0:41

If you find yourself, as I did, in

0:43

Edinburgh, Scotland, and

0:46

you walk west from Lawn Market of

0:49

a street Hill,

0:51

there, in the shadow of an ancient,

0:54

ancient, ancient On

1:01

most days, you'll find a tour

1:03

guide wearing a black, pointy,

1:06

witch's hat. Now,

1:09

aren't we so lucky we live in

1:10

a time where we're free to say the word witch, to

1:13

even be witch if we so wish?

1:17

Others throughout the ages were not so

1:19

lucky as you will find out.

1:21

The tourists

1:24

gather around her, a little half moon, little

1:26

half moon as they pull out their

1:28

phones and cameras to take pictures

1:31

of a small stone monument. Now

1:34

here we've the Witch's Well.

1:36

This is a little monument put up in

1:39

order to honor all those people who executed

1:42

as witches. In the winter of 1591,

1:45

the Well commemorates especially

1:48

deadly series of witch hunts and

1:50

is dedicated to those who were put to many

1:53

in this very place centuries

1:55

ago. They were tied to

1:58

states. were stu- wrangled,

2:01

and then they were burnt as witches.

2:04

Throughout Scotland, more than 4,000 people were

2:06

accused of being witches, and more

2:09

than half of them were executed.

2:12

We don't know exact numbers, because in some accounts,

2:14

it just says sundry witches,

2:17

not even dignifying them with

2:19

a name.

2:24

These sorts of witch trials have occurred throughout

2:27

human history and around the world,

2:29

where someone, most often a woman,

2:32

was accused by her community, by

2:34

her neighbors, sometimes by

2:36

her own husband or children, of

2:39

being a witch, which

2:42

left her with a terrible decision.

2:44

She could confess and beg for mercy

2:47

from the authorities, which in some

2:49

cases spared her life, but

2:51

in others, only confirmed

2:53

her guilt and led to her execution.

2:57

Or she could stand firm

2:59

through her interrogation and often

3:01

torture and say to the crowd,

3:05

"'I am not what you say I am.'" Though

3:08

this was often seen as a prideful

3:11

lack of repentance,

3:12

which could also lead to her

3:14

execution. Regardless

3:17

of her choice, one feature

3:19

of many of these witch hunts was

3:21

that the very accusation itself was

3:24

ultimately her condemnation.

3:35

Hi, Megan. Hi, Stacey. Thank you

3:37

so much for speaking with me. I'm delighted

3:39

to join you. This is Stacey Schiff,

3:42

Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer and

3:44

author of The Witches, Salem, 1692.

3:48

Stacey, you published this book

3:51

in 2016, And I just wonder,

3:53

was there something specific that made you want

3:55

to research and write this book about witch

3:58

trials at this specific moment in time.

3:59

There just seemed to me

4:02

to be so many obvious

4:05

and not so obvious parallels between that moment

4:08

and basically what we do today on social

4:11

media.

4:11

And I think what I was most struck by was the

4:14

sense that oral culture and

4:17

social media were very similar and

4:19

the ability to slander

4:22

someone, to just really

4:25

decimate someone's reputation very easily

4:28

was something that was a constant between 1692 and the

4:30

world in which we were then

4:33

living when I started writing. In

4:35

America, the witch trials that occurred

4:37

in Salem, Massachusetts are by far

4:40

the most infamous. It was there

4:42

that a zealous group of fundamentalists, the

4:45

Puritans, turned on one another,

4:47

and in in the span of months, accused

4:50

over 200 people of witchcraft.

4:54

And as Stacy writes in her book,

4:56

one of the forces behind this panic

4:59

was an almost paranoid sense of

5:01

constant danger. One can't

5:03

overstate how important was the concept

5:05

of watchfulness. You were meant to be

5:08

always watchful, always vigilant, not

5:11

only for the sake of your soul, but obviously

5:13

in the Massachusetts incarnation for

5:15

the sake of your safety.

5:17

The Puritans believed that evil

5:19

was lurking all around them, constantly

5:22

tempting them with sinfulness that could damn

5:25

their souls. But also, because

5:28

they were living on the edge of this new colony

5:31

in a land whose native people were hostile

5:33

to their presence,

5:34

they were also living, constantly

5:37

on guard against a real threat of

5:39

physical danger. But there is always

5:41

a sense that you were under assault

5:44

or that you were likely to be infiltrated

5:48

or that the enemy was just beyond your means.

5:51

So there is this constant sense of being

5:53

on the watch towers. And needless

5:56

to say, when you're watching for something and

5:58

you're watching vigilantly for something.

5:59

often see something.

6:02

But Stacey's book makes clear just

6:05

how different the people of Salem were

6:07

from the image of the ignorant, pitchfork-wielding

6:10

mob.

6:11

In fact, they could be obsessive about

6:13

reading and legal theory, and

6:15

the witch trial judges themselves were

6:18

well-educated men, a number of

6:20

them at Harvard. I

6:22

think one of the oddities about New

6:25

England in the 17th century and the

6:27

question of witchcraft is that you're talking

6:29

about one of the most literate communities

6:32

in the history of the world, possibly the most literate

6:34

community in the history of the world until that time.

6:37

It was imperative that everyone pray,

6:39

and in order to pray, one had to read. So

6:41

the literacy rate was tremendously high.

6:44

Moreover, the people who were the

6:46

witchcraft experts that year, which

6:49

is largely to say the clergy, are all

6:51

of them immensely erudite people who

6:54

have read everything that was to be read

6:57

on the subject of witchcraft. So it's a

6:59

funny

7:00

paradox in the sense that you have the

7:02

members of the community who are invested

7:05

most in this, what we would today call delusion,

7:07

those individuals are in fact

7:10

the best read, most highly educated

7:12

members of the community.

7:14

And what role did courts and

7:16

laws and the concept of justice

7:18

play in this society?

7:20

Justice is central to Puritanism.

7:23

The court records from the early years

7:25

of New England are almost laughably comprehensive,

7:28

And you see that even in the absence of lawyers, because

7:30

there were no lawyers yet at this point in Massachusetts

7:33

history, you have a very,

7:35

very law-loving, court-loving

7:38

society.

7:40

And because they were so literate and

7:42

so litigious, Stacy Schiff,

7:45

in researching her book, was able

7:47

to read their letters, their journals,

7:50

their court records, and gain

7:52

a deeper insight into how they understood

7:54

themselves.

