JK Rowling in ‘arrest me’ challenge over Scottish hate crime law
JK Rowling has challenged Scotland's new hate crime law in a series of social media posts - inviting police to arrest her if they believe she has committed an offence.
The Harry Potter author, who lives in Edinburgh, described several transgender women as men, including convicted prisoners, trans activists and other public figures.
She said "freedom of speech and belief" was at an end if accurate description of biological sex was outlawed.
Earlier, Scotland's first minister Humza Yousaf said the new law would deal with a "rising tide of hatred".
The Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021 creates a new crime of "stirring up hatred" relating to age, disability, religion, sexual orientation, transgender identity or being intersex.
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Ms Rowling, who has long been a critic of some trans activism, posted on X on the day the new legislation came into force.
OR, and hear me out, you could just not be a total asshole? Maybe have a baseline of tolerance and respect for the people who made you a billionaire? No? Then fuck right off and accept the consequences of your hatred.
It seems billionaires have really wacked out midlife crises. Instead of buying expensive cars and cheating on their partners, they come out as terfy nazis, build hate platforms, and crash companies. I mean to be fair, at this point the sample size is only two, JKKK Rowling and Musk, but it's still surprising that it'd happen twice.
Bill Gates started a charity.
Steve Jobs killed himself because he thought he knew better than his doctors. Well, that's wacked out too, but at least it's not being a Nazi...
These guys need to get on John McAfee's level
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McAfee
John McCracked
McAfee is not worth cracking
That dude's videos are extraordinary.
At last this guy was entertaining, not only disgusting like these modern "billionaires". Pff.
John McAfee’s poop hammock is perhaps the best story about him.
For the uninitiated:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5elAr2s6Gno
Have you seen the (censored) GoPro footage he released?
Oh you son of a..
Bill gates didn’t start the charity as a midlife crisis.
It’s a tax dodge and a lot of other ways of protecting his money while also doing a little reputation washing/ morality banking
Wasn't he 45 when he started the charity? That sounds like a perfect candidate to be a midlife crisis, haha
Just because it was midlife doesn’t mean it’s a crisis.
He started the charity as a shelter for his obscene wealth. That is all.
I'm not obscenely wealthy, so I don't have the experience...but it seems plausible that a billionaire midlife crisis could be "Where am I going to put this ridiculous amount of money that I've earned through less-than-ethical means?"
It’s plausible that a man who made his billions fucking everyone over who was even remotely near him….
… developed a conscience?
https://www.businessinsider.com/how-ultra-wealthy-americans-use-philanthropy-to-avoid-taxation-2021-10
https://apnews.com/article/business-philanthropy-b8acb10f529ac2dbaff7631021d823c9
I mean, the main motivator for the endowment was always Malinda Gates. I'm sure it functions as a tax shelter, but I doubt that was really the main motivator. He's already given over several times what his tax burden would have been, and if we compare it to other NGOs whose sole purpose is truly preserving or raising money, they really aren't comparable.
I'm in agreement that no one should have hundreds of millions of dollars, let alone billions. We can discuss the validity of NGO as a concept, but as far as NGO go, the gates foundation has done more actual aid work for 3rd world countries than most governments.
most governments don’t have nearly the same revenue. This is like saying corporations have done more to help homeless people than homeless shelters (to whom the corpos donate money.)
The reality is that a lot of the way things are, are caused by people like- and including- bill gates.
While there are many NGOs that exist to do good things- and are very good at aid- the gates foundation is not one of those.
I think you’ve bought into the reputation washing the foundation has done for the Gates, and severely underestimate just ho sociopathic they are…. And just how profitable the foundation is for them personally.
In this hypothetical, the shelters are still necessary for the investment to do any actual good, therefore the input of the investment could never exceed the input of the shelter.
One of the things that makes the gates foundation an actual working NGO is that they employ their own aid workers, and set up the logistics systems that support their mission.
