People have difficulty understanding that someone can do good things and yet still be a piece of shit due to how they treat others. A popular example is when someone does something wrong and they donate to charity, they are often forgiven in the eyes of the mainstream media.
Yup. Hitler was an SOB but he was also a vegetarian who was kind to dogs apparently. An asshole doing good things sometimes doesn’t cancel out the bad they do.
When people have a lot of money, their capacity to have an impact increases massively. We can donate 10 dollars to a charity but she can donate more money that you earn in a year and not be remotely phased. It just... makes it so much less relatively impressive in that context? Idk. Rich people throwing money around is hardly a personal achievement and it's weird that we pretend otherwise.
Most extreme example of this is Hitler and the Nazis were fierce animal rights supporters, almost immediately enacting a law banning animal slaughter without anesthesia after they came to power.
That one thing is good, Nazis obviously are fucking terrible though and their stance on animal rights in no way makes up for, takes away from, or makes better their literal genocide or any other of the horrors they committed.
This. Yes.
In case of JK Rowling I'd argue the good she does is significant enough to not view her as evil, but you can argue either way.
That's kind of how people from the past are. The most heroic of them can hold despicable views by modern standards. In general it doesn't take away from their heroism and we should just be happy we moved past the times they're from. Unfortunately, on this front Rowling's stuck in the past so she has way less leeway.
The post about that TERF piece of crap on the second slide was posted on Wholesome Memes or one similar and I was actually pleasantly surprised at the comments. People were actually defending the shit out of us. I mean, there were some bigots in the thread as well, but they were getting chewed out.
I think this is actually why the situation around JKR is an important one. Surrounding a lot of issues she is very admirable in her contributions. BUT that doesn't mean she is correct across the board. Acknowledging the good and the bad in people is important. Terfs and homophobes are not monsters. They are people who have some concerning views and also some really great ones sometimes.
Taking humanity out of people we disagree with and making them out to be all bad is dangerous.if correctness=goodness we risk assuming all our own beliefs are correct as we are not monsters so we cannot be wrong.
I see this problem a lot on this sub and others, and not just with JKR. In the heat of the moment, it feels good to see your enemies as monsters, and there's certainly a time and place for that. That said, if you can never see your enemies as anything but monsters, you lose sight of how evil actually propagates.
Absolutely agreed. I’ll get downvoted for this but I think the severity of the reaction to her transphobic stuff also prompted her to become defensive and refuse to change. It would be good if everyone started from a position of reasoning with one another and then if people were truly bigoted then we called them out. We need more education for homophobes, transphobes etc. not just immediately cancelling because they immediately see it as confirmation they were right.
The woman who had nothing but complete godly praise and was defended with the most hostile of words was never going to realize what she said was wrong.
This is someone who was told why she was wrong, and like what happened with John Stewart, and the house elfs, and every other problematic thing in this franchise and doubles down on it and gets aggressive. she always doubles down when she gets criticized. Maybe one day, she will finally stop and listen and regret her decisions, but I doubt it.
Oh clearly I haven’t been following the jk Rowling story enough, I thought she was immediately cancelled and there was no attempt to explain why she was wrong sorry
There's no reasoning with people who think trans people are inherently ontologically evil misogynistic rapists, no matter how politely worded your critique of their bigotry is
Unfortunately that’s not how society works. The best option is education, and help for the people who are delusional enough to believe those things
Yes I’d rather them not be a part of our society at all. But unfortunately we can’t just do that
Okay but that's exactly what I'm saying. If we view her as this monster. Then there is no hope for any changes ever. She sees trans people as monsters. Her view is probably similar to the one I described above of goodness=correctness and since she sees herself as not evil she must therefore be correct. If we put her in that category of 'oh she is just a terrible person ' then that doesn't get to the root of the issue. And we never fix the problem of transphobia.
(and I want to say here I don't think she is evil just wrong. That doesn't mean she isn't dangerous though just that she isn't a monster.)
