Application of the Case Study to Harry Potter Consumption

When it comes to applying the deontological perspective of animal consumption to Harry Potter consumption, a few things stick out. Mainly, moral rights, strict rules and abolitionists. A good question to ask yourself is whether you think the moral rights of transgender people have been violated by the actions of J.K. Rowling? One can have different perspectives here. Unlike consequentialists, deontologists do not concern themselves with the welfare of the people involved. JKR’s activity on Twitter alone might not indicate any breach of a moral right, but just sharing of opinion, though it might affect the well-being of some people reading them. However, her active participation in stopping trans people from using their pronouns, entering the bathroom of their choice, and accessing the gender-confirming surgeries easier could be a candidate for breaching moral rights. It is also clear that she funds organizations that tries to take away some legal rights, which can arguably fuel or be fuel by moral rights.

If you think that JKR’s actions through the years, whether directly or indirectly, did lead to some of these rights being violated, then perhaps you will adopt a deontological approach towards your consumption of Harry Potter. You can say "It is just wrong to consume it at all because it leads us to aid in the violation of trans rights." Recall abolitionism when it comes to animal use. You could potentially adopt a similar policy of complete cessation of consuming Harry Potter to ensure you do not increase the changes of your money eventually being used to violate some fundamental rights. You might adopt strict rules regarding any consumption of Harry Potter, whether it is pirated, fan-made, or officially written by JKR herself. Some of the reasoning behind people adopting this view, apart from not wanting their money to be potentially used to breach the rights of trans people, is to also prevent the series from getting more popular. The fear here is that if the series continues to get more popular, for more and more generations, it would result in many more people, whether intentionally or unintentionally, investing money in JKR. Most important take away from this perspective is that we are all subjects-of-a-life, which means we all have equal inherent value. This is detrimental, as JKR's actions seemingly target the value of trans people's lives.

Please note the following: JKR has her own moral rights. A lot of people point out her right to free speech, or do what she wants with the money she earns, or earn money from her creation. These are valuable points, but lead to further discussions that are beyond the scope of this website: When is it freedom of speech and when is it hate speech? Can she donate to KKK or the Nazi party with her money? Knowing she donates to these, would our view change regarding her right to earn money from her creation? The goal of the website (see the bottom of this page) is to advocate the consumption of HP in a way that aligns with support of trans rights. Naturally, I am presenting you the violations to trans rights to show why we might want to modify our consumption.

Unlike deontology, consequentialism focuses on the welfare of the interested parties. The consequentialist perspective on this topic gets a bit complicated. One of the root arguments of trans-exclusionary or gender-critical feminism lies in the concern for (cis)women’s safety in gendered spaces. This argument could be considered consequentialist: The well-being of women is seemingly at stake. However, remember the equal consideration of interests that we discussed when it comes to animals and humans. Similarly, the well-being and interests of trans people should equally be considered as the cisgender ones. The trans-exclusionary argument requires us to assign more weight to possible harm to (cis)women than the harm that exclusion of trans women would bring to them(1). Being denied the safety as well as other benefits that perhaps gendered spaces could provide for them. It must also be noted here that the best evidence suggests that giving trans women access to these gendered spaces does not increase risks to the users’ safety. With this in mind, let us zero in on JKR.

Do you think her actions affect the well-being of the people involved? Unfortunately, we know this is the case from many, many blog posts made about the topic. Given how large her Twitter following is, her tweets end up being seen by many trans folks. Her more active actions lead to trans people being demonized, which leads them to have lower well-being. She, at the very least, takes part in causes that will result in the massive suffering (and thus lowered well-being) of many trans folks. Imagine not being able to have gender-confirming surgery very easily as a trans person. This must be terrible for one’s mental health. The consistent denying of their existence, bullying (calling them all rapists would be bullying) and exclusion of trans people has in fact led them to be one of the groups with the highest numbers of suicide. Given that these are terrible for trans people, perhaps we must not support someone who does them. If this is your line of thinking, you are adopting a consequentialist perspective to the case.

Another consequentialist consideration might be your well-being. For some, a series like Harry Potter is an integral part of them. It would be because it has been around since they were kids, or because of the friendships made through a mutual love of the series, or because one finds it soothing. I can think of many people who turned to Harry Potter for comfort as kids when their home life became abusive and continue to do so as an adult. Most relate to Harry as a character because of such experiences. Perhaps completely quitting something that has complete cultural saturation like this might reduce your well-being as a consumer. In this regard, the support of the series might be considered separate from the support of the author of the series.

