I thought it was a reference to the Bill Gate’s quote from the 80s about “a computer on every desk and in every home.” Basically just a way of saying they want to make them affordable and ubiquitous enough that anyone who wants one can buy one, just like computers and cell phones went from expensive specialty tools to basic commodities. At least, that was my take.

If you're using it to say that we should hear bigots out and debate them civilly in the "marketplace of ideas," then I strongly disagree with you. We should not tolerate intolerance.

> She didn't have agency. No one chooses to be radicalized. She didn't sit down and make a rational decision. This is all primal, reactive lizard brain stuff. She was clearly victimized at some point in her life and this is triggering all those emotions of being attacks and hurt. Fight/ flight is kicking in and she'd going with the former.

If we afford Rowling that level of sympathy, then we must also extent it to the people hurt most by her words. And if we don't extend that same sympathy to them, then Rowling doesn't deserve it either. She can't have it both ways. Either everyone is responsible for their own words and deeds, or no one is.

If Rowling is justified in indulging her base instincts, then she should be prepared to accept the backlash from people doing the same. I think we could all do better, though. I'm all for compassion, let's just not put the onus entirely on one side.

> And she's being stripped of her power and influence... how?

Well...

> I've lost all respect for her. I'm not buying any of her books again. (And I work in an elementary school library.)

Seems to have worked with you and I, at least.

> What we're doing now isn't working. It's making her more vocal. She's doing more with her money out of spite. And as she intensifies, so does the mob who are attacking and harming other people.

> It's a vicious cycle. And you can win in a vicious cycle. We can't win by out hating her. We can't despise her into submission. And even if the mob does somehow win and bully her into being silent... is that how we want to win? Emotional violence?

Again, you make a lot of valid points! This is the discussion we should be having! We should be discussing how to effectively protest someone, not whether or not we should even be doing it at all.

We shouldn't be spending time defending someone who actively works against our common goals, regardless of the specifics of how she gets paid or whether or not she was involuntarily radicalized. We shouldn't be guilted into not boycotting a game to a prop up a fundamentally broken system, and we shouldn't equivocate the act of not buying a video game with destroying livelihoods.

I already stated a few comments back that I condemn the sort of attacks that actively hurt innocent bystanders, so you don't have to keep trying to convince me that that is a bad thing. I already agree with you there. I'm just saying don't conflate peaceful protest with aimless harassment.

By the way, I don't even personally care if someone plays Hogwarts Legacy, especially if they are simply ignorant or misinformed about he surrounding controversy. We all are victims of propaganda, and I am personally more concerned with going after the figureheads who influence a great number of people rather than chasing down their individual followers. I just don't think there is necessarily anything wrong with publicly boycotting the game and spreading the word about JKR's views.

Can you expand on what you mean by that?

I am aware of the context and the origin of the quote, I just don't see how it applies here.

I am genuinely not worried about the livelihoods of the people who made the game. Not because I don't care, but because I honestly and genuinely believe that they will be okay. If I really thought that they were at risk of losing their homes, then that might be different, but I really just don't see that happening.

Technology jobs aren't like other jobs; high turnover and frequent job changes are normal. These are not a vulnerable population of workers. Even if the studio collapses, they will not be out of work for long. That's not me being cold, it's just that this is legitimately a non-issue to me and people trying to make a huge deal out of it seem genuinely ridiculous to me.

Being called a conservative capitalist made me chuckle. I actually believe that the government should spend whatever it takes to eliminate destitute poverty. Nobody with the high-demand skills needed to work on a game like this is in any serious, immediate danger of living in poverty, though. And if they are, then the solution isn't to prop up the company that made the game by guilting people into not boycotting the game for activist reasons. The solution is to have a comprehensive social safety net to prevent people from falling into destitution from losing their jobs.

...but all of that is an entirely different and complex conversation, and entirely beside the point.

At the end of the day, nothing can convince me that individual people choosing not to buy a game that supports someone who dehumanizes trans people is morally equivalent to shoplifting or making game creators homeless. I'm sorry, but that is just an absurd equivalency to draw.

> I generally refer to being on Twitter as a two-minute hate, because that's what it is. The platform is designed to make you angry and push you to lash out at people. Because the angrier you get, the more you engage. The more you engage, the more time you spend on the platform and the more ads to see. The more ads you see, the more money Twitter makes.

> Twitter is incentivized to make people upset and angry and feed empty social outrage as people cancel random people or engage in rapid slacktivism.

I agree with your assessment. I don't know what is has to do with anything I've said, though.

I also think you're making Rowling out to be a lot more innocent than she is. Twitter manipulates and exploits our feelings, sure, but to act like Rowling has no agency in this process and just "had no choice" but to become an extreme bigot because angry people on the internet called her out on her bullshit just absolves her of all responsibility for her actions.

She has a huge platform that she could use to spread love and tolerance, but instead she uses it to spite people who rightfully (albeit maybe not always tactfully) hold her accountable for her words and deeds.

