"Harry Potter" author Rowling has been absent from social media for several days, after erroneously calling female Olympic boxer Khelif a "man."

Author J.K. Rowling has fallen silent on her usually busy X (formerly Twitter) feed, after Olympic gold medalist boxer Imane Khelif filed a legal complaint in France for alleged cyber harassment over statements regarding her gender.

On August 9, lawyers for Khelif filed a lawsuit with a special unit of the public prosecutor’s office in Paris, stemming from false statements that spread online about her gender after the Algerian boxer defeated Italy’s Angela Carini in her first fight of the 2024 Olympic Games. Carini pulled out 46 seconds into the bout and told reporters afterwards that she had “never felt a punch like this.”

  • LadyAutumn@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    1174·
    4 months ago

    Heaven forbid she lose money. Literally the only thing that could make her stop briefly pause harassing people on the internet.

    • floofloof@lemmy.caEnglish
      532·
      4 months ago

      She has billions. No matter how much she loses she’ll still be obscenely rich.

      • Blade9732@lemmy.world
        302·
        4 months ago

        Maybe they can sue for billions. Gawker got sued out of existence, I hope she gets some good US attorneys and files in a jurisdiction that has unlimited damages. Maybe we can all use the new “K” platform after she owns “X”.

          • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
            192·
            4 months ago

            Yep. Because they outed him. And he couldn’t sue them for that, so he waited around until he found something he could use to sink his teeth into them.

            People were cheering when Gawker lost and got shut down because Gawker sucked. Not me. I saw a billionaire using the justice system successfully for a personal vendetta and was horrified.

    • poo@lemmy.worldEnglish
      321·
      4 months ago

      Wait how is this blatant lie allowed to remain published online? I thought the WSJ had at least some credibility?

      • Doomsider@lemmy.world
        11·
        4 months ago

        No modern US media has any credibility anymore. They are owned by a handful of wealthy people who don’t give a shit about truth or journalistic integrity.

      • ameancow@lemmy.worldEnglish
        101·
        4 months ago

        how is this blatant lie allowed to remain published online?

        A lot of people still think there’s consequence or rules or regulations on what publications can say or do. We abolished those laws a long time ago.

    • jpreston2005@lemmy.world
      4·
      4 months ago

      The author, colin wright, touts himself as a fellow for SEGM “The Society For Evidence-Based Gender Medicine;” which is a non-profit organization that is known for its opposition to gender-affirming care for transgender youth and for engaging in political lobbying.

      He’s a POS who gets paid to write smear pieces endangering the lives of trans people, by people with even worse ideals than his own.

  • feedum_sneedson@lemmy.world
    43·
    4 months ago

    Use of the internet to in any way facilitate the outsourcing of on-site labour overseas is capitalism’s ultimate spatial fix, pass it on.

  • Leviathan@lemmy.world
    844·
    4 months ago

    “Could any picture sum up our new men’s rights movement better?” the writer asked. “The smirk of a male who’s knows he’s protected by a misogynist sporting establishment enjoying the distress of a woman he’s just punched in the head, and whose life’s ambition he’s just shattered.”

    This fucking smug cunt.

      • acosmichippo@lemmy.worldEnglish
        61·
        4 months ago

        all of this started when the (Russian controlled) IBA suddenly disqualified Khelif (who had been boxing for many years without issue) after beating a Russian. Since then IOC banned the IBA due to ties with organized crime, fixing fights, and financial instability, so now IBA has no influence on olympic boxing whatsoever.

        fast forward a couple years to the bigger stage of the olympics, twitter warriors pick up on the story again based on nothing more than “looks like a man” which happens disproportionately more to women of color. So yes, this kind of thing often does have racial undertones.

  • Grass@sh.itjust.works
    924·
    4 months ago

    I managed to never see a photo of rowling until now, and she totally looks like my friend’s dad in poorly done drag and probably also on hard drugs.

    • FarFarAway@startrek.websiteEnglish
      594·
      4 months ago

      I’m honestly confused how she could write a story where Harry Potter triumphs over he who must not be named, when he who must not be named was her hero.

      It must have been really tough for her.

