I wish that I could share with her and the world, My trans child's coming-out letter to me (mum) at age 12. They spoke of events and aha moments over years, including and before age 5. They wrote so articulately and clearly that it was only knowing the word 'trans' that they realized they were not alone, and could now describe their identity. They also said, " mum, you've always said you would be there for me". I had, and I am. The alternate was to deny their heartfelt trust in me to help them exist in joy.
But, sharing such a letter would only give them fuel, and make us targets. There's no openness to learning, she's only seeking validation to hate, no more, no less. It's so hard to see.
I've shared my own such letter in https://www.bedazzledink.com/hannas-ascent.html. While it's a novel, it is, as the blurb says, "the autobiography that could have been if she had taken a different road, and much of it comes from her own life."
It's what reality was before there was any possibility of such openness between children and parents.
One of my fondest memories was reading those books to my only child when they were about 3. My child grew up reading them and enjoyed them.
That was before either my child's egg or my egg cracked.
Now I'm a mom to a brilliant adult son, and it makes me so mad that one of my most cherished memories has been tainted because the author doesn't think either my son or I should even exist.
I have a meta-headcanon about the books: The story existed, in whatever place stories live before they find a writer to write them. It was a good story that needed to be told, but though it presented itself to many authors, all of them, for whatever reason, rejected it (not unlike what happened after it was written, the quest for a publisher). Eventually it found someone willing to give it a shot - not actually a writer, and in many ways not well-suited to the story, nor able to give it shape in the way it most deserved (and, unbeknownst to the story, a deeply flawed and reprehensible person), but *willing* to write it.
I find this a helpful way to not blame the HP story for its author, and am sharing it because others might also.
Corin, I have struggled with this so much, and especially because all of the main stars of the movies have been so supportive. I have a 3.5 year old grandson who will eventually come to the story. I got in line and bought the books at their midnight release times for my daughter, and read the entire first one and most of the second to her, before her reading skills began to take over.
I don't hate most of the people who are my enemies. Someone like Donald Trump doesn't merit my hatred; he's just a piece of human excretion - best forgotten about as soon as possible. But this woman, for the *deliberate* way she has used her influence for evil - it's hard not to hate. It really is.
Same here with my adult trans daughter, who is having severe anxiety around the current environment. She loved the HP series and was devastated by JKR’s transphobia. What is wrong with people who wake up filled with hate?
Same here with the anxiety. And then we hear people saying to chill out, we'll survive this... and I think to myself, "wow, privileged much?" I don't know how to reassure my daughter because I can't think of any silver linings for her.
She has made transphobia her entire personality at this point and I'm just like, why? Why does she hate trans people so much? Can't help but feel this is personal for her and she has some unresolved issues that she is actively choosing not to tackle so she can scapegoat trans people instead. It's so damn depressing. I grew up on her books and I do still love the stories and characters (thank God for fanon) but knowing she is so hateful brings me no end of sadness. Just think the good she could be doing if she chose to. Instead she spends her time & money spreading hate.
I'm so tired of waking up and being reminded about how much most people hate us and think we don't and/or shouldn't exist. You don't have to understand or relate, Jo. You just have to respect your fellow human beings enough to allow them to live their lives in safety and with dignity. Is it really so much to fucking ask.
I think what happened with her and many TERFS is they have unresolved trauma around men, and it's much easier to double down on the misogynistic idea of completely segregated sexes with entirely different modes of being (which helps the patriarchy because it can be made hierarchical by birthright), and then to demand segregation of the sexes. They're male-repulsed. And to people like that, it's a very easy narrative to say that their being a woman is entirely a consequence of their birth (having no gender incongruence means they cannot mentally separate gender and sex), and being a man and therefore a predator is a condition of birth also. If sex is both a birthright and also men are all predators bent on harming them, they follow that and mix it with old transphobic tropes that trans women are therefore going to hurt them and are "invading" women's spaces to perpetrate this harm.
Whats ironic is that their stance on trans women is deeply misandrist, but their view on trans men is deeply misogynistic, believing us to be stupid, gullible women who just don't understand the beauty of our bodies, and as women are to do, jumped rashly into a decision without thinking. Only they can help the poor stupid little girls from being corrupted by the evil trans women (to them, men).
