The all purpose J.K. Rowling thread

Today: J.K. Rowling wishes people had given Milo Yiannopoulos a platform and let him speak.

Because remember when Harry Potter defeated Voldemort in the marketplace of ideas?

“If there’s one thing that I stand against more than any other, it is authoritarianism,” J.K. Rowling declares without irony in the latest episode of The Witch Trials Of J.K. Rowling podcast. “It’s in literally every book I write.” In her personal life, at least, Rowling has a somewhat contradictory way of representing these beliefs. The increasing social and legal persecution of transgender people, for instance, bears all the hallmarks of that dreaded authoritarianism. Yet Rowling has curiously come out on the other side of that particular debate.

But surely, the author who wrote a whole series about children fighting allegorical Nazis would at least support the shunning of Nazis? Also no. In the same podcast episode, Rowling says critics should have engaged with alt-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos rather than running him off college campuses. “I’m watching from across the pond as he tries to speak on various campuses and there are protests, riots, ‘We want him de-platformed, we don’t want him to speak at all,’” she recalls (per The Telegraph). “And I thought it was a terrible strategic error. My feeling was, you are giving this man way more power than he deserves by behaving in this way. It made Milo look sexier and edgier than he deserved to look.”

“I thought it was strategically appalling… get on that platform and eviscerate his ideas, get on that platform and expose him for the charlatan that he is. You push back hard. You’ve given him so much power by refusing to talk,” Rowling continues. “In fact, they were serving his purposes because he was able to walk away from that saying, ‘Look, they don’t dare debate me, this is how dangerous and edgy I am.’ And I don’t think we want to cast the alt-right in that light.”

One might reasonably argue that allowing Yiannopoulos a platform would have been giving him power. Even that aside, this opinion represents a troubling evolution of Rowling’s beliefs, even outside the already troubling transphobia situation. We even have the benefit of being able to pinpoint the evolution exactly, because Rowling actually shared her thoughts on the situation back in 2017 when Yiannopoulos was being barred from campuses, having his book deal canceled, and being disinvited from CPAC. At that time, Rowling shared a meme on Twitter explaining that free speech “doesn’t mean that anyone else has to listen to your bullshit, or host you while you share it.” So no, it appears she didn’t find deplatforming “strategically appalling” six years ago. In the intervening years, though, she’s had some experience with critics calling for her to be deplatformed or her work to be boycotted, so small wonder that her opinion on what should be done in such a case has changed.

In 2023, Rowling’s definition of authoritarianism seems to pertain to people disagreeing with her specifically. Fans who bullied her off of a Harry Potter fan forum in the ’90s, where she’d been posting under a pseudonym, “were behaving in a way that I had depicted as one of the worst and most grievous of behaviors” in her books. (Rowling does not reveal the opinion she shared to get ousted from the forum, except that it was “very bland.”) Readers who criticized her for culturally appropriating indigenous customs when she expanded her magical world to America are accused of illiberal puritanism “so very contrary to [Rowling’s] core values.”


Defending vulnerable minorities and speaking truth to power would seem completely in line with Rowling’s values as they’ve supposedly been depicted in the Harry Potter series. And the writer acknowledges that she is a figure of power: “The pushback is often, ‘You’re wealthy, you can afford security, you haven’t been silenced.’ All true,” she says in The Witch Trials. But to criticize J.K. Rowling is, in her eyes, to criticize all women. “The attempt to intimidate and silence me is meant to serve as a warning to other women. And I say that because I have seen it used that way,” she claims.

What emerges from this conversation is a warped definition of authoritarianism, in which communities are condemned for self-regulating the kind of views they want to platform and minorities are scolded for speaking out against views that are directly harmful to them. This isn’t to say Rowling hasn’t been the subject of abuse and vitriol, because she has, without a doubt. Rather that she’s completely lost sight of what the word means and on which side of the line she falls. Here’s a hint: If you find yourself siding with Milo Yiannopoulos, in any way, you’ve probably taken a wrong turn somewhere along the line.

https://www.avclub.com/j-k-rowling-authoritarian-milo-yiannopoulos-podcast-1850183976

JK Rowling and Harry Potter aren't really about fighting Fascism though.
They're about maintaining the status quo at all costs.
Notice no systemic change happened after Grindelwald to prevent Voldemort, and no systemic change happened after Voldemort?
Notice the Malfoys get to get away with everything, and lead a sweet life in the name of negative peace?
Nope, everything "back to normal" and you're just gonna have to fight Hitler every 50 years.
Fuck off if you don't like it.
Hell, fuck off and DIE if you don't like it.
If you're one of the corpses in the crossfire, oh well, sucks to be you.

People can whine and blubber about the "snotty tone", but Ursula K. LeGuinn had Rowling nailed.

