening in plain sight.

https://terfisaslur.com

Yep, these are the charming people that women are expected to welcome into single sex spaces with open arms. I wonder why some of us are not so keen? 🤔

Helleofabore · 16/06/2025 21:55

MyRootinTootinBaby · 16/06/2025 20:31

I honestly just thought everyone disliked JKR after seeing social media posts etc. It wasn’t until I joined mumsnet that I saw that she had a following. I follow a lot of left media, and so hadn’t realised people liked her. I also work in a secondary school, and the kids don’t seem to like her either, so I just thought it was a universal dislike of her.

Oh well then. Since I don’t know anyone who disagrees with her does that mean we balance out.

And of course secondary students are not going to go around admitting to liking her with the risk of being ostracised are they? Shall I post the studies that show that around such topics these days that people aged between 18-28 remain silent about their views unless they feel confident they won’t experience negative ramifications? happy to, just let me know.

Why would children feel any different? I suspect there might be even more pressure to remain silent.

Helleofabore · 16/06/2025 22:04

I wonder if anyone who believes that a woman who can be now classified as being a women’s rights campaigner should not post anything that someone will take exception to understands the burden of that expectation.

It effectively limits a woman’s voice. If someone cannot find educational value in any interaction, I wonder if they are really so limited as to only learn within a limited range of carefully curated content.

Ketryne · 16/06/2025 22:08

Helleofabore · 16/06/2025 18:27

Ok. Thanks for the answer.

As far as I can see then, it is based on your own opinion that she should only use her platform to educate and to effectively 'be kind'.

Do you think that she should be free to express her opinions about current affairs? Or is that, according to you, stoking a culture war?

Should anyone who responds to highlight a news item be considered to be 'stoking a culture war'?

Or just her when she responds to an issue she sees as worthy to highlight around the needs of female people.

Also, should she respond to the male people who directly abuse her, or not? Should she just brush it all off lest she stoke a culture war?

I am trying to work out what is considered 'stoking a culture war' and what is not, by the way. What is her responding to a current affairs issue that she is concerned about and what is someone else's categorisation of that issue as being not worthy of response for instance?

Edited

Look, I’m a huge huge fan of her work, and in most cases I strongly agree with her viewpoints - especially her initial post and essay. She’s still in my top 3 fantasy dinner party guests. I’m not a hater.

I just think sometimes she plays into the hands of all the people who want to hate her, giving them the sound bites they’re looking for and it makes me roll my eyes a bit.

I know she cares deeply about the cause and has a right to exercise free speech, but personally I don’t think she’s particularly strategic in how she communicates. It’s actually nothing to do with being kind, it’s about being tactical - knowing when to speak and when not to, when to wait for more facts, balancing personal comments with bigger picture ones.

But if you have a public profile it’s your right to chose whether you want to put your individualism to one side and act as an ambassador for the cause or if you want to be another loudmouth on the internet. At the end of the day, she's just another human shouting into the abyss, with all the potential for human error that brings.

Verv · 16/06/2025 22:08

Helleofabore · 16/06/2025 22:04

I wonder if anyone who believes that a woman who can be now classified as being a women’s rights campaigner should not post anything that someone will take exception to understands the burden of that expectation.

It effectively limits a woman’s voice. If someone cannot find educational value in any interaction, I wonder if they are really so limited as to only learn within a limited range of carefully curated content.

It’s the age old misogyny though, isn’t it?
They could utter the same sentence and men are assertive, women are aggressive / rude.

Verv · 16/06/2025 22:16

Ketryne · 16/06/2025 22:08

Look, I’m a huge huge fan of her work, and in most cases I strongly agree with her viewpoints - especially her initial post and essay. She’s still in my top 3 fantasy dinner party guests. I’m not a hater.

I just think sometimes she plays into the hands of all the people who want to hate her, giving them the sound bites they’re looking for and it makes me roll my eyes a bit.

I know she cares deeply about the cause and has a right to exercise free speech, but personally I don’t think she’s particularly strategic in how she communicates. It’s actually nothing to do with being kind, it’s about being tactical - knowing when to speak and when not to, when to wait for more facts, balancing personal comments with bigger picture ones.

But if you have a public profile it’s your right to chose whether you want to put your individualism to one side and act as an ambassador for the cause or if you want to be another loudmouth on the internet. At the end of the day, she's just another human shouting into the abyss, with all the potential for human error that brings.

I don’t have a doubt in my mind that she has been absolutely instrumental, if not pivotal, in turning the tide on gender.

