The day the cavalry came
19th December, 2019
It is the anniversary of THAT tweet, the one in which JK Rowling arrived like a one-woman cavalry when all seemed lost, hours after the disgraceful judgement in the Maya Forstater case which held that Forstater’s beliefs, shared by everyone in the country except for a few Guardian staffers, HR managers and various lunatics on Twitter, were "not worthy of respect in a democratic society".
Since she stood up for women, she has been smeared and defamed by everyone from Buffalo Bills on Twitter to virtue-signalling cue-card readers on Saturday Night Live. Even her beautiful, compassionate essay on the matter remained mostly unread by the misogynist assholes calling her names. At least, I hope they hadn’t read it, because the idea of someone reading the testimony of a domestic violence survivor and then comparing them to Mel Gibson is too depressing to contemplate.
Rowling speaks for the majority of women, the majority of people, who reject this religion embraced by Hollywood stars, Silicon Valley shut-ins, fradulent academics and a generation of kids who caught brain worms off Tumblr. The incels at Twitter can’t be having that, so they capped the ‘likes’ on the tweet (212.4k my ass.)
The fight against gender identity ideology is still young, but we’ve ended 2020 on a positive note. The court victories of Keira Bell, Kate Scottow and Fair Cop bring fresh hope that a higher court will undo the Forstater judgement, and the terven resistance is becoming better-organised and bolder every day. (In 2121, keep your eyes on Ireland). Much of that can be credited to Rowling’s intervention. They were the right words at the right time, so raise a glass and make a toast to JK Rowling and the 19th of December; the cavalry and the day the cavalry came.
(Rowling portrait by The Artist Birdy Rose)
I can hardly believe it's been a year since her brave, wonderful stance. And those cowards are still trying (and failing) to silence women.
*2021 in Ireland. Pedant's corner. Hate speech legislation in Ireland will be a disaster. The Irish Minister for Justice has tried to frame it as not intended to 'catch anyone out' and that intention of the speaker is important. But, of course, it will create more problems than it solves and be used by trans lobby and others to bully people into silence.