Fandom Friday: Divorcing an Author

My Harry Potter journey began when I was just 3 years-old. Instead of the typical bedtime stories, my dad would read the Harry Potter books to me. By the time I was 7 or 8 I was reading them on my own and was the second one in my family to read the final book when it came out (after my dad of course). All this to say I am a huge Harry Potter fan and always will be. It’s a book series that shaped my childhood and is the biggest reason why I love to read. This is also why it hurts to see an author that I have loved for over 20 years make statements that have hurt major portions of the Harry Potter fandom. Statements for which I can no longer support her as a person.

In case you didn’t know, JK Rowling has made statements on Twitter this week that, in a way, invalidate people who are trans or non-binary. As seen in the photo above, she mocked an article for using the phrase “people who menstruate” instead of “woman”. It should be noted that not all women menstruate and not all who do menstruate are women. This tweet was seen by many in the trans community as erasing trans men and non-binaries and their needs/problems. She then went on to try and explain why she said what she said.

So let’s just clarify a few things. First of all, she mistakenly used the term ‘sex’ when in reality she meant ‘gender’. Gender is a social construct and used to market things like girl toys vs. boy toys, and/or girl interests vs. boy interests. Sex is used in reference to someone’s biological traits, such as hormone levels, chromosomes, genital anatomy, etc. In other words, trans folx believe sex is real too. Also, recognizing trans women as women in no way negates what you have gone through as a cis woman, nor does it take away from any of the fights you still face as one, such as reproductive rights or genital mutilation.

Then the book boxes started getting involved. For those that don’t know, there is a plethora of book box subscription for Middle Grade and YA books and they often feature Harry Potter merchandise in them. Not anymore. A lot of book boxes have come out with statements saying that they will no longer be featuring Harry Potter merch. Owlcrate, one of the most popular book boxes, has said they no longer will have licensed merch.

So then JK Rowling published an essay that felt more like a novel (seriously, has anyone posted it on Goodreads yet?) explaining why she believes in the things that she does. Note, she never apologizes to those she has hurt with these statements, just explains why she supports them. Boy is it riddled with rhetoric that is consistently used by transphobes to deny trans folx rights like using their preferred bathrooms. I don’t have time to unpack all of it, so I’m just going to cover a few points:

She says that she supports many charities and organizations that are designed to help women and children, some with a special focus on medical issues that affect women and men differently. And that’s great, it really is. But this operates under the assumption that gender is binary when most doctors disagree with that and supporting/running organizations that what study how different diseases affect women should be for both cis AND trans women.
She claims that as a former teacher she’s worried about the children and how exposing them to the trans community may affect them. Trans folx are the last people who would want to force a lifestyle on a child. If anything, exposing children to the trans community would teach them how to be more inclusive and accepting of other people’s lifestyles.
She brought up the right to freedom of speech. Really? Yes, everyone has a right to voice their thoughts, which also means that others have a right to disagree with you and show you why those thoughts are harmful to others.
She’s worried about the growing number of individuals who wish to transition and those who may end up regretting it/wish to detransition. The number of people who want to detransition is less than 1% of the total number of people who go through the transition, and most of the time happens before any surgery has happened.
She references being abused and sexually assualted by her ex-husband. This is not do downplay what she went through or anything, but I find using this as a low blow. I sympathize with her, but using your trauma as a reason why others should be denied basic human rights is an asshole thing to do.

There’s more to the essay that I don’t have the time nor the patience to breakdown, however, Andrew James Carter does a spectacular job of it on Twitter. I will end this post by reiterating that I will forever and always be a Potterhead and nothing JK Rowling says or does can take that from me. However from here on out I can no longer support her financially. Instead, I’ll be buying merch from unlicensed shops off Etsy or Instagram. I can only hope that Owlcrate will finish out their collection of Cara Kozik mugs (featured in the image below).