Wrote this over a month ago now, right when the For Women Scotland ruling passed. I meant to hold it back a week or so, make sure it felt productive and not reactive. Then I got a lil swept up in graduating and trying not to kms (sidenote, take your antidepressants kids) and it got lost.
Was re-reading it in light of the Ralph Fiennes casting announcement and I stand by it. So here’s my JKR yap for cis ppl in the fandom about why some trans ppl will (as is their right) never get over us being in this space (below the cut bc it’s Long)
was trying to explain the whole, why some trans people will never forgive you even though you're a Marauders Fan who doesn't give JKR money and headcanons all the Marauders to be queer and trans and poc and 'omg JKR would hate me hahaha,' thing to a cis person, and this is the metaphor I landed on. I'm sure it needs workshopping, so I'm always taking critique, but it has worked pretty well so I thought I'd share
Imagine you've been attacked by a dog (stay with me. I told you it was a metaphor). This dog attacked you violently and on purpose. There are lots of way to react to this, but I think we can all agree that the most common one is to Very Much want to avoid that dog going forward.
Now imagine there's someone who wants to be friends with you, but sometimes randomly they bring the dog round with them. They actually don't see anything wrong with the dog (isn't she just so fluffy and cute??? And one time, back in 1998, she did a really neat trick! Isn't that so cool!)
You probably would not like this person very much. Certainly would not trust them. They have poor judgement when it comes to dogs. Especially because the dog is still lunging at you! This is not a dog that bit once as a puppy. This dog still attacks you any time you get too close! Some people will not care about this at all. They will laugh and egg it on. Maybe swat it with a paper towel roll as it is actively taking a chunk out of your arm as if that will do anything. Maybe just ignore it all together. These are straight bigots. (These are theoretically not who you are in this metaphor.)
Okay, fine! Your 'friend' might say. I'll keep her on a leash. I'll put her in the back yard when you're coming to visit. (But when you're gone I'll still buy her lots of treats. I'll still support her over you. Over your literal life and safety).
This is still probably not someone you'd want to be friends with. (This is why most trans people do not want to be friends with someone who buys merch or supports the reboot.)
(But maybe that's also not you in this metaphor! You don't profit JKR at all.) There is a third type of friend. They don't bring the dog around. They bring pictures of the dog around, and a picture can't hurt anyone! And look they even photoshopped a little pride flag onto the dog's collar! Isn't that precious??? (They tell you that the dog would hate that! The dog would not. The dog cares about eating kibble and the faces of your friends, and that is it)
Still, this is just a picture. No actual harm done. In fact, a lot of other people the dog has hurt are quite fond of looking at pictures of the dog, aren't they?? So what's your problem?? Well, first of all, it's just worth considering that everyone reacts to a dog attack differently. Maybe they're just coping differently than you are. Maybe that was their childhood dog. Maybe it's hard to say goodbye to something you loved even when it hurt you.
But why is it so bad for them to bring pictures of the dog around you? (even beyond the common decency of the fact that you've told them not to). Because unless you tell Every Single person you show those pictures to that the picture might be cute, but the dog is vicious, then all they new people are going to see it as is cute! And then you know what they're going to do? Get the cute dog out of the back yard to play with it, and now we're right back to face mauling territory. They might even want to bring their dog around to play with that dog. And now what? Can you still trust their dog as safe? Or is their dog also going to attack you now??? (This is what happens when you fancast someone so much that it starts to leave this space. Hello Ben Barnes)
Am I saying that these is no ethical way to engage with the dog? No. Well, yes and no. But mostly no. Cause here's the thing, the dog isn't going to die in the next 40 years, (and I do think it's time to drop the metaphor)
JK Rowling has a billion dollars. She is going to be around, she is going to be causing problems for a long time. We cannot stop that. She is also not the only bad dog! She did not write the law, found For Women Scotland, pass the damn thing. If she were not here, transphobia would still be around.
HOWEVER!!!! That is not said to be defeatist or to suggest that it's fine to support her in any way shape or form. That is to say that even if every single trans person, queer person, ally left this space, it would still be populated, and I fear it would only grow in toxicity.
