Is JK Rowling ‘too big to be cancelled’?

[IwantToRetire]

When JK Rowling dared police to arrest her for challenging Scotland’s new hate crime law, one outcome was assured – the multi-billion-pound Harry Potter brand continues to be a licence to print money whatever controversy surrounds her vocal campaigns.

The author, whose provocative posts this week will not be treated as criminal by police, has become one of the few public figures who appear to be “too big to cancel”, due to the enduring appeal of her wizarding franchise for big business.

Accused of transphobia for her vocal support for sex-based rights, Rowling has faced calls for a boycott of Harry Potter, from its books and movies to the blockbuster video game Hogwarts Legacy.

Potter movie actors including Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson joined the backlash, criticising her comments.

Younger staff members at one of her publishers, Hachette, threatened to down tools and refuse to work on her book, The Ickabog, in protest at her views.

Rowling has said she is not concerned about how the backlash to her position on transgender issues – she has stated that sex is biological and that female-only spaces should be protected – will affect her legacy.

She had added that anyone who thinks she is concerned has “profoundly” misunderstood her.

Corporations which might normally distance themselves from public figures who face “cancellation” for offending minority groups are standing by her.

Hachette pulled rank on its staff, saying it was “proud to publish” The Ickabog, citing “freedom of expression” as a cornerstone of publishing.

The BBC is currently shooting season six of Strike, the detective novels published by Rowling under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith.
A ratings winner for the BBC, the broadcaster is expecting additional scrutiny of the new episodes which adapt The Ink Black Heart, the novel which echoes her situation with the inclusion of a character accused of transphobia.

The BBC has had to apologise twice to Rowling after guests on news shows accused her of being transphobic.

The author has seized control of her own narrative by appearing on the podcast The Witch Trials of JK Rowling, claiming that she is not concerned that the backlash will affect her legacy and that anyone who thinks she is transphobic has “profoundly” misunderstood her.

Its a much longer article than these few paragraphs, but I am surprised by the tone as it is published in the "i" paper https://inews.co.uk/news/media/jk-rowling-too-big-to-cancel-2987608

Can also be read at https://archive.ph/KavRe

New generations of kids are getting into Potter all the time.

World Book Day rolls around and you’ve got a lot of Potter costumes- Marvel/DC/Disney onesies and Potter are the big ones at our school.

Theres a bunch of young adults thought the books were written for them- not understanding that’s the mark of a good book, seeing yourself in it. Especially kid’s books. Now they think they’ve been betrayed because of what they projected onto it.

Parents continue to buy the books/merch because they love it and the kids love it.

She’s no reason to care, it’s wishful thinking on behalf of some folk who feel let down “their” author isn’t in agreement with them. The real world continues to turn and JK Rowling will continue to be successful.

I don't think she gives a toss about being liked or cancelled or whatever. She's fighting for women and girls, that's all that matters.

I have the same concern. Everything she says is valid but it's the end point of a journey that she has been on for a while.

The population en masse are just starting that journey.

It begins by assuming that while one should use "polite" pronouns and it is "polite" to say "TWAW", society including police, politicians, teachers etc understand that TWAM, TW don't experience the same challenges as women so when it comes to women only protections and opportunities, those stay as they were intended to be for female people.

Those at the start of the journey assume trans women just want to be left alone to gwt married, do their shopping or whatever without nasty people pointing and laughing "that's a man!".

It doesn't occur at the start that some trans women also want to stop anyone saying "but that's a man!" when they join women's sports teams, gain awards for women's achievements, act as female representatives or are held up as examples of women in male dominated fields.

We and JKR know this journey inevitably leads to the realisation that "woman", "girl", "she" and "her" cannot exist in a Schrodinger-like state of being sometimes the name for female people and sometimes a polite honorific for men-who-would-be-seen-as-women. We all eventually come to realise that if female people are to have any realistic protections under law or in society they need their own name that means all of them and no one else to attach those protections to, and that to mix up "being female" and "identifying with some social constructions culturally imposed onto the female" under the same name is far from progressive but is in fact a muddle that relies on society continuing to impose those sexist constructs onto the female.

But that's a lot to expect someone just at the start of the journey to take on board.

People need to work this thing through for themselves, to see for themselves that the reasonable assumptions they start with are not how this is actually playing out.

