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Controversy over transphobia in J.K Rowling's new book


Ser Drewy

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On 9/15/2020 at 10:25 AM, sologdin said:

never stopped the righteous Twitter mobs.

yeah, a bit frivolous.  pseudonyms have a certain license; my nom de guerre here is deliberately adopted from a character in a solzhenitsyn novel who is irredeemably rightwing, and that character is based on an actual person whose politics are as far right as it gets.  all this means nothing.

I'm sorry but what does this mean? 

I'm not very intelligent so I don't get the connection to "righteous Twitter mobs". 

Most of these people don't care about Rowling and are just angering themselves for no reason. 

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47 minutes ago, butterweedstrover said:

I haven't read the book nor will I. 

However I don't see why she got involved in politics to begin with. Literature is best involved with real world topics elliptically (well at least fantasy, Bear Town did an excellent job centering a story around a modern day issue). 

All of this is ancillary to the point that this subject isn't bettering her own life, so why is she fighting this battle? Its not personal and she's doing no one a favor. 

That being said the self-righteous anger on this thread and name calling has gone overboard.  

She is just one person, and she probably believes what she says which is more than I can say for most people. 

She’s been quite vocal on a number of matters over the years, often on issues I’m sure a lot of people here would support her on. She’s also been defensive and not a good faith actor before too.

I also suspect that the trans issue really wasn’t a big deal to her, it’s just that it intersects with some of her other views around feminism, and when she got push back it simply hardened her views and made her even more defensive and seeking victimhood.

 

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6 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

She’s been quite vocal on a number of matters over the years, often on issues I’m sure a lot of people here would support her on. She’s also been defensive and not a good faith actor before too.

I also suspect that the trans issue really wasn’t a big deal to her, it’s just that it intersects with some of her other views around feminism, and when she got push back it simply hardened her views and made her even more defensive and seeking victimhood.

 

Yeah I agree with this. 

It obviously wasn't something she cared about before, but the pushback made her decide to double/triple down on the issue. 

She should just let go. Engaging in online wars can seem exhilarating at first, but at some point you're letting other people control your own life. 

 

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12 minutes ago, butterweedstrover said:

Yeah I agree with this. 

It obviously wasn't something she cared about before, but the pushback made her decide to double/triple down on the issue. 

She should just let go. Engaging in online wars can seem exhilarating at first, but at some point you're letting other people control your own life. 

 

I have a suspicion she likes to feel like she is a ‘good person’ and is always fighting the good fight. It seemed that way when she was tweeting politics etc.

She is probably really shocked by the reaction to her tweets about ‘people who menstruate’. Her massive letter explaining why she is still a good and nice person was really just an extension of her trying to convince everyone of her own ‘niceness’. It’s kind of embarrassing.

I don’t think she is the sort of person to back down or apologise, it would dent her own self image too much. You are right though, she should have just moved away from the topic, as actually I doubt she would have had much interest in it if her tweet went unnoticed.

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2 hours ago, butterweedstrover said:

I haven't read the book nor will I. 

However I don't see why she got involved in politics to begin with. Literature is best involved with real world topics elliptically (well at least fantasy, Bear Town did an excellent job centering a story around a modern day issue). 

All of this is ancillary to the point that this subject isn't bettering her own life, so why is she fighting this battle? Its not personal and she's doing no one a favor. 

That being said the self-righteous anger on this thread and name calling has gone overboard.  

She is just one person, and she probably believes what she says which is more than I can say for most people. 

Eh. You don’t have to have personal connection to an issue to comment on it.

I’m not faulting her for being a celebrity commenting on a political in it of itself.

But bigotry is harmful. And she’s not some no name bigot on the street that no one is paying attention to.

Her twitter account alone is a platform towards millions.

I don’t think her getting criticized for her transphobia really altered her inclination to be transphobic.

Shes not unique if she genuinely believes in the things she espouses.

Richard Spencer believes having ethnic cleansing of America would be a good thing.

He’s one person whose rhetoric had help radicalize people into murdering people.

2 hours ago, butterweedstrover said:

I'm sorry but what does this mean? 

I'm not very intelligent so I don't get the connection to "righteous Twitter mobs". 

Most of these people don't care about Rowling and are just angering themselves for no reason. 

It’s anger at the knowledge Rowlings rhetoric does make the world for trans people more dangerous than it already is.

