I don’t understand the lore around JK Rowling and her disdain for Trans people. Didn’t she make gay characters?
Its confusing to be accepting of one and not the other.
I think she doesn’t mind gay people because in her mind “gay people aren’t pretending” But since trans women aren’t born with ovaries, she draws a big dumb line.
You’re asking prejudice to make sense…
Years ago when I boycotted the Harry Potter game people told me it was identity politics and people using the game to fundraise for trans people would be more effective. I know there’s no ethical consumption under Capitalism, and we also have very few or no options even if we try, but I still have some hesitation giving my money directly to something I know will funnel it directly to harming others (like avoiding ChicFillet) especially with software where you can just pirate.
But now we see her directly affecting politics and causing harm to people (such as the bullshit biological sex = gender ruling in the UK she funded) and it no longer feels conceptual. Any money or support of Harry Potter goes directly to harming others. Even just fundraising or steeling the software isn’t good enough if you’re promoting or even just making people feel validated to consume it. Trans rights are more important than my nostalgia for a kid’s book.
Years ago when I boycotted the Harry Potter game people told me it was identity politics and people using the game to fundraise for trans people would be more effective.
To be honest, I feel like a lot of these boycotts are good for calling attention to issues at least, and trying to create a narrative that we should be more conscious consumers in general. We should change attitudes from “it won’t do anything anyway” to “I can’t stomach giving money to these people”.
It is time to move on from Harry Potter, not just “decouple” it
Sad that someone who created such a beloved childhood series for so many is a massive bigot.
Walt Disney
To be fair hos whole generation was taught racism as facts in school
Stares mournfully at my Orson Scott Card Ender collection that started my childhood love of science fiction
My heartbreak was Marion Zimmer Bradley.
That’s easy.
If you want to continue enjoying Potter related things, pirate the fuck out of it.
Or just don’t. Accept that it was created by the figurehead of a widespread bigoted movement and move on. I read the series over 10 times. Read the 5th 6th and 7th books on release dates when I was a child. I discovered aspects of my identity through the Fandom. It far and away is the series I read as a kid that had the largest impact on me… well there were others that were close but still.
Haven’t touched any of it in half a decade. I never will again either. I’m not invested in the creations of people who cause harm to me and those I love. I have no interest in anything produced by people who would bring mass violent harm against my community. I accept the influence it had on me but I let go of it and moved on. I dont believe that anyone is incapable of that, genuinely. There are other better things out there that weren’t made by fascists.
I like harry potter. There are people out there judging me for doing so. to that i say, fuck off.
I am capable or separating art from the artist, something a lot of people really need to learn to do.
Her ‘art’ is shit though, apart from her being a transphobe her books are filled with racism, fatphobia, really weird talk about genitals etc and in the end at least one of her characters becomes a cop.
Besides all that, seperating the ‘art’ from the artist, if you still give her money (as she has careful contracts where she always gets royalties) is directly funding transphobia. If you wish to be the cause of more hatred, stripping of rights and death of trans people, well we don’t want you here, quite frankly.
And you give your money to the art or the artist?
i dont, actually. but thats just cuz im too poor to be spending money on random stuff i wanna read. piracy ftw
The art was made. The artist was paid. Then she came out as a twat. The damage is done and the proceeds from the franchise are mostly over, what with the books and movies being past tense. The only current, actionable issue is the TV show, which let’s face it, offers no value to viewers.
Every time you buy a HP goodie, you stream a HP film, you buy a new HP book, you play Hogwarts Legacy, you finance transphobia. And every time you speak about her works positively, you help her stay relevant, and you make other people buy her works, so you indirectly finance transphobia.
She still gets money from it, she has very careful contracts to ensure anything HP nets her royalties.
Does she not get royalties from that game what came out recently? Or the attractions at Universal Orlando?
She does.
Its not a matter of separating it from her. She isnt dead, shes still alive and consuming her work is kind of a passive endorsement. You know, sure she might be the figurehead of a movement that literally rejects transgender people from society, but thats not enough to give me pause in reading and enjoying her content.
Do you think listening to Chris Brown is cool? What about Diddy? You know separating art from the artist and what not. Consuming art is apparently an entirely neutral activity with no real world implications or consequences, so surely being like “sure Diddy is a serial sexual abuser, but I just adore his music. I’m capable of separating art from the artist” is also entirely valid in your view.
