Guests at the boozy lunch included JK Rowling, Joanna Cherry, Rosie Duffield, Maya Forstater and Kathleen Stock. (Twitter/ jk_rowling)
JK Rowling enjoyed a boozy lunch with a host of anti-trans activists, including members of the lobby group Get the L Out, while thousands protested for trans equality.
On Sunday (10 April) thousands of trans people and their allies gathered outside Downing Street to demand that Boris Johnson include trans people in a UK conversion therapy ban.
While a comprehensive ban had been promised for years, in recent weeks the government scrapped the planned legislation entirely, before reinstating it but keeping it perfectly legal for trans people to be subjected to conversion therapy.
Although Rowling once promised her trans followers that she would “march with you if you were discriminated against on the basis of being trans”, she was nowhere to be seen on the day of the protests.
In fact, she was enjoying a boozy lunch with a veritable who’s who of the UK’s so-called gender critical movement.
Rowling was photographed clutching a rainbow vape pen and wearing a “head girl” badge, and tweeted the next day: “There was a lunch and I’m not saying I’ve only just sobered up enough to type this tweet but at the same time, I’m not not saying that… It was me getting them drunk, to be honest.
“I do remember being authoritatively told I’m only 66 per cent straight. Watch this space for further developments.”
jk rowling hanging out with ‘get the l out,’ a group that in their own words “stands against transgenderism”
rowling once said she’d march with trans people “if they were discriminated against” – but here she is with those who explicitly call for that discrimination https://t.co/b026ZXYuq0
— Shaun (@shaun_vids) April 10, 2022
Get the L Out describes gender-affirming healthcare as “a form of misogynist medical abuse against lesbians” which “promotes the medical transition of lesbians and pushes harmful drugs and unnecessary medical practices on lesbians’ healthy bodies”.
The group also believes: “The LGBT community is coercing lesbians to accept penises as female organs and heterosexual intercourse as a lesbian sexual practice.
“We oppose this manipulative ideology and denounce it as a form of rape culture aimed at lesbians, as well as a form of conversion therapy.”
Other guests at the lunch party included elected politicians Joanna Cherry, an SNP MP who backed exempting “criticism of matters relating to transgender identity” from Scottish hate crime law, and Labour MP Rosie Duffield, who has made false claims that trans children in the UK are “cutting body parts off and rendering themselves completely infertile”.
Duffield tweeted that the lunch was her “best Sunday off in ages”.
I had the best day yesterday. Thank you @jk_rowling for bringing together so many of the women who’ve helped sustain each other through difficult times. #SisterhoodIsPowerful. #WomenWontWheesht pic.twitter.com/1xfT9lvbNd
— Joanna Cherry QC (@joannaccherry) April 11, 2022
🥰 Best Sunday off in ages x
— Rosie Duffield MP 🦕💜🦖 (@RosieDuffield1) April 10, 2022
Two ex-single mums now united for women’s rights ❤️ @RosieDuffield1 #RespectMySex pic.twitter.com/9iSXPifHa2
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) April 11, 2022
So-called gender critical journalists Suzanne Moore and Julie Bindel also made an appearance, and were joined by Maya Forstater, who argued that her “gender critical” beliefs are protected under the UK’s Equality Act, and is claiming at employment tribunal that she lost her employment because of these beliefs.
Further guests included LGB Alliance co-founder Allison Bailey, who is currently suing Stonewall to “stop them policing free speech”, Helen Joyce, author of the book Trans: When Ideology Meets Reality in which she argues that trans people fighting for rights and equality are like a “new state religion” with “blasphemy laws”, and former Sussex University professor Kathleen Stock, who believes that trans women should be barred from “places where females undress or sleep”.
. @jk_rowling has been such a source of strength to me and to so many women standing up for women’s rights. #SexMatters #RespectMySex pic.twitter.com/CZMQHIjOyv
— Maya Forstater (@MForstater) April 11, 2022
It’s amazing that we have had to put so much effort into this simple thing.
But on the other hand I got to meet all these smart, funny, brave women.
💜💚💜💚💜💚 pic.twitter.com/Fqtw5c0jiK
— Maya Forstater (@MForstater) April 11, 2022
So many other people with us in thought and laughter pic.twitter.com/ng4M7bQgSu
— Helen Joyce (@HJoyceGender) April 11, 2022
I was literally overexcited at the prospect of this, like a toddler! Paying for it today with a migraine. But what an amazing afternoon with some of my very favourite women, indeed my heroes https://t.co/GFa1FfZFxF
— Helen Joyce (@HJoyceGender) April 11, 2022
Thank you @jk_rowling for a fantastic day. pic.twitter.com/PYJkfMe549
— Allison Bailey (@BluskyeAllison) April 10, 2022
Unforgettable, and so much fun pic.twitter.com/dlggXpwv3o
— Anya Palmer (@anyabike) April 11, 2022
Comedian Aiden Comerford wrote on Twitter: “It feels exactly right that thousands of people were protesting against trans conversion on the streets while the GC movement were having a small, posh get together with JK Rowling.”
It feels exactly right that thousands of people were protesting against trans conversion on the streets while the GC movement were having a small, posh get together with @jk_rowling.
That says a lot about what is happening here. pic.twitter.com/9G0UnGPCEa
— Aidan Comerford (@AidanCTweets) April 11, 2022
“That says a lot about what is happening here.”
PinkNews has contacted JK Rowling for comment.