Actor Robbie Coltrane, who played Hagrid in the “Harry Potter” film series, has come to the defense of author J.K. Rowling amid the backlash against her criticisms of transgender ideology.
Speaking with Radio Times, Coltrane said that he could not understand why people were so outraged by Rowling’s comments about sex and gender being real while knocking the “Twitter generation.”
“I don’t think what she said was offensive really. I don’t know why but there’s a whole Twitter generation of people who hang around waiting to be offended,” he said, as reported by Yahoo U.K. “They wouldn’t have won the war, would they? That’s me talking like a grumpy old man, but you just think, ‘Oh, get over yourself. Wise up, stand up straight and carry on.’”
“I don’t want to get involved in all of that because of all the hate mail and all that s***, which I don’t need at my time of life,” he added.
As of this writing, Coltrane is the only cast member of the “Harry Potter” series to defend J.K. Rowling.
Earlier in the summer, J.K. Rowling said that transgender ideology could lead to the erasure of womanhood as we know it by denying the basic biological functions that differentiate women from men. “If sex isn’t real, there’s no same-sex attraction. If sex isn’t real, the lived reality of women globally is erased. I know and love trans people, but erasing the concept of sex removes the ability of many to meaningfully discuss their lives. It isn’t hate to speak the truth,” she tweeted.
Following her post, Rowling faced severe social media backlash, prompting “Harry Potter” stars Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint and “Fantastic Beasts” star Eddie Redmayne to publicly declare their support for the trans movement. As criticism mounted, Rowling penned an essay about her experiences as a survivor of both sexual assault and domestic violence and argued that the concept of men becoming women erases womanhood entirely.
“It isn’t enough for women to be trans allies,” she wrote. “Women must accept and admit that there is no material difference between trans women and themselves. But, as many women have said before me, ‘woman’ is not a costume. ‘Woman’ is not an idea in a man’s head. ‘Woman’ is not a pink brain, a liking for Jimmy Choos, or any of the other sexist ideas now somehow touted as progressive.”
On Monday the hashtag #RIPJKRowling began trending on Twitter in response to the news that her new book will center on a cross-dressing serial killer.
“According to the first review of the new mystery novel, the story’s antagonist is a male serial killer who wears dresses as he hunts and dupes his victims, who are women,” reported Insider. “Jake Kerridge of The Telegraph wrote the novel’s ‘moral seems to be: never trust a man in a dress.'”
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