7:56

On your best judgment, what do you think is the most gracious

7:58

understanding of the most Gracious underst- of

8:00

what they thought they were up to when they prosecuted

8:02

these witches. I think that what

8:05

we tend to forget is how

8:07

strongly the belief in witchcraft really

8:10

penetrates this community, and

8:12

how thoroughly and I think profoundly

8:15

everyone involved believed that

8:17

he was doing something

8:19

that was good for the community. We have

8:21

some indication that they were unclear

8:24

about how to prosecute

8:26

witchcraft, And they will, at

8:29

times, one justice in particular, they at times

8:31

will appeal to the ministry

8:34

to ask what kind of evidence they can

8:36

rely upon in the courtroom and

8:39

how a witchcraft diagnosis

8:41

could and should be made. And

8:44

obviously there were people here who must have

8:46

trumped up charges, but for

8:48

the most part all of the judicial

8:50

techniques which should have been followed were

8:53

followed. It's really fascinating,

8:55

again, because when we think about which trial is looking

8:57

back, we assume, I mean, the idea

9:00

that they would be strenuously adhering

9:02

to the

9:03

rules of evidence and things that

9:05

they had in place at the time, that they were really trying to

9:07

do the right thing in other words, that's not

9:10

the image that we get.

9:11

No, but you can see them

9:13

grappling with their consciences and you can see them

9:16

grappling with the testimony. I mean,

9:18

Arthur Miller actually makes a really interesting point

9:20

when he's talking about the crucible and he

9:23

talks about something which is so true

9:25

of that year in Salem, which is that you, in

9:27

the course of these kinds of prosecutions,

9:29

you can take on the characteristics of the thing that you abhor.

9:33

You become the thing that you most fear.

9:36

That's really the scariest part of all this, right? Is

9:38

that... Totally. You

9:40

could have people who are, again, very smart, very well

9:42

educated, like very dedicated

9:45

to the idea of justice, to the idea

9:47

that they want to do the

9:49

right thing. to be searching

9:51

themselves so deeply for

9:55

what the right answer is and how they should

9:57

behave and to still come.

9:59

to this kind of horrifying

10:02

conclusion where you have 19 people hanged. And

10:06

it's a terrifying thing to realize about what it

10:08

means to be human.

10:10

After you have

10:12

done all of your homework, asked all of the authorities

10:14

for their help, and

10:17

essentially scoured your soul, and you still can

10:19

make that kind of colossal error, yeah.

10:33

I was

10:33

so ill equipped for what happened to me.

10:36

I was living in a state of real tension

10:38

that I couldn't express to many people. So looking

10:41

back, would you say that the Christian parents

10:43

were maybe part of a moral panic? Yeah,

10:46

absolutely.

10:46

It's a scary world out there. People

10:49

can make mistakes, people can do bad

10:51

things. In fact, show me the human

10:53

being who hasn't. You're trashing someone,

10:56

but you feel like you're crusading.

10:58

You're a fucking guy, you're cheating, I'm telling you,

11:00

fucking trash his toes. Get up on time.

11:03

Get up on time.

11:05

I believe absolutely that

11:07

there is something dangerous

11:09

about this movement. Someone like

11:11

her, she really is just truly at the heart, bigoted,

11:14

hiding in this sheep's costume

11:17

pretending that she is an ally. You're

11:19

trying to have your views challenged. Completely. I'm

11:22

looking at this, I'm thinking, am I missing something? Just

11:24

the opposite of everything that she wrote into those books.

11:28

I have a lot of hope

11:31

for her. There's part of me that still cares

11:33

what she thinks, you know?

11:43

Chapter 7. What

11:45

if you're wrong? I'm just sticking right here.

11:49

Oh, sorry. Thank you. You're

11:51

fine. I'm just going to,

11:53

this guy's going to go by on you

11:55

Megan. Oh, sorry, thank you. You're

11:58

fine. after my first visit. My

12:01

producers and I went back to Scotland, back

12:03

to Rowling's home, back to her

12:05

drawing room with her color-coordinated

12:07

books to have one more conversation

12:10

with her for this series. I

12:12

wanted to ask her some of the questions from her critics

12:16

and to help me understand how she, someone

12:18

who has devoted so much of her life's work

12:21

to exploring human nature,

12:23

grapples with the fact

12:25

that she might be wrong.

12:27

All right. Okay. We've gathered here

12:29

today. Yes. Record.

12:32

Round two. Sounds good. Okay.

12:36

What do you think is the crux of the difference between

12:38

what you believe and what your critics say you

12:40

believe? Oh my god. I mean the crux,

12:43

there's an abyss.

12:44

I've been a king. I've been a... I

12:47

have to laugh because the hyperbole is so

12:49

extreme. I've been told I

12:51

wish for the genocide

12:53

of trans people. I've

12:56

been told, well, you want them to die, you don't want

12:58

them to exist.

12:59

And that, I think, is where

13:02

we become... It's

13:04

not even infuriated. Sometimes

13:07

you feel a little despair. You think, well,

13:09

maybe we need the storm to break. And

13:12

for people to say, but wait a moment, we do need

13:14

to ask questions. We've seen thousands

13:17

of percent increase in young women trying

13:20

to escape their physical bodies. not

13:22

be asking why that's happening?

13:25

I think the idea is that you

13:27

have become, for a lot of people,

13:30

you know the word is problematic, that you might

13:32

think of yourself as raising these

13:34

valid concerns, but they will criticize

13:37

either the way you've gone about it, or

13:39

the timing of it, or the language

13:41

you've used, and much more.

13:43

But before we get into some specifics,

13:46

I did just want to ask, at this point,

13:49

how does it feel that there is this gulf

13:52

between how you see yourself yourself and

13:56

how many other people now see you. This

14:00

will sound like an indirect answer, but I promise

14:02

you it isn't. If I think about

14:04

the people I most admire, actually

14:07

even the writers I most admire, when

14:09

it mattered they stood up, they didn't

14:11

sit at home and

14:14

worry about their royalties or worry

14:17

about their public image greatly. Not

14:19

that I seek to be controversial,

14:23

that's as embarrassing as seeking to be, some

14:26

sort of perfect. I

14:29

never wanted to be famous. So

14:31

if

14:32

you're very invested in that, then

14:35

of course this is going to destroy you. I

14:37

mean, I don't say this in

14:40

any self-aggrandizing way, but I

14:42

think it could have destroyed some people. If that's

14:45

where you're very invested, what has happened to me in the

14:47

last few years, I think there's no hope

14:49

that you will come out of it with your mental health intact,

14:53

or that

14:54

you wouldn't be offering

14:56

fulsome apologies. I've learned, I've done better.

14:59

I understand that whether you mean it or not, but

15:02

no, I have learned. I did

15:04

my learning before I spoke.