      • JustARaccoon@lemmy.world
        481·
        4 months ago

        It’s less that and more the system of prejudice itself is her hero, because she never truly challenges it, and the final state of peace at the end of the books does not require fixing its problems. Voldemort was a bad apple, nothing more (according to her I’d imagine)

        • LustyArgonian@lemmy.worldEnglish
          431·
          4 months ago

          Yeah the way she kind of bullies Hermione with the whole ‘SPEW’ thing was so off. First, Hermione had style and was a genius. I think she would know that ‘SPEW’ is a bad acronym.

          Also, making everyone turn away from her and no one supporting her - she didn’t need to really make it like that at all. Why couldnt the org have a cute name and Hermione and like Lavender Brown etc all get together to try to coordinate better working conditions for the elves. This then would later help with the plot involving the DA. It’s literally a fantasy and Harry gets magical hero results all the time. It’s just such a weird part of the books and negative when it really didn’t serve any purpose to be negative. Except to be shitty to lady activists.

          • MindTraveller@lemmy.caEnglish
            17·
            4 months ago

            Yeah the HP books are misogynist as fuck. When I was a little one and I found out they were written by a woman, I was in disbelief. Why would a woman write something so mean to women in general?

            Well, the author of HP goes by Robert these days so I guess I had the right idea.

            • Akuchimoya@startrek.website
              4·
              4 months ago

              goes by Robert

              I’m sorry, I think you just short circuited my brain. JK Rowling, who has so publicly and venomously been anti-trans… has spent the last few years pretending to be a man??? What in the hypocrisy is wrong with her!!!

              And now that you mention it, I’d read a long time ago, before she became public with her TERF-ness, that she went by “J K” on the HP books instead of Joanne because she or the publishers didn’t want to discourage boys from picking up a book written by a woman. And now that I’m typing this, I realize the fact that she wrote her books from a boy’s perspective, too. So in all these examples, she’s inhabiting a male persona.

              My brain… can list these facts, but cannot compute them together.

              • MindTraveller@lemmy.caEnglish
                3·
                4 months ago

                Robert Galbraith pretends to be a different gender in order to gain a political advantage and make money. Having absolutely no sense of empathy whatsoever, he assumes everyone else is like him. He assumes trans people are all pretending to be a different gender in order to gain a political advantage and make money. And the only political advantage you can get out of trans femininity (as opposed to trans masculinity) is the appropriation of feminist resources.

                (I mean, you can also get great skin, beautiful flowing locks, and resistance to covid from trans femininity, but I don’t think Robert knows about those)

  • P00ptart@lemmy.world
    1511·
    4 months ago

    No need for lawsuits. Put her in the ring. Let her defend her convictions with her face and fists.

  • SkyezOpen@lemmy.world
    191·
    4 months ago

    Last year boxer was blocked from competing…

    What in the Kentucky fried fuck is the editor doing.

    • TwinTusks@bitforged.spaceEnglish
      352·
      4 months ago

      Apparently that is not true. There was a report of test taken and result was xy, but the report was never shown to the public and the lab that took the test has been banned.

    • microphone900@lemmy.ml
      602·
      4 months ago

      I haven’t seen any reporting confirming that she’s got XY chromosomes. But if you have an article, please correct me if I’m wrong. What I’ve been able to find is this:

      Banned governing body that’s fueling outcry on Olympic boxers has Russian ties and troubled history

      Summary-

      • The disqualification was done in a tournament run by an organization banned by the Olympics.

      • She participated in tournaments run by this organization with no issues for the last several years.

      • The organization hasn’t said why she was disqualified.

      • The man spouting the ‘trans woman’ claims is the leader of the organization. He’s a friend of Putin and described as a drug trafficker.

      • Her disqualification happened after she beat the previously undefeated Russian boxer Amineva 3 days post fight.

      There’s more in the article, but these are the quick bullet points I came up with.

        • AngryishHumanoid@reddthat.com
          72·
          4 months ago

          But they haven’t said what test they performed to determine this, which would be the norm so the results can be verified.

            • AngryishHumanoid@reddthat.com
              72·
              4 months ago

              Why does she have to? Why would she have a copy of a test allegedly done by a 3rd party that, based on news reports, was just using it as an excuse to eliminate her for beating a Russian opponent?

