This thread is specifically for people who think JK Rowling is awful so..

[CurlewKate]

If you don't think she is please don’t post. Please can you tell me specifically what she has said or done that is so bad. I promise that I will listen and not argue. If you could include links that would be great. If your inclination is to assume that I’m posting in bad faith and any reasonably well informed person must be stupid or bigoted not to know, then please just let the thread die.

I just came on to make a similar point, Shortshriftandlethal, but you beat me to it!
I was going to say that if one thing has come out of this thread loud and clear, it's that by saying 'If you don't think she is please don’t post.' the OP has provided us with an opportunity to show what a disobedient, insubordinate, uncontrollable, mutinous bunch we are. Even the magic word 'please' didn't work!
Nobody puts the Feminism: Sex and gender discussion posters in a corner😁

You've clearly not been following her many posts on the subject of women's rights in Iran and Afghanistan, or any any other topic. Why not? Perhaps you are simply focusing on what it is that you choose to be offended by?

Apologies. I had no intention to be provocative or bad faith or any of the other things I’ve obviously appeared to be. And far be it from me to censor anyone- I was just hoping that this thread could be a little more targeted than many of the others. I am surrounded by people I love who are “JKR is a transphobe” inclination-I cannot ask them because we have agreed never to discuss the subject on pain of me losing them. I was hoping that this thread would help me understand their point of view. I was hoping for some clear links to her transphobic statements and beliefs-because I have not been able to find any myself and, frankly I want to be able to say to them. “Oh, I see what you mean! Even if I disagree with you, I see what you mean.”

She gives as good as she gets...that is what people don't like. It's supposedly fine for people like India willoughby to say insulting or plainly ridiculous things; or for people like Boy George to pass comment...but when she fails to be cowed by that...people hate her even more.

I didn't think it was a bad premise for a thread. We've all had that experience, of asking what's so awful about JKR, and getting side-eye for asking such a transphobic question. There was an outside chance that someone would actually answer, instead of throwing dust with stuff about Quidditch and sweatshops, or telling us to consult trans Reddit (who also never say - she's just axiomatically evil according to them).

Anyhow, transphobe = non-believer. That is all.

You won't find what you are looking for, because it really doesn't exist. All of the hatred towards her is based on ignorance ( not even having read in full her original statement) and on the plain old nastiness and prejudice of human nature, which is exacerbated by social media. People really seem to need to have objects of hatred, in order to affirm their tribal belonging.

I think she deserves a medal. The absolute vileness that she has been subjected to is inhuman. All for speaking out in favour of the dignity of women and girls.

Oh so she's the reason I had such a terrible headache last weekend. I was going to blame copious amounts of wine (I was at a wedding to be fair) but I should've known it was that bloody woman. 🙄.

Nooooo as @MissScarletInTheBallroom says, these posters are just incredibly, exceptionally busy.

hey @Viviennemary can you please give us some specific examples and quotes which underline what you describe as her hate?

Posters are not going to post evidence because there is nothing that they can directly link to that doesn't show how weak the evidence is behind their formed opinions.

As I said earlier, those holding her to unreal expectations surely forget that she is an author. She is not in a position where she is absorbing personal abuse for the ‘position’ such as a PM is expected. She is an author.

Yet these posts seem to expect that she is to act in ways that a country’s head of state should act. Along with working on all these campaigns to fix government policies that are not working etc.

And all to suit people’s individual wish list of political aims. A list that if she deviates from that person’s list, she is apparently worthy of being labelled ‘awful’ or worse by that individual.

She is held to account like no author I know.

She is expected to act like a queen or a PM and fix the world while absorbing all the abuse she gets. She is expected to be the penultimate activist while still producing entertainment for the masses and raising a family out of the lime light.

Which other person on this planet is held to this level of expectation across such a wide range of political interests?

Ignorant of what?

There's Lee Jordan, who's friends with Fred and George Weasley, Angelina Johnson, captain of the Quidditch team, who ends up married to George, Blaise Zabini and Professor Sinistra.

I hated them changing the actress for Lavender Brown. I imagined her as a black girl when I read the books. If anyone here read 'How to survive summer camp' by Jacqueline Wilson, the character Janie is a black girl with her hair in braids, so I imagined Lavender as an older version of her.