15:07

Everyone can do better. I

15:10

don't set out to cause pain, but

15:12

I see pain being caused and I

15:15

think damage being caused to women and girls and I just

15:17

can't

15:18

sit here and not speak.

15:20

One of your critics is a trans woman named

15:22

Natalie Wynn, who goes by the name ContraPoints

15:25

on YouTube. And she made

15:27

a long video essay critiquing your views

15:30

on trans issues. And

15:32

in it, she goes through how she understands bigotry,

15:35

which she breaks down into two categories,

15:38

direct bigotry and indirect bigotry. Direct

15:41

bigotry is the sort of thing that my family does,

15:44

being openly contemptuous and using

15:46

slurs and demonizing people,

15:48

marginalizing people openly. And

15:52

indirect bigotry is things like

15:54

people are just asking questions. They're

15:57

just concerned. there.

15:59

engaging in debate.

16:02

Activists have gone too far, political

16:04

correctness, cancel culture. In

16:06

other words, it's the idea that there are bad

16:09

actors who can hide behind virtues

16:12

or less extreme rhetoric, but

16:14

who are still undermining people's

16:16

rights.

16:17

I see this constantly and the

16:19

most frequent example

16:22

of that is they're

16:25

pretending to be concerned about children. It's

16:28

not about the children. They really hate

16:31

trans people.

16:32

Now, if you're saying that

16:34

indirect bigotry is asking

16:37

questions where you believe significant

16:39

harm is done, if you're saying indirect

16:41

bigotry is standing up for women's rights,

16:44

then you know what, guilty is charged.

16:46

I think it is a very bad faith argument to say

16:48

that people who are asking questions are being indirect

16:50

bigots. Because, you

16:53

know, that

16:54

itself in my view is a very

16:56

bad faith position. Do you think that some people

16:59

do use those kinds of, like I guess I'm thinking

17:01

here of like actual, people that most people

17:03

would recognize as big. Completely, pretty

17:05

much everyone in the world bar literal

17:07

psychopaths and clear

17:09

terrible predators are concerned about

17:11

harm to children, okay? So that's

17:14

a very common human trait. It's a human trait

17:16

to want to protect the vulnerable and

17:18

children are very vulnerable.

17:20

The trouble is, you see, One

17:23

may use concern

17:26

about children to justify other actions.

17:30

QAnon felt that children were being

17:32

trafficked and raped. One

17:34

may be concerned about children and

17:36

be correct.

17:38

People around Jimmy Saville, the UK's

17:40

most famous predator,

17:44

believe children were being harmed, but

17:46

his celebrity and his ability to raise money

17:48

for charity was such that nobody wanted

17:50

to look into that. So I'm

17:54

not sure it's as simple as saying

17:56

people are using it. Some people may genuinely

17:59

believe.

17:59

children being harmed and also

18:03

genuinely not want anyone to be trans, that is

18:05

not my position. You

18:07

have said that

18:08

you respect trans people.

18:10

You said that you would march with them,

18:12

that you think the transition is right for

18:14

some people. But you also

18:17

say that there's a real difference

18:19

between biological women and trans women

18:21

and a meaningful distinction between

18:24

the two in their experiences. And

18:27

I think some of your critics point to that and say,

18:31

you're essentially making trans women second

18:33

class women,

18:34

you know, like you're almost women that

18:37

despite all of their efforts to live in

18:39

the world as women as what feels

18:42

right and authentic to them, you

18:44

are essentially saying I'll treat you

18:46

as a woman.

18:47

You are an honorary woman. But

18:50

this distinction that you are emphasizing the

18:52

biological distinction that you see

18:55

as being so important, it

18:57

can feel hurtful to them. Like they

18:59

are, you know, almost a thing, but

19:02

not quite. Like something is being

19:04

held back. Like can you understand

19:06

the pain that that could cause?

19:09

Yes, is the short answer. Yes, I can understand

19:12

that hurt. The thing is, women

19:15

are the only group to my knowledge that

19:18

are being asked to embrace

19:21

members of their oppressor class unquestioningly

19:25

with no caveat. Now

19:27

on an individual basis, and I think many

19:29

people new to this

19:31

argument would see it on that level because

19:33

many people of my generation particularly think

19:36

that we're talking about old school transsexuals, people

19:38

who have been through full sex reassignment

19:40

because of profound gender dysphoria. And

19:43

I feel 100%

19:45

compassion for such people and

19:47

I would absolutely respect, Their

19:50

pronouns always have, always will,

19:52

and would want, as I say them,

19:54

to have comfortable, easy lives.

19:57

This movement, though, is pressing for

19:59

something different. Very different this

20:01

movement has argued continues to argue

20:04

that a man may have had no surgery whatsoever

20:07

But if he feels himself to be a woman

20:09

the door of every woman's bathroom

20:12

changing room rape

20:14

center should be open to him

20:16

and I say no, I'm afraid

20:19

I say no and We

20:21

are in a cultural moment where that

20:23

individuals hurt is being

20:26

prioritized over the hurt

20:28

of women whose rights and boundaries

20:30

are under sustained assault and

20:33

I think it's interesting to ask why the

20:35

pain of one group is

20:38

being prioritized over

20:40

the pain of other groups.

20:43

Yeah maybe a simpler way to ask it is

20:45

that is there a way in your mind to respect

20:47

both pains even though at some point

20:50

obviously there's going to be a moment

20:52

where

20:52

action or decision has to be

20:55

made. I do believe that there

20:57

is a way forward in which women

20:59

and girls retain their existing

21:02

rights and trans people are

21:04

properly protected.

21:06

There is a way,

21:08

absolutely a way, to respect both

21:11

points but I think we're currently unfortunately

21:13

at a place where that is very difficult

21:15

to achieve. I

21:18

believe feminists have tried very

21:20

hard to have this

21:23

discussion. How do we ensure everyone's

21:25

rights and safety? Where does

21:27

fairness lie? For example, in issues like

21:29

sport would be a very obvious one that's getting

21:31

a lot of publicity at the moment. Feminists

21:35

are asking for certain spaces. Rape shelters

21:37

would be a very obvious example to

21:39

remain female only or to have

21:41

separate provision for both groups because I

21:44

don't know a single feminist who doesn't acknowledge that

21:46

trans people also of course

21:49

are victims of sexual violence.

21:51

But at the moment there seems to be

21:53

a very black and white

21:56

view on the other side of the argument. It's

21:59

everything enough.

