J.K. Rowling shared a social media thread on Monday, the day a new Scottish despise-criminal offense law took impact, that misgendered numerous transgender ladies and appeared to indicate trans ladies have a penchant for sexual predation. On Tuesday, Scottish police declared they would not be investigating the “Harry Potter” author’s remarks as a criminal offense, as some of Rowling’s critics had named for.
“We have been given problems in relation to the social media publish,” a spokesperson for Police Scotland said in a assertion. “The feedback are not assessed to be felony and no further more motion will be taken.”
Scotland’s new Hate Crime and Public Purchase Act criminalizes “stirring up hatred” against people today based on their race, faith, disability, sexuality or gender identification.
“In passing the Scottish Despise Criminal offense Act, Scottish lawmakers appear to be to have positioned greater value on the thoughts of males performing their plan of femaleness, nonetheless misogynistically or opportunistically, than on the rights and freedoms of actual ladies and girls,” Rowling wrote, in section. “The new laws is huge open up to abuse by activists who desire to silence those of us speaking out about the hazards of removing women’s and girls’ one-sex areas, the nonsense created of criminal offense info if violent and sexual assaults fully commited by guys are recorded as feminine crimes, the grotesque unfairness of letting males to contend in woman sports activities, the injustice of women’s jobs, honours and prospects staying taken by trans-recognized males, and the truth and immutability of organic intercourse.”
Rowling also appeared to check the new measure by sharing photos of 10 transgender females — pairing a convicted rapist and sexual offender along with an activist and a broadcaster — and referring to them all as males.
“I’m at present out of the state, but if what I’ve composed right here qualifies as an offense under the terms of the new act, I glance forward to staying arrested when I return to the birthplace of the Scottish Enlightenment,” she wrote.
Rowling doubled down on her criticisms of the law on Tuesday and celebrated the announcement by law enforcement that she would not be prosecuted.
“I hope just about every girl in Scotland who wishes to speak up for the fact and significance of biological sex will be reassured by this announcement, and I believe in that all females — irrespective of profile or monetary suggests — will be taken care of similarly under the regulation,” she wrote on X.
Rowling has faced criticism for decades for her opinions about transgender people, together with questioning regardless of whether much more youthful folks have appear out as transgender in latest many years as the end result of a “contagion” fueled by social media. She has also contended that trans women and ladies pose a sexual violence danger to cisgender females in restrooms, changing rooms and prisons, and reiterated people statements on Monday.
“It is impossible to properly explain or tackle the reality of violence and sexual violence committed towards females and ladies, or handle the existing assault on women’s and girls’ legal rights, until we are permitted to simply call a person a gentleman,” Rowling wrote Monday. “Freedom of speech and belief are at an finish in Scotland if the accurate description of biological sex is deemed felony.”
Britain’s 1st trans broadcaster, India Willoughby — a single of the 10 trans women Rowling shared an impression of — slammed the creator Tuesday in posts of her very own on X. Before the police reported that Rowling would not be arrested, Willoughby identified as on the law enforcement to “start producing prosecutions and protecting the trans neighborhood.”
“If anyone place your identify on a list of sexual intercourse offenders, alongside with other harmless men and women, and then posted that record to 14 million folks would you be annoyed?” she stated in a video clip, referring to Rowling, who has 14 million followers on X. “Would you possibly go to the police and check with them to do anything? Would you be upset? Would you contemplate it hateful? Due to the fact which is what transpired yesterday.”
Talking with the broadcaster Sky News on Tuesday, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak declined to remark on Rowling’s remarks especially but characterized the new Scottish law as a violation of no cost speech.
“We really should not be criminalizing persons indicating typical sense points about biological sexual intercourse,” Sunak stated. “Clearly that is not ideal.”
Sunak himself has been criticized for his remarks on transgender Britons. In February, he mocked the Labour Party’s situation on the definition of a woman in just minutes of British lawmakers listening to that the mom of a murdered trans teenager was in Parliament at the time.
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