As Twitchy’s Gordon Kushner reported last week, actress Emma Watson recently tried to make nice with the woman who made her famous, J.K. Rowling.
She said some nice things about the world-famous author in her interview, but what was glaringly missing from it was an apology from Watson for many of the nasty words she and her Harry Potter co-stars Daniel Radcliffe and Rupert Grint have said about her in recent years.
All because Rowling holds the ‘crazy’ belief that men are not and cannot become women.
After Watson’s interview, Rowling wrote a brief post on X, noting that Watson is now trying to throw away the pitchfork that the young actress had so often brandished against her.
We thought that might be the end of that, but Watson’s comments garnered a lot of attention, with many people noting that Watson was trying to ‘sit on the fence’ (and also noticing that she never apologized).
“I think she’s going to find that you can’t sit on the fence… The real win is when ordinary people can say these things.”@DerryBanShee speaks to @joshxhowie about Emma Watson’s comments about JK Rowling.
📺 https://t.co/QFKNj0XXrH pic.twitter.com/ULjs4x89hT
— Sex Matters (@SexMattersOrg) September 29, 2025
Watson’s jab at Rowling with the comment, ‘I’m here for all the witches,’ happened at the 2022 BAFTA Awards. And there’s no question that it was hateful snark aimed directly at the author.
That comment definitely seemed to have rankled Rowling, so this morning, she wrote a much longer — and far more devastating — post. She was responding to Watson specifically, but also to her co-stars, Radcliffe and Grint.
It is the understatement of the year to say that Rowling’s post is well worth reading in its entirety:
I’m seeing quite a bit of comment about this, so I want to make a couple of points.
I’m not owed eternal agreement from any actor who once played a character I created. The idea is as ludicrous as me checking with the boss I had when I was twenty-one for what opinions I should… https://t.co/c0pz19P7jc
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) September 29, 2025
… what opinions I should hold these days.
Emma Watson and her co-stars have every right to embrace gender identity ideology. Such beliefs are legally protected, and I wouldn’t want to see any of them threatened with loss of work, or violence, or death, because of them.
However, Emma and Dan in particular have both made it clear over the last few years that they think our former professional association gives them a particular right – nay, obligation – to critique me and my views in public. Years after they finished acting in Potter, they continue to assume the role of de facto spokespeople for the world I created.
When you’ve known people since they were ten years old it’s hard to shake a certain protectiveness. Until quite recently, I hadn’t managed to throw off the memory of children who needed to be gently coaxed through their dialogue in a big scary film studio. For the past few years, I’ve repeatedly declined invitations from journalists to comment on Emma specifically, most notably on the Witch Trials of JK Rowling. Ironically, I told the producers that I didn’t want her to be hounded as the result of anything I said.
The television presenter in the attached clip highlights Emma’s ‘all witches’ speech, and in truth, that was a turning point for me, but it had a postscript that hurt far more than the speech itself. Emma asked someone to pass on a handwritten note from her to me, which contained the single sentence ‘I’m so sorry for what you’re going through’ (she has my phone number). This was back when the death, rape and torture threats against me were at their peak, at a time when my personal security measures had had to be tightened considerably and I was constantly worried for my family’s safety. Emma had just publicly poured more petrol on the flames, yet thought a one line expression of concern from her would reassure me of her fundamental sympathy and kindness.
Like other people who’ve never experienced adult life uncushioned by wealth and fame, Emma has so little experience of real life she’s ignorant of how ignorant she is. She’ll never need a homeless shelter. She’s never going to be placed on a mixed sex public hospital ward. I’d be astounded if she’s been in a high street changing room since childhood. Her ‘public bathroom’ is single occupancy and comes with a security man standing guard outside the door. Has she had to strip off in a newly mixed-sex changing room at a council-run swimming pool? Is she ever likely to need a state-run rape crisis centre that refuses to guarantee an all-female service? To find herself sharing a prison cell with a male rapist who’s identified into the women’s prison?
I wasn’t a multimillionaire at fourteen. I lived in poverty while writing the book that made Emma famous. I therefore understand from my own life experience what the trashing of women’s rights in which Emma has so enthusiastically participated means to women and girls without her privileges.
The greatest irony here is that, had Emma not decided in her most recent interview to declare that she loves and treasures me – a change of tack I suspect she’s adopted because she’s noticed full-throated condemnation of me is no longer quite as fashionable as it was – I might never have been this honest.
Adults can’t expect to cosy up to an activist movement that regularly calls for a friend’s assassination, then assert their right to the former friend’s love, as though the friend was in fact their mother. Emma is rightly free to disagree with me and indeed to discuss her feelings about me in public – but I have the same right, and I’ve finally decided to exercise it.
Straight. FIRE.
We’ll skip over the nerve of Watson to spend years trashing the woman without whom she would be anonymous and not at all rich. Even Rowling notes that Watson does not owe her any allegiance, certainly not allegiance of opinion.
