Harry Potter author JK Rowling has burned the bridge she had with franchise actors Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson after saying that their support and advocacy for transgender rights made them "complicit" to the controversial medical intervention in gender care that was criticized in an independent review released this week.
According to the BBC, the Cass Review was released on Wednesday (Apr. 10), highlighting that children had been let down by what it claimed as "remarkably weak" evidence on medical intervention in gender care.
"It is unusual for us to give a potentially life-changing treatment to young people and not know what happens to them in adulthood, and that's been a particular problem that we haven't had the follow-up into adulthood to know what the results of this are," report author Dr. Hilary Cass told BBC Radio 4.
In reaction to the report, Rowling published a string of tweets welcoming the review, which raised concerns about gender identity services for minors under 18.
Over the last four years, Hilary Cass has conducted the most robust review of the medical evidence for transitioning children that's ever been conducted. Mere hours after it was released to the press and public, committed ideologues are doubling down. 1/6 https://t.co/J4fA4JYgkC
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) April 10, 2024
"Over the last four years, Hilary Cass has conducted the most robust review of the medical evidence for transitioning children that's ever been conducted," she said on X, formerly Twitter. "Mere hours after it was released to the press and public, committed ideologues are doubling down."
Rowling also expressed outrage about how the trans rights movement supposedly destroyed countless lives due to the irreversible changes groups aligned to such an ideology allowed to happen in the past few years.
"The #CassReview may be a watershed moment, but it comes too late for detransitioners who've written me heartbreaking letters of regret," she concluded. "Today's not a triumph, it's the laying bare of a tragedy."
Rowling to Harry and Hermione: 'Save Your Apologies...'
Meanwhile, an X user named Adam Harris responded to Rowling's statements, wondering if Radcliffe and Watson - who portrayed Harry Potter and Hermione Granger, respectively - would "give [her] a public apology ... safe in the knowledge that [she would] forgive them."
Not safe, I'm afraid. Celebs who cosied up to a movement intent on eroding women's hard-won rights and who used their platforms to cheer on the transitioning of minors can save their apologies for traumatised detransitioners and vulnerable women reliant on single sex spaces.
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) April 10, 2024
"Not safe, I'm afraid," the author replied. "Celebs who cosied up to a movement intent on eroding women's hard-won rights and who used their platforms to cheer on the transitioning of minors can save their apologies for traumatized detransitioners and vulnerable women reliant on single sex spaces."
Both actors have criticized Rowling for her convictions in 2020.
"It's clear that we need to do more to support transgender and nonbinary people, not invalidate their identities," Radcliffe said.
"Trans people are who they say they are and deserve to live their lives without being constantly questioned or told they aren't who they say they are," Watson added.
Eddie Redmayne, the actor portraying Newt Scamander in Rowling's Fantastic Beasts franchise, also disagreed with the author, saying that "Trans women are women, trans men are men and non-binary identities are valid."
Rowling has been accused of being transphobic and a trans-exclusionary radical feminist (TERF) for her views on gender identity and for saying that transwomen should not be allowed into female-only spaces.
She has denied being transphobic, previously saying that she respected "every trans person's right to live any way that feels authentic and comfortable to them" and that she wanted people to be free from discrimination and abuse.
She also recently challenged police in Scotland, where she is currently residing, to arrest her under a new hate crime law after she described several trans women as men.
However, Police Scotland decided not to take any action, and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Labour Party's shadow chancellor for the Duchy of Lancaster Pat McFadden both supported Rowling's exercise of freedom of speech and criticized the Scottish legislation.
On the other hand, Ralph Fiennes, who played Potter villain Lord Voldemort, came to Rowling's defense, calling the abuse she received "disgusting" and "appalling."
Other stars, including Eddie Izzard and Helena Bonham Carter, have also said they did not consider Rowling's views to be transphobic but reflective of her own experience of abuse.
