J.K. Rowling's new book, The Ink Black Heart, features a storyline about creator who was doxxed by her own fandom over content viewers found transphobic and racist.
There was a time when JK Rowling was seen as an inspiration to aspiring writers everywhere with her rags to riches story. Then she became a meme for retconning every other detail about her series, and now she's known as the Transphobe who never stops posting about being one. What a life.
Imagine an alternate reality where JK either moved on from transphobia or never had it: She would easily go down in history as one of the best writers of the modern era, and her Twitter could just be silly jokes about Hogwarts classes starting up, Harry Potter holidays, or just worldbuilding.
Harry Potter itself wasn't for me and I read the whole series, but I at least had respect for her. Now she went full clout-chaser with the whole "DAE le trans people BAD!?!?! THANKS FOR THE CASH, TWITTER!"
there would be think pieces every few years about how fucked up the house elf slavery stuff was, or the anti-semitic goblins or whatever, but i don't imagine any of that would ever stick without the author publicly doing her best to make the world a worse place