So, in the end, they're simply using trauma and a conservative view of sex, gender, and the hierarchies therein to perpetuate the idea that women are dumb, men are predators, and that you are born as your sex and therefore must live in the lane you were put in or else it's cheating
It's a complete and total denial that gender exists on a continuum rather than a binary. I call these people "Binary Absolutists" as a result. They see the world in black and white and God FORBID anyone should exist in the grey area. Yet science has proven again and again that humans DO exist in the grey area and have since the dawn of history. There is plenty of evidence showing the existence of non-binary gender expression and plenty of cultures have recognized this. People like Rowling are so steeped in their binary absolutism that they cannot recognize anything else.
I used to present on tons of panel presentations about LGBT, and particularly T, issues. A favorite moment was the inevitable question, “So, do you believe gender is a continuum?” And I’d say, “Well, really, it’s a pandimensional fluid.” Everyone in the audience would nod, thoughtfully, and up in front of the room, my colleagues and I would be straightfacedly trying not to piss ourselves.
Well said. It is a bit of a slough, but I recommend Judith Butler's Who's Afraid of Gender where she addresses the flaws and the roots of the TERF movement, (and that they are, in fact, undermining feminism with their transphobia.
I am a 70-year-old lesbian and my daughter is transgender. I knew something was very different about my daughter when she was in grammar school. Finally at the age of 17 I found out. She is now 23, we live in Massachusetts, and she has not been in a hurry about surgery...until now. We are going to be meeting with her doctors in January about surgery because she is worried about Trumpenstein enacting a nationwide ban. J.K. Rowling is a transphobe. At one time I loved Harry Potter, but I'm so over her that I am over it. I've read the books. I've seen the movies. She gets not one royalty dime from me anymore. She's despicable.
I am in my 75 year and my heart goes out to you and yours. My children are 57 and 55. GRANDgirls are 27 and 25. One GRANDson 8. My entire family are loving, caring and inclusive of all. Well now that I typed that I guess we are not inclusive of the fellon followers, haters and JK liars. Wishing you and yours the best in 2025.
Let’s dare to remind that Jesus said some are born eunuch, some are made eunuch, and some choose to make themselves eunuch. accept it if you can. I am not a translation expert but I think in those times the term was general to gender difference. The hate is just bigotry perpetuated.
So she is really in flat earther territory at this point. She is denying something that is demonstrably true. I mean, she should just open a newspaper or have a look at social media where there are a bunch that of trans kids actually campaigning for better treatment.
I personally can recollect feeling “different” from a young age. Certainly as a teen I have fairly vivid memories of identifying with my gender not my assigned sex. I simply didn’t understand what that meant at the time and that is horrific.
JKR is trying to push us back to those days where people were unaware and THAT is incredibly harmful and demonstrably so (see all the recent studies on that) rather than the nonsensical hyperbole that Rowling employs.
Can she just fuck off and leave people alone? Her opinion is against all major medical organisations and her rhetoric is harmful.
Again, to reiterate, she is in flat-earther, anti-vaxxer, etc, territory now: a totally unhinged individual rambling incoherently.
I distinctly remember asking my mother to buy me a pair of patent leather girl's shoes. I must have been three or four years old.
She, of course, refused. It WAS the 1970's after all. And now that I'm an adult I can buy whatever the fuck I want and JK Rowling has nothing to say about it.
I'm glad that WP poll exists, of course, but it misses the point that SO many children don't even know what questions to ask until they're older teenagers.
I went through high school spending my days paying rapt attention in class, and nights (in breaks from studying) fantasizing about being a girl. And of course not allowing those worlds to come anywhere remotely close to each other.
I have avoided being seen as proselytizing for my novel on someone else's Substack, but I think now is time for an exception. You can read my own story of how that was in the first few chapters of https://www.bedazzledink.com/hannas-ascent.html.
So she is MAGA: saying whatever comes into her mind with no formal study in scientific disciplines, she touts her opinion as fact, in whichever way it pleases her.
But why, one wonders? An early onset dementia symptom is anger. Not much else makes sense.
The Orwellian (sorry, George, that you must be remembered only for one book) audacity of this denial is truly breathtaking.
I refer to Orwell very deliberately. "It denotes an attitude and a brutal policy of draconian control by propaganda, surveillance, disinformation, denial of truth (doublethink), and manipulation of the past,..." [Wikipedia] That is exactly what Rowling is supporting and indeed practicing to the extent that she has the power.