So I think to be effective JKR needs to stay "ahead but in sight". Far enough ahead to ask meaningful questions, not so far that the questions can be ignored because they seem too far fetched.

(Oh, and stop goading IW. Grey rock that one. IW created a useful opportunity to make an important point that JKR was smart to seize, but overall that person is so small and obsessed with such narrow aspects of the overall issues that to continue to toy with them risks looking like bullying. What's that phrase - something like "It's not fair to get into a battle of wits with an unarmed man"?)

Yep.

I don’t really understand what all the fuss is about. Celebrity has opinion - so what?

People can choose to agree or disagree.
I do not agree with her views, but I respect her right to express them.

This! They did try to cancel her. Remember all the anniversary stuff about the films - sky did a whole big special with pretty much everyone even only vaguely connected with them in it - except JKR. Various awards she’d been given were rescinded, schools who had Houses named after her changed them, she was omitted from various lists highlighting successful children’s or British authors, the publishing house of the strike books had to fend off a staff rebellion if they published her books . They really did try but basically shes too successful, popular and rich and in the end that was what mattered.

Can I ask, what is it you don't agree with?

Only one of the characteristics of this debate, is that many people don't actually read what she says before coming to a conclusion.

What exactly don't you agree with? Do you believe people can change sex?

Lively thread:

https://twitter.com/jk_rowling/status/1777028759754780771

I've seen this twitter thread this evening, quite by chance, and I'm actually a bit shocked.

I'm no longer sure JKR is such a friend to women as I once thought. If true, I think she could lose a fair bit of her current core support.

I don't think anyone is "too big to cancel", although I have my own issues with the concept of "cancelling" (but that is another thread entirely).

https://twitter.com/innominace/status/1776980668615971086?t=JMk-FHaTWLvaQgBh8Jh1ng&s=19

The short answer is yes, she is too big to be cancelled.

And I don't believe it's because people like Harry Potter too much, because there are plenty of American millennials who continue to be obsessed with Harry Potter whilst believing that JK Rowling is an evil transphobic bigot.

But she has 14 million Twitter followers and so much personal wealth that she never needs to work again. She doesn't need to worry about the impact speaking out might have on her career, or on her ability to pay her mortgage. I expect she still worries about her personal safety, but she can afford a level of private security which others cannot. That wealth and power is what has enabled her to speak out when others have been intimidated into silence, and the 14 million Twitter followers mean that her message has been heard.

Most sane adults agree with her that humans can't change sex, that women should be allowed to have their own single sex spaces and sports, and that confused and unhappy children should not be enabled to make irreversible changes to their healthy bodies.

The Hogwarts Legacy game has been a huge hit. A new Harry Potter series is in the pipeline. Her Strike books continue to appear in the bestseller lists.

Basically, money talks. And the money is saying that most people either agree with her or simply do not care enough about her views on this matter to boycott her.

Flickersy. I can't see the full thread, only the first post. I have looked to see if it has been unrolled on the thread reader app, but it is not currently there.

An Internet random with 388 followers? Yeah I’m totally convinced that JKR is not a friend to woman because someone on Twitter posted some completely unevidenced highly biased tweets

They're not completely un-evidenced though are they? There's screenshots and supporting evidence from mainstream media reporting.

I don't know how to do that I'm afraid. Is it a specific app?

She does have top notch security.

Your previous posts on other threads do not place you in a credible light.

https://threadreaderapp.com/

If you think I'm trolling then report it by all means.

Judging by how popular HP still is, I think the vast majority of people don’t give 2 fucks about cancelling JKR for her opinions. I am sure she’s certainly big enough to withstand the small amount of TRAs etc shouting hatred at her.

She’s too correct to be cancelled.

People can believe the sky is green and the world is flat as intensely as they want but sooner or later people come back to the reality that the sky is blue and the world is round.

Jo Rowling, being a fan of reality, can’t be cancelled because everyone knows that she’s right, even those who hate her know that men can’t turn into women.

"Jo Rowling, being a fan of reality, can’t be cancelled because everyone knows that she’s right, even those who hate her know that men can’t turn into women".

This. A lie will always fall - even if it takes years.

"Stirs up trouble" is pretty much the #1 trait I look for in my female role models 😁

Thank you, but it looks like I'd need to create a burner twitter account to use it as it doesn't seem anonymous?

I think if she was saying something truly offensive there would be a big backlash but as she isn't there isn't.