JK Rowling lends her support to trans row

A WOMAN who “misgendered” a Dundee cou nci l lor has been given support from an unexpected source – Harry Potter author JK Rowling.

The author has lent her support to researcher Maya Forstater on Twitter after the worker lost a landmark employment tribunal case for making “intimidating, hostile” comments about trans people.

She wrote: “Call yourself whatever you like . . . but force women out of their jobs for stating that sex is real? #IStandWithMaya.”

Forstater lost her job with think tank CGD Europe last year after other staff raised concerns about allegedly transphobic remarks she made on social media, including retweeting a cartoon of a person flashing two women with the caption: “It’s all right – it’s a woman’s penis.”

In August this year, after losing her job, Forstater was the subject of a complaint by Dundee rights of others. He wrote: “It is a core component of her belief that she will refer to a person by the sex she considered appropriate even if it violates their dignity and/or creates an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment. The approach is not worthy of respect in a democratic society.”

Murray has welcomed the judgment. In an exclusive statement to the Tele, the councillor said: “The judgment is very welcome, and trans people up and down the UK will be relieved to have it confirmed that such extremist views are not without consequence.

“She has wasted £80,000 so far on this case, to defend her outright transphobia, and I hope that she does the decent thing and accepts that she was in the wrong.

“The intervention of people such as JK Rowling is unhelpful at best. Using her nearly 15 million followers to whip up yet more hysteria against trans people is absolutely unacceptable and she should be ashamed of herself. On a personal note, as someone who grew up with the Harry Potter books, I am absolutely gutted to see her spread such malicious messages.”