              • Snowflake@sh.itjust.works
                37·
                4 months ago

                Do you know she doesn’t have the test results? When I get medical tests done I usually do receive the test results.

                There are news reports saying she’s a man if you care so much about news reports.

                It’s funny how it works both ways. She doesn’t have to release the results. And they don’t have to release them so you can verify it either. Playing your own stupid game. Why do they have to release the results?

                • AngryishHumanoid@reddthat.com
                  72·
                  4 months ago

                  You seem to be misunderstanding, intentionally I would guess. They claimed they did a test to “confirm” she was not a woman, I’m saying that’s a steaming hot load of bullshit and they were just looking for an excuse and they have no results to release.

                  Please cite your sources saying there are news reports that she’s a man.

    • AngryishHumanoid@reddthat.com
      464·
      4 months ago

      That doesn’t make her not female, or trans. From the Snopes article about this:

      There are genetic conditions, termed differences of sexual development, in which biological females are born with XY chromosomes but possess female anatomy, or that affect how a biological female regulates and reacts to testosterone, causing levels typically associated with males. Though there is no independent confirmation that Khelif has these conditions, people born this way would legally be considered female or intersex.

      Debates over these issues in the context of women’s sports have nothing to do with a purported “woke” or “trans agenda,” because such instances involve women who were born as women, identify as women and have not undergone any sex reassignment surgery or procedure to change this fact. That is what IOC spokesperson Mark Adams meant when he clarified to the press “this is not a transgender issue.”

      Gender-reassignment procedures require significant financial and medical resources. The notion that a woman from a rural western Algerian village who sold scrap metal to support her boxing career would have had the ability to undergo such a procedure in a deeply conservative Muslim country that prohibits the practice is extremely unlikely, at best.

        • MindTraveller@lemmy.caEnglish
          1218·
          4 months ago

          Sure there is. That mouth breather is refusing to use a woman’s feminine pronouns over an unsubstantiated rumour about a minor medical abnormality. They’re being ten times as rude as I am.

              • SLfgb@feddit.nl
                62·
                4 months ago

                I’m sorry but no. Using gender-neutral language does not describe gender; using ‘they’ isn’t to misgender, it just leaves the gender unspecified.

                You can correctly use ‘they’ for anyone. If they’d said ‘he’, now that would’ve been different…

                (Edit: typo)

                • Lemminary@lemmy.world
                  42·
                  4 months ago

                  Yeah, it’s so minor. I think that commenter is only looking for a reason to be upset on behalf of someone else and use that as an excuse to blow up.

                • MindTraveller@lemmy.caEnglish
                  711·
                  4 months ago

                  I didn’t say they were misgendering her, I said they refused to use her preferred pronouns. Surely you can agree with the factual accuracy of that statement.

      • minyakcurry@monyet.cc
        714·
        4 months ago

        The bullshit about XY chromosomes is pretty stupid, which is why the other replier provided an article and a few key points in refutation.

        The OP’s comment didn’t read to me as particularly incendiary, but thanks for labelling them as transphobic and mouth breathing with no precedent! Really appreciate good contributions to discourse like yours.

        EDIT: not sure what the downvotes are for. XY chromosomes are not exactly valid for determining sex, much less gender. Women might have Y chromosomes, or even three copies of X. Gender has nothing to do with this at all, in fact.

        Using XY as an argument is therefore bullshit.

        Even if it’s bullshit, there’s no need to call someone a mouth breather unprovoked. The other thread seems to be a shitshow anyway, so I’m glad the replier is being called out.

    • Gsus4@mander.xyz
      82·
      4 months ago

      According to anti-trans people like her, there are only men and women. At birth Khleif was medically determined to be a woman and always lived as a woman. End of story, particularly for people like JKR who think this is a simple issue.

    • Solumbran@lemmy.world
      173·
      4 months ago

      “I don’t agree with the nazis, but they are allowed to have opinions that we don’t agree with, I don’t understand the hate”

      Yeah, no problem with that logic. Wanting a minority to die/not exist is just an opinion not worth disdain, that’s all, right?

    • Fisk400@feddit.nu
      144·
      4 months ago

      Is that the bar for you? Anything less evil than directly and personally stabbing a baby is ok?

