- cross-posted to:
- scotland@feddit.uk
- cross-posted to:
- scotland@feddit.uk
JK Rowling has challenged Scotland’s new hate crime law in a series of social media posts - inviting police to arrest her if they believe she has committed an offence.
The Harry Potter author, who lives in Edinburgh, described several transgender women as men, including convicted prisoners, trans activists and other public figures.
She said “freedom of speech and belief” was at an end if accurate description of biological sex was outlawed.
Earlier, Scotland’s first minister Humza Yousaf said the new law would deal with a “rising tide of hatred”.
The Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021 creates a new crime of “stirring up hatred” relating to age, disability, religion, sexual orientation, transgender identity or being intersex.
…
Ms Rowling, who has long been a critic of some trans activism, posted on X on the day the new legislation came into force.
“But what if conservatives ape what you’re doing and make shit up?” is an all-purpose argument against doing anything.
“But what if conservatives call you a terrorist?” is both a real problem that happened to people, and an obviously shite reason to say “therefore let’s not fight terrorism.”
Stop treating “but who decides?” like a table-slapping counterargument. Every law has a line. Unless you’re an outright anarchist, someone has to draw a line, somewhere, and choosing not to draw a sensible one never seems to stop assholes from drawing an unreasonable one. I mean for fuck’s sake, have you seen American states censoring school libraries for fear of acknowledging queer people? That’s not some backlash or ironic reversal. They’re just bastards. The fact they’ll latch onto whatever we’re doing, as an excuse, doesn’t make us responsible for their bastardry.
Yeah, so let’s not play their game and not give governments any tools to be able to censor anyone. In best case in some constitutional form.