That, and she's surrounded herself with the TERF version of Grima Wormtongue, and driven off her non-TERF friends, even ones who stuck up for her.
So there's that.

Kind of like the Star Wars sequels. Defeating Vader and the Emperor was all for nothing because the New Republic couldn’t stop the first order from rising and the Emperor making a comeback. That Disney’s fault though.

She's not wrong there - these loser political demagogues like Milo want to be banned from speaking engagements as that's the best thing to gain more notoriety, support and money. The more controversy, the better

on the plus side, google shows apparently his latest achievement was being the "campaign manager" to Kanye (he hooked up the McDonald's and Nick Fuentes when KKKanye dined with the Donald), and he just got fired...

so I dunno... the whole "we aren't renting the stage to this guy" thing might give a last gasp, but only before a slow slide into sidekick-dom.

Nope. What losers like Milo want is to make shitloads of money from sold out lectures, and to make shitloads of money selling books at those lectures. And they want massive yet ineffectual protests against those lectures so they get more free publicity and elevate their standing in political circles, getting them more paid television appearances and maybe even a shot at political office.

If their speaking engagements can't be booked or they get cancelled they'll still try to wring some publicity out of it, but it's barely a consolation prize compared to what they really wanted.

Well you can't have Star Wars without the Wars part, can you.

QFT.

I imagine we wouldn't have been looking quite so critically at her books quite this early into her legacy if she hadn't decided to go all in on fascism.

I guess this means I'll have to continue my 25+ year boycott of her books and movies.

Seriously?

Ticket prices at universities for lectures by people like Milo are $5 a head. Ann Coulter, who sadly has much more cache than Milo is currently charging $50 to hear her speak and that usually includes a copy of whatever shit book she’s promoting in small venues
https://www.ticketsmarter.com/p/ann-coulter-tickets

Hardly shitloads

Nope. What they want is the money from conservative millionaires and billionaires that fund their hatred as well as crowd sourcing on the internet because they’ve been censored by the radical left and they need your help to fight these injustices (barf). That’s where the cash is, know your grift bro!

Plus, the whole bit where Hermione campaigning for House Elves' rights is set up for ridicule, and Rowling has the House Elves proudly declare that they actually like being slaves.

Yes but have you considered the short creatures with long noses who control everyone's gold?

I was talking about Nifflers of course. What were you thinking?

"“If there’s one thing that I stand against more than any other, it is authoritarianism,” J.K. Rowling declares"

Sure hon. Get back to me when you have thoughts on Florida.

She said that she doesn't believe men who think they are women should be allowed in women bathrooms which is a view that many in this world believe in. The fact that a loud minority uses that as a means to try and cancel her just shows how far gone the far left is. They've even taken their brand of Rowling hate to the gaming world. It's so pathetic.

You can't claim the moral high ground over a fascist by being a fascist yourself.

I will say this has all come full circle. In the 90s it was far right wackos who didn't want witchcraft taught to children. Today it's far left wackos who want everyone who doesn't conform to their view of the world to be ridiculed and shamed.

If transwomen are men with a delusion that they're women, then they're not going to go into the bathroom to try to get a peek at vag.

And no hetero cis is going to risk a fucking hate crime to pretend to be trans.

So's flat Earth.

A minority can't cancel you.
That's not how any of this works.
Re-take elementary school math.

What I don't get about the bathrooms thing is that women's toilets are cubicles anyway - it's not like the urinals in the guys' where someone can glance over and see your cock.

Are women leaving the big doors open so you can see the little doors?

The fact that you think flat earthers are in the same league only proves my point and shows what a complete nutter you are.

Are you trying to tell a woman what she should or should not be comfortable with?

An attack on me is an attack on all men.
You're a misandrist.

If a white woman says "I'm scared of Black men 'cause they're all rapists," are you going to waggle your finger at anyone who says she's being racist?

Unless those women are equally concerned that lesbians might be perving on them in the toilets too, I'm saying there's limited opportunity for it to happen.

Sorry bro, but apples and oranges isn't a clever debate tactic.

Meanwhile, it looks like the smear campaign backfired...

Why? They're both fruit, and both grow from trees.

Seems like a great starting point for comparisons.

Smears are lies.
Rowling actually is a bigot.

Unless you're saying "bigotry is true, because money!!".

Hmm, T.R's blocked himself from every layer of search.
For a guy with a "don't care" user title, he sure is paranoid about something.
Couldn't possibly be because we'd very quickly be able to lock on that he's no champion of women.

He hasn't. You might be typing T.R. and getting a "no such poster" but he doesn't have the second period. Echoing back to his school days, perhaps, or his Mom's sexual history.

Either way, typing T.R, pulls up all his recent stuff and the list looks extensive enough to go back a while.

I didn't block myself, you're just a moron that lacks basic computer skills.