No, it’s the cowardice of Watson to try to privately apologize (through a written note delivered secondhand, no less) while publicly shaming Rowling that infuriated the author. So, she correctly notes that Watson has NO IDEA what she is talking about regarding gender issues and the rights of women, especially women who are not rich.
In the politest way possible, Rowling ends by telling Watson that she can take her newfound ‘love and affection’ and shove it.
What a line.
“Like other people who’ve never experienced adult life uncushioned by wealth and fame, Emma has so little experience of real life she’s ignorant of how ignorant she is.” https://t.co/irxu1spV79
— Jithin Jacob (@pepperedwords) September 29, 2025
Have we mentioned before that Rowling is an incredibly talented writer?
Life hack:
Don’t get into a battle of words & ideas with one of the most successful authors of a generation. https://t.co/khU8OoBwiS— DWray (@d_wray) September 29, 2025
That’s right behind never getting into a land war in Asia and never going up against a Sicilian when death is on the line.
“I lived in poverty while writing the book that made Emma famous.”
This wrecked me.
Every single part of this is so beautifully written. I’m so sorry you had to stand alone.
— Matt Van Swol (@matt_vanswol) September 29, 2025
She’s not standing alone anymore. But she’s also making it clear that she doesn’t want to stand anywhere near Watson, Radcliffe, or Grint.
“Adults can’t expect to cosy up to an activist movement that regularly calls for a friend’s assassination, then assert their right to the former friend’s love…” https://t.co/DvuIMMR31L
— Robert Spencer (@jihadwatchRS) September 29, 2025
That pretty much says it all right there, but Rowling also enjoys responding to the replies in her posts, and she expanded further there.
She could have contacted me privately any time to say her views had changed, if they have. I’d have been entirely supportive. What she’s chosen to do instead is yet another bit of public brand repositioning, without talking to me, but using me for her purpose. It’s getting old.
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) September 29, 2025
Exactly.
And yes, it is very tiresome when celebrities think we don’t notice they are doing some CYA public relations, rather than heartfelt expressions of their true feelings.
I’m proud of you.
I feel silly to feel proud of a woman I don’t know and probably have no right to feel proud of.
But I feel proud of you for standing up and voicing so clearly and unequivocally the affrontery, insult, hurt, and subdued anger most of us have felt at the hands…— Janet Inglis (@ThatAussieWoman) September 29, 2025
… at the hands of people we were once close to.
You expressed it for all of us perfectly.
I’m sorry it was so personal and dangerous for you.
I hope this brilliant post was somewhat cathartic.
It was, and thank you ❤️
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) September 29, 2025
Others who have experienced the poisonous slings and arrows from the trans activist cult also expressed their appreciation.
Thank you for all you do to hold the line for women and girls ❤️
— MaryCate Delvey (@marycatedelvey) September 29, 2025
J.K. Rowling is a modern day civil rights hero https://t.co/F8vNHJexEY
— Riley Gaines (@Riley_Gaines_) September 29, 2025
I’m so glad you’ve come out & said this. Constantly being lectured about this by the privileged 1%, who will never deal with any of these issues has been the most infuriating to say the least.
— Reese🇺🇸🐊 (@reeseonable) September 29, 2025
Hopefully, Watson will genuinely wake up to the madness of gender ideology (not just pay lip service to ‘both sides’) before she has any children of her own. There is already one Cynthia Nixon in the world, abusing her children, and that is one too many.
J.K writing this like: pic.twitter.com/nbCfzvawpy
— DahEdu (@FernandoEMB) September 29, 2025
You can tell that she really didn’t want to write it. As she noted, she spent years keeping it mostly to herself.
But Watson asked for the fire, so she can’t complain about the heat.
Watson and Radcliffe are 35 and 36. It’s understandable they might been carried along with Hollywood orthodoxy and worried about being “cancelled” in their younger years, but now, when they’re both nearer 40 than 30? J.K. is right to treat them like what they are: spoiled adults.
— Jack Montgomery (@JackBMontgomery) September 29, 2025
Well said.
We can endure 1000 barbs from our enemies but a single smarmy comment from someone feigning to care about us after years of backstabbing is all we need to unleash our righteous rage.
— Lyndsey Fifield (@lyndseyfifield) September 29, 2025
Rowling held on to her motherly instincts about Watson and the other young actors as long as she could.
This morning, she delivered the straight truth and tough love harder than a Sectumsempra curse.
I never was into Harry Potter books, but JK Rowling may well be the best writer in the world. https://t.co/qEycombQbR
— grokker (@alternativetak3) September 29, 2025
Sometimes, J.K. Rowling makes us laugh as she effortlessly roasts her haters.
Other times, we simply stand in awe of how good she is at this, at standing up for women, truth, and honor.
Today was one of the latter times.
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