22:01

When it comes to the bathroom question, we've

22:04

heard from a lot of people that essentially the

22:06

risks just don't seem very high to them. Many

22:09

of them can understand why males

22:11

and females shouldn't be housed in the same prison cells,

22:14

but when it comes to bathrooms, there already aren't

22:17

guards at the door and nobody's checking before

22:19

we go in. And essentially, a bad

22:22

actor would come in regardless of whatever

22:24

our conventions are. I disagree quite strongly

22:26

on that. There is a social taboo.

22:28

There has been until very recently

22:30

historically, there has been a social taboo. So

22:33

that if my husband decided

22:36

that he wanted to use the ladies bathroom, the

22:38

women inside would feel confident in challenging

22:40

his right to be there. And

22:43

I think, in my view, most

22:45

decent men watching a man walking into

22:47

the ladies bathroom might well challenge him too.

22:51

That is now being eroded. So

22:54

we have statistics on this. The

22:57

Sunday Times issued

22:58

a freedom of information request from the government.

23:03

88% of sexual assaults happen in unisex spaces.

23:07

The Sunday Times data Rowling is referencing

23:10

specifically addressed reported sexual assaults,

23:13

harassment and voyeurism in changing

23:15

rooms at sports centers and swimming pools,

23:18

and compared the rates of incidents that occurred in

23:20

single sex versus unisex

23:23

changing rooms. We have had multiple

23:26

instances in this country and

23:28

in America because I

23:30

went and looked because I was

23:32

thinking, well, does this happen?

23:34

And it happens voyeurism, sexual

23:37

assault. The men

23:40

particularly arguing that this

23:42

isn't a risk alarm me candidly.

23:44

Are they naive?

23:46

Do they not know what their fellow men do?

23:50

There are a lot of critics who say,

23:52

you and your comments are giving fuel

23:54

to the right. Well, my

23:56

answer would be, I think you're giving fuel to

23:59

the right.

23:59

This is why many left-wing

24:03

feminists in particular are sitting with their head

24:05

in their hands. The

24:07

right has wanted for years

24:10

and years and years to not

24:12

all of the right, but certainly the further

24:14

right and the religious right, have

24:17

wanted to castigate the

24:19

lesbian and gay and bisexual movement as it

24:22

is inherently degenerate and part

24:24

of the left's broader degeneracy.

24:27

When you defend to the placing

24:29

of rapists in cells

24:32

with women, you are handing the right

24:35

a perfect opportunity to say,

24:37

you see, we told you the moral degeneracy

24:40

that would result if you say homosexual relationships

24:42

are okay. And I think for

24:44

many leftists, for many feminists,

24:47

we are despairing of the fact

24:49

that people are,

24:51

in our view, colluding

24:54

with a deeply misogynist movement,

24:56

which is benefiting, politically

24:58

speaking, the far right. And

25:02

I

25:03

worry very

25:05

deeply that as the left becomes increasingly puritanical

25:10

and authoritarian and judgmental, we

25:13

are pushing swathes of

25:15

people towards not just the right,

25:18

it's pushing them to the outright. That's

25:20

what scares me,

25:21

that particularly young men,

25:24

when they're being told everything in the world is

25:26

their fault and they have no right

25:28

to a voice and they are everything

25:30

that is wrong with society. It

25:33

is unfortunately a human

25:35

reaction to go to the place where you will be embraced

25:38

and if the only place where you can make

25:40

a joke or be accepted is a place

25:43

that is full of poisonous ideas then

25:46

you're likely to go there particularly when you're

25:48

young so I think that the left

25:50

is making a tremendous

25:53

mistake in espousing this

25:55

kind of, in my view, quasi-religious,

25:58

incredibly sort of witch hunt.

25:59

behavior because there will be

26:02

people who will just feel when they've been shamed

26:04

and abused and they feel it was unfair

26:07

where are they going to go you know this

26:09

that worries me very deeply in

26:11

my lifetime we've seen such

26:13

a shift on the left and I still

26:16

would define myself as off the left but

26:19

you know I was born in the 60s when

26:21

transgression really was the preserve of the

26:23

left you know when challenging

26:26

authority and making the dark joke and then

26:28

breaking societal norms was

26:29

very much the preserve of the left. I've

26:32

lived to see the left become

26:35

incredibly puritanical

26:38

and rigid

26:39

and watching the alt-right, and this is

26:41

a new phenomenon. The alt-right

26:43

is not the conservative right, with whom I disagree

26:46

on many, many, many things. I'm just saying,

26:48

we're seeing the growth of something very

26:51

much facilitated by the internet that

26:54

alarms and disturbs me and it worries

26:56

me that the left are absolutely playing

26:58

into that demographics hands.

27:01

You wrote a book, many books,

27:04

where young children have a lot

27:06

of autonomy and make very

27:08

adult decisions and some

27:10

of them come with really great risks and

27:13

that's like sneaking off into a dungeon or

27:16

running away to fight the most powerful wizard who

27:18

has ever existed.

27:19

And some of your critics wonder if

27:22

there's something contradictory in saying

27:24

that young people are not old

27:26

enough

27:27

to know who they are, to make

27:30

this decision about whether to medically

27:33

transition.

27:34

Those are fantasy books. And the point of

27:36

fantasy is that we are allowed

27:39

to explore in imagination things

27:42

that frighten us, challenge us. We're

27:44

allowed to escape into a world that's

27:46

scary, but then we can come back. We can close the

27:48

book. We can think about what we've read. we can

27:50

think about what it means to make irreversible decisions.

27:52

By contrast,

27:55

we are dealing with the real world here.

27:58

they're dealing with children. in

28:00

my view, being

28:03

persuaded that

28:06

a solution for all distress

28:09

is lifelong medicalization.

28:11

That is real world harm. There's

28:14

no closing the book and walking away. There's

28:16

no playing with this, experimenting

28:18

with this, and not suffering

28:21

harm in my view. Now,

28:25

people will say, perhaps, But

28:27

you've already said that for some people this will

28:30

be the answer. And I will say yes,

28:32

for persistent gender dysphoria, I

28:35

believe, I certainly hope that

28:37

for adults who have found no other way to resolve

28:40

their gender dysphoria, transition may be the answer.

28:42

I want to see those people protected. I want

28:44

their rights protected. I wish

28:47

them lives full of joy and fulfillment.

28:50

But when we're talking about children, I think that is

28:52

a very different question.

28:55

Now, you've said that

28:56

you've been immersing yourself in a lot of reading, memoirs

28:59

and philosophy and academic literature all

29:02

around this subject. And I

29:05

know that one thing that's made this conversation

29:07

about minors medically transitioning

29:10

so contentious is that because

29:12

it's quite new, there

29:13

aren't a lot of authoritative studies. And

29:16

so with the studies that are out there, the

29:18

assertion is that people on all sides

29:21

are cherry picking to fit their arguments.