I don't feel sorry that people aren't universally celebrating her anymore. Just because it doesn't hurt her finances much doesn't mean it is meaningless. Publicly naming and shaming people who spread hate and say intolerable things helps to strip them of their power and influence. At the very least, she no longer has an underserved squeaky clean image in the public eye. Maybe that doesn't matter to you, but it matters to the people whose rights and dignity Rowling feels are negotiable.

> We're talking about people with mortgages and health insurance and kids going to school who's livelihood will be destroyed by this.

Sorry, but not matter how you spin it, it was always a possibility the game would flop. Nothing is a safe bet. Therefore, guilting people who choose to boycott the game for ruining the livelihoods of the developers is just inherently silly to me. Highly anticipated games flop all the time. It's a shame, but even leaving politics aside for a second, no one is obligated to buy a product out of pity for its creators.

Especially since, as we've established, they have already been compensated for the work they have finished. All the sales figures affect is whether or not they get their bonuses and get to go on to create another game. But that was always going to be the case anyway. This is a normal process in the industry. Worst case scenario, they pack up and move on to the next project. No one is going to be permanently unemployed from this.

> But that's also not what's happing here. There's a LOT of harassment being directed at people who aren't boycotting, which isn't cool and just makes the anti-Rowling movement look bad. Getting mad at people because they're not joining in on two-minute hate.

I agree that attacking people over this is wrong, but let's clarify what an attack is.

Doxxing, ad hominem, verbal abuse, etc, yes those are attacks.

Advocating for people to boycott the game, educating people on Rowling's attacks on trans rights or criticizing bad aspects of the franchise itself are not attacks. That is activism, and you are not entitled to be unbothered by activism in the public sphere because that would defeat the entire point.

You can push back against the activism, criticize/critique it, choose to ignore it, etc. I think you raise some valid points, for example. But broadly categorizing it all as mere attacks and harassment sparked by two minute hate is reductive.

I partially agree, but it depends on what you classify as an attack.

Doxxing, ad hominem, verbal abuse, etc, yes those are attacks.

Advocating for people to boycott the game, educating people on Rowling's attacks on trans rights or criticizing bad aspects of the franchise itself are not attacks. That is activism, and you are not entitled to be unbothered by activism in the public sphere because that would defeat the entire point. Not being able to earn money from something that people are actively protesting against is not a tragedy. This is not the only game out there that people can play or stream.

No, wouldn't go so far. I'm sure many of the people buying the game simply just aren't that invested in the larger politics and just see it as any other game. Whether it is wrong to financially support someone who works to actively harm society is, I concede, a moral gray area. I'm not necessarily saying I agree with this site's intention, but I'm mostly indifferent to it personally.

I was moreso just arguing the larger point that just because bullying group X is wrong doesn't mean that group Y doesn't deserve that same treatment. Just because we know we shouldn't harass vulnerable or innocent groups doesn't mean we must extend that same kindness to bigots.

I am less concerned with any individual person's purchasing decision than I am of the words and actions of the figurehead spreading hateful speech in the first place, in this case Rowling herself. Going after the people who play the game isn't something I am personally interested in, but it doesn't mean I have to be outraged that other people do it.

That's just the risk and the cost of doing business, though. No one should feel obligated to buy a product whose values they don't agree with so that the company who made it can get its investment back. Everyone involved in making the game is aware of the potential that it may flop going into it, and in fact that is statistically by far the more likely scenario.

I know it sucks to be dragged down by association, but we didn't know then what we know now and that is nobody's fault. I still think it is perfectly reasonable to boycott the game on principle alone, regardless of whose paycheck it may harm.

Also, I'm skeptical of the claim that the game devs get a bonus if the game does well, but JKR doesn't. Do we actually know either of those to be true? I don't think it matters either way, I just find it hard to believe.

I don't equivocate bullying an innocent group of people based on their identity to bullying a group of people based on their words and actions. You can't just swap words around freely like that, because they aren't equivalent. Bigots and fascists deserved to be bullied. Their opinions are not worth hearing out, and they should be socially shunned. So in short, yes, bullying bullies is okay in my book.

Aren't all those people salaried, and therefore already got paid?

No, but what's your point?

> Rowling is not exactly reticent about her opinions. If she hated Jews she'd have said so straight out.

Probably not, though. Most people, even bigots, understand that expressing outright antisemitism is socially unacceptable. Clearly we aren't there with transphobia yet, because she can say what she says and still have people defend her "right to her opinion."

Many people don't understand trans issues, and therefore see them as up for debate rather than being a human rights issue. I don't necessarily blame them for being ignorant considering the vast amount misinformation out there, but it does give JKR a lot more leeway to be openly transphobic compared to being openly antisemitic, racist, sexist, etc.

(Please note that I'm not debating whether or not she is antisemitic, I haven't examined the claims or the evidence either way. I am simply offering a counterpoint to the specific part of your comment that I quoted.)

Framing it as a mere difference of opinion makes light of the suffering of the people she is actively working to dehumanize. I don’t think opinions that dehumanize others are worthy of respect or consideration, and speaking out against them, even in an “uncivil” manner, is fully called for.