Rachel Riley has doubled down on her support of after the author was accused of transphobia.
The Countdown star said in a recent interview that she believes the attacks on Rowling are due to her support for Jewish people.
‘I think a lot of the attacks on JK Rowling are really because she spoke out for Jews against and antisemitism,’ Riley, 36, said.
She added of her philanthropy: ‘She has made a real difference to the world. And [just saying] this will get us both cancelled.’
Responding to criticism on Twitter of her comments in the interview, Riley said: ‘I support trans rights for people to live as they please & I support @jk_rowling (who also does).
‘We all know any mention of this subject whatsoever will result in a pile on for whoever dares comment. It’s horrible I’m so sorry for the people directly affected by this toxicity.’
In 2020, Rowling, 56, criticised an article that referred to ‘people who menstruate’, rather than women, going on to about the trans community over the past couple of years despite denying she is transphobic.
She also recently attended a lunch with women’s rights campaigners, which fuelled tensions with trans equality groups.
She was joined by a large group of guests, including Maya Forstater, co-founder of Sex Matters which supports the Respect My Sex slogan, Professor Kathleen Stock who resigned from the University of Sussex amid a transphobia row, MP Rosie Duffield, and Get The L Out activist Lianne Timmermann.
It’s said that the purpose of the meeting was to ‘eat, drink and be extremely merry’ and that they bonded over their experiences of receiving online abuse for their beliefs.
Rowling’s lunch came the day after thousands of trans equality groups descended on Downing Street to protest for the
The author had previously tweeted: ‘I respect every trans person’s right to live any way that feels authentic and comfortable to them. I’d march with you if you were discriminated against on the basis of being trans.
‘At the same time, my life has been shaped by being female. I do not believe it’s hateful to say so.’
