J.K. Rowling has taken aim at John Oliver for comments he made defending transgender athletes in women’s sports.
Oliver said on his HBO show last week there was “no evidence” transgender women “pose any threat to safety or fairness.”
Rowling fired back at Oliver in a lengthy post on X, accusing him of supporting an “elitist post-modern ideology” and being indifferent to women facing humiliation in sports.
“Nothing about this feels good, because John Oliver generously gave his time for my charity Lumos, and I liked him very much when I met him, but God knows, if you ever need an example of motivated reasoning and confirmation bias, this video’s for you,” she began.
The post was accompanied by a clip of Oliver defending transgender athletes, saying: “An undoubtedly intelligent person spouts absolute [expletive] to support something he wants to be true, but isn’t.”
Rowling pointed out Oliver had frequently “come up against men who argue exactly what Oliver does here, using the very same talking points.’”