Margaret Atwood had a bad day on Twitter yesterday and today isn’t looking so great for her either.
It all started when the 81-year-old Handmaid’s Tale author shared a transphobic op-ed by problematic journalist Rosie DiManno titled “Why can’t we say ‘woman’ anymore?”
Why can’t we say ‘woman’ anymore? https://t.co/ghcQDJgxWE via @torontostar
— Margaret E. Atwood (@MargaretAtwood) October 19, 2021
In the past, DiManno has mocked a male survivor of sexual assault for coming forward with his story and used derogatory terms to describe Black and Indigenous people. Just last year, she made headlines for hitting “reply all” on a company memo then sending 60 colleagues a racist email.
After sharing the article, which voices sympathy for transphobic author JK Rowling and rails against “trans activism run amok”, Atwood was met with a tidal wave of backlash from her two million Twitter followers. Many people called her out for siding with a transphobe and promoting TERF ideology. (TERF is the acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminist.)
How about we take this to the next level?
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Related: Margaret Atwood just added her name to the list of authors with transphobic leanings
Since most people like Atwood and would probably agree that she’s not transphobic, she could have easily squashed this whole thing by, say, deleting the tweet or, better yet, apologizing. A simple “Oops! That was stupid of me. I promise to do better in the future!” would have sufficed.
Instead, she choose to double down, responding to angry followers by telling them to “read Rosie’s piece” and insisting she’s “not a Terf.” (For the record, we read the piece and it does, indeed, contain TERF sentiment.) Now, someone has added “TERF” to Atwood’s own Wikipedia page.
Someone edited Margaret Atwood’s Wikipedia page.
The hatred of women is sharp as a needle and twice as cruel pic.twitter.com/iMb6ziYWMj
— Lorelei ???????? (@hatpinwoman) October 20, 2021
Why do we get the feeling this isn’t going to end anytime soon?
Let’s see what folx are saying…
Look I'm not tryna 'cancel' Margaret Atwood. I'm personally just REALLY tired of casual, lazy transphobia and as a cis person the BARE MINIMUM I can do is call it out, wherever I see it. Atwood doesn't get a free pass just cause she's a beloved Canadian author and feminist
— ?Steven??Daniel?McKenna?™ (@tweets_by_stevo) October 20, 2021
Open twitter for the first time in ages and the very first thing I see is that one of my all time favourite authors is retweeting TERFs and doubling down on it. #MargaretAtwood pic.twitter.com/O9KL9YLviY
— Sara Bear (@canadiansarbear) October 20, 2021
Why are so many rich and famous people determined to discriminate against trans and NB people? Go use your platform for non-hateful purposes! #MargaretAtwood
— Sarah Sahagian (@sarahsahagian) October 19, 2021
Canada, it’s okay to stop worshipping Margaret Atwood. You have my blessing.
— Jen The Feisty Librarian (@Feisty_Waters) October 20, 2021
Seeing Margaret Atwood come down on the side of "Why say 'for pregnant ppl or ppl who want to be pregnant', you can just say 'women'?" as if she didn't write a whole book about how it's monstrous to assume that anyone with a PAF body is just a potential pregnancy is beyond satire
— Rex Monday (@FaggyMcDykepuff) October 20, 2021
Margaret Atwood flirting with terfery doesn't surprise me in the slightest. It's a surprise when some second-wave white-feminist liberal Boomer *doesn't* embrace transphobia.
— A Midsummer Night's SCREAM ? (@autogynamelia) October 20, 2021
No offense Margaret Atwood but if I wanted a nerd’s opinion I’d ask
— Christin (@hexprax) October 19, 2021
Margaret Atwood: *writes a book showing how a dystopian society where women are essentially defined by their uterus is a horrible place*
Also Margaret Atwood: *retweets an opinion piece which complains that we no longer define someone as a women purely because they have a uterus*— Sudsy Wudsy (@poofylepoofpoof) October 20, 2021
Feeling pretty anxious about Margaret Atwood going terfwards. As lockdown eases, we all have to check on our mums and aunties, especially the ones who wear a lot of jewellery, and have some gentle convos to make sure they’ve not gone bung over lockdown.