Promoting Ideas can have real world consequences.

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3 hours ago, butterweedstrover said:

That being said the self-righteous anger on this thread and name calling has gone overboard.  

She is just one person, and she probably believes what she says which is more than I can say for most people. 

Sooo . . . I should applaud people speaking from genuinely held beliefs no matter how repugnant and harmful because people being disingenuous about their beliefs are annoying?

Like "Those Nazis might have some bad ideas about the Jews, but at least they really believe what they say. Those dudebro feminists, though, they are the real enemy."

No. That is no way to evaluate the moral weight of speech and action.

And this is (frustratingly) a way of thinking that has corrupted our politics and political discourse. People are drawn to bigoted demagogues over responsible politicians because "at least they believe what they are saying", and bam, we get hit with leaders who lack ethics, good policy grounding and are enthralled with inflaming the base desires and speaking to the fears of people who are ignorant about the issues. This is exactly the appeal of the politician Pauline Hanson here in Australia, and I can't even name all the ways that she is wrong and despicable and pathetic.

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51 minutes ago, Mazzack said:

Sooo . . . I should applaud people speaking from genuinely held beliefs no matter how repugnant and harmful because people being disingenuous about their beliefs are annoying?

Like "Those Nazis might have some bad ideas about the Jews, but at least they really believe what they say. Those dudebro feminists, though, they are the real enemy."

No. That is no way to evaluate the moral weight of speech and action.

And this is (frustratingly) a way of thinking that has corrupted our politics and political discourse. People are drawn to bigoted demagogues over responsible politicians because "at least they believe what they are saying", and bam, we get hit with leaders who lack ethics, good policy grounding and are enthralled with inflaming the base desires and speaking to the fears of people who are ignorant about the issues. This is exactly the appeal of the politician Pauline Hanson here in Australia, and I can't even name all the ways that she is wrong and despicable and pathetic.

What she is saying is not Nazism. 

She is being opportunistic which I why I think she should stop. 

And no, people rarely believe in much of anything. Getting angry about subjects you don't understand isn't believing in something, it's just a social past time or activity to fill out your social media page.  

Most people just value consumption and instant gratification. Really wanting something out of life is rare. Now I don't think JK Rowling cares about this issue as much as she lets on. 

She saw it got attention so she decided to cast herself as the victim, which is pretty weak of her. 

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I doubt that Rowling is being opportunistic. It doesn’t fit with any other thing she has done, other than pound the pavement looking for a publisher and recklessly haunting cafes to write in with baby in tow. She opportunistically lives in Britain, where she agrees with paying large amounts of taxes as her way to give back.  Even so, she supports charities. Harry Potter was about wizards, sure, but it was also endorsing resistance, self defense. and self sacrifice. She still gets her books burned because of the make- believe occultism.if she doesn’t get trans entirely, lots of people don’t. If you believe that young people were rashly subverting puberty on a lark, it may horrify. I think  the decision is  much more innate and careful, but that just my opinion. I don’t really think anyone on high doses of hormones should be competing, other than on a privately owned team. If you want allies, I would resist calling strong willed women feminazi. It’s a turn off for sure. Also you guys are standing on our shoulders...you’re welcome. I would benefit from your stories.

what she may have done is had her eye was caught by this story and it’s topical

 

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3 hours ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

It’s anger at the knowledge Rowlings rhetoric does make the world for trans people more dangerous than it already is.

Promoting Ideas can have real world consequences.

Just to agree with you, the UK government is not going ahead with changes to the GRA and you're kidding yourself if you think that wasn't influenced by the minority but very vocal opposition which includes JKs shit storm on the issue.

We're not just talking about harm directly to trans people from her words, we're not even just talking about the way her words can inspire hatred towards trans people on the individual level. We're talking using your influence to reinforce institutional oppression against a minority that seeks to make us tear our identities apart and pretend we don't exist so that we don't offend others with our mere existence.

That's a hell of a lot more than just "not getting trans", and surely if you respect her you can hold her to a higher fucking standard than "I don't understand something, therefore rather than actually getting informed on the subject I'll just join a large campaign dedicated to suppressing the rights of a minority". It's not something that happens by accident ffs.

