F ³ The Books That Built a Bully’s Bullhorn

I have always been opposed to book burning. I was brought up to believe that books are our friends. From the moment that I was old enough to understand that book burning represents the violent suppression of ideas and intellectual freedom, I have known it was wrong.

Yesterday I had a bad moment that challenged those beliefs. It wasn’t more than a few seconds.

British fiction author JK Rowling inserted herself into an event at the Paris Olympics and spewed a lot of hateful, ignorant nonsense. And for just a moment I wished that all her books would burst into flame.

It’s not the books that are the problem. The harm that is caused by JK Rowling comes from her brain, her attitudes, her appalling lack of knowledge and empathy. But the multimillion dollar success of her books has given her a platform to make hateful accusations about transgender human beings who have never done her any harm. This weekend she chose to extend that to anyone who doesn’t look cisgender enough to meet her own personal criteria.

If it weren’t for the fortune generated by those books, Rowling would be just another hateful, uninformed busybody. Her outsized influence with others who share her backward and harmful views would never have existed.

All of us have a choice in life to use our powers for good or evil. When you look at Rowling you see what wealth and fame has empowered and it’s ugly. Imagine how much good her money and social capital might have brought into the world if she had chosen love instead of hate.

If an unknown Rowling had stood on a box in Hyde Park and ranted against trans, non binary, and intersex people would she be raking in the cash? I doubt it. Yet, here we are, witnessing all the hurt that one person can cause by harnessing the discretionary income of millions of fiction readers.

I still don’t believe in book burning. There’s no solution in that. The solution comes, I hope, in standing up to bullies and in refusing to buy what they are selling.

Village Green/Town² Comments

Comments

Teacher Gifts

Today is the last day of school before the Winter Break. It’s a good time to remember the far-reaching nature of our public school system. You may not have children. You may have sent your children to independent schools. It matters not. You will be impacted one way or another. Yesterday I read a long thread on Facebook about several waves of illness in the schools right now. There’s influenza A and norovirus, I believe. And of course there’s COVID. Apparently in some individual schools the rate of illness is high enough for school admin to notify parents. When I was little the acceptable holiday gift for a teacher was one of those lovely floral handkerchief squares. (I don’t know what it was for male teachers. They were rare in my elementary years.) These days the range of teacher gifts is wider and I have fond memories of Target gift cards which I have written about before. I think it’s safe to say that giving one’s teacher Influenza, norovirus, or COVID is not the ideal holiday...

They Can Wait

This is not a typical Saturday post. That’s because, in my community, it’s not a typical Saturday. Oakland Mills High School, after years of deferred repair, needs massive renovation. It’s pretty simple: when you don’t fix a problem it gets bigger. The school system itself said the the OMHS school building was "no longer conducive to learning" back in 2018. 2018 . But Thursday the Boad of Education voted to push it out of the lineup of important projects which will be given the go-ahead to proceed soonest. In my opinion it’s a terrible decision and sets a dangerous precedent. To explain, here’s the advocacy letter I sent in support of Oakland Mills High School. I was rather proud of it. I am writing to ask you to proceed with needed renovation at Oakland Mills High School in the most timely and comprehensive manner humanly possible. I have read the letter sent to you by the Oakland Mills Community Association and I am in complete agreement. You are extremel...

Columbia Chance Connection

Last night, as my husband and I were about to sit down to dinner, our front door swung open and a cheery voice announced, “I’m ba—ack!” We weren’t expecting anyone. Clearly the only people who’d walk right in to our house would be one of our offspring. I had my reading glasses on so I wasn’t seeing too clearly. It seemed too tall for our youngest, but we knew our eldest was at work. I took off my glasses to see a friendly but confused face scanning our living room. When her gaze landed on us we all had a sudden realization. We didn’t know eachother. “Oh I’m so sorry! I’m in the wrong house! My daughter just moved in and she needed hooks for the kitchen so I ran out to get them.” She waved the package. “All these houses look the same and I don’t know the neighborhood yet. I thought this was my daughter’s house.” We were all getting a bit giggly. “That’s okay. For a quick second we thought you were our daughter,” said my husband. I told her our names and said she should defin...

Village Green/Town²

Search This Blog