    • sushibowl@feddit.nl
      262·
      4 months ago

      The bigotry is on the same level, but I think JK Rowling is actively militant on a far different level compared to Orson Scott Card. Just looking at their twitter for example, OSC tweets maybe once a month and 9/10 times it’s about a book signing or other such promotion. JK Rowling’s feed is a constant flow of hatred on trans people. She tries very hard to make sure you are reminded of her bigotry every single time you hear anything about her.

      The reach is different too. OSC has some 16k followers. Rowling has 15 million. It’s natural for her to attract a much higher degree of disdain.

      • valek879@sh.itjust.works
        291·
        4 months ago

        This is it right here. I am a trans person and I actually like both the enderverse and harry potter and I’m not a fan of either author. But I can say I like the enderverse without any shame or self loathing because Card doesn’t appear to speak about his shitty views unless directly asked.

        Now with Joanne on the other hand… Well, fuck her and her IP and everything else she might ever do. She is a billionaire and like Musk just can’t be happy with that and shut the fuck up. I get it you foul bitch, you hate me and that I exist, now go buy a fucking yacht and let me struggle to pay rent, buy food, and simply live in peace. All I have ever done to that self righteous cunt is buy her books and yet she feels the need to denigrate me and my existence and espouse hate directed toward me every chance she gets. Just stfu Joanne, you’ve won the game you never have to worry about having your basic needs met ever again. You’ve won. Now go the fuck away.

        Basically I can put blinders on and still enjoy the enderverse and shadows, but I can’t do that with Joanne. Harry Potter will never hold the same place in my heart as it once did. I cannot read it anymore without feeling gross and disgusted with myself for enjoying anything this foul human has produced.

        • MindTraveller@lemmy.caEnglish
          71·
          4 months ago

          To be fair, Ender Wiggin calls his black friend the N word and jokes about owning him as a slave one time. Ender’s Game still somehow manages to be less racist than Harry Potter, but it’s a close race.

          Totally agree with you that I’m less ashamed to like the Ender books tho. Every time I try to understand Leibniz I just remember reading the Ender sequels.

    • Zagorath@aussie.zoneEnglish
      12·
      4 months ago

      She’s not out there stabbing babies

      Rowling is using her considerable clout to drum up hatred of trans people. She might not be wielding the bat, but she helps embolden those who do. It’s essentially stochastic terrorism. To my knowledge, Card has not gone nearly as far off the deep end in this respect.

    • db0@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      134·
      4 months ago

      She’s gone hard into terf land and is spreading hate and disinfo about trans people

  • OneMeaningManyNames@lemmy.mlEnglish
    161·
    4 months ago

    Rowling has been silent on X since August 7, when she shared a post from researcher Maya Forstater, who was fired from her job after making anti-trans statements.

    (my emphases)

    I don’t know where Newsweek takes its facts from but this is another lie pushed by the TERF propaganda machine. Forstater was a tax expert whose contract was not renewed after she was horrible to her trans and non-binary colleagues. (Yes the ‘researcher’ wording is put there on purpose, to amplify the perception that her freedom of speech was violated, or as Rowling likes to put it ‘her livelihood was threatened for disagreeing with the trans lobby’.)

    She then went to a labor tribunal court or sth, to claim that her belief in the “immutability and reality of sex” is a protected belief, and made a fuss about being fired for her beliefs, when in reality she was merely discontinued for being a dick to the people she worked with. Her Twitter feed was full of conflating trans people with rapists and pedophiles.

    The first judge took into account her definition that requires working plumbing to name someone a woman, and consulted a biological expert, impartial to gender identity, that precluded any scientific basis to Forstater’s childish views on biological sex. The judge deemed her belief is “unworthy of respect in a democratic society”, but later, an appeal court said she has a right to believe that but she still cannot misgender people.

    Critical legal theorists suggested that the appeal court held a very low bar as for what opinions “worthy of respect” should be, and that its ruling should be better interpreted as “marginally better than an outright nazi”.

    It is a red flag for both the author and the outlet that they lead with a snippet of propaganda which is as false as unsubstantiated claims that Khelif’s trans or DSD. So should we conclude both toxic narratives are pushed by the same epicenters?