She cannot any longer be considered a more or less garden-variety purveyor of prejudice. She is an active soldier of evil, marching arm in arm with Matt Walsh and pals. She knows exactly what she is doing: deliberately inflicting harm on those with the least defenses. And apparently enjoying it.
I used to compare the challenge of reconciling her creation of the artistically eminent HP series with the challenge of reconciling the man Richard Wagner with his music. But no longer. Wagner's antisemitism pales compared to what she is doing.
A thoughtful comment. When cruelty and harm are the tools she uses, then the conclusion that she "an active soldier of evil" makes sense. But, perhaps it is the Quaker influences in my past, but I think the best tool is not to respond to hate with hate but to shun the one who is doing the hating. A bully always wants an audience. Deny her that audience and perhaps she can break the curse that is eating away at her soul.
You're being sensible there... :) Seriously, that's why I do my best to quell the "hate" response to everyone. DJT isn't worth my emotion of any kind, and that's really the same. It can be hard, in the face of knowing how much misery she's causing, and seeing how she's just embracing it. But I don't disagree with you at all.
How about we start an equally well investigated rumor. I have never met JK: therefore, She doesn’t exist. HP series is a true account of the world of wizards. Cancel JK.
I wish that I could share with her and the world, My trans child's coming-out letter to me (mum) at age 12. They spoke of events and aha moments over years, including and before age 5. They wrote so articulately and clearly that it was only knowing the word 'trans' that they realized they were not alone, and could now describe their identity. They also said, " mum, you've always said you would be there for me". I had, and I am. The alternate was to deny their heartfelt trust in me to help them exist in joy.
But, sharing such a letter would only give them fuel, and make us targets. There's no openness to learning, she's only seeking validation to hate, no more, no less. It's so hard to see.
I've shared my own such letter in https://www.bedazzledink.com/hannas-ascent.html. While it's a novel, it is, as the blurb says, "the autobiography that could have been if she had taken a different road, and much of it comes from her own life."
It's what reality was before there was any possibility of such openness between children and parents.
Next step of the fascist playbook? There is no persecution if there are no victims.
"There are no trans kids" is an aspirational statement for her.
It starts with pretending we don't exist.
It ends with making sure we don't exist.
It's really heartbreaking to see the impact this has on my transgender daughter who grew up with the HP series. 💔
One of my fondest memories was reading those books to my only child when they were about 3. My child grew up reading them and enjoyed them.
That was before either my child's egg or my egg cracked.
Now I'm a mom to a brilliant adult son, and it makes me so mad that one of my most cherished memories has been tainted because the author doesn't think either my son or I should even exist.
I have a meta-headcanon about the books: The story existed, in whatever place stories live before they find a writer to write them. It was a good story that needed to be told, but though it presented itself to many authors, all of them, for whatever reason, rejected it (not unlike what happened after it was written, the quest for a publisher). Eventually it found someone willing to give it a shot - not actually a writer, and in many ways not well-suited to the story, nor able to give it shape in the way it most deserved (and, unbeknownst to the story, a deeply flawed and reprehensible person), but *willing* to write it.
I find this a helpful way to not blame the HP story for its author, and am sharing it because others might also.
A most Pratchettian view. 💚
Corin, I have struggled with this so much, and especially because all of the main stars of the movies have been so supportive. I have a 3.5 year old grandson who will eventually come to the story. I got in line and bought the books at their midnight release times for my daughter, and read the entire first one and most of the second to her, before her reading skills began to take over.
I don't hate most of the people who are my enemies. Someone like Donald Trump doesn't merit my hatred; he's just a piece of human excretion - best forgotten about as soon as possible. But this woman, for the *deliberate* way she has used her influence for evil - it's hard not to hate. It really is.
Same here with my adult trans daughter, who is having severe anxiety around the current environment. She loved the HP series and was devastated by JKR’s transphobia. What is wrong with people who wake up filled with hate?
Same here with the anxiety. And then we hear people saying to chill out, we'll survive this... and I think to myself, "wow, privileged much?" I don't know how to reassure my daughter because I can't think of any silver linings for her.
I am sorry.
And she knows this how, exactly? Is she an expert on the matter? Has she conducted any peer-reviewed research? NO SHE HAS NOT.
She is simply just another transphobic asshole with an OPINION. One that is NOT grounded or based on ANY scientific research whatsoever.