29:24

What evidence are you seeing that makes you

29:26

think that you are right to

29:28

be worried?

29:29

I haven't yet found a study that

29:32

hasn't found that the majority of young

29:34

people, children, and adolescents

29:37

experiencing gender dysphoria

29:39

will grow out of it. Now,

29:42

I haven't found a single study that contradicts

29:44

that, and I have gone looking. The

29:46

majority of children will, if allowed to

29:48

go through adolescence, many

29:51

of them will grow up to, not all, but many

29:53

will grow up to be gay, and they

29:55

will, their gender dysphoria will resolve.

29:58

Why then? If that's the evidence,

30:01

are we

30:02

immediately putting

30:04

children onto an affirmative

30:07

path? Can we follow

30:09

the science? There's activism

30:11

and all activism isn't equal.

30:17

I genuinely think that we are watching one of the worst

30:19

medical scandals in a century.

30:22

And I believe that those who should have known better,

30:25

and I'm talking here not God knows about

30:28

trans people, gender dysphoric people, distress

30:31

young people. I'm certainly not talking about them. I

30:33

am talking about medics and

30:36

those who have cheered this on unquestioningly,

30:39

creating a climate in which

30:41

many people trying to raise red

30:43

flags have been intimidated and silenced.

30:46

And I would ask proponents

30:48

of gender identity ideology who are so

30:51

militant, who who are so determined

30:53

on no debate, I would ask them, what

30:55

if you are wrong?

30:58

If I'm wrong, honestly,

31:00

hallelujah. If I'm wrong,

31:03

great. People aren't being harmed.

31:07

But

31:07

if you are wrong, you have

31:09

cheered on, you have created

31:11

a climate, quite a threatening climate in

31:14

which whistleblowers and young

31:16

people themselves are being intimidated

31:19

out of raising concerns. I

31:21

think it was in 2018, Professor Carl

31:23

Hennigan, who is at the Oxford

31:26

Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine,

31:29

and he spoke up publicly and he said,

31:31

we are watching an unregulated live

31:34

experiment on children.

31:36

He was instantly condemned as a transphobe

31:39

by, I think, the Oxford University's

31:42

LGBT

31:43

society. So, when you say

31:45

that people aren't being harmed, if you're

31:47

wrong, you mean physically, your

31:50

critics say that you are harming people with

31:52

your words and with the ideas that you are

31:54

promoting.

31:56

Well, I actually I received an email

31:59

right after I spoke. spoke out in which a

32:01

left wing man I know emailed me

32:04

and he said, a trans

32:06

man had been killed in Germany.

32:09

And he said to me, your rhetoric

32:13

contributes to an environment in which police

32:16

are less likely to investigate that crime.

32:20

Now, join the dots for me.

32:23

What I had said at that point is there

32:25

used to be a word for people who menstruate.

32:29

Is he genuinely arguing that

32:32

by saying women menstruate police

32:36

investigating murder will say

32:38

well better wrap up the investigation. These

32:43

hyperbolic accusations are thrown

32:46

at anyone who challenges this ideology,

32:49

your words will cause people to kill themselves.

32:51

Your words will stop police

32:54

investigation. Your words

32:56

will cause men to be violent

32:58

trans women.

33:00

Blaming women for the violence

33:02

of men is a hallmark of

33:04

something that is not normally seen as progressive.

33:08

That is misogyny writ large.

33:11

To go back to your concern about

33:13

the left feeding a backlash that

33:16

might help the helped the far right. There

33:18

has been a real and rapid loss of

33:21

public trust in institutions of all kinds over

33:24

the past few years. And it sounds

33:26

like this experience you're having is

33:29

causing you yourself to have doubts about

33:31

the trustworthiness of some of our institutions

33:34

in this moment. Completely. And I think that

33:36

this is the, I mean, we've seen this play out in

33:38

the last decade, this undermining

33:41

of experts. The experts

33:43

can't be trusted. The media can't be trusted. governments

33:46

can't be trusted. And I would be

33:48

lying if I didn't say that I have lost faith in

33:50

certain institutions. I have

33:53

lost a degree of faith in what

33:55

is obviously the industry I know best the

33:57

publishing industry

33:58

I've been shocked by

34:01

the positions that publishing has taken. I

34:03

am

34:04

pleased and proud to say that my publisher

34:07

has taken,

34:10

my editor in fact, has taken a robust

34:12

position on freedom of speech. And

34:15

I was relieved that he took that position, not for my

34:18

sake, but it was a declaration on freedom

34:20

of speech that I think publishing, if

34:22

publishers stand for nothing else, they should

34:24

stand for plurality of views. And

34:27

the other institutions that I have definitely

34:30

lost faith in are educational institutions

34:33

who I think have taken a

34:34

very dogmatic position on this and

34:37

are shutting down debate, freedom of thought

34:39

and freedom of expression. And I,

34:42

if we cannot look to those institutions to

34:44

protect those very precious things, we

34:47

are in trouble. And I'm afraid I think

34:49

we are currently in trouble.

34:51

Well, one of the concerns you voiced is

34:53

around language and institutions

34:57

using phrases like birthing

34:58

people

34:59

or cervix havers or people

35:02

who menstruate. And some

35:04

of your critics just don't see a problem with

35:06

this. They see it as just making

35:08

language more inclusive. So,

35:11

for instance, in the world of journalism,

35:13

the Associated Press released a new style guide guide

35:15

explaining that when referring to transgender

35:17

people, phrases like, is

35:20

a woman, are more to the point than

35:22

identifies as a woman. Can

35:25

you make the case to the skeptic, why

35:28

is this an issue for you? That

35:30

from the Associated Press

35:32

is hugely powerful. They've edged from

35:35

identifies as a woman, so a man identifies

35:38

as a woman, which I think we all understand what

35:40

that means into is a woman.

35:42

And that's precisely the creep that

35:45

I'm talking about. We

35:47

are using language to

35:50

make accurate definition of sex

35:52

difference

35:53

unspeakable. When I read

35:56

news stories, woman

35:58

convicted of exposing her penis.

35:59

on the street.

36:02

Now I'm laughing but it's not actually that

36:04

funny. I hear myself saying the words and that

36:06

seems so absurd to me but

36:08

there is now a journalistic convention that

36:11

no matter the crime, women convicted

36:13

of raping a small boy, these are real

36:15

news stories.