I always thought Parvati and Lavender's obsession with Divination and Hermione being incredulous was normal teenage girls Vs Hermione's 'I'm not like the other girls' attitude. I've known a lot of teenage girls (myself included) who got into Buffy and Charmed, decided we were Wiccans, and that was that.

I'm not even going to touch on the goblin thing. JK Rowling has been a vocal critic of anti-Semitism for a long time.

I agree, its demanding her to be everyones rich mum.

Interestingly, my “JKR is a transphobe” family members are outspoken about her NOT being anti semitic. Sometimes a goblin is just a goblin.

I have to also ask, because I have seen this raised quite a lot again lately, why do people feel that they should have ANY authority to declare what causes and campaign issues anyone chooses to work on.

Your own priorities, are your own priorities. NO ONE ELSES.

There is a fuck ton of wrong in expecting anyone to comply with your dictates on what they should and should not be focusing on. Whether it is individuals on MN or JK Rowling.

Write to your MP or a government minister and tell them what you think they should be focused on by all means. Other people? Well, you should expect people to reject your dictated priorities and I wouldn't expect people to do it nicely either.

I would say “requests” rather than demands. And ignorant of what?

It is fucking bizarre to see it in action.

Some people seem to assume she (and her funds) is there for their personal direction and to be the fixer of all things. I got the feeling from reading this thread as I do from all the other threads about her, some people like to think that they somehow 'own' her. That she is there to fix the world according to them.

She is an author!

The haters are not ignorant of what she's said and done, but believe, correctly, that it is directly oppositional to TRAs' demands.

Things she's said and done:

She supported Forstater, she mocked language like "people who menstruate", she stated that biological sex is real and important, she drew attention to male violence, she described [gender] as an ideology that is harmful to children, and described the term cisgender as "ideological language signifying belief in the unfalsifiable concept of gender identity." She opposes self-ID, opposed the Scottish Gender Recognition Reform Bill, and donated £70,000 to FWS. She founded a sexual assault crisis centre for women, that excludes transwomen. She opposed the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021, and deliberately misgendered several transwomen in order to test it.

TRAs' demands:

Don't do any of this!:

https://transactual.org.uk/transphobia/

In a country with a state-imposed ideology, she's an agnostic, a secularist, and someone who thinks we should all be free not to believe, and to debate whether the ideology is harmful. One specific harm was the loss of sex-based rights, and she put her money where her mouth is and helped fix it. Exactly this, is what TRAs mean by transphobia.

One of the interesting things about the podcast 'The Witch Trials of JK Rowling' is that it reminds you of the level of madness (e.g. book burning) that surrounded her pre 2020, before she became more voluble on the subject of women's rights.

Also, many of the people who condemn her now were quite happy with her tone when she was tweeting about Brexit.

https://mashable.com/article/j-k-rowling-peoples-vote-brexit-tweet?test_uuid=003aGE6xTMbhuvdzpnH5X4Q&test_variant=b

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2016/06/john-oliver-jk-rowling-brexit?srsltid=AfmBOoqYJSUxhfrKXD6B4rMA_bHaK7t7g3s2tYzvTWd9rYQ-GEgQlONZ

Yup! She basically went 'come and have a go if you think you're hard enough'. They were in fact, not hard enough. Absolute legend! 😁

Ignorant of her original piece...the original plea on behalf of female dignity that so many decided was hateful, but which it turns out very few, if any, had read in full; if at all.

People used to refer to it all of the time, but none could analyse it or say what they found objectionable within it.

🤣🤣🤣

You are assuming that other people are as rational as you. @CurlewKate could try putting to her family questions like 'what if an Orthodox Jewish woman can't go out, because she can't be sure of not encountering a biological male in the toilets?'. And if they're anything like my trans friends, the answer will be 'she's a bigot, held back by religion (the irony🙄) and needs to learn'.

They know what that essay is about. They just think what they want is more important.

Most people that I challenged on their negative comments had not actually read it. They were simply responding to third party hearsay and twitter gossip.

I’m not ignorant of that. I was assuming there must be more.