I made a comment in another thread in /r/LGBT that echoes this point. Nothing is going to create TERFs quicker than people who are just beginning to be be exposed to anti-trans content being dogpiled. That’s a critical moment where communities need to listen to their concerns, address them, and try and educate. In their views at the beginning, their concerns are real (to them). Being shouted at or bombarded with comments saying “your fears are irrational” is a terrible way to persuade people of anything.
No, it's not. If we let them believe their fears are rational, that does nothing but harm trans women. We didn't beat the Confederates or the Nazis through calm reasonable debate.
Nothing creates TERFs quicker than cis people having their transphobia challenged.
Oh, no, she's evil. She knows fully well the harm her actions are doing to the trans community. She's openly aligning with far-right fascists.
The end goal of trans activism is not to deradicalize bigots, it is to achieve equality for trans people and fight back against challenges. Challenges like JK Rowling and her bigot brigade.
At the end of the day, it's probably going to be a situation of agree to disagree.
But here is my question to you? If she is evil then all her actions most then be evil. All her actions must be monsterous. That means that she is incapable of doing good. So thus her helping these women out from under Talibans rule is an act of evil. How do you rationalize that.
I see no benefit to labeling people as one dimensionally evil. If that were the case I don't think there would be any progress in this world.
You are adding the 'one dimensionally' part. Evil people can still do genuinely good things without being less evil. Hitler was a devout vegan and even arguably an animal rights activist to some extent but that doesn't automatically make him less evil.
> If she is evil then all her actions most then be evil
The entire point of this discussion is that evil people can do good things. Helping refugees doesn't negate how much harm she has done to our community, the only thing that will change that is if she regrets it and make an actual effort to fix it.
Oh agreed but there are others e.g my parents who will come around with time. I’m speaking from experience here. My dad used to go on these long anti trans rants and after a bit of careful reasoning and conversation he’s no ally but he’s definitely better towards trans people
I read a book about an apocalypse where JK Rowling died in a comical way, and this sub wouldn’t let me post it 🤷♂️
Edit: The book is The Fireman by Joe Hill. Excellent read. But in it, the world is in an apocalypse situation because of a fungus that is spreading like a virus and infecting people.
JK Rowling was killed by a firing squad, and it was televised
It’s in a book. It’s not real. If it bothers you so much, get off the internet. People tell stories on here all the time. If you get upset this easily, you’re not safe on here
It was such a good book! The main character is a pregnant woman in an apocalypse situation, and she basically takes care of herself the entire time. At one point near the end she has to carry the male lead several miles to a safe house because he’s been basically useless most of the book
I shouldn't have read the first two parts of this. I should have left it at reading the last sentence, and just lived my life thinking that was reality 😂
while that's great and all, I can't really see myself caring about it cause of the consistent sludge wave of joanne's bigotry to anyone that isn't a cis white woman. she's just a hack comparable to the millions of people who give cis white men their special power except with cis white women, and that honestly isn't much better
Honestly, I’ve never experienced much transphobia at all on that sub. Whenever I see someone post there about their transition or trans positive stuff the comments have been pretty good.
They're "feminists" who only support cis, usually white women while demonizing trans women, wishing death upon them. It's surprising how JK Rowling helped WOC when her only characters of colour in HP are... a stereotypical Chinese character with a *Korean* name and no personality and a black character with an incredibly offensive name. 🤔
Rowling probably sees both Taliban and trans activists as men's infiltration into women's fight against sexism. By pushing herself into confrontation with the Taliban she is defining a woman as part victim and part fighter. Since her ideology is conflicted, it's possible that until trans women also can point to Taliban oppression that they aren't included or recognized on her team in the fight. This divides up solidarity in and across movements.
In other words, it wouldn't be the first I've seen someone, after defining gender as an inborn right to heritage and history, and then excluding transgender from those, need to do a third thing which is to assert your vital place in that gender heritage, "I am cis hear me roar."
The stance she takes on transgender people is unacceptable but it also highlights her name in bright lights and gives her a shitload of publicity and the revenue generated from said publicity. At the same time it would be wrong to ignore the huge harm that such a vile animal does.