36:17

I see that as political

36:21

language, I see that as an ideological,

36:25

I don't believe it to be factual, there's

36:27

a body of feminists who would say these are

36:29

not our crimes, these are not women's crimes. And

36:32

I would say something else, I don't believe you can

36:34

accurately analyse sexual violence or

36:37

violence when committed by males and we know that 98

36:39

to 99 percent of sexual

36:41

violence is committed by men, women

36:44

are form 88 percent

36:46

of victims of sexual violence. How

36:48

can we record accurate

36:50

data, how can we analyse this phenomenon

36:53

without being able to accurately

36:56

talk about who is the perpetrator

36:58

and who is the victim. So what you're saying is that

37:00

by changing the language there

37:03

to focus, especially around sex crimes,

37:06

to focus on gender rather than sex,

37:09

you're obscuring an important fact

37:11

which is that biology actually is implicated

37:14

there. Exactly that.

37:16

One of the things that your critics say often is some version

37:19

of, I wish you would listen.

37:21

Why isn't she listening to us?

37:23

Because they think

37:26

that nobody

37:28

could possibly disagree with them

37:31

if they heard what they were saying. And

37:33

I truly believe that the notion that I

37:36

have listened and I have read and I

37:38

have learned and I've looked at the theory

37:40

and I've looked at personal accounts and still

37:42

disagree is simply enough. So

37:45

what you're saying is they think they want you

37:47

to listen when really they want you to agree.

37:49

I'm afraid that is exactly what I think, yeah.

37:53

And then the other extremely common question

37:55

that comes up, And it comes off

37:57

almost like a plea. is

37:59

just

37:59

Why? Why are you doing

38:02

this? Why can't you just let people be who they

38:04

are and support them the way that you do for

38:06

these outsider characters in your book? If

38:08

one of those people is listening right now,

38:12

how would you talk to them? What would you say to them?

38:14

Can you speak to them?

38:16

I would say to them, you as

38:19

a human being, the

38:20

self that you are, I have

38:22

the utmost respect for you. I

38:25

want you protected, I want you safe, I

38:27

would treat you with respect, always.

38:30

And I would

38:32

say, I'm worried,

38:35

I'm worried that we're, I'm worried that

38:37

you, yourself, may

38:41

have got caught up in something that may

38:43

ultimately harm you.

38:44

But I'm asking some questions

38:47

because I think some vulnerable groups are

38:49

being harmed. And that includes

38:52

the gay community, that includes

38:55

vulnerable women, and it

38:58

includes vulnerable youth. Now,

39:01

if you identify as trans, if

39:04

that is an answer for you, then

39:06

I'm with you 100%,

39:09

but we are seeing mounting evidence that this

39:11

is not the answer for everyone, and

39:14

that we may be living through a cultural moment

39:16

that we will look back on, not with pride,

39:19

but with

39:21

puzzlement that we let it happen.

39:41

We'll be right back.

39:53

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podcast is supported by Athletic Greens.

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Thank

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44:04

I'm really interested in the question of discernment. I

44:08

think of this scene from one of your books, it was Harry

44:10

Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, where

44:12

Hermione, the hero, and

44:14

Professor Umbridge, who was clearly in the

44:16

wrong, have this showdown in

44:18

class. Hermione says in

44:20

a moment of defiance that she disagrees

44:22

with something in her textbook and Umbridge berates

44:25

her like, who are you to disagree

44:27

with this expert who wrote this textbook

44:30

and punishes her. Now

44:32

to anyone reading this it is so frustrating

44:34

and unjust but I venture to

44:36

say that no one thinks they are the Umbridge.

44:39

No one ever thinks that. No one

44:41

ever thinks they're Umbridge. And some

44:44

people see you as the Umbridge. You

44:46

have these younger critics online

44:47

and they see Hermione

44:49

as standing up to an older person with

44:52

power and they see

44:54

themselves as standing up to you.

44:56

Yeah,

44:57

and I understand because

45:00

they've told me very explicitly why they

45:03

have that interpretation. How do you know

45:05

if you are a Hermione or an Umbridge?

45:08

Well, if you're having a lot of fun

45:10

doing it and getting a huge sense of

45:12

self-satisfaction out of it, then I

45:15

do believe you maybe want to

45:17

stop and think, am I getting

45:20

a huge ego rush out of this. That

45:22

would be a good question to ask yourself.

45:25

You know, is this giving me pleasure? Because

45:28

I can say from my heart none of this has

45:30

given me pleasure. It has given me anxiety.

45:33

It has made me

45:36

at times feel vulnerable. So

45:38

although I don't regret anything, I've

45:40

had concerns from my family's safety. Some

45:43

of the threats have not been too

45:46

amusing to me. There

45:49

has been fallout in my my life inevitably. I still

45:53

don't regret standing up, but I don't,

45:56

it certainly hasn't given me pleasure on any

45:58

level.

45:59

You know, one

46:02

of the key moments for me, so you say, you

46:05

talk about righteousness. There

46:07

was an incident in 2019, I believe, in which... Here,

46:11

Rowling mentioned the incident that we spoke about

46:13

in Chapter 4, where, in

46:16

a nearby Scottish town, a 10-year-old

46:17

girl was sexually assaulted

46:20

by an 18-year-old trans woman in a

46:22

public bathroom. Some of

46:24

the discourse I saw after that incident really

46:27

took me aback. Because

46:30

one of the first things I saw was the turfs

46:33

love it when something like this happens.

46:37

Now,

46:39

what thought process has led you

46:41

to believe

46:43

that the turfs, this demonized evil

46:45

group, I mean they just hate trans people,

46:47

they want them all dead, we all know this, that's who

46:49

they are.

46:50

What leads you

46:53

to believe that we want 10-year-old

46:56

children? Escape

46:58

rape by a hair's

47:00

whisker. How has your black

47:03

and white thinking evolved to the point where you think

47:06

that feminists

47:08

like me actively are gleeful

47:11

when women are raped or attacked? That's

47:14

great. We can use this to bash trans women

47:16

with. And I've seen that discourse

47:18

and I think if you're thinking is

47:21

that It's

47:23

not just irrational that is

47:25

such a bad faith position at

47:28

no point You stop and say to yourself there

47:30

may be some nuance here Is

47:33

this all moving pieces on a chessboard

47:35

for you? Is it all again? Does real

47:38

world hurt and harm not

47:40

count at all?

47:42

There's one other question that I had about

47:45

discernment. So how do

47:47

you know if you're fighting for something that is truly

47:49

righteous or just something that appears

47:51

to be righteous? How do you know that the courage

47:53

to call out an injustice isn't

47:56

actually just a call to join an unjust

47:58

mob? Yeah.

