In a new podcast episode, Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, whose explicitly transphobic comments have tainted the beloved fantasy series over the past couple years, says she “never set out to upset anyone.”
“However, I was not uncomfortable with getting off my pedestal,” Rowling added, per Variety.
The podcast is produced by The Free Press, a new media company founded by Bari Weiss, a controversial former New York Times opinion columnist. On the podcast, Rowling claims her anti-trans comments have been misinterpreted.
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“What has interested me in recent years, particularly on social media [is when fans say], ‘You’ve ruined your legacy,” Rowling is quoted as saying in the podcast. “‘Oh, you could have been beloved forever, but you chose to say this.’ And I think: ‘You could not have misunderstood me more profoundly.’”
Rowling first attracted controversy with a series of tweets she posted in 2020, but prior to that, she’d been liking tweets that criticized the transgender movement. She later said those likes had been mistakes.
“If sex isn’t real, there’s no same-sex attraction,” Rowling tweeted in June 2020. “If sex isn’t real, the lived reality of women globally is erased. I know and love trans people, but erasing the concept of sex removes the ability of many to meaningfully discuss their lives. It isn’t hate to speak the truth.”
“‘People who menstruate,’” Rowling commented in another 2020 tweet. “I’m sure there used to be a word for those people. Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud?”
In a 2020 blog post, the author elaborated: “The ‘inclusive’ language that calls female people ‘menstruators’ and ‘people with vulvas’ strikes many women as dehumanizing and demeaning. I understand why trans activists consider this language to be appropriate and kind, but for those of us who’ve had degrading slurs spat at us by violent men, it’s not neutral, it’s hostile and alienating.”
“I want trans women to be safe,” Rowling’s blog post continued. “At the same time, I do not want to make natal girls and women less safe. When you throw open the doors of bathrooms and changing rooms to any man who believes or feels he’s a woman–and, as I’ve said, gender confirmation certificates may now be granted without any need for surgery or hormones–then you open the door to any and all men who wish to come inside. That is the simple truth.”
