J.K. Rowling has clapped back at Emma Watson after the actress opened up about their complicated relationship on Jay Shetty’s On Purpose podcast last week — and let’s just say, it wasn’t subtle.
Rowling jumped on X (formerly Twitter) on Monday, September 29, telling followers she’d seen “quite a bit of comment” about Watson’s interview. What followed was a multi-part post that directly addressed Watson’s remarks — and threw a few sharp jabs.
What did Emma Watson actually say about J.K. Rowling?
In the September 24 chat with Shetty, Watson stressed that while she doesn’t agree with Rowling on everything, there was “just no world in which I could ever cancel her out”.
“I just believe that no one is disposable,” Watson explained.
“And everyone as far as possible, whatever the conversation is, should and can be treated with, at the very least, dignity and respect.”
She admitted she wished there had been the chance to talk things through properly, but dodged further commentary, saying she didn’t want to add fuel to what she called a “really toxic debate”.
Watson — who has publicly supported the transgender community before, including a widely shared 2020 post on X where she wrote “trans people are who they say they are” — also spoke warmly about Rowling’s role in launching her career.
“There is just no world in which I could ever cancel that out, for anything,” she said.
J.K. Rowling’s response to Emma Watson
Rowling’s thread began with a fairly measured statement, conceding that Watson and others were free to disagree with her. “I’m not owed eternal agreement from any actor who once played a character I created,” she wrote. That’s where the measured stance ended.
“The idea is as ludicrous as me checking with the boss I had when I was 21 for what opinions I should hold these days,” Rowling continued.
Her post then dove into her frustrations with the wider debate about women’s rights and the impact of supporting trans issues — a controversy that Rowling has pushed for years.
She’s faced significant backlash since 2018, first being called out for liking tweets seen as anti-trans, then openly aligning herself with Maya Forstater, a researcher fired for transphobic comments, and doubling down with a lengthy essay defending her stance in 2020. Watson and fellow Harry Potter cast mate Daniel Radcliffe have spoken out to “firmly stand with the trans community” and publicly distance themselves from the author’s positions.
In her post yesterday, Rowling acknowledged that Watson and Radcliffe had “every right to embrace gender identity ideology”, and said she wouldn’t want to see them threatened “with loss of work, or violence, or death, because of them”.
But Rowling claimed the pair had, over the years, acted as “de facto spokespeople for the world I created” by publicly criticising her views.
She then revealed she had deliberately avoided speaking about Watson for several years.
“For the past few years, I’ve repeatedly declined invitations from journalists to comment on Emma specifically, most notably on The Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling. Ironically, I told the producers that I didn’t want her to be hounded as the result of anything I said,” Rowling added.
The Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling is an audio documentary podcast series that explored Rowling’s controversies featuring in-depth interviews with the Harry Potter author herself.
The BAFTA turning point
Rowling then pointed to Watson’s 2022 BAFTA Awards remark — where the actress said she was there “for all of the witches” — as a moment that deeply hurt her. She revealed that Watson followed the speech with a handwritten one-line note saying, “I’m so sorry for what you’re going through”.
Rowling said that, at the time, she was facing extreme threats and had ramped up security for her and her family. “Emma had just publicly poured more petrol on the flames, yet thought a one line expression of concern from her would reassure me of her fundamental sympathy and kindness.”
Targeting Watson’s privilege
From there, Rowling’s post became increasingly pointed. She accused Watson of being “ignorant of how ignorant she is” because of her insulated life and listed examples of situations she believed Watson would never experience.
“She’ll never need a homeless shelter. She’s never going to be placed on a mixed sex public hospital ward. I’d be astounded if she’s been in a high street changing room since childhood. Her ‘public bathroom’ is single occupancy and comes with a security man standing guard outside the door,” Rowling wrote.
Bringing up her own background, Rowling added: “I wasn’t a multimillionaire at fourteen. I lived in poverty while writing the book that made Emma famous. I therefore understand from my own life experience what the trashing of women’s rights in which Emma has so enthusiastically participated means to women and girls without her privileges.”
The final word
Rowling ended her post by calling out what she saw as hypocrisy in Watson’s recent podcast comments. “The greatest irony here is that, had Emma not decided in her most recent interview to declare that she loves and treasures me… I might never have been this honest.”
She concluded: “Adults can’t expect to cosy up to an activist movement that regularly calls for a friend’s assassination, then assert their right to the former friend’s love, as though the friend was in fact their mother… Emma is rightly free to disagree with me and indeed to discuss her feelings about me in public — but I have the same right, and I’ve finally decided to exercise it.”
Rowling’s recent X post wasn’t the only time she’s taken a swipe at Watson lately. Just a few days before her lengthy response, Rowling shared a parody video of Watson on social media, poking fun at the actress in the midst of their public back-and-forth.
For now, while Watson floated an olive branch, Rowling seems to have set it spectacularly on fire. If anyone was hoping for a magical reunion (and for Rowling to take accountability), it looks like even a phoenix would struggle to revive this friendship.
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