Briton JK Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter adventures, said Monday, November 22 that she had received many death threats from some activists for transgender rights who accuse her of transphobia.
“I have now received so many death threats that I could line the house with them and I have not stopped speaking out”, the novelist said in a series of tweets. She also denounces the fact that three activists “photographed themselves in front of (his) house” the previous week, “by positioning yourself carefully so that (his) address is visible”, before posting the snapshot on Twitter.
Contacted by AFP, Scottish police said that a “investigation is in progress”.
Last year JK Rowling shared an article on Twitter about “menstruating people”, commenting ironically: “I’m sure we should have a word for these people. Someone help me. Feum? Famme? Feemm? “. She has drawn the wrath of some Internet users, who reminded her that transgender men can have their period and transgender women cannot.
The status of trans people has been hotly debated in recent years in the UK, with activists fighting for their rights on one side and some intellectuals, authors and teachers accused of transphobia on the other, claiming to be victims. of the “cancel culture”.
A professor of philosophy, Kathleen Stock, resigned from the University of Sussex (southern England) in October, saying she was the victim of a campaign of “bullying”. In particular, she felt that gender identity cannot take precedence over biological sex. “when it comes to law and politics”.
JK Rowling claims in her tweets that she has been contacted by many women who have done “the subject of intimidation campaigns ranging from harassment on social networks to the targeting of their employers, including the disclosure of personal data and direct threats of violence, including rape.” She accuses in particular the three activists who posted her address online of having done so to “intimidate her and prevent her from defending women’s rights based on gender” biological.
According to the National Bureau of Statistics, transgender Britons are “twice as likely” to be victims of a crime or an offense than those who are not. In 2019, two in five trans people had been the victims of a hate crime or incident, according to the YouGov institute.