— Demonic Perrottet (@julesfurious) October 20, 2021
Homeschooled Adult progressive
child me me
?
Canceling Margaret Atwood— ? Jeremiah Warren ? He/Him (@jeremiahjw) October 19, 2021
Graham Gremore is the Features Editor and a Staff Writer at Queerty. Follow him on Twitter @grahamgremore.
ciasteczek
its funny to watch when woke mob is coming for their own
Alex_S
Exactly!
barryaksarben
and it is even funnier when straight trolls come here thinking that no one on this sight knows their secret. You are pathetic sitting in your deplorable home with either your very unhappy family or your horribly disappointed parents. What is really enjoyable is to see just how far the idiots who think Trump is Jesus will go to continue to believe in the fat buffoon. Yes, I know you will keep coming here since you have no fking life so feel you were treated poorly. Wah wah wah. Dickless INCE:LS
Ken A.
@barryaksarben And here you are doing the same thing.
Hank31
Trans activists relentlessly attack women, feminists, and progressives b/c they know that these are the targets who will grovel and beg for forgiveness. It’s a power trip by very delusional and damaged people.
barryaksarben
WTF. No one is attacking women. WHo ? show actual proof. Just like Trump you spout out these lies but have ZERO proof. No one is firing women or denying them housing or even the use of a fkin bathroom so stop with the obviously phony shit
sfhairy
Somehow, I don’t think she cares. So the jokes on Queerty.
ryeguypdx
I agree with Atwood and Rowling. I want trans people to be happy and healthy and to achieve everything they want, but their attempts to change language, science, and the everyday existence of other people is overreach. They way they slander anyone who disagrees with them is obnoxious. The way the media, including Queerty, covers it is cowardice.
Ken A.
I agree, they also couldn’t give a shit about their allies and they’re tearing the LGB community apart. No one deserves to be harassed or bullied for who they are but then again the demands those people continually make and attack their own. Queerty covers these like LGBT Nation, for the drama. But I’m surprised they call themselves journalists when all they do is maybe type one paragraph and the rest of the page is embedded tweets.
iminheatlikeacat
Wow, what’s happened on here? I stopped visiting this site because I was getting tired of having comments deleted for posting in support of JK Rowling. Looks like the “TERF” accusations are being met with the derision and eye rolls they deserve on here too, as they are pretty much everywhere else these days. How to overplay your hand 101. Insufferable.
mastik8
They’re eating their own now.
LumpyPillows
Why do people think Twitter comments have anything to do with reality or real people. Best I can tell its all battshit crazy left and right wing nuts.
Kangol2
So you were asleep for the four years that Don the Con was on Twitter as US President and had his legion of right-wing crazies tweeting and RTing every crazy thing that came off his tiny fingers? You get the entire range on Twitter; Queerty curates what you’re seeing on here.
GreekKeys
“I don’t mind being unpopular on Twitter, because Twitter’s not a real place.” – David Chapelle.
barryaksarben
just denying twitter doesnt mean it doesnt exist. That is his ego and his loss of his genius. He got old and is no longer funny or relevant
JohnnyBoy2
Release the screech monkeys! Somebody expressed a benign opinion that disagrees with a small group of very loud and crazy trans-activists! Never mind that the vast majority of actual trans people have utterly no problem with the things that Margaret Atwood or JK Rowling have said.
These activists are making an embarrassing spectacle of themselves. They are hurting trans rights by being so ridiculous, and inviting mockery and derision.
barryaksarben
NAME ONE! All these comments about radical trans people scaring the billions of cis women is so Trumpesque in its faked outrage.
Prax07
Blah, Blah, Blah…more trans outrage over Nothing. Go make up some more nonsensical pronouns and leave the old lady alone.
kish
Who knew Queerty had so many old and bitchy transphobes as readers?
Mr. Stadnick
everyone
JohnnyBoy2
You just illustrated the hypocrisy of trans activists and woke folks. You just made a prejudicial remark about old people. This is particularly weird, since there is no way you know how old anyone is here. You called someone bitchy. That is misogynistic speech.
Ken A.