47:59

So coming from Westboro, where

48:02

I believed so strongly that I was doing the right

48:04

thing, and then to leave

48:06

and come to believe that it was so destructive

48:08

and harmful,

48:10

I had this moment in time,

48:13

and it lasted for many

48:15

months, where I was like, how

48:17

can I ever trust my own mind again? Because

48:20

I was so certain. And

48:22

so I was trying to like looking

48:24

for some kind of solid footing, like what

48:27

leg do I have to stand Like, how can

48:30

I trust my mind? Like, how do I not

48:32

make the same mistake again and again going

48:34

forward? And so I

48:36

basically came up with this list of questions that

48:38

kind of grew over time.

48:40

And a few of them you've alluded to already. So

48:43

these are the questions that I asked myself to see, like,

48:46

am I starting to go down a bad path?

48:49

So the first question is, are you capable of

48:51

entertaining real doubt about your beliefs,

48:54

or are you operating from a position of certainty?

48:57

Yeah, and I think that that's key.

48:59

I think it's when we are most certain

49:03

When we're getting that rush of adrenaline that

49:05

says God, I'm a good person. That's

49:07

when we should most question ourselves That's

49:11

when you need to stop and ask yourself

49:13

a question

49:14

And the second point is can you articulate

49:16

the evidence that you would need to see

49:18

in order to change your position or

49:21

is your perspective unfalsifiable

49:23

we've discussed this already and I think

49:25

that's a a such a good question

49:28

because I asked myself that question

49:30

on this issue. What would I need to see? And

49:32

I could articulate what I would need

49:34

to see to

49:37

move me from my

49:39

position, my thought-out position. Can

49:41

you articulate your opponent's perspective in a

49:43

way that they recognize or are you straw

49:46

manning? And I think that's excellent.

49:49

And I genuinely believe I could articulate

49:52

my opponent's position because

49:55

I've read their books and I think

49:57

people need to read these things, they need to understand.

49:59

what is being argued. Fourth

50:02

one was, are you attacking ideas

50:04

or attacking the people who hold them?

50:07

Always the ideas. Are

50:09

you willing to cut off close relationships with people

50:11

who disagree with you, particularly

50:13

over relatively small points of contention?

50:16

No, I'm not. A

50:18

difference of belief is nothing to me.

50:21

But I can imagine myself no

50:23

longer wishing to have a relationship with a person

50:25

who behaved in certain ways towards

50:27

me or towards others. because I

50:30

do strongly believe it's watch

50:32

what people are doing, not what they're saying. And

50:36

so certain behaviors would probably be a deal

50:38

breaker for me. And that would include

50:41

demonizing others for small

50:43

transgressions. That would be a revelation

50:47

to me that that person wasn't who I thought they were

50:49

probably.

50:50

And then the last one was,

50:53

are you willing to use extraordinary means

50:55

against people who disagree with you? And

50:57

by that I mean things like forcing people out of their jobs

51:00

or homes, you know, violence or threats of violence

51:02

or Or things like what my family and I did

51:04

celebrating misfortune and tragedy.

51:08

I don't know why but that question has actually made me quite

51:10

emotional that you say that to me because I sit

51:12

opposite you and I like you so much and

51:15

you're such a humane and reasonable

51:17

person and to

51:19

hear you describing those behaviors is

51:24

I can really understand why

51:26

you had your long dark night of the soul. One

51:30

thing that you said to me earlier in our discussion

51:32

really stuck with me. You

51:34

said to me that not long before you left, you

51:37

said to someone, an interviewer, I'm

51:39

all in and you

51:42

told me I believed that I had questioned

51:44

myself and I was fine with everything.

51:47

But you said you hadn't gone deep

51:49

enough, trust and obey, right? you'd

51:52

never actually taken

51:54

apart the most fundamental three words of

51:56

your belief system. never challenge those.

52:00

talk about that because that really interests me.

52:02

Yeah,

52:05

so I grew up in a family of lawyers,

52:07

right? So my mom is one of 13 and I think 11 of the 13

52:10

went to law school. They

52:13

were very, very smart,

52:15

very analytical, very logical

52:17

people, which I think surprised

52:20

a lot of people

52:21

to learn because it's easy to assume

52:24

that these are just kind of rednecks with

52:26

backwards beliefs or something. specifically

52:29

with unexamined beliefs. These are just their personal

52:32

prejudices and they're living them out in the world. When

52:35

in fact, my grandfather was a well-known

52:39

award-winning civil rights attorney. He

52:42

was somebody who had reason to believe that he was

52:44

on the right side of things, on a lot of

52:46

things. And we

52:48

were constantly looking around at what other people

52:50

believed

52:51

and other understandings of the Bible. And

52:54

then going back to the word, right? back

52:56

to the King James Version of the Bible and trying

52:59

to show and memorizing

53:02

chapter and verse why everybody else was wrong,

53:04

all the evidence. So it was a constant process

53:06

of examination asking these questions.

53:09

But I realized before

53:11

I left that there were two fundamental

53:14

premises of our ideology

53:16

that I

53:18

never questioned.

53:20

I never truly questioned the idea

53:22

that the Bible was the the literal infallible word

53:24

of God, and that Westboro's understanding

53:27

of it was the right one. Because

53:30

again, it was all laid out there for me. And

53:34

as many questions as I asked, from

53:36

those two premises, essentially everything

53:39

else basically fell into place.

53:42

There were a few small contradictions that

53:44

outsiders were able to find on Twitter. And

53:48

I do wonder, Like if

53:51

not for some internal contradiction,

53:54

relatively small points, if

53:56

that had never revealed themselves to

53:58

me, they'd never revealed themselves to me.

53:59

then I would have just accepted.

54:02

I would never have thought to question those

54:04

two basic premises. That

54:07

actually is, it's one of the reasons that

54:09

I came up with this list, because if

54:12

I asked myself all these hard

54:14

questions, like what I imagined, like I

54:16

really thought I was digging in deep, you

54:19

know, it was really terrifying

54:21

to realize, like,

54:22

even when you're really trying, even

54:25

when it's an earnest attempt

54:28

and all of your intellect. And again, I'm

54:31

surrounded by people who are all

54:33

incredibly intelligent and well-intentioned. Like

54:36

I know those people. We

54:38

would do anything for each other. Like, you know, and

54:40

so it's just the idea that

54:43

such people could still

54:45

get to a place that was so wrong and

54:48

so harmful and so destructive. It

54:50

helps me, I guess, now feel

54:52

a lot of

54:54

understanding and grace for people,

54:57

even when they're doing harmful things. So it's that question

54:59

about,

55:00

are you talking ideas to the people who hold them? That

55:03

is very, it's huge

55:05

to me because of the way that people were

55:07

able to understand that

55:10

even though I was doing horrible things,

55:12

I was trying to do the right thing. And

55:15

that was something that they could tap into. And so this

55:17

is, for me, even though it

55:20

can be kind of scary to see what

55:22

people are capable of, even

55:25

when they're trying to do the right thing, it's also

55:28

a hopeful thing because that desire to do good

55:30

is something that you can tap

55:32

into, which is why the desire to shut

55:34

down debate and conversation is so

55:37

alarming to me because that is the

55:39

only thing that can ultimately

55:42

change hearts and minds. And it's,

55:44

I think, the only real tool we have

55:47

outside of actual force and violence

55:50

to make change.

