This is the first section of the opinion piece which is about Rowling/Fry. There is a second section about a rapist, and a third section about Pride month.
Michael Deacon
Columnist
21 June 2025 6:00am BST
"Sir Stephen Fry, the renowned psychoanalyst, says he believes that JK Rowling “has been radicalised”. I must say that I for one was somewhat taken aback by this diagnosis. Because, if Ms Rowling has indeed been “radicalised”, that means she harbours beliefs that are “radical”.
In which case, would Sir Stephen be so kind as to tell us which of her beliefs he has in mind?
Take, for example, Ms Rowling’s belief that women don’t have testicles. Or her belief that men can’t give birth. Is either of those beliefs radical? Extreme? Wildly at variance with established medical science?
Perhaps he’s thinking of her belief that biological males should not be entitled to enter the female changing room at their local swimming pool and strip naked in front of small girls. Or her belief that confused children should not be pumped with drugs designed to prevent them from going through a normal, healthy puberty. Or her belief that we should not grant a convicted rapist his wish to be placed in a jail full of women merely because he’s suddenly taken to sporting a blonde wig and pink leggings.
Does Sir Stephen consider those beliefs to be radical? I do hope he’ll let us know. It’s urgent. Otherwise, there’s a serious risk that innocent members of the public will become radicalised, too.
In the meantime, I’m anxious to ascertain how exactly Ms Rowling came to fall for the outlandish notion that women are female and men are male. Who radicalised her? Sir Stephen reckons it was “Terfs” (i.e., trans-exclusionary radical feminists). But I wonder if she was brainwashed at an early age – by, say, an O-level biology teacher. Or perhaps some appallingly irresponsible school librarian gave her access to a dictionary.
Whatever the source of her indoctrination, I dread to think what crazed ideological nonsense this dangerous woman will pollute our children’s minds with next. The Earth is round? Water is wet? Members of the family Ursidae typically defecate in arboreal environs?
Then again, I suppose there is an alternative way to look at this story. Which is that the beliefs Ms Rowling espouses have been completely mainstream since the dawn of humanity – and that it is, in fact, her opponents who have been “radicalised”. Just a thought."