JK Rowling defends comments about transgender people despite backlash

J.K. Rowling is defending her views on transgender issues, even as many people on the internet, including actor Daniel Radcliffe and others who starred in the film adaptations of her Harry Potter books, continue to criticise her.

The author angered many on June 6 when she commented on an article headlined, Opinion: Creating a more equal post-COVID-19 world for people who menstruate, saying, “‘People who menstruate.’ I’m sure there used to be a word for those people. Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud?”

After Rowling was called out, because people who don’t identify as women menstruate, too, she argued that people were wrongly “erasing the concept of sex.”

In the days since that exchange, several actors who’ve appeared in movies based on Rowling’s work have publicly disagreed with her.

“Transgender women are women,” Radcliffe, who played the title character in her most famous film franchise, wrote in an essay for the non-profit LGBTQ organisation Trevor Project.

“Any statement to the contrary erases the identity and dignity of transgender people and goes against all advice given by professional health care associations who have far more expertise on this subject matter than either [Rowling] or I.”

Most recently Emma Watson, an outspoken activist who played Hermione Granger in the series, responded to Rowling’s controversial post on Twitter, including two organisations she donates to that support trans people — Mermaids and Mama Cash.

“Trans people are who they say they are and deserve to live their lives without being constantly questioned or told they aren’t who they say they are,” Emma wrote.

“I want my trans followers to know that I and so many other people around the world see you, respect you and love you for who you are.”

Now Rowling has shared a 3,600-word essay on her website, in which she outlined the reasons she feels compelled to speak out on the issue and why she’s “worried about the new transgender activism.”

She explained she’s been interested in trans issues for several years because, professionally, she’s writing a crime series with a character who’s affected by the same issues. Personally, her reasons included being “a domestic abuse and sexual assault survivor.”

“I’m mentioning these things now not in an attempt to garner sympathy,” Rowling wrote, “but out of solidarity with the huge numbers of women who have histories like mine, who’ve been slurred as bigots for having concerns around single-sex spaces.”

She defended her earlier argument, when she said, “But, as many women have said before me, ‘woman’ is not a costume. ‘Woman’ is not an idea in a man’s head. ‘Woman’ is not a pink brain, a liking for Jimmy Choos or any of the other sexist ideas now somehow touted as progressive.

“Moreover, the ‘inclusive’ language that calls female people ‘menstruators’ and ‘people with vulvas’ strikes many women as dehumanising 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.”

After Rowling published her essay, the Human Rights Campaign responded in a statement from the organisation’s president, Alphonso David, given to Variety:

Additional reporting by Raechal Shewfelt.

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