The recent release of “Hogwarts Legacy,” has been long awaited by many fans, marking the first role-playing game to give a true representation of what it may be like to attend Hogwarts. But rather than the expected celebratory reaction from fans, many have boycotted the title. 

These boycotts stem from disagreements with JK Rowling, series author, and her public opinions against the transgender community. While initially read as a righteous protest, the concern now is that many people have gone too far in trying to make a statement against the series.

Simply put, people have been harassing and doxxing others just because they bought or showed interest in the game. Many streamers were spammed, told not to play the game, called transphobic and even were sent death threats for simply showing interest in this newly released game.

A major case of this harrassment is HasanAbi, the most watched Twitch streamer in the U.S. in 2022, who decided to not play the game after he was harassed by people in his chat and online, essentially bullying him for planning to play the game. The persecution of those trying to play the game also reached a widespread scale with the creation of a site that actively tracks which Twitch streamers have played the game, in an effort to let people see who to boycott, which was fortunately shut down recently. 

While backlash against “Harry Potter” isn’t new due to Rowling’s consistent transphobic rhetoric, as well as other accusations regarding anti-Semitism and racial stereotypes, this type of backlash has reached a new low. This time with people targeting a completely disconnected community, going as far as inflicting physical harm against individual users through the unlawful distribution of revealing personal information

The issue lies not with fighting for rights of the oppressed, but rather the way in which it is conducted. Attacking and harming others for the sake of “activism” doesn’t help at all, as it just becomes people hurting others. The means utilized to reach an intended end is just as important as the end result itself. 

In the instance of “Hogwarts Legacy,” the assailants are stooping to the same level as Rowling and others who actively suppress minority groups. The biggest platform for this boycott was of course Twitter, with many of the comment sections on posts about the game being filled with toxicity and anger from both sides, just spiraling the drama further out of control. 

Briefly putting aside the harassment, however, is considering the fact that Rowling had little involvement with the project and will only receive royalties. With a net worth of nearly one billion dollars, this would barely make a dent in her pockets and only harm its game developers. 

While the sentiment on the boycott is completely understandable, the idea of fighting this battle over a video game is extremely impractical, especially considering how little damage it actually does to Rowling. What should be done instead is fighting for these oppressed minorities’ rights rather than boycotting some video game to make a statement. 

Just as bad is that many committing these egregious acts aren’t even transgender, speaking over the actual community. This isn’t the message people should be sending as they call themselves “trans allies,” as it happens to elicit the inverse reaction, leading people to get a negative impression of transgender people. 

This doesn’t mean that someone who isn’t transgender can’t share the burden of the community, but it is imperative for motivations and goals to be aligned. Allies should be more supportive as opposed to trying to take the matter into their own hands; they should communicate alongside the group, not for them. 

It is utterly backwards that in many cases, the voices that are most heard are the ones hurting the community the most. It is also people like this who drive the divide between transgender and cisgender people further—and that should be the biggest takeaway from this whole situation.

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