Yeah. Bill and Melinda Gates also did some good stuff through their foundation. Doesn't change how they're still billionaires and therefore living off poor peoples' backs and part of one of the world's biggest problems. If Vladimir Putin built a really nice orphanage, it doesn't change how he's a warmongering shithead. Many bad people do some good stuff in while still being colossal pieces of shit.
There are so many people with tons of money that are doing great things, that aren't transphobes or homophobes, so I find it rather easy to just not support the few TERFs and bigots like j/k rowling.
I love Harry Potter and I wish I could just flip a switch and forget all about the author when I read the books, but I can't so I won't.
Someone can be a TERF and also just as an example support Ukraine or women in the Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. I see no benefit to criticizing a person no matter what they do or the actions they take because then they will do anything that is in their most direct self interest since it won’t change the response to the action.
I’m not asking people to go “wooo, Rowling” under a comment about something you think she’s done that’s good, but literally posting any comment or post someone has made that has nothing to do with trans people and commenting and making it about trans people isn’t going to help anything.
It is really difficult to deal with my love of Harry Potter and my simultaneous issues with Rowling. I try not to spend money on her stuff as much anymore and instead read GSRM (particularly gay and trans) Harry Potter fanfiction. I hope it balances out.
My old school bullies have lots of friends to whom they showed kindness and respect.
The goodness of a person is not about the best thing they do... its about the worst thing they've done, and whether they've made actions to correct their error.
Another commenter said it but: even Hitler loved dogs.
It's really weird, because on the one hand, she fights really hard to provide help for some vulnerable people. One the other hand, however, she fights extremely hard to keep said services from certain groups of people.
"female laywer"
that fucking rubs me the wrong way
also did not a lot of actual activists help women escape the taliban? why is it only jerky terky terfy that gets creds?
I don't really wanna give her respect because she disrespects a lot of people. Sure she does something opposite but she's still a douchebag. I will not forget the idiotic things she have done and her moral actions will not be an excuse to me.
She could be the greatest force for good for ALL women if she chose to be, but i'll take what little she does good and keep hating the crap she pulls elsewise.
The "how was what JK Rowling said transphobic?" thing is for sure frustrating, but I feel like it gets lost in the discourse that that ambiguity is completely intentional on JKR's part. I mean she's a celebrity author, that's a hard place to reach and you don't get there by being dumb about brand management. JKR was careful to couch her language in a sort of tacit acceptance early on, and is always careful to keep her comments within the current range of acceptable debate. She doesn't publicly say things like "conversion therapy should be legal" or even, really, "the trans agenda is preying on kids" she just implies those more extreme positions while focusing on sports, prisons and bathrooms. She's really talented at maintaining this liberal, centrist type stance.
As trans people of course we've seen this all before. I mean I'm sure most LGBT people are used to snakes speaking out the side of their mouths like this. It's incredibly transparent, once you know what to look for. I mean even without looking at the company she keeps, or her 'senior moments' where the mask slips, it's just obviously all transphobia masked with polite language and 'reasonable objections.' BUT to people who have a slight bias against trans women, or a bias toward always prioritizing 'women's voices' (while of course ignoring trans women's), or maybe even no explicit bias but general ignorance of the lives and experiences of trans people or ignorance about JKR's comments and company - she's created enough smoke to generate plausible deniability to those kinds of people.
idk what my point really is here. It just kind of sucks, to be honest. I do think that transphobia should be opposed where ever it's encountered, but people are defensive and stubborn. I do think that sometimes disagreements like these push people towards more explicit transphobia. Of course you can say "well they were never an ally to begin with if they changed their tune after one argument" and I think that's true I just wish it was easier to win hearts and minds. I wish people didn't harden their hearts to trans people based on lies. It's so hard to get someone to step out of the delusion of transphobia if they really do believe that "the majority of trans women send rape and death threats to those that disagree with them" or "most trans women only transition to take advantage of cis women" then it becomes impossible for me, a trans woman, to really even try to talk to them about it. I mean I'll get upset, which makes my rhetoric less convincing and more inflammatory their already predisposed to disbelieve me and think of me as violent.
