JK Rowling, 57, is known for making her opinion on gender norms very clear, with her recent comments being no different. The Harry Potter author has now voiced her concerns on a new podcast, admitting she finds 14-year-olds changing their gender to be “too young” to make that choice. She also shared her own identity issues as a child as she admitted she questioned her sexuality growing up.
Harry Potter author Rowling came under fire in 2020 for the comments she made about menstruating, leading her to be the centre of a transphobic debate.
The best-selling author has now appeared on the podcast, The Witch Trials of JK Rowling where she argues that teenagers are “too young” to change their gender.
She said that people as young as 14 could never “truly understand what the loss of their fertility is”.
This comes after Rowling was “begged” by her friends to keep quiet about her thoughts on transgender issues to avoid incredible backlash.
Rowling brought it upon herself to speak out, however, as she feels women are being “shut down”, leaving her unable to live with herself if she didn’t do something.
She said: “As an adolescent… I questioned my sexuality, thinking: ‘Well, I can tell my friends are pretty. Does that mean I’m gay?'”
Despite this, she said she grew up “to be a straight woman” but never forgot the anxiety around her body.
She also said that at 14 she didn’t want children, but the role of a mother ended up being the “most joyful, wonderful thing” in her life.
She said at the time she could not “have comprehended that and would have had no idea about what” she was giving up.
Rowling first came under fire in 2020 when she posted a link on Twitter with the heading reading: “Opinion: Creating a more equal post-COVID-19 world for people who menstruate.”
Rowling commented: “‘People who menstruate’. I’m sure there used to be a word for those people. Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud?”
Her comment was immediately hit with backlash and she was accused of being “transphobic” for her remarks.
Rowling then followed up her tweet with another comment in which she criticised the idea that a person’s biological sex is not real.
She wrote: “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.
“The idea that women like me, who’ve been empathetic to trans people for decades, feeling kinship because they’re vulnerable in the same way as women — ie, to male violence – ‘hate’ trans people because they think sex is real and has lived consequences — is nonsense.”
Rowling added that she supports transgender rights and took issue with being labelled a “TERF”, a trans-exclusionary radical feminist.
She also shared a tweet in 2019 backing Maya Forstater, a tax expert who was sacked for tweeting that “men cannot become women”.
A year later she explained her position in an essay in which she also claimed she had been the victim of domestic violence and abuse in her first marriage.
Rowling told the podcast she has been subjected to death threats in recent years due to her comments.
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