There are some forms of outreach, of hard work that can only be done by people within the community. I see people say a lot that JKR has 14 million Twitter followers. This is true. It is also true that there are over 8 billion people on this earth. It is also true that outside of this week, her average likes per original tweet are what, 20k on a good day? Her replies often only get a few hundred. When you live in and around the communities she is hurting it can be easy to forget how little the average person knows about her. TWICE in the past 2 weeks someone mentioned Harry Potter to me in passing, I mentioned JK Rowling in my reply and they said 'who?' I had to tell them she was the author. These were Gen-Z people I was talking to.
Many many people have heard of her, I will easily concede that, but I think it bears the occasional reminder that the average person, the average casual Harry Potter reader, the kind of person most likely to stumble upon MaraudersTok on their FYP does not know what she's done anymore. It just isn't that common of knowledge. Even my more woke non-fandom friends are shocked every time I tell them the specifics of what she's been up to. They all seem to assume it was a few transphobic tweets back in like 2016, and she was cancelled, and that was it. They do not realize how active and hateful she is in British politics (this is especially true for me and the 99.16% of the world's population that is not British).
And that means some people need to stay around. I know some people will disagree with me, and that's okay. I welcome your thoughts in the comments. But here's what I think: LOTS of the people in this fandom want to do the right thing, but do not know what that is. People who are not aware of what she's done and is still doing. People who don't understand how their individual actions can shape our collective human experience. It is my genuinely held belief that these people can be taught. Why? Because I know these people, because I was these people. I've seen it work.
I owned Harry Potter merch as a kid. I've been to Universal. I'd never so much as heard of trans people before high school, when I joined this fandom. This fandom, and the amazing people who took a chance and took their time on me have helped me to grow and change so much. I am not perfect, but I do a lot of work for the trans community (both online, and more importantly irl with local groups) that I would not have done without the influence of people in this space.
I genuinely think wouldn't have done that otherwise. I've been in a lot of other fandoms too and I've never seen one that talks about trans rights as much as this one. I know that is a necessary side effect of the original author's bigotry, but they don't have this caliber of conversation in the Hunger Games fandom, I don't see it when I'm hanging out in Marvel, Supernatural, any other fandom I know. (and I am not saying they don't talk about it at all, or that they don't have trans headcanons or things, but the quantity, depth, and quality of the conversations has been, in my experience, markedly different)
And I think there's something very real and valid to be said for the fact that these conversations can be had other places. If we all migrate away from this fandom, then maybe we can start having more of these conversations in those places as well, but what about here?
Cause JKR isn't dead, and she shows no signs of stopping. She has enough money to go on like this until she dies. If we all left the quality of the art here would suffer, yes, but there would be enough uneducated new people, enough actual TERFs to keep it going. And without good and patient people here to keep having these same damn conversations, to keep educating, then the only people left here teaching will be the TERFs, and I personally refuse to cede any ground to something that I know will make more fucking TERFs.
I do not begrudge anyone their decision to leave. Especially not a trans person who has to leave for their own mental health. I do not begrudge anyone who chooses to hate me for staying. I do not blame any trans person who wants to yell on the internet about blood on my hands because I know I'm right down in it. But I also have to stay. I think some of us have to stay.
I just don't think strangers yelling from the outside about how you have blood on your hands for engaging with this fandom (which, again, cathartic and important for the yeller) is not very effective for the person being yelled at. The only people who really take that to heart and actually leave the fandom were very rarely your biggest problem people, those profiting JK Rowling, in the first place. Often they are the educators and the voices of good in this fandom.
And if they want to leave, I will wish them well on their way out. But I cannot, in good conscience, do that. Because I've seen this method work. I've seen the slow and incremental, but very real, change that befriending 'neutral' people can make in this space. It is not for every person. I understand why the concept of even being able to be 'neutral' about a matter of life and death at this point is so horrifying that many people can't get past it. But the bigots can get past it. They're happy to recruit.
So I don't think I can afford to step back right now. I want keep reaching out. Keep using this fandom to make connections and change minds. I will not shun you for what you did not know, and I can take the brunt of ignorant and stupid questions. I know I am not perfect, and I cannot expect perfection of anyone else, but I do not think now is the time for me to step back into a bubble where everyone agrees with me. It's time to dig in, interact with people who don't agree with me, and do the work to make them see why trans rights are human rights and why we cannot pet the damn dog.