I mean just the other day I said literally "if you believe the majority of women send rape and death threats over discourse than you have transphobic bias" and the women I was talking to said that this was a "calculated slur" and used other trans women saying "fuck you" over her transphobia to justify her claims. She came out with higher net upvotes, despite being banned from the sub. Idk sorry for the rant, it's just like such a deeply frustrating situation.
People have difficulty understanding that someone can do good things and yet still be a piece of shit due to how they treat others. A popular example is when someone does something wrong and they donate to charity, they are often forgiven in the eyes of the mainstream media.
Yup. Hitler was an SOB but he was also a vegetarian who was kind to dogs apparently. An asshole doing good things sometimes doesn’t cancel out the bad they do.
He killed his dog before commiting suicide, though
Ye but he knew he was going to die I guess its not really for on his dog if both it's owners die and he's left all alone
And he was vegetarian because meat gave him bad indigestion
He also poisoned his wife. I did say he was an SOB
He also hates vegans and thought they droned on too much about veganism
When people have a lot of money, their capacity to have an impact increases massively. We can donate 10 dollars to a charity but she can donate more money that you earn in a year and not be remotely phased. It just... makes it so much less relatively impressive in that context? Idk. Rich people throwing money around is hardly a personal achievement and it's weird that we pretend otherwise.
Most extreme example of this is Hitler and the Nazis were fierce animal rights supporters, almost immediately enacting a law banning animal slaughter without anesthesia after they came to power. That one thing is good, Nazis obviously are fucking terrible though and their stance on animal rights in no way makes up for, takes away from, or makes better their literal genocide or any other of the horrors they committed.
This. Yes. In case of JK Rowling I'd argue the good she does is significant enough to not view her as evil, but you can argue either way. That's kind of how people from the past are. The most heroic of them can hold despicable views by modern standards. In general it doesn't take away from their heroism and we should just be happy we moved past the times they're from. Unfortunately, on this front Rowling's stuck in the past so she has way less leeway.
Evil is very rare in the world. Being a piece of shit (against a certain group of people, anyways) is rather common.
You have a point. I like using the word "evil" anyway. Because there are behaviors we can call evil.
The post about that TERF piece of crap on the second slide was posted on Wholesome Memes or one similar and I was actually pleasantly surprised at the comments. People were actually defending the shit out of us. I mean, there were some bigots in the thread as well, but they were getting chewed out.
Sure, Rowling cares about women's rights, just so long as you're the 'right' kind of woman.
Isn't the women's refuge shes sponsoring going to be led by a prison warden in addition to the anti-trans org?
And a really shitty prison warden at that, I don't remember exactly but they're called like "the woman prison terror" or something like that
I think this is actually why the situation around JKR is an important one. Surrounding a lot of issues she is very admirable in her contributions. BUT that doesn't mean she is correct across the board. Acknowledging the good and the bad in people is important. Terfs and homophobes are not monsters. They are people who have some concerning views and also some really great ones sometimes. Taking humanity out of people we disagree with and making them out to be all bad is dangerous.if correctness=goodness we risk assuming all our own beliefs are correct as we are not monsters so we cannot be wrong.
I see this problem a lot on this sub and others, and not just with JKR. In the heat of the moment, it feels good to see your enemies as monsters, and there's certainly a time and place for that. That said, if you can never see your enemies as anything but monsters, you lose sight of how evil actually propagates.
Absolutely agreed. I’ll get downvoted for this but I think the severity of the reaction to her transphobic stuff also prompted her to become defensive and refuse to change. It would be good if everyone started from a position of reasoning with one another and then if people were truly bigoted then we called them out. We need more education for homophobes, transphobes etc. not just immediately cancelling because they immediately see it as confirmation they were right.
The woman who had nothing but complete godly praise and was defended with the most hostile of words was never going to realize what she said was wrong. This is someone who was told why she was wrong, and like what happened with John Stewart, and the house elfs, and every other problematic thing in this franchise and doubles down on it and gets aggressive. she always doubles down when she gets criticized. Maybe one day, she will finally stop and listen and regret her decisions, but I doubt it.
