Independent opinion piece on JKR

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First time starting a MN thread, but has anyone seen this opinion piece in the Independent? An anonymous trans person writing under a pseudonym and pedalling all the usual wilful misunderstandings about JKR and the need for single-sex spaces. It’s silly enough on it’s own but gets carried away enough to outright accuse her of Islamophobia because the Troubled Blood killer poses as a Muslim woman. I haven’t read the book but this is the first I’ve heard of anything like that. Is this even true? (Do I really need to ask?)

www.independent.co.uk/voices/transgender-cis-refuge-charity-sexual-abuse-jk-rowling-b837344.html

Perhaps the independent wishes to identify as bankrupt?

I haven't read Troubled Blood.

In The Silkworm there was a minor plotline about a burkha being purchased in order to provide a disguise for the killer. As far as I'm aware there is no storyline in Troubled Blood about the killer dressing as a Muslim woman.

It's a badly written and poorly argued article which does not address any of the very real issues that come up in this debate.

The Independent is an absolute joke, publishing crap like this.

I'm pretty sure that in none of her books does a "cis" man dress as a Muslim woman in order to murder "cis" women. But why bother dealing with what she actually says/writes when you can just make shit up, I guess?

And yeah, The Independent isn't fit to wipe your arse on.

Ah yes, having looked again this piece doesn’t name the book specifically @EdgeOfACoin. I’m not sure if the writer is describing JKR or every famous name who signed the letter of support as “reeking of Islamophobia”, you’d like to think a national media outlet would make that clear - or check with a few lawyers - before pressing ‘publish’, yet...

I get the strong impression that the writer of the article has not read any of the Strike books.

This article cannot be shared enough. It is written by Andrew Doyle, posing as Titania McGrath. If you take the 4th letter from every sentence in the article it spells out ‘Titania McGrath wrote this you gullible hacks’.

www.independent.co.uk/voices/comedy-stand-sexism-racism-metoo-free-speech-ricky-gervais-dave-chappelle-a8796341.html

Yeah that’s a real dud. It doesn’t read like they’ve had anything to do with a refuge.

I hope JKRs lawyers are on it about the book.

I've read Troubled Blood, and there's nothing in there about anyone posing as a Muslim woman.

I've read Troubled Blood too. No reference to Muslim women or their clothes at all. The famously offending 'women's coat' barely even gets a mention. Once sentence.

Here's a Mail piece about the brief passage in Silkworm:

www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-8747125/JK-Rowling-accused-Islamophobia-passage-book-shared-online.html

How the idea that a killer might disguise himself as a Muslim woman could be Islamophobic I have no idea. How stupid do you have to be to think that a bad person disguising themselves as something else is a slur on the something else? If the killer had disguised himself as a doctor, would that have been doctor-phobic? I mean, how do people this thick actually function in the world?

I read that article. Usual stuff. Ignores the impact of allowing males in women's spaces. Tells us to be nice.

It would be great to have a real conversation about this issue.

SPOILER

It’s a woman, in ‘Silkworm’, who disguised herself in a burka.
The ‘cross dressing’ is mentioned three times in TB, and it’s simply wearing a women’s coat and, I think, a wig- a ruse to allay women’s suspicion of unknown men.

Ah thanks @RoyalCorgi, not sure how that passed me by. What a ridiculous argument, anything to avoid listening to what is actually being said.

The writer in the Indy can’t even contemplate discussion of the issue without putting the word debate in inverted commas, yet can hide behind a false name (to protect their identity, no less) and accuse all sorts.

I read this yesterday and along with other things found it totally depressing.

Not the lies being peddled about JKR because everybody knows they are crap.

What is really dangerous about this article is the lies told about support services for women, and the author presuming to claim superior understanding because they claim to run a helpline.

I haven't got time at the moment to go through the really insidious arguements (eg the funding issue) but for the Independent to publish this, and like the Guardian, will not get a counter arguement from women involved in VAW services is really, really dangerous.

And the publish stuff like this to be on trend, and do not for one moment think about the women erasing impact of all of this.

It is a truely loathsome article.

tbh it feels like they schedule in a witch burning article every fortnight and just tweak it to include the name of the current witch du jour

we've heard all of this before multiple times and it doesnt work anymore. too much sunlight is coming in....

[quote TheRealMcKenna]This article cannot be shared enough. It is written by Andrew Doyle, posing as Titania McGrath. If you take the 4th letter from every sentence in the article it spells out ‘Titania McGrath wrote this you gullible hacks’.

www.independent.co.uk/voices/comedy-stand-sexism-racism-metoo-free-speech-ricky-gervais-dave-chappelle-a8796341.html[/quote]
That is fucking genius! I can't believe he pulled that one off (or indeed that it's still on their website).

(And yes, I was sad enough to check, and it really does say that ).

That is fucking genius! I can't believe he pulled that one off (or indeed that it's still on their website).

Yes, why on earth did they leave it on their website? Don't they feel any kind of embarrassment about being duped?

They really are a joke.

Quite incredibly, Chortle seem to have investigated that more thoroughly than the Indy:

Chortle has seen emails from [exec editor Will] Gore in which he defended the piece, saying : ‘I’m confident he has done some comedy…. I’ve no reason to think Liam isn’t a real person… The suggestion I have seen elsewhere that it is so outlandish that it must be false, is bizarre. I also reject absolutely the notion that this was "fake news".’

Pathetic...

www.chortle.co.uk/news/2019/12/11/44978/hoax!_truth_behind_hate_speech_in_comedy_article_revealed#

Can you please add a spoiler alert to this thread as I'm part way through Troubled Blood and now I know when I get to a certain bit I know who the killer is. 😡

Don't worry neverenough, I've read Troubled Blood and I don't think this thread has given anything away! Hope you enjoy it as much as I did, it's definitely her best one yet.

Phew. @heathspeedwell

Thanks 😊

On the other hand, here's a fantastic article in Private Eye which gets really gets it. The text is a bit small but hopefully you can enlarge it. It's really good.

@Malahaha that's brilliant, thank you!