That’s great for you.
But for people that want to continue enjoying it, that’s not a viable route.
And, like I said to a different comment, that’s pretty much reiterating the post that I was responding to. And that’s fine for what it is, but it’s such a pointless thing to make as a response to a suggestion of piracy that works fun a base assumption that there are people that won’t just throw away their existing books and movies, and jump on a boycott.
Like, your opinion is valid and all, it just wasn’t useful as a response to my suggestion
I do think on some level piracy is more ethical than paying her money, but I still see consuming her work in any form as unethical. I think everyone has an internal line beyond which they will no longer consume or engage with art created by someone. Like child abusers tends to be a major one, or sexual assaulters or murderers. Not that these are hard lines that immediately disqualify any art from consumption, but I think most would agree that consuming art knowingly made by people who do those things is wrong and unethical. There’s exceptions as always, loads of famous people running around who do those things who’s art people love. But still I think that its hard to defend that, and that most people have a line somewhere.
By continuing to consume her work you are indirectly stating that she hasn’t done anything to cross that line for you. (Not you specifically, the proverbial you) I don’t think it’s impossible to let go of content created by harmful people, or that anyone categorically can never do that. I think to suggest that is kind of ridiculous. Like I doubt many people would seriously defend listening to and enjoying Diddy’s music.
But for people that want to continue enjoying it, that’s not a viable route.
why would you continue to enjoy it though?
Because they just do. People like what they like. Don’t yuck their yum.
The best we can do is encourage responsible methods of enjoying it… like denying the creator their royalties now that we know what they spend them on.
Don’t yuck their yum.
yes their sweet yummy trash fantasy THAT PUTS MONEY INTO ROWLINGS CAMPAIGN AGAINST TRANSFOLK.
yummy my ass
It sounds like you just hate the content and are using the authors shit behavior as an excuse to talk shit about the content itself. Get some perspective.
Liking a story doesn’t make the reader support all the viewpoints of the author. In many cases, the purchases were already made before her opinions were widely known. Just like how most of us probably inadvertently supported Wienstein before discovering what kinda monster he is, or the thousands of examples of bad people that produce content over the decades. I owned a bill Cosby album, and its still funny, but he’s a monster.
Calling Joanne a shit person is incredibly dismissive of who she is and what she has done.
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Why not?
Look, there’s always going to be a debate about art vs artist. It’s inevitable.
Any work by a flawed person can, and likely will, be conflicted in anyone that shares an objection to the creator. Some will resolve that conflict by rejecting all of it, some will only reject the creator, and some will reject neither, but feel bad about it.
There’s no single answer. There is no answer that is the only right answer, no matter what any individual thinks is the right answer there’s just people making their way through life the best they can.
I don’t think you’re actually asking me to explain the reasons why someone can and will continue enjoying the works of a shitty person. If you are, I can try to explain it, but the way you asked is very rarely an actual question, it’s usually just an invitation to an argument, and I don’t do that on blahaj. But, if that’s not the case, I can write out any of the dozens of reasons I’ve seen and heard people express, maybe even the common thread between them in the hopes that it will help you as a fellow human being find understating with other human beings.
My take? I don’t care. I have no emotional connection to Potter stuff. I enjoy them, but it isn’t like it matters. It’s just shit to pass the hours until death eventually takes us all. But I know that some people do have an emotional connection, and I’m perfectly fine with suggesting a way for them to keep their joy from being stolen from them by a harridan with a small mind and even less of a heart.
Life is too fucking ugly already. If someone finds joy in Potter stuff, IDGAF, we need all the joy we can get. Since there are absolutely ways to steal that joy back from the author without lining her pockets, not only will I not judge anyone doing so, I’ll gladly point them to the software needed to do it. Well, not here, because I ain’t fucking with blahaj like that, but in general.