Fuck her. She's just as bad as the Nazis.
She has made transphobia her entire personality at this point and I'm just like, why? Why does she hate trans people so much? Can't help but feel this is personal for her and she has some unresolved issues that she is actively choosing not to tackle so she can scapegoat trans people instead. It's so damn depressing. I grew up on her books and I do still love the stories and characters (thank God for fanon) but knowing she is so hateful brings me no end of sadness. Just think the good she could be doing if she chose to. Instead she spends her time & money spreading hate.
I'm so tired of waking up and being reminded about how much most people hate us and think we don't and/or shouldn't exist. You don't have to understand or relate, Jo. You just have to respect your fellow human beings enough to allow them to live their lives in safety and with dignity. Is it really so much to fucking ask.
I think what happened with her and many TERFS is they have unresolved trauma around men, and it's much easier to double down on the misogynistic idea of completely segregated sexes with entirely different modes of being (which helps the patriarchy because it can be made hierarchical by birthright), and then to demand segregation of the sexes. They're male-repulsed. And to people like that, it's a very easy narrative to say that their being a woman is entirely a consequence of their birth (having no gender incongruence means they cannot mentally separate gender and sex), and being a man and therefore a predator is a condition of birth also. If sex is both a birthright and also men are all predators bent on harming them, they follow that and mix it with old transphobic tropes that trans women are therefore going to hurt them and are "invading" women's spaces to perpetrate this harm.
Whats ironic is that their stance on trans women is deeply misandrist, but their view on trans men is deeply misogynistic, believing us to be stupid, gullible women who just don't understand the beauty of our bodies, and as women are to do, jumped rashly into a decision without thinking. Only they can help the poor stupid little girls from being corrupted by the evil trans women (to them, men).
So, in the end, they're simply using trauma and a conservative view of sex, gender, and the hierarchies therein to perpetuate the idea that women are dumb, men are predators, and that you are born as your sex and therefore must live in the lane you were put in or else it's cheating
It's a complete and total denial that gender exists on a continuum rather than a binary. I call these people "Binary Absolutists" as a result. They see the world in black and white and God FORBID anyone should exist in the grey area. Yet science has proven again and again that humans DO exist in the grey area and have since the dawn of history. There is plenty of evidence showing the existence of non-binary gender expression and plenty of cultures have recognized this. People like Rowling are so steeped in their binary absolutism that they cannot recognize anything else.
I used to present on tons of panel presentations about LGBT, and particularly T, issues. A favorite moment was the inevitable question, “So, do you believe gender is a continuum?” And I’d say, “Well, really, it’s a pandimensional fluid.” Everyone in the audience would nod, thoughtfully, and up in front of the room, my colleagues and I would be straightfacedly trying not to piss ourselves.
Well said. It is a bit of a slough, but I recommend Judith Butler's Who's Afraid of Gender where she addresses the flaws and the roots of the TERF movement, (and that they are, in fact, undermining feminism with their transphobia.
Insightful, thank you.
Can somebody cast a spell on her or something?
"Cone of Silence" seems like an appropriate spell here.
How about "Boil Water", right between the ears.
Um, I dunno. As I recall the Cone of Silence from "Get Smart," it didn't exactly work as intended. :-)
Yeah, gotta cast the D&D version :-)
Earlier this year I went to the library in Berlin where researchers are piecing together the remnants of the institute of sexology's collection.
I've seen the books. I've talked to the researchers. I've been to the Eldorado.
The destruction of our western trans history in Berlin 1933 was not a fever dream.
I am a 70-year-old lesbian and my daughter is transgender. I knew something was very different about my daughter when she was in grammar school. Finally at the age of 17 I found out. She is now 23, we live in Massachusetts, and she has not been in a hurry about surgery...until now. We are going to be meeting with her doctors in January about surgery because she is worried about Trumpenstein enacting a nationwide ban. J.K. Rowling is a transphobe. At one time I loved Harry Potter, but I'm so over her that I am over it. I've read the books. I've seen the movies. She gets not one royalty dime from me anymore. She's despicable.
I am in my 75 year and my heart goes out to you and yours. My children are 57 and 55. GRANDgirls are 27 and 25. One GRANDson 8. My entire family are loving, caring and inclusive of all. Well now that I typed that I guess we are not inclusive of the fellon followers, haters and JK liars. Wishing you and yours the best in 2025.