She has every right to respond and not be kowtowed by the abuse she’s faced, and one of the greatest weapons in her arsenal is searing acerbic wit.

I think the time for decorum - tact, thoughtfulness, restraint, balance, diplomacy etc passed a few years ago.

Helleofabore · 16/06/2025 22:26

Verv · 16/06/2025 22:08

It’s the age old misogyny though, isn’t it?
They could utter the same sentence and men are assertive, women are aggressive / rude.

Indeed.

Including women using their voice to usually cleverly highlight issues being akin to Katie Hopkins (wasn’t that mentioned as a comparator up thread) and loud mouthed, hateful and shouting into the abyss.

I still haven’t seen an example of bullying. So I can only assume it is one of those false characterisations or is based on her reacting to the abuse she gets directly from the person she is reacting to.

The reality is that many of her tweets, those which some may find a waste of her effort or uncomfortable reading or whatever they wish to complain about, really often highlight issues that then provide others the awareness to also respond. It is how some people find out about even smaller issues that some consider inconsequential.

I don’t believe that some people understand her power. She is uncancellable. She CAN say things that activists will try to exaggerate but when people are asked to point out the falsity or the hate, they cannot. But her saying it in the first place shifts the Overton window for others.

It is not hard to see the effect once you start looking for it.

Verv · 16/06/2025 22:28

Yep. Completely agree.

TheKeatingFive · 16/06/2025 22:29

NImumconfused · 16/06/2025 21:52

Yep, these are the charming people that women are expected to welcome into single sex spaces with open arms. I wonder why some of us are not so keen? 🤔

Quite

TheKeatingFive · 16/06/2025 22:32

Ketryne · 16/06/2025 22:08

Look, I’m a huge huge fan of her work, and in most cases I strongly agree with her viewpoints - especially her initial post and essay. She’s still in my top 3 fantasy dinner party guests. I’m not a hater.

I just think sometimes she plays into the hands of all the people who want to hate her, giving them the sound bites they’re looking for and it makes me roll my eyes a bit.

I know she cares deeply about the cause and has a right to exercise free speech, but personally I don’t think she’s particularly strategic in how she communicates. It’s actually nothing to do with being kind, it’s about being tactical - knowing when to speak and when not to, when to wait for more facts, balancing personal comments with bigger picture ones.

But if you have a public profile it’s your right to chose whether you want to put your individualism to one side and act as an ambassador for the cause or if you want to be another loudmouth on the internet. At the end of the day, she's just another human shouting into the abyss, with all the potential for human error that brings.

I know she cares deeply about the cause and has a right to exercise free speech, but personally I don’t think she’s particularly strategic in how she communicates. It’s actually nothing to do with being kind, it’s about being tactical - knowing when to speak and when not to, when to wait for more facts, balancing personal comments with bigger picture ones.

When do you think she should have waited for more facts?

Helleofabore · 16/06/2025 22:41

Ketryne · 16/06/2025 22:08

Look, I’m a huge huge fan of her work, and in most cases I strongly agree with her viewpoints - especially her initial post and essay. She’s still in my top 3 fantasy dinner party guests. I’m not a hater.

I just think sometimes she plays into the hands of all the people who want to hate her, giving them the sound bites they’re looking for and it makes me roll my eyes a bit.

I know she cares deeply about the cause and has a right to exercise free speech, but personally I don’t think she’s particularly strategic in how she communicates. It’s actually nothing to do with being kind, it’s about being tactical - knowing when to speak and when not to, when to wait for more facts, balancing personal comments with bigger picture ones.

But if you have a public profile it’s your right to chose whether you want to put your individualism to one side and act as an ambassador for the cause or if you want to be another loudmouth on the internet. At the end of the day, she's just another human shouting into the abyss, with all the potential for human error that brings.

But if you have a public profile it’s your right to chose whether you want to put your individualism to one side and act as an ambassador for the cause or if you want to be another loudmouth on the internet. At the end of the day, she's just another human shouting into the abyss, with all the potential for human error that brings.

Are you meaning to infer she is a loudmouth? And say she is just shouting into the abyss? Really?

She is hardly just shouting into the abyss. She has been pivotal in getting many things done.

Not only that, but I believe you have completely missed the Overton window impact she has. She moves the Overton window so that other people can speak with less fear of being cancelled. She cannot be cancelled so she often says things that need to be articulated by someone who refuses to be cancelled.