That’s my take on the matter. Anyone that wants to boycott can and should do so. Those that need the joy of the works, they can and should do so in a way that doesn’t make the jerk any richer
I maintain what I said. Everyone has a line. Murder, sexual violence, child abuse, you know everyone has a point beyond which they will no longer consume content produced by someone. By continuing to consume content produced by Joanne Rowling, they are saying that she hasn’t done anything enough to actually make the content she produced unethical to consume. There are always exceptions when it comes to art. I’m never going to convince people not to like something. But they can and should have to sit with the shame of that. The least they can do is own it, “yes spearheading an international movement to attack the rights of queer people is not enough for me to give up my favorite childhood author”. If that’s it for them, great. They’re people who should probably stay away from the trans community. But to try and act like “No matter what an artist does it doesn’t matter, their art is still sacred on its own and enjoyable without any ethical implcations” is ridiculous.
We’re adult members of a community facing an ongoing outside attempt to literally destroy us. She is the figurehead of a movement thats sole aim is to entirely drive us out of society, an aim she is aware will kill us. If thats not enough for someone to drop a fucking book series than clearly trans lives dont matter too damn much to them.
Are you following me around to other parts of the thread?
That’s a little fucking creepy
Youre spreading apologia for people supporting a woman who is extremely harmful to my community. I’m not going to passively sit back and watch you attempt to downplay how serious this conversation is to us. You ignored my comment and I did bring it over here when I saw you saying the same thing in an adjacent comment (this is all under my original comment, I see the updates). I’m not interested in people spreading support direct or indirect for Joanne Rowling on my home instance. I will argue against that every single step of the way.
She could just be glancing at the entire thread once in a while. Not that weird
Why not?
because it profits a horrible person! how is that a hard concept to comprehend?
your -their - whomever’s - “innocent fandom” PROFITS THE PERSON WANTING TO HURT TRANSFOLK AND YOU DON’T CARE ENOUGH TO SIMPLY CONSUME SOMETHING ELSE.
That’s just dumb, and feckless.
Or grow out of it altogether. Plenty of much better alternatives.
You do understand that you’re just repeating what was in the post that I was responding to, right?
You basically just said “nuh-uh” and said the same thing over again.
Which you can feel free to do, it just doesn’t make any sense.
I read an interview with someone at Adobe a long time ago that talked about how they knew very well Photoshop was the most pirated software on the planet at the time and in fact they even did their best to track how much it was pirated and factored that in to their estimation of prevalence and reach.
I’d be surprised if the publishing industry doesn’t do something similar in order to get an idea of just how popular a title and/or author is, which will of course factor in to any decision to keep publishing new work by an author and thus make them all more money.
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She makes money from the popularity of her IP, whether or not she makes money from any individual title. The success of that game makes her money, because it tells studios that it is profitable to make Potter content, and that will make her money.
So no, do not purchase her stuff, because she will explicitly use her profits from her IP to actively target and hurt trans folk.
This isn’t hypothetical. It’s not multiple steps removed. It’s not “there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism”. This is someone who is explicitly using her money to hurt vulnerable people, so you do not give her more money or encourage others to.
Ever.
No, Rowling has very careful contracts where she gets royalties from all HP related things.
bitchedit: i didn’t think i was being misogynistic here but after some reading and self-crit i can see my mistake.
Someone being awful is no excuse for misogyny.
Alright then, she’s a piece of shit.
[Genuine] Much better. 🙂
Excellent use of that meme 😆
I believe the use here indicates an intense emotional dislike of the subject. Thanks to other factors ‘bitch’ allows the user to convey that dislike while being satisfied with the impact. That the subject is also a woman, tying the other, original meaning in, solidifies ‘bitch’ as a very appropriate word to use.
‘Bitch’(fem.) and ‘bastard’(masc.) are gendered derogatory terms. I recommend a thesaurus for other, less inflammatory terms.
Its use is always misogynistic when used this way. The B slur when applied to women likens them to a dog and when used for men or nonbinary people likens them to a woman and thus a dog. So, no, it’s always misogynistic.
We should do better than stooping to their level and prove them correct about us, that we hate women, even if we are women (but they don’t see us as that thus proving their point). The B slur is only reclaimable if it’s only ever used positively ioo.
Good point about reclamation. Also about trans women representing women. Just the whole thing really. Sorry I know that’s what upvote button is for but this was very good.
Thank you, we appreciate that and really no need to apologise, we appreciate replies and good (faith) discussion.
I’m not going to remove this comment, but in the future please don’t use misogynistic insults.
understood
