Engaging in a war of words with Alastair Campbell and Rory Stewart of The Rest Is Politics, the Harry Potter author posted a meme of Scooby-Doo and his pal Shaggy shivering in terror.
The image, she joked on X, was “live footage” of the pair. “Mmmm. Bit weird,” responded Campbell, still the master of the dark arts of political spin. “But hey ho.”
Rowling, a prominent gender-critical feminist, and the socially liberal Campbell have been sparring over trans issues.
Rowling is a good deal more socially liberal than Campbell is.
The latest row has focused on The Rest Is Politics not inviting For Women Scotland (FWS) on the podcast, the group behind the UK Supreme Court judgment decreeing that sex, in terms of the UK Equality Act, is biological.
It comes after Campbell and Stewart hosted Sarah McBride, America’s first transgender member of Congress.
In other words these two men have not invited gender critical feminists on their podcast but they have invited a man who claims to be a woman and is a member of Congress. Ignoring women while fawning on men who pretend to be women is not the height of “socially liberal”; it what’s technically known as adding insult to injury.
But the friction goes back further and is all the spicier because Campbell’s daughter Grace, a comedian, once called the FWS women celebrating their victory “freaks” and “ugly with the worst hair, the worst clothes and the worst views”.
Oh do stop giggling, god damn it. It’s not “spicy”. It’s not some trivial by the way that Campbell’s horrible daughter spewed all those insults to please yet another man pretending to be a woman. None of this crap is funny.
Campbell rejected criticism that he would not host gender-critical spokespeople on a spin-off of their podcast called The Rest Is Politics: Leading.
“For all those claiming we won’t listen to people who share JK Rowling views, we have in the past asked JK Rowling, who said no. She is a leading voice and therefore we would happily talk to her on Leading. Previous attempts have been rebuffed,” he said.
What he means is she’s an extremely famous voice and therefore he and his mate would happily have her on their poxy podcast. Yes of course you would, you patronizing piece of crap, because that would be good for you, but the women you should be talking to are the ones your putrid daughter mocked and dismissed on her ass-kissing fame-chasing podcast.
Rowling responded: “That’s because I wasn’t interested in being used to boost the viewing figures of a pair of exceptionally arrogant men whose understanding of this issue drips with classism and misogyny.
“If you’re genuinely interested in a debate, I’m at a loss to understand why you’re uninterested in interviewing FWS, who secured the Supreme Court victory and are therefore THE leading voices on this issue. But perhaps your charming daughter has adequately represented the entire Campbell family’s view, by describing them as ‘ugly’ women, with whom she wouldn’t ‘want to be in a room’?”
It doesn’t pay to mess with JKR.
Susan Smith, co-director of FWS, said the group would still meet with The Rest Is Politics. But she added: “We have always said that we would engage with Mr Campbell. However, he has made it clear that he thinks anyone other than Ms Rowling is below his touch.
“We do not know if this is because he really is this arrogant, or if he fears that he would be humiliated should he attempt to debate any of the many qualified women who have studied this issue and he feels safe in the knowledge that JK Rowling will turn him down.
I think I’ll go with both? He really is this arrogant – that’s obvious – and he doesn’t want to talk to those intelligent women who know far more about the subject than he does.
“Insultingly, he has now told feminists that they should listen to his interview with the trans politician Sarah McBride, something which suggests he has crossed from political commentator to online troll.”
I did listen to a few minutes of it and was unmoved. McBride chats well enough but he’s no JK Rowling.
Rowling, meanwhile, referring to McBride as male, posted: “What better way could there be of repudiating accusations of misogyny than recommending an episode where three men instead of two discuss which rights women should be fine giving up — without, of course, mentioning the words ‘women’s rights’?”
Four men? A hundred? A few billion?