The Letter

A letter was published in Harper’s magazine on Tuesday, and signed by a whole bunch of famous people, including authors J.K. Rowling, Margaret Atwood, and Salman Rushdie, intellectuals Stephen Pinker and Noam Chomsky, feminist lawyer Gloria Steinem, chess Master Gary Kasparov, and others, about 150 in total.
It read, in part “The free exchange of information and ideas, the lifeblood of a liberal society, is daily becoming more constricted. While we have come to expect this on the radical right, censoriousness is also spreading more widely in our culture: an intolerance of opposing views, a vogue for public shaming and ostracism, and the tendency to dissolve complex policy issues in a blinding moral certainty….”
It’s not specifically stated, but I see this as support for J.K. Rowling. That’s because she’s the most recent hate magnet, although many on the list have taken their turn, and because one transgender activist, Jennifer Finney Boylan, who signed the letter, recanted her position within hours. “I did not know who else had signed that letter,” she tweeted. I doubt very much if she was referring to Gary Kasparov.
It seems to me, though, that Rowling has won this battle. Regardless of which is the correct bathroom for transgender people to use, it seems that at least 150 highly respected and influential people have decided to tell the trans community to calm the fuck down.
With all due respect to my trans friends, I am very happy about that.