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J.Okay. Rowling won’t be prosecuted, police have stated, following feedback the creator made about new hate crime legal guidelines on-line.
Yesterday (April 1), Rowling dared police to arrest her as she expressed her opposition to new hate crime laws that has simply come into drive in Scotland.
The brand new legal guidelines got here into drive yesterday, making it a criminal offense to “fire up hatred” on the idea of age, incapacity, faith, sexual orientation, transgender identification or being intersex. An individual commits an offence if they convey materials, or behave in a way, “{that a} affordable particular person would think about to be threatening or abusive”, with the intention of inciting hatred based mostly on one among these traits. Separate legal guidelines will probably be introduced in to sort out misogyny as a selected offence.
Rowling decried the brand new laws in a prolonged thread on X/Twitter.
“I’m at present in another country, but when what I’ve written right here qualifies as an offence underneath the phrases of the brand new act, I stay up for being arrested after I return to the birthplace of the Scottish Enlightenment,” she wrote.
She added that “freedom of speech and perception are at an finish in Scotland” if what she termed “the correct description of organic intercourse” is “deemed legal.”
Police have now stated JK Rowling’s feedback about new hate crime legal guidelines “are usually not assessed to be legal”.
In response to the police’s resolution on Tuesday (April 2), Rowling posted on X/Twitter: “I hope each lady in Scotland who needs to talk up for the fact and significance of organic intercourse will probably be reassured by this announcement, and I belief that every one girls – no matter profile or monetary means – will probably be handled equally underneath the regulation.”
Scotland’s First Minster Humza Yousef has addressed the “disinformation” being unfold concerning the invoice, notably by gender-critical teams, claiming there’s a “triple lock” of safety for speech – an specific clause on free speech, a defence for any accused particular person’s actions being “affordable” and the act being suitable with the European Conference on Human Rights.
Rowling was reported to the police final month over accusations of transphobic abuse, after she stated the broadcaster India Willoughby – who was talked about within the thread posted at the moment – “didn’t change into a lady” and is “cosplaying a misogynistic male fantasy of what a lady is”.
Willoughby stated Rowling’s phrases have been “in breach of each the Equality Act and the Gender Recognition Act” and later stated on X/Twitter that it was recorded as a non-crime hate incident. In response, Rowling stated that the “police are going to be very busy”.
The creator has confronted a backlash for numerous remarks, stemming again to 2020. Harry Potter stars Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint have all spoken out towards her views and defended transgender men and women.
Plenty of actors have additionally come to Rowling’s defence, together with Evanna Lynch, Helena Bonham Carter and Jim Broadbent.
In October, Rowling stated she would “fortunately” go to jail relatively than discuss with transgender girls as “girls”.
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