version

Well-known member
I didn't realise the male pseudonym she's using, Robert Galbraith, also happens to be the name of a psychiatrist who experimented with gay conversion therapy. I dunno whether that's why she chose it, but it doesn't look good when taken with everything else.
 

boxedjoy

Well-known member
Rowling being so insanely wealthy that she never has to do anything ever again, and yet continuing with this nonsense, it's absolute madness
 
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padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
I think Rowling must be actively trying to upset people at this point
her cards are on the table at this point, no point for her in pretending otherwise. and, controversy sells.

caricatured transgender serial killer of women was stale when Silence of the Lambs did it 30 years ago

then again, the last thing that would surprise me about JK Rowling is the reuse of stale, hackneyed plot devices
 

boxedjoy

Well-known member
if I had Rowling's money I would just live in my mansion, drinking fine spirits and shagging models all day, diving around pools of money like the opening scenes of Ducktails - she can literally go fuck off into an ivory tower and not have to deal with any of this regardless of how she feels about it, and the fact she feels compelled otherwise is just so abhorrent
 

Leo

Well-known member
Back when 99% of everyone was dirt poor, now that was a time of proper behaving men

yeah, you're right. there have always been shitty people acting shittily, but perhaps not all drawn like moths to a flame as they are when money can be made.

also, was there ever a time when 99% of everyone was dirt poor?
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
I didn't realise the male pseudonym she's using, Robert Galbraith, also happens to be the name of a psychiatrist who experimented with gay conversion therapy. I dunno whether that's why she chose it, but it doesn't look good when taken with everything else.

FTR
 

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
Er...yeah? I think all these people tweeting #RIPJKRowling and getting hysterical over a book they haven't read should seek help tbh. The media reporting of this has been terribly irresponsible on the whole.

 

boxedjoy

Well-known member
Let's say it was a coincidence. She would still have Googled "Robert Galbraith" to check he wasn't like some massive paedo from overseas or something. It's completely disingenuous.
 

boxedjoy

Well-known member
I mean: publishing a book where the plot can be so easily summed up as "trans presenting character is violent killer", under a pen name that's identical to a gay conversion enthusiast, after having spent months cultivating the drama and criticism of being deliberately outspoken against trans rights - none of that exists in a bubble.

I imagine the reason people are hysterical about it is because for a lot of people in their late 20s and early 30s these books were pivotal in their identity - the first books they loved, and lots of parallels with Harry Potter finding his sense of self and home to be made with LGBT+ people and their struggles. People who would have taken Rowling's much-publicised personal battles with adversity as inspiring and heroic.
 

constant escape

winter withered, warm
Well do you think the goal (of those opposing Rowling here) is to prevent bigoted narratives from gaining steam (and thus the argument would be whether or not the narrative is bigoted)?

In trying to prevent such things, is collateral damage justified? In this case, giving Rowling the benefit of the doubt (I'm not familiar with the situation beyond this thread), the collateral damage would be the suppression of a narrative created not by a bigot, but by a commentator, a commentator who doesn't classify under the demographics being commented upon.

She did make prior comments about biological build determining gender, no? So that likely, for most people, makes it less plausible to give her the benefit of the doubt - but the above questioning should apply, in broad strokes, to such situations in general.

Just asking for opinions, not for what the Right Answer is.
 

padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
I mean: publishing a book where the plot can be so easily summed up as "trans presenting character is violent killer", under a pen name that's identical to a gay conversion enthusiast, after having spent months cultivating the drama and criticism of being deliberately outspoken against trans rights - none of that exists in a bubble
yes that would all seem totally obvious, wouldn't it
 

padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
giving Rowling the benefit of the doubt
as @boxedjoy lays out she doesn't deserve the benefit of the doubt

she has spent a great deal of time staking out her position - fine, that's her position. she has to live with the consequences.

she, for example, has literally compared gender-affirming therapy to conversion therapy - about as ugly as it gets short of actual slurs

so when her alias turns out to be a literal pioneer of conversion therapy, of course it raises eyebrows

she doesn't get the benefit of the doubt in this situation, either
 
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