I agree, my claim isn't that bill gates deserves his wealth, or that his NGO validates his earnings, or even the economic system that allowed it. My claim is simply that the gates foundation is about as good of an NGO we could ever expect to have within our current economic system.
I think that the vast majority of those impacted by the "sociopathy" you speak of are/were other wealthy silicon valley types, and the rest of the 1rst world in general. Was he a monopolistic technocrat who personally slowed the march of technology for personal gain? Yes, but to be honest so did other corporations like apple. The thing apple hasn't done is save +30 million lives from preventable diseases.
As far as how profitable the foundation is...... I don't really think you understand how tax write offs work. They aren't an infinite supply of free tax credits that you can deduct from your personal income. There is a point where the amount you give exceeds your personal tax burden.
If it were truly about making money, he would just do the same thing musk is, keeping his investments in unrealized gains, and then using those assets as collateral for tax free loans.
Also, Id hardly claim the gates foundation has been a success at reputation washing. I mean just in the last couple years he's been accused of everything from drinking baby's blood for adrenochrome, injecting people with the 5g, and even creating COVID. I think he's a difficult person to have a nuanced opinion over. People tend to not criticize them for the things he's actually done, and tend to focus instead on some hidden insidiousness.
I didn't say that
Have you ever worked with the Gates foundation? Because calling it a "tax dodge" like that is completely baseless, they're a really reallyngood charity, like honestly one of the best in the world, and also that's very ignorant of how taxes work.
They do good work and help people? That's great! They do the best work out of all charities worldwide? That's even better!
Still a tax dodge. You really want to help the world, donate. The money being out of their control is kind of the point...
How is the money being out of their control the point?
The point is to save lives and help people, which the Gates foundation does incredibly well.
And it's not a tax dodge, he's literally just not selling his Microsoft shares for cash, getting taxed, and then giving the money to the foundation and instead just giving the foundation the shares directly.
You could just google it and alleviate your own ignorance of all the scummy ways both the foundation and the trust are used to avoid taxes (and other expenses.) here's a forbe's article with the stuff they're actually allowed to talk about. The "good work" you're so keen to point out... is part of the grift.
Specifically so schmucks like you pounce whenever some schmuck like me says "they're not that nice." That's the part about "reputation washing". he gives some money - literal pocket change for somebody that makes nearly 11 million per day.
you don't get that fucking rich by being "nice" or "decent" or even human, really. this is about Bezos, but it puts their wealth into perspective. Decent humans, with that kind of wealth could solve global housing. Or they could solve the food shortage. he hasn't even come close to that. No. The foundation isn't a force for good, even if it occasionally does good shit.
for example, the Rich Douche exploited the pandemic to make money, by investing in vaccine companies. And refusing to release the IP on the Vaccine. Because that would hurt
histhe foundation's profits.My dude, I have worked with the foundation to help create diagnostic tools for deseases that would otherwise gone unnoticed in developing countries.
The work we have done has saved thousands and thousands of peoples lives. So you can take your.
And shove it right up your arse. If saving peoples lives is a "grift" to you because bill Gates didn't sell his shares in Microsost before he gave them to his trust, because obviously the shares will keep increasing in price, then honestly I don't fucking care.
And yes I know Bill Gates did shitty things and screwed a lot of people over in his early carrier to become so rich and I'm not excusing that. But the Gates foundation isn't part of that and has done way too much good for humanity as a whole for some ignorant chucklefuck with no first hand experience of what they do to dismiss it as a "grift".
Here's what your Forbes article says:
My dude, are you hearing yourself?
You don't understand how taxes work.
All that may be true, but it does a lot of good too.
Steve Jobs was always a piece of shit, and he had that diet well before he got cancer. But yeah the fact he continued to double down in the face of death shows how much of a narcissist he was.
I think a factor with some of them, probably both the ones you mentioned, is that they can't handle criticism. So when they get any push back they double down. Then they get drawn into conservative nonsense that reinforces their beliefs. Then it's a downward spiral as they get radicalized far beyond their original positions.
