29/04/2024
The left wing newspaper Socialist Worker was in no doubt that millionaire author Joanne Rowling, who fashions herself "JK" Rowling, is no friend of ordinary people with her latest outburst against transgender people, about whom she has been running a preoccupied and fixated campaign for some years. The paper notes "Author JK Rowling has deliberately intensified the war on trans people. After the Scottish Hate Crime and Public Order Act came into operation on Monday 1st April, Rowling posted pictures of ten high-profile trans people, ridiculed them and denied their status as women. And, in a stab at the Scottish government and its supposed right to make its own laws, Rishi Sunak agreed with her. You don’t have to think the act is perfect to recognise what Rowling and her Tory supporters are trying to do. They hope to pose as friends of ordinary people while ramping up anti-trans hatred. It’s what the Westminster government did last year before when it blocked the Scottish Gender Recognition Reform bill. It’s another attempt at division and scapegoating". LGBT+ Newswire Pink News added that Scotland’s first minister Humza Yousaf said the new hate crime laws would tackle the tide of hatred that has been “far too pervasive in our society”. He said the country has to have a “zero-tolerance approach to it” so it can “take strong action against it”. “I’ve got every confidence in [the] police investigating matters of hatred appropriately, and of course making sure that we protect freedom of expression so vital to our democracy,” he added. LGBT+ internet commentators also had something to say about Rowling's outburst. One gay man said "Another rant by this judgemental, arrogant narcissist. She doesn't need arresting under the hate crime law. She needs confining in an institution for her clear delusions of grandeur".
