how students at Hogwarts went to the bathroom before plumbing.
On a more personal level, Rowling has further drawn criticism for being a trans-exclusionary radical feminist or TERF, aka. a feminist who doesn't believe transgender women are real women. In addition to having a history of "Liking" anti-trans articles and comments posted to Twitter, she took to the social media platform last December to Maya Forstater, a researcher who was fired shortly after making transphobic statements. Now, Rowling has once again sparked anger online for posting ant-trans comments.
On Saturday, June 6, Rowling tweeted about an article titled "Opinion: Creating a more equal post-COVID-19 world for people who menstruate", saying “‘People who menstruate.’ I’m sure there used to be a word for those people. Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud?” Her comments were quickly criticized for being transphobic, promoting Rowling to post a series of followup tweets. You can read her comments below.
LGBTQ rights organization GLAAD has since responded to Rowling's comments on Twitter, saying "JK Rowling continues to align herself with an ideology which willfully distorts facts about gender identity and people who are trans. In 2020, there is no excuse for targeting trans people." They've further asked people to lend their backing to organizations that transgender individuals (particularly, transgender people of color), including the Marsha P. Johnson Institute and National Black Trans Advocacy Coalition. Queer artists like writers and cartoonists Molly Knox Ostertag and Kate Leth have also publicly criticized Rowling's tweets. Many of them, like Ostertag, have additionally mentioned being confounded Rowling would decide to go on "a transphobic screed about biological gender" in the middle of the current worldwide Black Lives Matter protests and coronavirus pandemic (not to mention, this year's LGBTQ Pride Month).
It remains to be seen if the criticism of Rowling have any noticeable impact on her career, including the Fantastic Beasts movies. surprise inclusion of all eight Harry Potter movies.
Source: JK Rowling/Twitter
