JK Rowling writings removed from Leichhardt Women’s medical centre in row over ‘transphobia’

A Sydney women’s health centre has removed an essay by J.K. Rowling from its social media pages and issued a grovelling apology, after being called “transphobic” over the issue.

A Sydney women’s health centre has removed an essay by acclaimed children’s author J.K. Rowling from its social media pages and issued a grovelling apology, after being called “transphobic” over the issue.

However some women’s rights advocates have raised concerns over the growing use of “censorship” to silence women’s services.

An online activist pro-trans Facebook group called LGBTI Rights Australia branded Ms Rowling as having “fascist views” and campaigned MPs and NSW Government health services to black-ban her essay from the inner-city health service.

After being attacked this week, the Leichhardt Women’s Community Health Service also ended up also removing a re-posting of a Sydney Morning Herald news story which had reported on mounting concerns by medical researchers that “inclusive language” dehumanises women.

An Australian anonymous pro-trans group has succeeded in black-banning beloved children’s author J K Rowling’s writings from a Sydney women’s health centre.

The long running women’s centre, 80 per cent taxpayer funded, pulled the Harry Potter author from its Facebook page after the online attack.

“Leichhardt Women’s Community Health Centre is sincerely sorry for the offense (sic), distress and hurt to the trans community, caused by the uploading to Facebook of the JK Rowling article on Sex and Gender. This article has been retracted. It was inadvertently uploaded to Facebook without approval.”

In the essay from 2020 Ms Rowling writes about her concerns with trans activism and recounts her own experiences of being a domestic abuse and sexual assault survivor.

The pro-trans Facebook group called LGBTI Rights Australia branded Ms Rowling as having “fascist views”. Photo: Rob Stothard/Getty Images

Facebook group LGBTI Rights Australia, which does not reveal who operates the account, had complained, saying: “It is a well-known fact that J.K. Rowling is transphobic and has used her platform to incite harm against the transgender community globally.”

The pro-trans group, which states it doesn’t “have time for second-wave feminism”, thanked its “awesome allies that used their voices to get this outcome”.

“We cannot sit by and allow any NSW Health funded public service to engage such fascist views and put our trans community at risk,” it posted.

Save Women's Sport Australasia founder Katherine Deves. Picture: Kenji Sato

Women’s sports right advocate Katherine Deves said “it appears we have lost women’s rights for this generation”.

“The Leichhardt Women’s Clinic has been subjected to the usual modus operandi of a vicious social media pile-on to force them to purge their online presence of anything deemed “offensive”, a public retraction and apology, and a promise to prioritise gender identity by signing up to ACON’s Pride in Wellbeing scheme that replaces sex with gender identity for health care provision.

“This is yet another disproportionate response by activists against women, and an egregious incursion into freedom of speech and freedom of belief by a not-for-profit, non-governmental community women‘s clinic.”

Sall Grover, chief executive of Giggle For Girls.

Business entrepreneur Sall Grover, who runs a women’s only networking group called Giggle For Girls, said she “understood how scary it is when you’re attacked for being ‘transphobic’,”.

“But it is not transphobic to acknowledge reality or defend women’s rights,” she said.

“But the more organisations that stand up for women, the sooner the era of censorship of women’s voices will end.”

Feminist Legal Clinic solicitor Anna Kerr said it was “tragic and shameful to see another women‘s service capitulate to bullying by the trans lobby”.

“Women must stop apologising and start defending the right of their sisters to freedom of expression,” she said.