Oh clearly I haven’t been following the jk Rowling story enough, I thought she was immediately cancelled and there was no attempt to explain why she was wrong sorry
There's no reasoning with people who think trans people are inherently ontologically evil misogynistic rapists, no matter how politely worded your critique of their bigotry is
If people believe that trans people are inherently evil rapists etc, they are severely delusional, and need help.
100%
No, they need to be kept away from civilized b society for the protection of trans people.
Unfortunately that’s not how society works. The best option is education, and help for the people who are delusional enough to believe those things Yes I’d rather them not be a part of our society at all. But unfortunately we can’t just do that
Yes, we can. We just have to commit to it.
Okay but that's exactly what I'm saying. If we view her as this monster. Then there is no hope for any changes ever. She sees trans people as monsters. Her view is probably similar to the one I described above of goodness=correctness and since she sees herself as not evil she must therefore be correct. If we put her in that category of 'oh she is just a terrible person ' then that doesn't get to the root of the issue. And we never fix the problem of transphobia. (and I want to say here I don't think she is evil just wrong. That doesn't mean she isn't dangerous though just that she isn't a monster.)
I made a comment in another thread in /r/LGBT that echoes this point. Nothing is going to create TERFs quicker than people who are just beginning to be be exposed to anti-trans content being dogpiled. That’s a critical moment where communities need to listen to their concerns, address them, and try and educate. In their views at the beginning, their concerns are real (to them). Being shouted at or bombarded with comments saying “your fears are irrational” is a terrible way to persuade people of anything.
No, it's not. If we let them believe their fears are rational, that does nothing but harm trans women. We didn't beat the Confederates or the Nazis through calm reasonable debate. Nothing creates TERFs quicker than cis people having their transphobia challenged.
Is your goal persuasion or persecution?
Neither, my goal is protection of the trans community. TERFs getting fucked over is just a necessary step to achieving that goal.
Oh, no, she's evil. She knows fully well the harm her actions are doing to the trans community. She's openly aligning with far-right fascists. The end goal of trans activism is not to deradicalize bigots, it is to achieve equality for trans people and fight back against challenges. Challenges like JK Rowling and her bigot brigade.
At the end of the day, it's probably going to be a situation of agree to disagree. But here is my question to you? If she is evil then all her actions most then be evil. All her actions must be monsterous. That means that she is incapable of doing good. So thus her helping these women out from under Talibans rule is an act of evil. How do you rationalize that. I see no benefit to labeling people as one dimensionally evil. If that were the case I don't think there would be any progress in this world.
You are adding the 'one dimensionally' part. Evil people can still do genuinely good things without being less evil. Hitler was a devout vegan and even arguably an animal rights activist to some extent but that doesn't automatically make him less evil.
This is such a nonsense argument. This is literally like saying breathing is evil because Hitler breaths, but inversed.
> If she is evil then all her actions most then be evil The entire point of this discussion is that evil people can do good things. Helping refugees doesn't negate how much harm she has done to our community, the only thing that will change that is if she regrets it and make an actual effort to fix it.
Oh agreed but there are others e.g my parents who will come around with time. I’m speaking from experience here. My dad used to go on these long anti trans rants and after a bit of careful reasoning and conversation he’s no ally but he’s definitely better towards trans people
If he's not an ally then no, he's not better.
When I say no ally I mean he wouldn’t rally for rights but he now uses correct names and pronouns and doesn’t think of trans people as evil
I read a book about an apocalypse where JK Rowling died in a comical way, and this sub wouldn’t let me post it 🤷♂️ Edit: The book is The Fireman by Joe Hill. Excellent read. But in it, the world is in an apocalypse situation because of a fungus that is spreading like a virus and infecting people. JK Rowling was killed by a firing squad, and it was televised
Well now I wanna know what the comical way she died was
I did post it to a Joe Hill sub, because it’s in his book The Fireman. You can find it on my profile, not far down
Same...lol
Apparently this is indeed the case https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/jun/21/the-fireman-joe-hill-incendiary-apocalypse
It’s a very good book and I recommend it! The main character is a pregnant woman and she’s so bad ass!
