JK Rowling: Harry Potter author brands UK newsreader India Willoughby a man after court decision

Matt Shrivell
The Nightly
J.K. Rowling has spoken out about the court ruling in the UK and mentioned India Willoughby.
J.K. Rowling has spoken out about the court ruling in the UK and mentioned India Willoughby. Credit: TheWest

World-renowned author of the Harry Potter books, JK Rowling, has wasted no time jumping back into the transgender debate limelight and branded a famous UK newsreader a ‘man’ after a controversial court ruling.

The UK Supreme Court recently handed down a ruling that a woman is someone who is born biologically as a woman, a statement that has been met with a tide of anger and jubilation from both sides of the argument.

India Willoughby, an openly transgender media personality, fell firmly in Rowling’s sights as she took to social media to describe Willoughy as “the gift that keeps on giving” and declared the broadcaster “remains a man” followijg the decision.

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The Daily Mail is reporting that the billionaire writer fired back at the newsreader after they made claims Rowling and the judge who summarised the ruling are neighbours.

Emotions are running high in the UK after the Supreme Court ruled that ‘sex’, ‘man’ and ‘woman’ in the Equality Act must mean ‘biological sex’, rejecting any alternative interpretations as ‘incoherence and impracticable’

The ruling means trans women with a gender recognition certificate (GRC) could potentially be excluded from single-sex spaces if ‘proportionate’.

Reacting to the ruling, broadcaster and journalist Ms Willoughby said the decision marked a ‘grim day for Britain’.

The news reader the took to X to declare that “Turns out Judge Hodge is only JK Rowling’s funking neighbour in the same exclusive area of Edinburgh, Merchiston. What a country. Really is the 1950s. #Establishment.’

JK Rowling responded by saying “I don’t live in Merciston” and that she has “never met Lord Hodge”.

She added that Ms Willoughby “remains the funniest thing in my mentions” and that she “remains a man”.

Ms Willoughby went on to post: “Were frumps jealous? I think that’s a big part of this?”

The author replied again and said: ‘”The Supreme Court ruled I’m not a woman because women envy my gorgeousness”.

“He truly is the gift that keeps on giving.”

The writer also took to social media and said women are ‘waiting to hear the Prime Minister’s views’ on the ruling and made a dig at his previous assertions that ‘trans women are women’.

Rowling called for UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer to speak out on the ruling, hitting out at previous remarks he has made in support of the trans community

In an 88-page ruling, the High Court justices said: ‘The definition of sex in the Equality Act 2010 makes clear that the concept of sex is binary, a person is either a woman or a man.’

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