I certainly did. Your first paragraph was very much giving her the benefit of the doubt that she wasn’t always a piece of shit. I disagree. I think she just no longer needs to hide it.
Giving someone the benefit of the doubt isn’t the same as being an apologist.
I think that there are aspects of her personality that sadly lends itself to her ending up in situations like this, but I see the trans stuff more so as a symptom and not a belief she’s held strongly and evily her whole life.
The things I have noticed about Rowling’s character is that she seems to love being praised like a hero or an icon. I think she wants to be a role model because she kinda became one when she wrote her books. I think it gave her a high she hasn’t been able to feel since.
I have also noticed that Rowling tends to double down on things she say. When she started retconing Harry Potter and making everyone retroactively black and gay, she became very aggressive toward anyone who disagreed or questioned this depiction of hers. Back then, people didn’t care as much because she was PC so while she was obnoxious, she was still perceived to be somewhat well-meaning, if in a performative way.
I think she is a massive perfectionist who’s terrified of being wrong or less perfect. I think she retconed her characters because she wanted the credit of being ahead of her time. It wasn’t enough to have written the most popular book series for kids and teens, that changed the landscape of children’s literature. No. She also needed the credit of being PC before it was cool. Even if that wasn’t the case.
She also started calling people fascist on Twitter, pewdiepie being one of them and she never backed down from that statement despite being entirely misinformed and ignorant about the situation with him. I vaguely remember similar instances where she would barge in to discussions on Twitter and make statements that were foolish and uninformed and never apologizing for anything or taking the L.
When the trans stuff happened, it just makes sense to me that she would double down on that too because she cannot be wrong. Personally I don’t think her initial comments on the subject were all that wild, but the things I have heard her say and do since sounds pretty extreme and to me is in line with her pattern of doubling down and going to the extremes to be right before ever admitting fault or backing down.
In that sense, I agree that the pattern of behavior probably was a reoccurring thing for many years, but I don’t believe she hated trans people always. I also don’t believe she cared about PC stuff until it became popular. All those things are mere symptoms of a deeper character flaw of someone who yearns for validation and to be right. But this is just me armchair diagnosing here and I don’t know enough about her past nor about how she is as a person, but based on the things I have casually observed her do for almost two decades, I do believe that this current behavior of hers was cultivated and nurtured rather than being how she was day one. I think she gave in to her negative traits and the fact that she ended up clinging to trans issues, to me, is more down to chance than the core motivation for her. It could have been anything else, honestly, but it became trans stuff.
And no, I am not apologizing for her because I have always found her behavior fucking cringe and misguided. I just don’t believe she has always been a trans hater. At the end of the day, I do kind of feel sorry for her in the same way I feel sorry for Musk and Trump and all his lickspittles.
What hole must you have inside to feel such an urge to self-destruct and actively hurt other people when you feel the smallest bit of pushback or rejection? That must be a very sad existence.
Very well said and I do agree with most of it. My point was more so that just being a transphobe is not the only thing making her a terrible person. There were very troublesome depictions even in her books before we knew she had gone off the deep end. I would argue that those indicate she has always held vile beliefs, she just didn’t flaunt them so brazenly. The fact that she is unable to admit her errors and correct her ways is also an indication that she holds these beliefs deeply.
Yeah, I see what you mean! In that sense, I don’t think we disagree all that much, actually :D
What things in the books have you noticed? I only read the first 4 and got stuck in the 5th - twice. My latest read was ten to twelve years ago, so I’m a bit fuzzy on the details. I just remember being incredibly unimpressed with the writing and story during my last read while still enjoying the world and atmosphere. Didn’t pick up on any weird views and beliefs back then, I think.
I don’t think you read my comment.
I certainly did. Your first paragraph was very much giving her the benefit of the doubt that she wasn’t always a piece of shit. I disagree. I think she just no longer needs to hide it.
Giving someone the benefit of the doubt isn’t the same as being an apologist.
I think that there are aspects of her personality that sadly lends itself to her ending up in situations like this, but I see the trans stuff more so as a symptom and not a belief she’s held strongly and evily her whole life.
The things I have noticed about Rowling’s character is that she seems to love being praised like a hero or an icon. I think she wants to be a role model because she kinda became one when she wrote her books. I think it gave her a high she hasn’t been able to feel since.
I have also noticed that Rowling tends to double down on things she say. When she started retconing Harry Potter and making everyone retroactively black and gay, she became very aggressive toward anyone who disagreed or questioned this depiction of hers. Back then, people didn’t care as much because she was PC so while she was obnoxious, she was still perceived to be somewhat well-meaning, if in a performative way.
I think she is a massive perfectionist who’s terrified of being wrong or less perfect. I think she retconed her characters because she wanted the credit of being ahead of her time. It wasn’t enough to have written the most popular book series for kids and teens, that changed the landscape of children’s literature. No. She also needed the credit of being PC before it was cool. Even if that wasn’t the case.
She also started calling people fascist on Twitter, pewdiepie being one of them and she never backed down from that statement despite being entirely misinformed and ignorant about the situation with him. I vaguely remember similar instances where she would barge in to discussions on Twitter and make statements that were foolish and uninformed and never apologizing for anything or taking the L.
When the trans stuff happened, it just makes sense to me that she would double down on that too because she cannot be wrong. Personally I don’t think her initial comments on the subject were all that wild, but the things I have heard her say and do since sounds pretty extreme and to me is in line with her pattern of doubling down and going to the extremes to be right before ever admitting fault or backing down.
In that sense, I agree that the pattern of behavior probably was a reoccurring thing for many years, but I don’t believe she hated trans people always. I also don’t believe she cared about PC stuff until it became popular. All those things are mere symptoms of a deeper character flaw of someone who yearns for validation and to be right. But this is just me armchair diagnosing here and I don’t know enough about her past nor about how she is as a person, but based on the things I have casually observed her do for almost two decades, I do believe that this current behavior of hers was cultivated and nurtured rather than being how she was day one. I think she gave in to her negative traits and the fact that she ended up clinging to trans issues, to me, is more down to chance than the core motivation for her. It could have been anything else, honestly, but it became trans stuff.
And no, I am not apologizing for her because I have always found her behavior fucking cringe and misguided. I just don’t believe she has always been a trans hater. At the end of the day, I do kind of feel sorry for her in the same way I feel sorry for Musk and Trump and all his lickspittles.
What hole must you have inside to feel such an urge to self-destruct and actively hurt other people when you feel the smallest bit of pushback or rejection? That must be a very sad existence.
Very well said and I do agree with most of it. My point was more so that just being a transphobe is not the only thing making her a terrible person. There were very troublesome depictions even in her books before we knew she had gone off the deep end. I would argue that those indicate she has always held vile beliefs, she just didn’t flaunt them so brazenly. The fact that she is unable to admit her errors and correct her ways is also an indication that she holds these beliefs deeply.
Yeah, I see what you mean! In that sense, I don’t think we disagree all that much, actually :D
What things in the books have you noticed? I only read the first 4 and got stuck in the 5th - twice. My latest read was ten to twelve years ago, so I’m a bit fuzzy on the details. I just remember being incredibly unimpressed with the writing and story during my last read while still enjoying the world and atmosphere. Didn’t pick up on any weird views and beliefs back then, I think.