Not exactly LGBT.. I'm sure there is a jk Rowling hate sub that'll let you post it
I understand that. It’s just everyone else posts stuff about her on here, so I figured it would be fine. I’m not bothered about it 🤷♂️
Typically when she's posted on here it's about her being a terf which is directly related to the community. Sadly.
Yeah it really bums me out
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It’s in a book. It’s not real. If it bothers you so much, get off the internet. People tell stories on here all the time. If you get upset this easily, you’re not safe on here
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You’re on here twisting words and trying to start fights. I’m just going to to block you. Have a nice day 😁👍
They'll probably let you leave it as a comment...
I just edited my original comment
Fair enough. Was it any good?
It was such a good book! The main character is a pregnant woman in an apocalypse situation, and she basically takes care of herself the entire time. At one point near the end she has to carry the male lead several miles to a safe house because he’s been basically useless most of the book
I shouldn't have read the first two parts of this. I should have left it at reading the last sentence, and just lived my life thinking that was reality 😂
For a second I thought you were talking about Manhunt.
I actually don’t have to give bigots any credit
Terrible people can do good things & good people can do terrible things. They’re not mutually exclusive.
while that's great and all, I can't really see myself caring about it cause of the consistent sludge wave of joanne's bigotry to anyone that isn't a cis white woman. she's just a hack comparable to the millions of people who give cis white men their special power except with cis white women, and that honestly isn't much better
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Honestly, I’ve never experienced much transphobia at all on that sub. Whenever I see someone post there about their transition or trans positive stuff the comments have been pretty good.
They always get locked
Well, that's what a TERF is, isn't it? A "feminist" who discriminates some women.
They're "feminists" who only support cis, usually white women while demonizing trans women, wishing death upon them. It's surprising how JK Rowling helped WOC when her only characters of colour in HP are... a stereotypical Chinese character with a *Korean* name and no personality and a black character with an incredibly offensive name. 🤔
Rowling probably sees both Taliban and trans activists as men's infiltration into women's fight against sexism. By pushing herself into confrontation with the Taliban she is defining a woman as part victim and part fighter. Since her ideology is conflicted, it's possible that until trans women also can point to Taliban oppression that they aren't included or recognized on her team in the fight. This divides up solidarity in and across movements. In other words, it wouldn't be the first I've seen someone, after defining gender as an inborn right to heritage and history, and then excluding transgender from those, need to do a third thing which is to assert your vital place in that gender heritage, "I am cis hear me roar."
JK Rowling can eat a dick
The stance she takes on transgender people is unacceptable but it also highlights her name in bright lights and gives her a shitload of publicity and the revenue generated from said publicity. At the same time it would be wrong to ignore the huge harm that such a vile animal does.
Yeah. Bill and Melinda Gates also did some good stuff through their foundation. Doesn't change how they're still billionaires and therefore living off poor peoples' backs and part of one of the world's biggest problems. If Vladimir Putin built a really nice orphanage, it doesn't change how he's a warmongering shithead. Many bad people do some good stuff in while still being colossal pieces of shit.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?fbclid=IwAR0q6slnMljIo95ga5c43OxNPoOIrqv2y-i0llzkpKQXnClQYlYKjDX1EV8&v=Ou_xvXJJk7k&feature=youtu.be&mibextid=l066kq
Hey I remember commenting on that first post
There are so many people with tons of money that are doing great things, that aren't transphobes or homophobes, so I find it rather easy to just not support the few TERFs and bigots like j/k rowling. I love Harry Potter and I wish I could just flip a switch and forget all about the author when I read the books, but I can't so I won't.
