City’s approval of Vancouver Harry Potter event draws ire of LGBTQ2 community
Global News
J.K. Rowling has come under fire for her views on transgender rights. She has described transgender hormone therapy as a “new kind of conversion therapy for young gay people.”
Backlash against a new Harry Potter-themed attraction in Stanley Park has one Park Board commissioner looking into cancelling the contract.
“I have learned a great deal in the last five days about the linkage of the Harry Potter franchise with J.K. Rowling and I am very surprised at what I’ve learned and I was not aware of the reputational risk of bringing a Harry Potter-themed event to Vancouver at the time that I approved this in camera,” Tom Digby told Global News.
“Now I’m just speaking as one Park Board commissioner, one out of seven, that I do not speak on behalf of the Park Board. But, I can say, I myself was not aware of the reputational risk that this would bring.”
In recent years, Rowling has come under fire for her outspoken views on transgender rights. (In 2020, Rowling described transgender hormone therapy as a “new kind of conversion therapy for young gay people.”)
In April, the U.K. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that a woman is defined by biological sex under equalities law.
Rowling celebrated the ruling, posting on social media that “It took three extraordinary, tenacious Scottish women with an army behind them to get this case heard by the Supreme Court and, in winning, they’ve protected the rights of women and girls across the UK.”
Digby said since the announcement of the event, Harry Potter: A Forbidden Forest Experience is coming to Vancouver this winter, he said they have had a “massive wave” of responses from people from all different communities.
He added that many have been “saying that the work that J.K. Rowling does is particularly disturbing for a specific segment of the community, particularly the gender diverse and particularly trans community.
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