55:52

Yeah. Every crowd, every mob

55:54

is made up of individuals. And

55:56

it's reaching the individuals and not allowing

55:59

this to become more...

55:59

mob on mob that will change

56:02

things for the best if

56:04

we're to have any hope. And

56:07

your story obviously is one of redemption.

56:10

And I love everything that you say about the good

56:12

in your family. I truly do.

56:15

Okay, very last question. Why

56:20

have you been willing to talk to me? What

56:22

do you hope this does? I've

56:25

been willing to talk to you specifically

56:28

because you wrote me that incredible letter and

56:30

because I think I've had a hundred people

56:33

at least say, explain

56:35

yourself, explain yourself. But

56:37

I felt that you and I could have a conversation

56:40

that interested me.

56:42

And in terms of what I hope this

56:44

does, I suppose I hope people enjoy

56:46

the podcast, honestly.

56:49

I don't mean this in any arrogant way,

56:52

and I don't mean this in any self-pitying

56:54

way. But

56:56

I feel that I've said what I've said,

56:59

And maybe when the mist clears, some people

57:01

will understand better.

57:04

Some will always hate me for what I've

57:06

said. I accept that. I

57:11

know I won't ever regret having stood up on this issue,

57:13

ever. You know, that's the price you pay.

57:16

If you want to be universally

57:20

and eternally beloved, then you must curate

57:24

your image in a way that I'm simply not prepared to

57:26

do. I'm not in the business of

57:28

doing that.

57:29

And I'm not taking a long bet here. I'm

57:31

not thinking, oh, I think this cultural moment will

57:33

pass and therefore I will be vindicated. I

57:35

don't know what the future holds. I only

57:38

know that I would have betrayed

57:40

myself and I

57:42

passionately believe I would have betrayed a lot of women

57:44

and girls if I had not stood up on this issue.

57:48

There are more important things in this world

57:50

than being popular. And

57:52

that doesn't mean it's more important to me to be right.

57:56

It means it's more important to me to do the right

57:58

thing.

58:05

Music

58:12

Joe Rowling, thank you so much

58:14

for speaking with me. Thank you.

58:19

We good? I mean, you got anything else

58:21

to say? Have a good other

58:24

too. I'm gonna

58:26

termination

58:30

his ass.

58:38

Siri Newsome,

58:50

which trials

58:53

of JK Rowling.

58:56

This series is dedicated to everyone out

58:58

there who's trying to have difficult conversations,

59:01

trying to listen with empathy and

59:03

to speak with honesty and in good faith,

59:07

even when it's hard.

59:10

So much has happened since we started our reporting

59:13

and we'll be back in a month or so with a bit of an epilogue,

59:16

so stay tuned.

59:18

But in the meantime, if this show

59:20

has meant something to you,

59:22

if it has moved you or provoked you

59:24

or inspired you, or maybe

59:26

caused you to question some of your assumptions, please

59:29

share it with your community, share

59:31

it with your friends or family, start

59:33

a podcast club, discuss it, debate

59:36

it, join the public conversation

59:38

as messy as it can be sometimes. And

59:41

if you think we've missed something or have recommendations

59:44

for our team, we're always happy to

59:46

hear from you.

59:48

You can send us an email at whichtrials

59:51

at thefp.com or

59:53

send me a message on Twitter at Megan

59:55

Phelps. And if you would,

59:58

please leave us a review on

59:59

Apple or Spotify to help others

1:00:02

discover the show.

1:00:05

And now

1:00:08

for some thank yous.

1:00:14

The Witch Trials of JK Rowling

1:00:16

was produced by Andy Mills, Matthew

1:00:19

Bull, and me, Megan

1:00:21

Phelps-Roper, with production and

1:00:23

editing support from Candace Mattel-Kahn.

1:00:26

The series is brought to you by the Free Press.

1:00:29

The show was mixed by Matthew Bull. Sound

1:00:32

Design by Andy Mills and Matthew Bull.

1:00:37

Editorial Advising by Barry Weiss.

1:00:39

Additional editing support from Emily

1:00:41

Yoffie. Original

1:00:44

music composed and performed by Peter

1:00:46

Laelish, Kobe Beanert, John

1:00:48

Ivins, and Matthew Bull. The

1:00:51

wonderful readings from Harry Potter and the Philosopher's

1:00:54

Stone in Episode 1 were and performed

1:00:56

by actor Crispin Letts with

1:00:58

special permission from JK Rowling. Our

1:01:01

beautiful artwork was created by Eliana

1:01:04

Blazer Gould with art direction

1:01:07

by Susie Weiss.

1:01:09

Fact-checking

1:01:09

by Natalie Ballard and

1:01:11

me. Special thanks to

1:01:14

Stephanie Roper, Kate Vieland,

1:01:16

Rebecca Salt, Noah Phelps

1:01:19

Roper,

1:01:20

Laura Floyd, Lucy Biggers,

1:01:23

Jonathan Hunt, Isaac Graftein,

1:01:26

Alex Burns, Camille Foster,

1:01:29

Erin Bole,

1:01:30

Katie Herzog, Jesse Singel,

1:01:33

Joy Neill, Kat Rosenfield,

1:01:35

Lacey Green, Noah's dad,

1:01:38

Jay, Maya Salkin, Buck

1:01:41

Angel, Corinna Khan, Marcy

1:01:43

Bowers, and Jonathan Haidt. And

1:01:46

to many patient and supportive members

1:01:49

of my family, including Joyce

1:01:52

Marlin, Tor, and Solvi

1:01:54

Lynn Phelan, Josh Phelps-Roper,

1:01:57

Nancy Taves, and Tom Kennan.

1:02:01

And of course, our thanks

1:02:03

to J.K. Rowling for inviting us into

1:02:05

her home.

1:02:08

Last but not least, our most profound

1:02:10

thanks goes to everyone who shared their

1:02:12

stories with us, and to our friends,

1:02:15

who listened and gave us encouragement and

1:02:17

feedback along the way.

1:02:21

Goodbye for now, but we'll

1:02:23

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