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4 hours ago, karaddin said:

Just to agree with you, the UK government is not going ahead with changes to the GRA and you're kidding yourself if you think that wasn't influenced by the minority but very vocal opposition which includes JKs shit storm on the issue

It is not a minority view. If you check out YouGov polling data it shows that while the majority of the country support trans rights and don’t have a problem with changing sex, the majority of people think laws shouldn’t be made easier than the existing ones. 
 

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2020/07/16/where-does-british-public-stand-transgender-rights

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7 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

The non change of law is reflected by the opinions of the majority of people within the country. That’s the point. 

I'm not even talking about that though. My post wasn't a response to your conversation with karaddin. Twas a reading of the survey :dunno:

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3 hours ago, Heartofice said:

It is not a minority view. If you check out YouGov polling data it shows that while the majority of the country support trans rights and don’t have a problem with changing sex, the majority of people think laws shouldn’t be made easier than the existing ones. 
 

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2020/07/16/where-does-british-public-stand-transgender-rights

What exactly is your view of Rowling’s Transphobia?

So far you haven’t directly addressed that.

Mostly just the offense her transphobia generated

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11 minutes ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

What exactly is your view of Rowling’s Transphobia?

So far you haven’t directly addressed that.

Mostly just the offense her transphobia generated

Haha! I know you’ve been dying to get that out of me. Continuously looking for an argument. You wonder why I always laugh at your posts?

Ok sure. This time I’ll bite. Even though I really didn’t want to go into it because it’s shaky grounds and I don’t honestly have a strong opinion on it, and am happy to be proven wrong.

What I think is that I’m not entirely convinced that Rowling is a transphobe, as in I don’t think she hates trans people or is scared of them or wants to discriminate against them. 
 

What I do think is that her opinions are based on her own feminists viewpoint, and of her own experience, painting herself and other women as victims, victims of men, men who she sees as violent oppressors. I think that her uninformed preoccupation with who can use toilets and changing rooms is because she has a fear that relaxed laws will be abused by men, because she doesn’t trust men. 
 

This is why I suspect she really has little interest in the wellbeing of trans people or any strong opinions on trans rights. What she cares about is protecting women and children, and that’s why she’s so convinced of her own goodness.

I also think she is wrong on a number of issues, like the above ‘toilet’ thing, I’ve read enough on it to see that her fears have no foundation. But being wrong and uninformed doesn’t make her a transphobe. In fact her views seem to be in line with the vast majority of the British population.

What I also think, as I mentioned above, is that she hasn’t handled the backlash well, and that she has gotten caught in a web of having to double down on her opinions, rather than shut up about them. Her own sense of entitlement and victimhood has led her to think that she could never be in the wrong on anything, and so she’s going out of her way to try and win an argument, on an issue I suspect she actually in her heart doesn’t care about.

Its pretty obvious I don’t like her, I think she is a shit person, and I’ve seen this pattern of her behaviour before. But I am not convinced she is a transphobe, but as I said, I am open to the idea that she harbours those thoughts. I don’t have any certainty about what other people think , unlike a lot of people who claim empathy as some sort of psychic power.

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https://www.google.com/amp/s/ew.com/movies/fantastic-beasts-franchise-future-jk-rowling/%3famp=true

I know most would have seen this or something like this, but still... 

JK Rowling seems to have problems with anything she does. Cormoran Strike to Newt Scamander. 

Spoiler

Star Johnny Depp plays the franchise's villain Gellert Grindelwald and has been under fire for years due to domestic violence allegations made by his ex-wife Amber Heard.

Ezra Miller - Choking episode

Rowling - well.... Which one to say first? 

 

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I wonder if, now there’s been a new statement on the legal situation, Rowling will come to the sudden shocking realisation that toilets are, and always have been, open for entry to her nightmare scenario of predatory men dressed in women’s clothing, regardless of whether they have a gender recognition certificate in their back pocket.

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don't get the connection to "righteous Twitter mobs". 

the colloquy on page one of the thread concerned the mobs aforesaid drawing unsavory inferences about her pseudonym, as i recall it?

that said, somewhat cynical to assume bad faith in concluding that kindly interlocutors anger themselves needlessly?

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[mod] I've had enough of having to read a bunch of cisgender people talk out of their asses about my lived experience and that of @karaddin purely for the entertainment value of bloviating on the internet. Topic closed, and please do not open another thread on it. Thank you. [/mod]

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