Thank you for your kind words. I wish you the best as well! We’re in this together.
Let’s dare to remind that Jesus said some are born eunuch, some are made eunuch, and some choose to make themselves eunuch. accept it if you can. I am not a translation expert but I think in those times the term was general to gender difference. The hate is just bigotry perpetuated.
I remember a couple of the verses. "Some have become eunuchs for the kingdom of God. Let him receive it who will."
Also, an Ethiopian eunuch was baptized. So he was accepted in the church.
Well, she claims to be a christian, but I guess she disagrees with Jesus over the existence of trans people.
She's a Christian the same way Donald Trump is one.
What I find ironic is the same people who hated Harry Potter for being "satanic" now praise her for her transphobia.
They just lie, lie, and lie. I’m so tired
I’m so tired of this JoKeR
What is so broken in her brain that she’s made this her life
So she is really in flat earther territory at this point. She is denying something that is demonstrably true. I mean, she should just open a newspaper or have a look at social media where there are a bunch that of trans kids actually campaigning for better treatment.
I personally can recollect feeling “different” from a young age. Certainly as a teen I have fairly vivid memories of identifying with my gender not my assigned sex. I simply didn’t understand what that meant at the time and that is horrific.
JKR is trying to push us back to those days where people were unaware and THAT is incredibly harmful and demonstrably so (see all the recent studies on that) rather than the nonsensical hyperbole that Rowling employs.
Can she just fuck off and leave people alone? Her opinion is against all major medical organisations and her rhetoric is harmful.
Again, to reiterate, she is in flat-earther, anti-vaxxer, etc, territory now: a totally unhinged individual rambling incoherently.
I distinctly remember asking my mother to buy me a pair of patent leather girl's shoes. I must have been three or four years old.
She, of course, refused. It WAS the 1970's after all. And now that I'm an adult I can buy whatever the fuck I want and JK Rowling has nothing to say about it.
I'm glad that WP poll exists, of course, but it misses the point that SO many children don't even know what questions to ask until they're older teenagers.
I went through high school spending my days paying rapt attention in class, and nights (in breaks from studying) fantasizing about being a girl. And of course not allowing those worlds to come anywhere remotely close to each other.
I have avoided being seen as proselytizing for my novel on someone else's Substack, but I think now is time for an exception. You can read my own story of how that was in the first few chapters of https://www.bedazzledink.com/hannas-ascent.html.
So she is MAGA: saying whatever comes into her mind with no formal study in scientific disciplines, she touts her opinion as fact, in whichever way it pleases her.
But why, one wonders? An early onset dementia symptom is anger. Not much else makes sense.
I saw this after posting a stack note about Rowling
"Rowling and the Curse of her unthinking, narcissistic mind"
The Orwellian (sorry, George, that you must be remembered only for one book) audacity of this denial is truly breathtaking.
I refer to Orwell very deliberately. "It denotes an attitude and a brutal policy of draconian control by propaganda, surveillance, disinformation, denial of truth (doublethink), and manipulation of the past,..." [Wikipedia] That is exactly what Rowling is supporting and indeed practicing to the extent that she has the power.
She cannot any longer be considered a more or less garden-variety purveyor of prejudice. She is an active soldier of evil, marching arm in arm with Matt Walsh and pals. She knows exactly what she is doing: deliberately inflicting harm on those with the least defenses. And apparently enjoying it.
I used to compare the challenge of reconciling her creation of the artistically eminent HP series with the challenge of reconciling the man Richard Wagner with his music. But no longer. Wagner's antisemitism pales compared to what she is doing.
A thoughtful comment. When cruelty and harm are the tools she uses, then the conclusion that she "an active soldier of evil" makes sense. But, perhaps it is the Quaker influences in my past, but I think the best tool is not to respond to hate with hate but to shun the one who is doing the hating. A bully always wants an audience. Deny her that audience and perhaps she can break the curse that is eating away at her soul.
You're being sensible there... :) Seriously, that's why I do my best to quell the "hate" response to everyone. DJT isn't worth my emotion of any kind, and that's really the same. It can be hard, in the face of knowing how much misery she's causing, and seeing how she's just embracing it. But I don't disagree with you at all.
How about we start an equally well investigated rumor. I have never met JK: therefore, She doesn’t exist. HP series is a true account of the world of wizards. Cancel JK.