Consequentialists always say that humans are notoriously bad for making exact calculations of consequences before acting. There is very little possibility for you to be able to calculate accurately what amount of money from your purchase goes to JKR, or what kind of consequence you will bring about exactly with your purchase. If you want to continue consuming the series, and yet want to avoid supporting causes that result in great suffering to a part of the population, then it is not permissible for you to support JKR in your consumption.

Please note: One objection we might consider here is the wishy-washy nature of consequentialist conclusions, especially in light of concrete empirical evidence. This common objection is one of the reasons why contemporary consequentialists tend to appeal to empirical results (see, William MacAskill or Peter Singer). One might suggest that JKR has provoked a massive backlash and outrage, which led to a positive contribution to trans activism and allyship. This objection reminds me of the evil pleasures objection against some forms of consequentialism: "What if one gets their pleasure from hurting someone unwilling to be hurt? Wouldn't the consequentialist say that this is allowed, even that it is good since there is more pleasure involved?" But I always think that these types of arguments focus too much on the point of view of the sadist, and not the point of view of the sufferer. It is great that JKR's horrible actions have led to something good, like unity among people. But the good that has done does not negate the suffering she has directly caused to many people even just through her Tweets or the indirect suffering she has caused through her donations to prevent the passing of some bills that protect trans people, even in the US. Following this, one can respond by saying that though there might have been a positive consequence e of JKR's action, the suffering she has caused to the trans and/or ally community outweighs it. Empirically, we will never know for certain whether her actions had a net negative or positive impact, thus perhaps it is true that there is some guesswork here. However, it at least seems to me that it had a greatly negative impact. Hence, my original conclusion that at least some form of consequentialism would support the consumption of HP in a royalty-free way remains. Remember that even a hardened act consequentialist recognizes that consistency within our actions (stable habits and dispositions) might overall lead to better results than just aiming to actively maximize expected utility.(2) Following this, having a decisive way you consume HP rather than making calculations every time might just be the better way to consume it.

When we were considering meat consumption, we saw that virtue ethicists tried to adopt some virtues and avoid others. Namely, they tried to adopt compassion and temperance as well as avoid cruelty and self-indulgence. I think the question here is: Do you consider JKR’s actions to be cruel? If you do so, do you think a virtuous person would take part in the practice of monetarily supporting a cruel person? I think not. Compassion and kindness seem to prevail for a virtue ethicist. Given that we have established the sufferings endured by trans people daily (see here and here), a virtuous person would surely show compassion and avoid further cruelty. Remember the principle they adopt: "Make every reasonable effort not to provide financial support for institutions or practices that cause or support unnecessary harm."(3)

Focusing on Harry Potter consumption alone, I think the virtue ethicist has two options. 1) You cease Harry Potter consumption all together, or 2) You cease Harry Potter consumption in a way that makes JKR money. Like liking meat, but avoiding it out of temperance, the virtue ethicist would avoid Harry Potter consumption. To not do so would be self-indulgent. However, here is where the consumption of HP separates from meat: I think it is not so clear whether they would avoid the consumption together, or limit it to sources that do not support JKR. For instance, last year, when Hogwarts Legacy (video game) first came out, everyone was so excited. But knowing the situation with JKR, some people chose not to buy the game, even though they love everything about Harry Potter. Others were so excited that they went ahead and bought the game, which was about $70. The virtue ethicist might call the ones in the latter group self-indulgent and call the ones in the former group as having temperance. But what about right now? Since it has been over a year since the game came out, it can be found in many second-hand stores, not to mention on some pirated websites. Can the ones in the former group play the game now through those channels, and remain virtuous? Can they still count as having demonstrated temperance? The answers to these seem ambiguous to me, however, either option prevents one from reaching JKR, which can be seen as avoiding cruelty in some sense. Additionally, similar to the case with eating meat, if you are avoiding consumption of at least new and official Harry Potter merchandise and products, let your loved ones know to avoid a gift that sends you down a moral panic that leads to an existential crisis.

Please note: Within the parameters set by virtue ethics, kindness and compassion should equally be extended to JKR. This is why the community often uses the term 'firing' instead of 'cancelling' her. 'Firing' means the temporary withholding of economic support of her, and it is temporary because she deserves the opportunity to learn and grow. If tomorrow she came out saying 'I learned that I harmed the trans community tremendously, and I apologize for that. I will try to be better' and then donate to organizations that help with trans mental health, and people continued boycotting her, then we could argue the same kindness and compassion were not granted to her. As of right now, the kindness and compassion one can offer her comes in the form of opportunity and hope that she will one day understand that she caused pain and that different views need not mean diminished value or rights. 

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