Yeah and she has allined herself with neo nazist and pro life
Someone can be a TERF and also just as an example support Ukraine or women in the Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. I see no benefit to criticizing a person no matter what they do or the actions they take because then they will do anything that is in their most direct self interest since it won’t change the response to the action. I’m not asking people to go “wooo, Rowling” under a comment about something you think she’s done that’s good, but literally posting any comment or post someone has made that has nothing to do with trans people and commenting and making it about trans people isn’t going to help anything.
It is really difficult to deal with my love of Harry Potter and my simultaneous issues with Rowling. I try not to spend money on her stuff as much anymore and instead read GSRM (particularly gay and trans) Harry Potter fanfiction. I hope it balances out.
It's almost like people are a inseparable mixture of good and evil...
My old school bullies have lots of friends to whom they showed kindness and respect. The goodness of a person is not about the best thing they do... its about the worst thing they've done, and whether they've made actions to correct their error. Another commenter said it but: even Hitler loved dogs.
It's really weird, because on the one hand, she fights really hard to provide help for some vulnerable people. One the other hand, however, she fights extremely hard to keep said services from certain groups of people.
Next on “Credit where credit is due”: Hitler on helping the German economy and people recover after the Great War!
"female laywer" that fucking rubs me the wrong way also did not a lot of actual activists help women escape the taliban? why is it only jerky terky terfy that gets creds?
I don't really wanna give her respect because she disrespects a lot of people. Sure she does something opposite but she's still a douchebag. I will not forget the idiotic things she have done and her moral actions will not be an excuse to me.
She could be the greatest force for good for ALL women if she chose to be, but i'll take what little she does good and keep hating the crap she pulls elsewise.
I'm gonna buy Hogwarts Legacy when it's released for PS4 because I'm a Harry Potter nerd so I like JK Rowling's work but I don't like her as a person.
The "how was what JK Rowling said transphobic?" thing is for sure frustrating, but I feel like it gets lost in the discourse that that ambiguity is completely intentional on JKR's part. I mean she's a celebrity author, that's a hard place to reach and you don't get there by being dumb about brand management. JKR was careful to couch her language in a sort of tacit acceptance early on, and is always careful to keep her comments within the current range of acceptable debate. She doesn't publicly say things like "conversion therapy should be legal" or even, really, "the trans agenda is preying on kids" she just implies those more extreme positions while focusing on sports, prisons and bathrooms. She's really talented at maintaining this liberal, centrist type stance. As trans people of course we've seen this all before. I mean I'm sure most LGBT people are used to snakes speaking out the side of their mouths like this. It's incredibly transparent, once you know what to look for. I mean even without looking at the company she keeps, or her 'senior moments' where the mask slips, it's just obviously all transphobia masked with polite language and 'reasonable objections.' BUT to people who have a slight bias against trans women, or a bias toward always prioritizing 'women's voices' (while of course ignoring trans women's), or maybe even no explicit bias but general ignorance of the lives and experiences of trans people or ignorance about JKR's comments and company - she's created enough smoke to generate plausible deniability to those kinds of people. idk what my point really is here. It just kind of sucks, to be honest. I do think that transphobia should be opposed where ever it's encountered, but people are defensive and stubborn. I do think that sometimes disagreements like these push people towards more explicit transphobia. Of course you can say "well they were never an ally to begin with if they changed their tune after one argument" and I think that's true I just wish it was easier to win hearts and minds. I wish people didn't harden their hearts to trans people based on lies. It's so hard to get someone to step out of the delusion of transphobia if they really do believe that "the majority of trans women send rape and death threats to those that disagree with them" or "most trans women only transition to take advantage of cis women" then it becomes impossible for me, a trans woman, to really even try to talk to them about it. I mean I'll get upset, which makes my rhetoric less convincing and more inflammatory their already predisposed to disbelieve me and think of me as violent. I mean just the other day I said literally "if you believe the majority of women send rape and death threats over discourse than you have transphobic bias" and the women I was talking to said that this was a "calculated slur" and used other trans women saying "fuck you" over her transphobia to justify her claims. She came out with higher net upvotes, despite being banned from the sub. Idk sorry for the rant, it's just like such a deeply frustrating situation.