That is what being ‘loudmouthed’ can do. Like she drew fire when extreme activists were threatening women with the Scottish hate crime law when it became live.

Being an ‘ambassador’ is not enough sometimes. Sometimes you need to not simply remain polite and above it all. There are moments to move discussion into those areas some claim dismissively, and I believe in this instance incorrectly, are ‘culture wars’ to enact the change needed. Simply remaining ‘ambassadorial’ has been proven not to work.

But yet, we see this type of dismissal often when some people say things like, there has to be a middle ground, or women are so aggressive on this and they don’t need to be, the moderate approach is always best and so on. It is too often from people who really only have a periphery understanding of what has happened and how results are being achieved now.

Conkerjar · 16/06/2025 23:50

VickyEadieofThigh · 15/06/2025 14:17

A lot of people have simply accepted the option that JKR is "transphobic" (I've recently seen suggestions she's also "homophobic", which - as I'm a gay woman - I find hilarious) without any actuproof.

My American friend said she was "transphobic" and when I asked for examples, she admitted that she'd simply been told this by other friends.

I like 'actuproof'. It's like proof with bells on.

Sommertidenhejhej · 17/06/2025 00:39

TheKeatingFive · 16/06/2025 22:32

I know she cares deeply about the cause and has a right to exercise free speech, but personally I don’t think she’s particularly strategic in how she communicates. It’s actually nothing to do with being kind, it’s about being tactical - knowing when to speak and when not to, when to wait for more facts, balancing personal comments with bigger picture ones.

When do you think she should have waited for more facts?

I think she’s tried all of the ‘be kind’ bollocks in the past and the TRAs have walked all over her. So she’s fighting them at their own game using their rules. She has long since given up giving a fuck what anyone thinks of her. She is glorious.

Mama2many73 · 17/06/2025 03:12

FOJN · 15/06/2025 14:32

Apparently believing in biological sex and single sex spaces is transphobic. Talking about personal experiences which inform this view is "weaponising trauma" and also transphobic.

AND the woman had the audacity to write the case for her own prosecution. Feel free to read and make up your own mind.

https://www.jkrowling.com/opinions/j-k-rowling-writes-about-her-reasons-for-speaking-out-on-sex-and-gender-issues/

Genuinely thank you for posting that link. I'm so fed up of the hate surrounding her for her comments but when I've tried to look into there's never a direct quote, it's always someone 'interpreting ' what she said ie twisting into a transphobic comment.

Ketryne · 17/06/2025 03:19

TheKeatingFive · 16/06/2025 22:32

I know she cares deeply about the cause and has a right to exercise free speech, but personally I don’t think she’s particularly strategic in how she communicates. It’s actually nothing to do with being kind, it’s about being tactical - knowing when to speak and when not to, when to wait for more facts, balancing personal comments with bigger picture ones.

When do you think she should have waited for more facts?

I thought calling Imane Khelif, the Olympic boxer, a man on social media was a particular mis-step. Yes she may have failed a gender eligibility test, meaning she might have some kind of intersex condition that makes her participation in professional sort complicated. But this is someone who was born a woman and lived as a women her whole life. Whatever she is, she is not trans. JKR was unnecessarily mean and muddied the water on the issue of trans women in women’s sport (which I’m absolutely against).

This is just an example of when her response felt kneejerk and news driven rather than smart.

I would just add though, I think we’re ALL just loudmouths on the internet shouting into the abyss. No one is perfect, and acting like she is, is just as binary as her haters calling her the devil,

TheKeatingFive · 17/06/2025 03:28

Ketryne · 17/06/2025 03:19

I thought calling Imane Khelif, the Olympic boxer, a man on social media was a particular mis-step. Yes she may have failed a gender eligibility test, meaning she might have some kind of intersex condition that makes her participation in professional sort complicated. But this is someone who was born a woman and lived as a women her whole life. Whatever she is, she is not trans. JKR was unnecessarily mean and muddied the water on the issue of trans women in women’s sport (which I’m absolutely against).

This is just an example of when her response felt kneejerk and news driven rather than smart.

I would just add though, I think we’re ALL just loudmouths on the internet shouting into the abyss. No one is perfect, and acting like she is, is just as binary as her haters calling her the devil,

She appears to have been proved 100% right with Khelif though.

And whatever about Khelif's personal situation, it could not possibly justify him going into a ring and punching women in the full knowledge that he's a male with all the benefits of having gone through male puberty.

His opponents did not deserve to have to fight a man without their consent. I'm glad JKR called that out.

Swipe left for the next trending thread