Actor Daniel Radcliffe recently told media sources that he wouldn't have been able to "look at himself" if he didn't speak out in support of trans people after author JK Rowling was accused of transphobia.
According to sources, the 33-year-old actor spoke up on the topic in 2020, after the Harry Potter author was accused of transphobia over various statements - including criticising an opinion piece that used the term ‘people who menstruate’ and advocating for single-sex spaces. Daniel insisted that it was ‘important’ he did so because he didn't want the queer and trans fans of the wizarding saga to feel cast aside.
“I don't think I would've been able to look myself in the mirror had I not said anything. The reason I felt very, very much as though I needed to say something when I did was because, particularly since finishing Harry Potter, I've met so many queer and trans kids and young people who had a huge amount of identification with Potter on that. So, seeing them hurt on that day... I wanted them to know that not everybody in the franchise felt that way. And that was really important,” the actor told media sources.
While Daniel's castmates Emma Watson and Rupert Grint have also criticised the author for her statements on the importance of biological sex, she was recently defended by Ralph Fiennes, who slammed the flak Rowling has received because of her views.
The actor, who portrayed Lord Voldemort in the Harry Potter films told sources, “The verbal abuse directed at her is disgusting, it's appalling. I mean, I can understand a viewpoint that might be angry at what she says about women but it's not some obscene, uber Right-wing fascist. It's just a woman saying, ‘I'm a woman and I feel I'm a woman and I want to be able to say that I'm a woman’. And I understand where she's coming from. Even though I'm not a woman. J.K. Rowling has written these great books about empowerment, about young children finding themselves as human beings.”
Sources stated that in 2020, Daniel wrote a letter with The Trevor Project to pledge his support to the trans community. He wrote, “Transgender women are women. Any statement to the contrary erases the identity and dignity of transgender people and goes against all advice given by professional health care associations who have far more expertise on this subject.”