Separating art from its artist is harmful; Fans willingly stay ignorant, take no accountability

Editorial

Imagine you have a friend who is being bullied. They may be attacked for their race, religion, gender identity, a disability, or something else. You try to help them out since you don’t want to see them being harassed for such a dumb reason. Then, you go home and listen to your favorite song, whose creator just so happens to share those same opinions as your friend’s bullies. It’s okay, right? You don’t really agree with the person, but you just have to listen to their music. Just ignore the artist and enjoy the content.

The described situation is far more complex than that.

Separating the art from its artist does more damage and occurs more often than one may think. For example, fans of Harry Potter have been forced into the hot seat by author J.K. Rowling, who stunned many in 2020 when she proclaimed her transphobia on Twitter.

Now, this isn’t the first time Rowling has faced backlash; from directly including the most stereotypical characters in her books (i.e., the greedy bank tellers that match up almost perfectly with harmful Jewish stereotypes) to plain old poorly-named characters (Cho Chang, a Ravenclaw girl who’s name is made up of two Asian last names, and Kingsley Shacklebolt, the only Black character in the series, who’s last name clearly alludes to slavery), the author is no stranger to being called out for being problemat- ic. Multiple people have called the author out for all of this, but Rowling and many of her fans choose to ignore issues simply because Harry Potter brings them a sense of nostalgia.

Now, that is understandable to a degree. When something has been such a huge part of your life for so long, it’s hard to let it go, especially since the Harry Potter fandom is so exceptionally large. According to Pottermore, the fanbase of the series about wizards and witches to-