To be fair, you just described my mother to a tee. She’s a narcissist and has managed to alienate everyone from her life.
You can add Markus Persson to that sample group
Oh yeah!
So you would like it to be enshrined in law that it is acceptable for whoever holds power to arrest people whom they believe to be assholes?
No, not even a little bit. There is a difference between being an asshole and committing a hate crime. Hate crime laws, when properly crafted and enforced, are an important component of a functional society. They can act as a deterrent, but they are also a way for those materially harmed by a hate crime to get justice. Free speech is never a universal right, anywhere in the world. There are always legitimate restrictions to ensure the public's overall health and safety.
What is the difference?
I'm not sure there is a difference with this law.
I'm not sure that's true. Freedom of speech is an important component, and sometimes that means tolerating distasteful speech.
What constitutes harm though? The UK tends to include offense (or offence) as a harm.
Absolutely, but being offended by a bigot probably shouldn't be criminal without some component of advocacy for violence.
We don't have to tolerate the intolerant, they refuse to abide by the mutual contract of tolerance so they don't deserve the protections of a tolerant society.
JKR isn't just doing a little bit of free speech she is a billionaire advocating for hate on a massive platform and donating to hate groups, she has influence and power. She is absolutely advocating for the restriction on trans peoples rights, that is violence. Especially in a time when anti trans hate is on the rise we should be even more skeptical of claims of free speech, right now across the world hate crimes against trans people are going up and our rights are being stripped away.
Arguments about free speech are just a way to ignore the issue and do nothing as transphobia continues to thrive and spread. Stop defending hate.
Until the intolerance of the intolerant is applied to not tolerate you... You see hate crime laws being used to defend religions from criticism for example.
Oh my what ever might that be like, having to deal with intolerance. I never have to deal with that nope. Nope it's definitely not a daily occurrence for pretty much all trans people.
But the transphobes get to advocate for my erasure and that's just free speech.. yep makes sense.. totally fair and balanced
What? I think you missed what I was saying. For example they could argue criticism of their religion is itself intolerant and should therefore be illegal.
So.. we should just let bigots get their way and let them continue to successfully advocate for the rights of trans people and other minorities to be stripped away because they might also try to do a religious theocracy?
That is what freedom of speech is. I really don't like what a lot of people say, and I think a lot of it is harmful
Well I think that's a cop out to do nothing and act moral while letting other people get hurt and suffer.
Freedoms should only go so far as to not encroach on other people's freedoms, hate speech goes too far, advocating people's right to healthcare to be stripped away is too far, advocating we be classified as sex offenders just by existing is too far.
I don't care what your abstract notion about free speech is, it's just a fanciful notion that has never actually been realized and doesn't work in practice. Meanwhile real people are getting hurt now and you choose to defend the speech of those advocating that violence. It's wrong.
You can do a lot without being authoritarian. The question is if the government can do it with threat of violence, and I don't think that's ok. To point a gun at someone for saying* something I disagree with.
Agreed, but advocating it, definitely not. If so anyone advocating draft, or imprisonment for a crime I believe unjust, or according to some people- taxation, or banning unpasteurized milk. Would all be to some people advocating infringing on their rights.
No, arguments about free speech recognize that there is no more important right that a free society can have. If a group can dictate that the language that they find distasteful is criminal, then so can any other group.
Without protections for free speech, what happens when an authoritarian like Trump determines that support for trans people is actually misogyny, or that support for POC is racist against white people and then criminalizes that speech? These are arguments they already make.
You're talking about prior restraint which, at least in the US, has always been harshly scrutinized. As it should be. A line needs to be drawn, but promoting violence should be that line, not merely that which is distasteful.
You know it doesn’t work that way but spout nonsense anyway.
That's already the law. Look at Florida.
Are you seriously arguing against hate crime laws??