Transphobe is OUT Cissexist is in Catch up.
kish
“Old” has nothing to do with chronological age, but mindset. “Bitchy” has nothing to do with gender expression, but the nastiness that has been displayed on here. I do not need to see anyone’s face to know it is a bunch of old white gay men who spew hatred.
lykeitiz
#TeamAtwood
#TeamRowling
#TeamChappelle
Extremism is NOT the way to equality.
Prax07
@kish #teamtransphobeproud
tallskin4
Wow, I cannot believe so many feminists have been radicallised into thinking men aren’t the most oppressed subset of women!
inbama
Is it envy that causes transwomen to so hate actual women?
Gay rights weren’t achieved by threatening, slandering and physically assaulting straights. Why are trans activists so viscous towards women?
iminheatlikeacat
Because they’re mostly angry straight men who get angry because they thought identifying themselves into lesbians would allow them access to “fellow lesbians” and get angry when lesbian women turn them down, just like angry straight men often do.
cliche guevara
Someone forgot to tell you about the Stonewall riots, Compton’s Cafeteria riots and the White Night riots. You know, how this whole gay rights thing kicked off. Spoiler alter, use of the word riot in all of those wasn’t poetic flourish.
IvanPH
Today, I’ll buy a Margaret Atwood book and visit the new Harry Potter store in New York.
Halfnhalf
UCK YOU
Dijonaise
The right wing slimes are winning by turning us against each other. Think before you post, you ignorant f$cks.
AxelDC
Could you find someone else to savage besides gay allies?
almorgen
Love to watch the woke mob go after their own. Hate that the media covers them as if they are the majority of liberals, gays, or anything else. Love to see so many agree here.
humble charlie
Though I think she MUST do something about her hair, I think the main problem is that too many have PTSD (perhaps for a good reason), and so at the slightest slight they feel they must react as if they’re about to be nuked. But beware of an even worse backlash. Bullies come in all genders and etceteras.
Ken A.
Picking on an 80 something woman for expressing herself is disgusting. Ok here it goes. The brainwashed err “WOKE” crowd is doing more damage to us in the LGBT community than they are helping. Even Michael Meyers is now HOMOPHOBIC because he killed a gay couple in Halloween Kills. This insanity at some point has got stop.
Halfnhalf
I guess I’m not wanted here. I didn’t know there was so much hate in the queer community for transgender. I always though it wouldn.t last. LGBT can go to LBG, So many of you seem to dis us.
All of you who say queer isn’t a choice, and people were born that way. If you’re not queer. What are you doing here. Queerty made need to change their name to Trolly, Reading this kind of shit just depresses me. I may just stop.
Joshooeerr
Just stop. Anyone trying to make a case for Margaret Atwood suddenly qualifying as a transphobic extremist only exposes themselves as hopelessly dim. The woman’s integrity is there for anyone to see in her countless excellent works and in hours and hours of thoughtful discourse across numerous interviews and speeches. The idea that you can erase or reverse all of that with one astoundingly stupid attempt at engineering a “gotcha” moment is ridiculous. What is even the goal here? To take another supportive person and silence them? It makes no sense.
moretruth
Drop the T.
ManCanBemuse
The current societal and political turmoil was eerily predicted in the book entitled “The Ecstasy of Carbon,” by Charles T. Laffoday. It is based upon an Anthropological Futurism, which acknowledges the intrinsic importance of the vital archetypes of human evolution upon current human behavior and projects their influence into future scenarios of adaptation to increasing technology and artificial intelligence. It is here, as well as in its forerunner from 2010, “Fixed Stars Rise,” where the post-election chaos was foreseen as well as a coming collapse of Empire. Soon, it is predicted that a growing men’s movement will begin to associate the increasing emotionalism and ideology of western society and its attendant censorship of individual freedom of expression upon the increased power and influence of women. It is here where a variety of forces of a men’s movement reach a detente and seek to restore a Patriarchy. It is also here where this men’s movement begins to face an ironic dilemma, whereby it realizes an existential necessity to hybridize with the increasingly intelligent presence of artificial intelligence; yet, the AI seek only to hybridize with the most compatible forms of humanity who in their view can only be a select group of gay men, as they view them, from the standpoint of human archetypes, as the farthest removed from the soon to be superfluous psychological, biological and emotional traits associated with procreation.